                     Love without Criticism
                        is not True Love
                     by Gershon ben-Shabtai
                          July 1, 1991
       
       There are those who say that it is wrong to complain about and point out the faults
of the Jewish State.  To dwell upon the many problems we face here and blame our leaders, it
is claimed, can only create more problems and drive away friends.
       No one loved Jews and Eretz Yisrael more than did Rabbi Kahane.  He criticized
his country only because he wanted to make her better; he wanted to see a true Jewish State
whose priorities were what was good for the Jewish People.  He did more than criticize.  He
offered alternatives and fought his way into a hostile Knesset where he rocked the boat so
hard that the majority there, fearing his uncanny ability to sway the masses, conspired to have
him barred from running.
       Despite the fact that his love was repaid with hatred, he never gave up on his people
and his country.  Even after being banned, blackballed and ostracized he continued to reach
out to the people and show them how they could demand a voice in a government which, by
all rights is supposed to belong to them!  Referendum is a true democratic process where the
people themselves express their will directly.  All he wanted was to improve his country and
the lot of his people.
       Rabbi Kahane was often criticized for emphasizing Aliyah for negative reasons.  No
Jew in America wants to hear predictions of a new Holocaust, G-d forbid, in that country. 
They would prefer to hear nice things about Eretz Yisrael and set her on the pedestal which
she deserves.  But there were two purposes to emphasize the negative:
       1. While positive reasons abound, and, indeed, he often expounded upon them,
history has taught us that few Jews actually will get up and leave a comfortable exile for a
difficult aliyah only for positive reasons.  The majority will only come if they feel oppressed in
the land where they live; and
       2. The fact is, because American Jews are so comfortable and happy in their
pleasant exile they make studied efforts to avoid thinking about unpleasant realities.  

       Jews living in Germany in 1928 had very much the same attitude about Germany as
Jews living in America presently have about that country, but they didn't have the history of a
Holocaust to learn from.  Exile and Redemption are incompatible concepts which cannot exist
simultaneously.  If the redemption is beginning, and it is, then the exile must be coming to an
end, which it is.  To recognize this Jewish Truth is to understand the imperative to leave the
exile and come home to Israel which is the only place on earth where Jews have a future.
       That the leadership in the Jewish State is in need of improvement; that we face
many difficulties and hardships here, are facts that must be addressed if they are to be
corrected.  To  pretend that we have already arrived at paradise and everything is just perfect
will only guarantee disappointment to those who come here seeking Jewish perfection and will
see them fleeing back to the exile in disgust.  
       Better they should be prepared for the truth and armed with the hope that we can
meet the challenges by facing them and working to correct the mistakes that have been made
in the past.
       Let us recognize that G-d gave Eretz Yisrael to the Jewish People as a gift.  Yet He
knew that any gift which is not earned, is not appreciated.  A father will soon realize that if he
buys his son a new car, he will soon take his gift for granted.  While, on the other hand, if his
son has to work hard and earn the money to buy the same car, he will treat it with far more
respect and care.  How much more so does our Father in Heaven want us to love and care for
the gift of Eretz Yisrael?  It is for this reason that he gives it to us through much suffering.
       "Humanists", like Abie Nathan, are much like the son who was given the new car. 
When people throw rocks and dent it up; and when he needs to get it serviced and pay for gas
and oil, he finds it easier to abandon the car rather than pay for it or fight for it.  Had he
bought the car with his own money, invested in something which he recognized as rightfully
his, then he would fight to keep it and pay to take care of it.
       The crime of Abie Nathan is not in his desire to talk to Yassir Arafat.  His crime is
in his willingness to recognize the claims of our enemies to our country.  Everyone wants
peace and we all want it now.  But not at any price.  Somewhere we must draw a line.  By
refusing to draw that line people, like Abie Nathan, who 
mean well, are making it easier for our enemies to destroy us.  Abie Nathan loves mankind and
his people.  But because of his refusal to be honest with himself he is endangering both.  
       Fifteen years ago, July 4, 1976, Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin chose not to risk the
lives of his people by engaging in meaningless "negotiations" with friends and foes.  He saw a
clear and present danger of Jews being murdered after being hijacked to Entebbe.  In an
unprecedented act of heroism, in defiance of international norms, he sent in a commando unit
to rescue the Jewish hostages and bring them home.  As usual there was much criticism of
Israel by the nations of the world, but the Jewish nation was united in its feeling of pride and
self-respect for its army and its leadership.
       Five years later, Prime Minister Menachem Begin took a similar position of not
relying on the good graces of our friends nor worrying about "world opinion" when he
recognized that Iraq was about to achieve the ability to attack Israel with nuclear weapons. 
Again, in defiance of international norms, he sent in the Israeli Air Force which simply
destroyed the nuclear facility in Iraq before it could be used to destroy us.  He couldn't have
cared less what the world had to say about it as he much preferred the criticism to a nuclear
explosion in his country.
       These were fine examples of clear and simple Jewish thinking.  We did, indeed, get
much criticism, but we did the right thing.  Why is it that our vision is restricted to something
as clear as a nuclear bomb held over our heads before we take the necessary steps to dismantle
it?  Have not the Arabs of Israel presented us with an equal threat to the future and security of
our nation?  Why can we not accept the same moral imperative that obligated us to wipe out
Iraq's nuclear reactor, regardless of world opinion, to obliterate the threat of our enemies
within whose aim is to destroy us slowly and painfully?
       Cries of racism, religious persecution, endangering the lives of innocent civilians,
violating the sovereignty of foreign nations all rang out after Entebbe and the attack in Iraq. 
Who cared?  Jewish lives were saved and that is what mattered.  What makes the "Palestinian"
concept any less of a danger than those?  Let the world call us what it will, rather than honor
us with more monuments and memorials.
       Yes, I criticize my country and my pathetic Jewish leaders.  Not because I seek
harm for either, rather because I know what they are capable of and cannot sit quietly and
watch them refuse to stand up to the challenges which they are fully capable of meeting.
Having said this, I hasten to add that Prime Minister Shamir, of whom I have been very
disappointed in the past, has shown himself still possessed of the strength and fortitude which
had once guided him.  His unswerving determination to continue building new settlements and
to permit Jews to live in all parts of our country in direct defiance of American pressure is to
be given the highest of praise.  
       I would still like to see him further express that courage by officially: incorporating
the Jewish lands liberated in the June 1967 War into the Jewish State; disenfranchising all non-Jews; enacting and enforcing a mandatory death sentence for all Arab terrorists; and removing
all enemies of the state from within its borders.  It is because of my love for my country and
my fear for the future of my people that I raise these issues again and again. It is my hope to
remind my brothers and sisters of the very real G-dly mission of the Jewish State.  If we can
accept the role we are all destined to play and simply do what is best for Jews, in the end we
will best serve all of mankind as well.

 