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truthprevails4ever:

Abdel Monem Aboul Futuh is one of two frontrunners in the Egyptian presidential election. His closest opponent is Amr Moussa. Conveniently, Futuh is NOT the official Muslim Brotherhood candidate but he still has unkind words for Israel.

Via Egypt Independent:

A leading Islamist candidate in Egypt’s presidential election has branded Israel a “racist state” and said a shared 1979 peace treaty was “a national security threat” that should be revised.

Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh also denounced Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden’s assassination by US special forces as an act of “state terrorism,” in a late Saturday Egyptian television interview.

Abouel Fotouh, a front runner in the 23-24 May election according to polls, had earlier described Israel as an “enemy” in a televised debate with his main contender, former Foreign Minister and Arab League chief Amr Moussa.

In Saturday’s interview with the private Egyptian CBC satellite station, he said he had opposed the treaty since its implementation.

“I still view the peace treaty as a national security threat to Egypt, and it must be revised,” Abouel Fotouh said.

Are there any leftists out there who might possibly be willing to direct their anger at racism toward a more deserving source or will they continue being afflicted with the psychological condition known as displacement?

Futuh used to be a member of the Brotherhood who was allegedly expelled for running for president when the official Brotherhood position was that it wouldn’t field a presidential candidate. That begs the question: If Futuh was expelled from the Ikhwan for running for president, why is Mohamed Mursi – the Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate – still a member?

Perhaps that question might involve the top Muslim Brotherhood sheikh, Yusuf Al-Qaradawi. He has endorsed Futuh.

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“A Muslim Moses, the predecessor of Saul, led the exodus of the Muslim Children of Israel out of Egypt”

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I dont mean to be ignorant or anything, I'm writing a paper on the claim that the Yom Kippur War was Israel's fault. I couldn't find much other than it was caused because of the 6 Day War. I'm not sure what else would have caused the Yom Kippur War by somepeopleplacesandthings
Remember, the Yom Kippur War wasn’t started by Israel - it was a complete surprise attack.
Causes of the Yom Kippur War 1973 (and its devastation)

1. Egypt and Syria needed to restore their honour after their previous humiliating defeats

2. Israel was overconfident from its previous military victories and because the United States was supplying arms to Israel. (It was the Cold War and the Soviet Union was providing arms to the Arab countries)

3. Sadaat, (Egypt) wanted Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai before/without negotiations 

4. Syria and Egypt prepared for a surprise attack with the support of the Soviet Union

5. Israeli intelligence ignored reports as they thought an Arab attack was unlikely during Ramadan (and they wouldn’t dare attack Israel because of Israel’s military prowess).

These causes are a little more two sided than the paper you’re writing, but I’m sure it can still be useful.

Also, check out the following sources.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths3/MF1973.html

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/73_War.html

ϟ פרשת שמות

zavatchalavudvash:

There were three stages of the Israelites’ exile in Egypt: גרות-being a foreigner, עבדות-slavery, and עינוי-affliction. As we saw in the previous weeks’ Parshiot, the Israelites only intended to temporarily live in the Land of Egypt (ג.ו.ר) and remain foreigners in the land. However, they began to feel comfortable there, settled there (ש.ו.ב)and felt bound to the land (א.ח.ז.).

The first stage of exile, גרות, didn’t last very long as the Israelites soon adapted to their new environment. It was this feeling of routine that led to the second stage of the Israelites’ exile- עבדות. However, the Israelite’s slavery wasn’t JUST slavery, it is described as “back breaking” and “harsh”.

וַיַּעֲבִדוּ מִצְרַיִם אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּפָרֶךְ:

So the Egyptians enslaved the children of Israel with back breaking labour.

(Exodus 1:1)

The only other time the root פ.ר.כ appears in Tanakh, is in the word פרוכת - the curtain separating the Holy of Holies from the Sanctuary in the Tabernacle. From this we can see, that the wordבְּפָרֶךְ contains a connotation of separation. The second stage of exile, עבדות separated the Israelites from other Egyptian citizens, making them slaves with no civil or political rights. The Israelites were isolated. 

It is interesting to notice, that the separation and isolation of the Israelites occurred once the Israelites were settled and comfortable in Egypt. The Israelites had forgotten the first stage of their exile גרות and needed to be reminded that they were still foreigners. This isolation, this בְּפָרֶךְ- reminded the Israelites that they were different, they had their own homeland, and they were foreigners in Egypt.

This concept of isolation and being different, is one of the defining characteristics of the Jewish people throughout the millennium. After the Israelites are redeemed from Egypt, G-d tells them through Moses

וְאַתֶּם תִּהְיוּ לִי מַמְלֶכֶת כֹּהֲנִים וְגוֹי קָדוֹשׁ

And you shall be to Me a kingdom of princes and a holy nation.’

(Exodus 19:6)

The root ק.ד.ש also has a connotation of isolation and separation. For example, Shabbat, is the holiest day of the week and it is ‘set aside’ and ‘different’ to all the other days of the week. The Jewish people, the “holy nation” are also set aside and different.

