Thursday, May 21, 2020

Waiting for you to come home


This past Shabbat’s Torah reading, Behar-Bechukotai, has three major concepts, that relate directly to events of the day, and without delving deeper into them, they might be completely missed.
 
PM Netanyahu in forming his new government coalition, has conditioned participation on full acceptance of the Trump peace plan, including the possibility of Palestinian statehood.
Shas and United Torah Judaism, the Sephardi and Ashkenazi Haredi parties, have joined on. Rafi Peretz has jumped the sinking Yamina ship of opposition, to swim ashore onto Netanyahu’s beachhead attack on Religious Zionism.
 
In true Machiavellian-style, Netanyahu, after having successfully disemboweled the Blue and White party to his left, turned rightward, and torpedoed Yamina.
 
Peretz agreed, that the Jewish Home faction would leave Yamina, and join up with Likud, in the government. He will back Netanyahu’s application of Israeli sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria. He has also agreed, to support Netanyahu’s other positions related to the Trump plan, including potentially, Jewish Home support for Palestinian statehood in part of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel).
 
How could three religious parties agree to such a thing?
 
In this past week’s Torah reading, the whole Jewish world learned, “The land shall not be sold permanently, for the land belongs to Me, for you are sojourners and residents with Me” (Leviticus 25:23).
 
And, Rashi says there, “Permanently: irreversibly. A permanent, irreversible sale.
Although this is referring to the right of redemption of the land, after a sale between Jews, is there anything more permanent, than the setting up of an enemy state in our midst?
In the parsha, talking about the Jubilee year, the Torah says, “For the land belongs to Me: [God says,] Do not be selfish about the land [hesitating to return it to its rightful owner at Jubilee], because the land does not belong to you” (Torat Kohanim).
 
If Eretz Yisrael doesn’t really belong to the Jewish people, but to God, then no one, no prime minister, no Israeli government, no one, has a right to give away part of it to some other “nation.” READ MORE