Sunday, May 27, 2007
5/27/2007 01:03:00 PM | 
Posted by
JoeSettler
It’s strange. There was a time when the Golan was almost completely in the national consensus. Except for the extreme left, and their short-sighted political adventurist/opportunist, no one questioned our right or need for the Golan or the Hermon mountain.
Yet, here we are, with Olmert, Peres and their followers both publicly and anonymously announcing on a near daily basis that we must be rid of the Golan if we want to prop up a third world repressive regime (I mean Syria, not Israel), and the idea, quite scarily, is gaining momentum.
I don’t think it has to do with the Jewish artifacts, archeology, and history that is being uncovered all the time on the Golan. Though God forbid we should find more links to our past.
It couldn’t be because the percentage of Religious Jews (compared to non-religious Jews) living on the Golan might be higher than that of even Judea and Samaria.
To be honest, I don’t know why.
But Ha’aretz is reporting on a new hiking trail that was just inaugurated for the Golan.
So you are probably saying to yourself, see JoeSettler is wrong. Israel does want the Golan.
Except you would be wrong.
You see this trail was developed by the Golan Tourism Association in response to the not so subtle snub they got from Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel.
You see, the SPNI has an important and defining hiking trail that traverses Israel called “Shvil Yisrael” or the “Israel Trail. If you go to the map though you’ll notice that it is rather selective as to where it goes.
Obviously it would never go into Judea or Samaria, but there was a conscious decision to not include the Golan as part of the “Israel Trail” for political reasons!
So while the SPNI helped develop and mark the Golan Trail, it is done as a completely separate track.
While the SPNI has the right to define their trails however they want, and while they obviously do have trails in the Golan, and along the Jordan River, you have to admit that purposely not including the Golan as part of the Israel Trail is about as political a statement as you can make.
Yet, here we are, with Olmert, Peres and their followers both publicly and anonymously announcing on a near daily basis that we must be rid of the Golan if we want to prop up a third world repressive regime (I mean Syria, not Israel), and the idea, quite scarily, is gaining momentum.
I don’t think it has to do with the Jewish artifacts, archeology, and history that is being uncovered all the time on the Golan. Though God forbid we should find more links to our past.
It couldn’t be because the percentage of Religious Jews (compared to non-religious Jews) living on the Golan might be higher than that of even Judea and Samaria.
To be honest, I don’t know why.
But Ha’aretz is reporting on a new hiking trail that was just inaugurated for the Golan.
So you are probably saying to yourself, see JoeSettler is wrong. Israel does want the Golan.
Except you would be wrong.
You see this trail was developed by the Golan Tourism Association in response to the not so subtle snub they got from Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel.
You see, the SPNI has an important and defining hiking trail that traverses Israel called “Shvil Yisrael” or the “Israel Trail. If you go to the map though you’ll notice that it is rather selective as to where it goes.
Obviously it would never go into Judea or Samaria, but there was a conscious decision to not include the Golan as part of the “Israel Trail” for political reasons!
So while the SPNI helped develop and mark the Golan Trail, it is done as a completely separate track.
While the SPNI has the right to define their trails however they want, and while they obviously do have trails in the Golan, and along the Jordan River, you have to admit that purposely not including the Golan as part of the Israel Trail is about as political a statement as you can make.
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5 comments:
Jews have lost the concept of what it means to be a Jew. Once that goes... everything goes.
http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/whatmeanstobeajew.htm
Wasn't Rabin the first to broach giving Syria the chance to destroy the north?
"no one questioned our right or need for the Golan or the Hermon mountain."
muse is correct. i remember when i was in israel in 92-93 that giving back the golan was on the fastrack.
A poll this morning in Makor Rishon says 68% of Israelis would rather keep the Golan than have a peace agreement with Syria. The problem is not "public opinion". The problem is the docility of the public. The people of this country refuse to protest anything the government does in the security or political realm. When it comes to money, that is a different story, though. At the height of the terror war in 2001, up until the Pesach Nite Massacre in 2002, even though Sharon said over and over there is nothing that can be done to stop terror and "restraint is strength" there were NEVER and demonstrations against the government's inaction.
Today, there are almost no protests over the government abandonment of Sederot, even by the residents of the town.
About a month before the Gush Katif pogrom, one of the TOP ideological/political leaders of the "orange camp" came to my town. The FIRST thing he said was "we now must pray". I exploded! I interrupted him. I told him he was throwing in the towel. He then said "it is forbidden to block roads because people won't like it", although, of course, the Histadrut blocks roads all the time as part of pay demands, I have been coerced to participate in these myself. So this fellow says we can't inconvenience anyone EVEN TO SAVE THE LIVES OF THE ISRAELIS WHO WILL BE KILLED AS A RESULT OF DESTROYING GUSH KATIF. We weren't just trying to save the settlements, we were trying to prevent a war! Unfortunately, just as we predicted, the war came, both in the north and the south.
This may sound harsh, but these people, who preached for years their "love of Eretz Israel" and their "love of Am Israel", really only love the regime in power, view only it as "holy" and everything else is subordinate to it. They have sacrificed everything on the altar of "mamlachtiut". Their view of the Messianic Era is when there are rows and rows of kippa-wearing functionaries sitting in government offices, when a kippa-wearing soldier bulldozes down Jewish homes in YESHA, and when a kippa wearing Aluf Mishne signs banning orders exiling Jews from their homes.
Until we purge ourselves out of this mental sickness, not only the Golan is in danger, but the whole Jewish state is in danger, as we see in Sederot and Kiryat Shemonah.
The only thing that saved the Golan in 2000 when Barak offered it to Assad, and what saves the yishuvim in YOSH today is that the oligarchs who control Israel (the "government" is merely the executive arm of this group, it doesn't really make the decisions) apparently are not united yet in their decision to get rid of them.
The public has proven over and over it is docile and will put up with anything the regime does. It is time to wake up!
26 May 2008 I see a year has passed, nothing has altered, things therefore are worse, as in politics if you don't drive forward, then you drift back. As has been said the public is indifferent and the price will be painful, but after we pay the price then we will wake up-perhaps! Steve Roth Mishmar Hayarden.
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