Eretz Yisrael Time

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Tuesday, December 19, 2006
I started off my evening planning to go to the Slifkin kickoff at the OU-Israel offices, but mistakenly thought it began at 6:00 and not 8:00 and I couldn’t figure out why no one was there when I got there “late”.

So I then headed out to the Manhigut Yehudit conference in the Ramada where I hung out with Bone Crusher who was bouncing while we ate sufganiot.

JoeSettler Jr. was getting a bit tired so we left before the end, but we heard Esther Pollard and various other heroes of the Orange movement speak as they lit the Chanukah candles.

But who knew!

This is the first time that Mrs. JoeSettler actually heard Moshe speak about Manhigut Yehudit and its goals, up till then it was always just hello-goodbye at social events.

She said Moshe spoke to the point. He stated the problems and stated the solutions. She doesn’t like politics and he didn’t speak politics. He spoke common sense.

She most appreciated when he said that judges need to be elected by the people, not by other judges but she was most impressed by the young people who were introduced who had stood their ground against the expulsion and the judges who jailed them on political grounds.

The large hall in the Ramada Renaissance was completely full.

Manhigut Yehudit is growing in size. I hope now it also grows in political maturity - not so it can start cutting backroom deals with other politicians, but rather to gain experience to avoid being taken advantage of by those more experienced politicians that would use and abuse Manhigut’s powerbase by trying to cut deals and backstabbing.

Manhigut Yehudit needs to stick to its long term plans and avoid the backrooms.

This conference showed that the people are there to build a real powerbase.

Moshe – use it wisely.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Right back at you Joe.

See http://jewishleadership.blogspot.com/2006/12/question-dude-wheres-my-country-answer.html

bar_kochba132 said...

I am afraid to say that I don't pin any hopes on Manhigut Yehudit (MY) as long as they are a part of the Likud. I try to read everything Feiglin writes, including his weekly column in Makor Rishon. As a writer, he is very good. I agree with almost everything he says. As a politician, all I can say is that I view MY as a political cult of groupies hanging around Feiglin. It is interesting that you alluded to part of the problem yourself when you mentioned that MY should avoid "backroom deals". It was these deals that make Olmert Prime Minister today, and also put numerous other former Likud, now Kadmima people in power. MY supported them because they viewed it as a way of clearing their own path to getting Knesset seats, NOT in strengthening the religious and strong Eretz Israel component of the Likud. (recall that when MY supported Olmert, he had already proven his deceitfulness by supporting Barak in the 1999 election campaign when he was in the Likud as Mayor of Jerusalem).

In any event, there is NO CHANCE that MY will have any influence on Israeli politics while they are in the Likud. Feiglin seems the think that all Israel needs is him as the head of the Likud and some MY people forming the Knesset list. Don't you realize that Israel is NOT run by the political parties...it is run by oligarchs who have bought off ALL the parties (including Ihud Leumi/MAFDAL). Anyone who is perceived as a "troublemaker" will have investigations launched by the State Prosecutor's Office and the Police (regardless of whether they have done anyting or not..e.g.
Haim Ramon). The Likud itself is a party of backstabbing gangsters who betrayed Gush Katif and their own party members when they turned their back on the members referendum that voted against destroying Gush Katif. Organized crime has significant influence in the party and many of the rest of the central committee and MK's are post-Zionists nihilists no different than thos in Labor or Kadima. Don't give me this nonsense that "the Likud is the party of Am Israel". SO WHAT? The membership and voters have NO influence on party policies. Being in the Likud will only taint MY. If MY ever really got powerful, those who really control the party (those I mentioned above) will destroy Feiglin and the rest of the MY, or co-opt it, as Sharon at least partially did in getting MY to support his people before Gush Katif came up.

No top-down changes will make any difference. The only way the oligarchs can be challenged is by educating the people (something Feiglin is good at) and getting them to refuse to fall into the traps that the oligarchs set for the (i.e. believing lies in the media about people being investigated, demanding changes in the Supreme Court, etc).

If MY doesn't learn this, it will disappear, and sooner than later.

Anonymous said...

Why expose yourself to the unholy atmosphere of the OU?

You can't eat their food, or stomach their politics, so why go there?

Your timing must have been Freudian!


http://ouboycott.googlepages.com/

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