                      A Voice from Hebron
                     by Gary M. Cooperberg 
               Fifty Years of Jewish Independence
                       December 31, 1997
                                
     As we approach the fiftieth anniversary of the rebirth of Jewish sovereignty in our homeland, it
is tragically perplexing to observe, what can only be referred to as, national insanity.  When we try to
examine the "Israel experience" in this short period of time, it leaves us wondering how it is possible
for an intelligent people to so thoroughly dupe themselves.
     As the Jewish people worked so hard to fulfill an ancient dream to return to the Land and
reestablish Jewish sovereignty here, it was clear that it would take a miracle to see that dream fulfilled. 
Undeterred, for at least a hundred years, Jews from all over the world sought to go home to, what was
then called, "Palestine".  Many did return and built humble lives in a land which had remained
desolate for centuries.  Swamps were drained and deserts planted.  As the Jews returned to the Land, so
the Land returned to the Jews, renewing itself and yielding its fruits for the first time in two thousand
years.
     With the end of World War II, survivors of Hitler's War against the Jews came home.  The
obstacles were legion and the odds were impossible.  But survivors, who had witnessed the murder of
six million of their brothers with the world's most recent attempt to destroy the entire Jewish people,
were not prepared to give up on even the most slender of hopes.
     The War for Jewish independence in the Land of Israel was fought by Jews who had only one
hope left. . . to reestablish Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel.  They were prepared to sacrifice
everything to see this hope materialize.  Those who had endured a literal Hell on Earth under the
Nazis were not about to be deterred by the British or the Arabs.  If there was even the slightest chance
to redeem their homeland, they would fight to the death to do it.
     Jewish heros arose who proudly marched to their death, on British gallows and on the
battlefield.  Those authentic descendants of the ancient Jewish people had no interest in convincing the
nations of the world in the justice of their cause.  The nations of the world had already shown their true
colors as they turned their backs as Hitler perfected modern factories of efficient mass murder.  They
remained coldly and brutally passive to an unprecedented attempt at genocide of the Jewish people. 
There was no purpose to try to please those who had no interest in our existence.  The Jewish people
had only one hope for a continued existence and that was to rebuild their own homeland.  For this they
would not ask permission.  Either they would succeed or they would fail.  But they would never give
up the fight.
     We, the entire Jewish people, owe a debt of gratitude which can never be repaid.  Those Jewish
heros, who gave their very lives so that never again would Jews be forced to depend upon the mercy of
the nations, believed that their struggle would enable their descendants to live as proud Jews in their
own homeland.  Never again would a Jew need to turn to foreign rulers for their security.  In an
independent Jewish homeland the Jew would, at long last, be able to live by his Torah without fear or
timidity.  With a Jewish army to protect the Land and the People of Israel, the days of Jewish
groveling before the nations would, at long last, be over.
     How do our leaders of today have the chutzpa to visit the graves of those Jewish heros?  How
can they explain to those holy martyrs why we have voluntarily handed over Jewish soil to the PLO? 
How can we begin to explain why we continue to negotiate with murderers of our people, give them
control over parts of our homeland, give them arms and fortifications, build by-pass roads to
demonstrate our fear of them, and have, what appears to be, a national consensus to continue with this
madness?
     It should be obvious to all of us that this conduct can only be termed insane.  But just pause
for a moment and try to imagine how Dov Gruner or Zeev Jabotinsky would react should we have to
audacity to try to explain our futile and absurd attempt to achieve peace by cowardly surrendering to
our enemies from a position of strength.  Do you think that even the golden tongued Bibi Netanyahu
could convince any of those Jewish heros who died in the Israeli War of Independence that he will
bring peace and security by surrendering Jewish Land to anyone, much less Arafat?
     How dare any Jew permit such folly to take place?  This Land was not given to us on a silver
platter.  Yes, it was a gift of G-d to the Jewish People.  It was fulfillment of His Promise to our Father,
Abraham.  But it was also paid for with oceans of Jewish blood.  Only the Jewish People has a right to
this Land, and no Jew has the right to negotiate our birthright with anyone.  We are guilty of
desecrating our G-d as well as the blood of so many countless Jewish martyrs when we as much as
suggest a possibility of giving one grain of sand on the Gaza beach to foreigners, much less to our
eternal enemies.
     While Shimon Peres is literally raising billions of dollars to build an infrastructure to enable
the PLO to thrive in Gaza as well as Judea and Samaria, we wonder why Israel is suffering its highest
rate of unemployment.  As Netanyahu is busy making new maps to plan further retreat before our
enemies, he wonders why his government is in a constant state of crisis threatening to topple him from
power from day to day.
     As our leaders are making "peace", we learn of new arms build-ups in Iran and Iraq.  We see
Syria openly preparing for war and we hear Arafat demanding that we stop building in our own
homeland even as he announces his intentions to declare statehood on Jewish soil.  Yet our Prime
Minister, whose ability to keep his precarious government coalition from falling apart has already
become legendary, claims that he will make peace with everyone.
     Peace cannot, never has, and never will be achieved by appeasing bloodthirsty enemies.  As we
stand on the threshold of our fiftieth anniversary of the return of Jewish sovereignty to the Land of
Israel, we dare not close our eyes to the price that sovereignty cost us.  We dare not pretend that peace
can be achieved by giving away that which was purchased with Jewish blood.
To as much as lend legitimacy to the concept of negotiating our birthright with anyone, much less the
likes of an Arafat, is a slap in the face to the Living G-d of Israel Who has wrought countless miracles
to enable us to return home.  It is also an outright act of treason which endangers the lives of the
people of Israel.
     Let us remember our martyrs who perished so that we would live to see the dream of Zion
fulfilled.  Let us dedicate every ounce of our strength to oppose the desecration of their memory.  We
did not come home to rebuild Zion as a poor replica of the United States.  We were never intended to
be the "land of the free and the home of the brave".  Israel was always intended to be the eternal
homeland of the Jewish People.  To welcome Arabs, or any other people, to share our homeland with
us is to deny the authentic purpose of this country.  While we can and should accept foreigners who
wish to live with us here, under Jewish sovereignty, as welcome guests, we dare not consider the
prospect to accept them as equal citizens.  For this tragic error we continue to suffer today.
     It seems that, in the short space of fifty years since our regained independence in our
homeland, we have forgotten the most basic factors which enabled such a miracle to occur.  We have
created a foreign political leadership, from so-called right to left,  whose pragmatic and "modern"
policies actually deny the dream of Zion which has begun to be fulfilled!  
     How does a people live for two thousand years with a dream which they literally have given
their lives for, see that dream come to fruition and then work to destroy it. . . for folly?  If we do not
stop the mad merry-go-round which finds us participating in plans for our own self destruction now,
then we will only have ourselves to blame for the horrible tragedies which, G-d forbid, we bring upon
our own heads.