What is Insanity
We are all familiar with the definition of Insanity that is attributed to Albert Einstein: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Well, unfortunately, this is exactly what the Israeli political and military establishments are doing since at least as early as 1982 with ever diminishing any measure of success. I say “at least,” because there were earlier examples of attacking terrorist bodies with no real success and even some notorious failures.
When I present my point of view, which I will do here in a minute I am looked upon as a strange fellow with esoteric and even insane ideas that are not based on reality and nobody even dream about implementing them, yet we all dissect the latest failures of the Israeli operations and try to find ways how could they, should they, would they do the same thing again with better (maybe) chance of success. In light of this, my ideas are not that insane anymore and deserve at least one chance of implementation.
The blessings “by your sword you shall live” and “He will be wild as an untamed donkey. He will fight with everyone, and everyone will fight with him. He will have conflicts with all his relatives" were given to Esau and Ishmael respectively and not to Jacob. That means that if we live by the sword, we are somehow in the wrong direction. Now, as soon as I say that, I am accused of calling to dissolve the army and surrender and what not, so let me state that this is NOT what I mean. I just state the obvious that we are somehow doing the wrong thing.
So, from here there are several possible and impossible directions. If we dismiss the impossible option of surrendering and agree to be annihilated by the Islamo-Fascists, then it leaves us with two options, negotiating via diplomacy or calling upon Go-d.
The secularist Israeli establishment is trying the military and diplomacy options for so many years with dismal results as far as the goal of achieving piece is concerned. The circle of enemies, their numbers and significance in the world just seem to be growing and even “successes” as Egypt and Jordan seem to be in peril when we see the growing power of the Islamo-Fascists in those countries. But the tendency of the Israeli Establishment to do so stems from another theme that in my youth was embodied with the personality of Moshe Dayan a”h. This was and still is, the notion of “my own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me.” There is not enough humility in that secularist culture to pursue or even consider other directions.
There is another notion, attributed to George Santayana: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” The Israelis are pretty intelligent and they do know about that, so what do they do to avoid confronting that history? The answer is that there is a very strong tendency to deny that such history ever occurred and thus we could ignore its lessons. But we should not go that way; we should acknowledge Jewish history and learned its lessons.
One of the most successful Jewish kings was Hezekiah. He did try the diplomacy and military options. Yet, when he faced the final option of total annihilation he acknowledged Go-d. He actually addressed Go-d personally facing the altar in the holy temple (yes, it still existed in his time) and he submitted his fait and the fait of the Jewish people into Go-d’s hand. He did not dissolve the army even at that point, nor did he surrender to the Assyrians. And Go-d delivered a decisive blow to the Assyrians.
History teaches us that the Jewish people do not live in the usual way as other people live. As much as many of us would want to believe that we are, we don’t! So let’s stop pursuing the impossible and acknowledge Go-d sovereignty upon us. When I get to this point, people begin to mock me as if I was a student of one of these Haredi Rabbis and would want us all to go back to medieval times. So I have to assert that this is NOT the case! Acknowledging Go-d and going in his ways is not necessarily doing it the Haredi way. Nor does the Torah assert that this is the way to go. There are many positive ways we could pursue without going overboard. But the important thing is that we should ALL (and the emphasize is on all) or most of us must acknowledge Go-d, address him and strongly ask for his intervention on our behalf. More importantly, we should elect or appoint a leadership that would pursue this direction on our behalf and with our total support.
And no, we should not dissolve the army or the ministry of exterior, just begin to look at them as tools rather then means unto themselves.
When I present my point of view, which I will do here in a minute I am looked upon as a strange fellow with esoteric and even insane ideas that are not based on reality and nobody even dream about implementing them, yet we all dissect the latest failures of the Israeli operations and try to find ways how could they, should they, would they do the same thing again with better (maybe) chance of success. In light of this, my ideas are not that insane anymore and deserve at least one chance of implementation.
The blessings “by your sword you shall live” and “He will be wild as an untamed donkey. He will fight with everyone, and everyone will fight with him. He will have conflicts with all his relatives" were given to Esau and Ishmael respectively and not to Jacob. That means that if we live by the sword, we are somehow in the wrong direction. Now, as soon as I say that, I am accused of calling to dissolve the army and surrender and what not, so let me state that this is NOT what I mean. I just state the obvious that we are somehow doing the wrong thing.
So, from here there are several possible and impossible directions. If we dismiss the impossible option of surrendering and agree to be annihilated by the Islamo-Fascists, then it leaves us with two options, negotiating via diplomacy or calling upon Go-d.
The secularist Israeli establishment is trying the military and diplomacy options for so many years with dismal results as far as the goal of achieving piece is concerned. The circle of enemies, their numbers and significance in the world just seem to be growing and even “successes” as Egypt and Jordan seem to be in peril when we see the growing power of the Islamo-Fascists in those countries. But the tendency of the Israeli Establishment to do so stems from another theme that in my youth was embodied with the personality of Moshe Dayan a”h. This was and still is, the notion of “my own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me.” There is not enough humility in that secularist culture to pursue or even consider other directions.
There is another notion, attributed to George Santayana: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” The Israelis are pretty intelligent and they do know about that, so what do they do to avoid confronting that history? The answer is that there is a very strong tendency to deny that such history ever occurred and thus we could ignore its lessons. But we should not go that way; we should acknowledge Jewish history and learned its lessons.
One of the most successful Jewish kings was Hezekiah. He did try the diplomacy and military options. Yet, when he faced the final option of total annihilation he acknowledged Go-d. He actually addressed Go-d personally facing the altar in the holy temple (yes, it still existed in his time) and he submitted his fait and the fait of the Jewish people into Go-d’s hand. He did not dissolve the army even at that point, nor did he surrender to the Assyrians. And Go-d delivered a decisive blow to the Assyrians.
History teaches us that the Jewish people do not live in the usual way as other people live. As much as many of us would want to believe that we are, we don’t! So let’s stop pursuing the impossible and acknowledge Go-d sovereignty upon us. When I get to this point, people begin to mock me as if I was a student of one of these Haredi Rabbis and would want us all to go back to medieval times. So I have to assert that this is NOT the case! Acknowledging Go-d and going in his ways is not necessarily doing it the Haredi way. Nor does the Torah assert that this is the way to go. There are many positive ways we could pursue without going overboard. But the important thing is that we should ALL (and the emphasize is on all) or most of us must acknowledge Go-d, address him and strongly ask for his intervention on our behalf. More importantly, we should elect or appoint a leadership that would pursue this direction on our behalf and with our total support.
And no, we should not dissolve the army or the ministry of exterior, just begin to look at them as tools rather then means unto themselves.
posted by ZA at 4:07 אחה״צ
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