Eretz Yisrael Time

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Thursday, December 29, 2005
Some details will be blurred to protect the identity and location of those involved.

I received a pressing phone call last evening. One of the new “illegal” outpost that was just established urgently needed someone to do guard duty overnight (for protection against Arabs, not the police).

A fellow settler and I drove way out there looking for this new illegal outpost called “Beerot Jonathan”, aptly named after Jonathan Pollard.

Finally, after driving off-road for a while and then walking through some muddy fields we stumbled upon the illegal outpost.

The outpost itself is built on State-owned land which over the past few years has found itself illegally occupied by Arab squatters planting crops in their attempt to claim primordial ownership.

The "illegal" Jewish occupiers of this outpost are the wonderful children from the nearby town just overlooking this hill.


I left this morning with an overall positive impression, but merged with some rather mixed feelings.


I met wonderful, dedicated youth who overwhelmingly felt the need to do something “more” and “positive” for Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael after the Expulsion.


I don’t know if the idea of outposts was their idea or the idea of some adults, but I felt that for these incidental wounded of the expulsion, it was more therapeutic than productive (which is also undeniably important). It is an attempt to take back control of their lives, help conquer their fear that their own home and even country may be next, and perhaps even to simply “stick it to the (fat) man”.

Their message is “Construction – not Destruction

We discussed though the night whether they would be doing army service. We discussed how/where else they could be more effective. We discussed if they really felt that camping out on a hill for a few days was really going to make a difference. We discussed what more they could be doing to make their message heard and how to open the hearts of all their fellow Jews in Israel.

I don’t think we reached any definite conclusions, though my fellow settler and I did discuss a new education program we hope to pilot soon based on some of the answers we received.


I think these outposts are important for the kids.

But I think the adults can find a better way to make use of the incredible energy, love, faith, and dedication that these kids have for Am Yisrael, Eretz Yisrael, and Torat Yisrael (in whatever order).

I am not saying not to use outposts, but not the way they are being implemented right now.
Incredible energies are gathered together – now focus them properly, promote them properly, nurture them properly.

I’ll need to write more about this about this another time.

5 comments:

JoeSettler said...

Incredible.

A (serious) record number of hits on these posts today but not a single comment.

treppenwitz said...

I liked what you wrote. If you had looked at the hill opposite, you could have waved hello this morning. :-)

tafka PP said...

I was also impressed with how you wrote this (although I disagree with bits) but didn't want you to think I was beginning to stalk you!

JoeSettler said...

pp: You should know, I'm not in the least bit against these outposts, in fact I was just updated that some of them will begin to house families after Chanukah.

It is the long term I am worried about. Moetzet Yesha burnt everyone out in Kfar Maimon, and the various RW leaders didn't direct any activities properly during the actual disengagement (meaning activists weren't utilized to their maximum potential).

I don't want to see a repeat of that.

Thanks for writing.

westbankmama said...

What can I comment on when I agree with everything you say.

I think that what the teenagers are doing is great, but...

It seems to me that we are beginning to look at the larger, overall picture (the forest)- and the kids are repeating our mistakes by building outposts (the trees).

On the other hand I admire their mesiras nefesh and don't want to be a wet blanket.

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