Menachem Begin would hold a Parsha Shiur at his house every Shabbat. At one such Shiur, he talked about the identity of the Jewish people and the very fact that we are separate, that we are different. He explained that the reason that the Jews are separate is not because there is only one Jewish state in the world or because Hebrew is the official language of one country in the world but because we are something unique a  “nation-faith” –. This means that we are not just a nation – the Jewish People, but also a religion – Judaism. One cannot be a member of Am Yisrael without being Jewish, and one cannot be Jewish without being part of Am Yisrael. The two MUST go together. If we assimilate, if we forget our religion, if we forget that we are foreigners in a foreign land, if we become comfortable in a foreign land; we cease to be different and we cease to exist.

The back breaking Egyptian slavery was not just to remind us that we’re different…but happened BECAUSE we are different. The Egyptians enslaved the Israelites BECAUSE they were foreigners, and because, as foreigners they had no rights. The actual root of the עבדות, was the גרות, and the mistaken notion that foreigners have no rights.

In contrast to the Egyptian way of thinking, the Torah’s laws ALWAYS protect the rights of strangers. 24 times throughout the Torah, whenever the Torah discusses a person’s rights, the stranger, the foreigner, is given special protection.

The measure of justice in a country, is not measured by the rights attained by the rich, native, well-connected people, but by the justice given to the unprotected stranger. One of the basic ideas of Jewish law is complete equality of the native and the stranger.

R’ Samson Raphael Hirsch wrote in his commentary on this phrase

In Jewish Law, the homeland does not grant human rights; rather, human rights grant the homeland! Jewish law does not distinguish between human rights and citizens’ rights. 

R’ Samson Raphael Hirsch unfortunately died long before the re-establishment of the State of Israel; but as Jews, we can be proud to say, how relevant a description, his words are to the Jewish state.

In the one Jewish state in the world, anyone can receive Israeli citizenship, anyone with Israeli citizenship can run for Parliament, be a Supreme Court Judge, receive a tertiary education etc! 20% of Israeli’s population is Arab, and they are represented in our governmental, legal, military, law enforcement, education and medical systems!

In a neighbourhood where abuse of human rights, civil rights and political rights is rampant, Israel a safe haven and a “light unto the nations”.

As Jews in Israel, we must remember our own history. Our own abuse, exile, and discrimination. We must be a “light unto the nations” and remain a proud upholder of human, civil and political rights for all - as Jewish Law requires us.

However, as Jews in the Diaspora, we must remember that we are different, we are separate. We must not become overly comfortable in our host countries, and remember that we have an eternal homeland that is waiting for us. 

Question !
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Question !

ϟ Egyptians plan to block Jews from attending pilgrimage

From Al Masry al Youm:

A number of political groups in Egypt announced Monday that they plan to protest at the Abu Hasira festival near the delta city of Damanhour.

The festival, scheduled for 9 to 10 January, is held on the annual anniversary of the death of Abu Hasira, whose mausoleum is located in the village of Damtu outside Damanhour.

The groups said they will form human shields to prevent any “Zionist” visitors from visiting Abu Hasira’s tomb in the near future, saying that such a visit was unpopular, and unacceptable legally and politically, state-run news agency MENA said.

Bloggers Against Abu Hasira, the Nasserist Trend, the Muslim Brotherhood, theFreedom and Justice Party, the April 6 Youth Movement and the Mohamed ElBaradei campaign signed the group statement.

Permission for Israelis to visit Abu Hasira’s tomb has angered some in Egypt, especially because it is not included in the list of celebrations authorized to be held in Egypt. The Supreme Administrative Court upheld a 2001 lower court decision to abolish the annual event.

In 2009, Israeli reports indicated that ousted President Hosni Mubarak agreed to a request on behalf of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to allow hundreds of Israelis to celebrate the festival.

Abu Hasira was born in Morocco and, according to Jewish lore, the ship that was carrying him to Palestine sank. Abu Hasira floated on a straw mat which eventually landed on Syrian shores. The rabbi, according to Jewish tradition, went from Syria to Palestine and then on to Egypt.

He died in Damtu in 1880. Every year, thousands of Jews come to celebrate the anniversary of his death.

After Egypt and Israel signed the Camp David Accords in 1979, Israel requested the cooperation of the Egyptian security authorities in the organization of annual official trips to the tomb for the festival, which lasts for a period of one week.

The celebrations include a number of Jewish rituals along with the consumption of dried fruit, butter and feteer. During the celebrations, the visitors sit at the mausoleum, cry, recite Jewish prayers and slaughter animals in accordance to Jewish law.

The mausoleum, which includes the tomb and the hill it is situated upon, is among the Jewish Antiquities in Egypt registered with the Egyptian Ministry of State for Antiquities. Former Culture Minister Farouk Hosni issued decision No. 75 of 2001 annexing the mausoleum to the Supreme Council of Antiquities.

The youth division of the Muslim Brotherhood party said that “cessation of these celebrations should be considered one of the fruits of the January 25 revolution.”

Rosa el Youssef reports that Israel asked UNESCO to compel Egypt to allow the ceremonies.

The anniversary of Yaakov Abuhatzeira’s death is the 19th of Tevet, which would be this coming Friday night and Saturday


(Source: elderofziyon.blogspot.com)

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The Secret Life of Cairo’s Jews
About 120 years ago, a cache of manuscripts, mostly fragments, was discovered in the storeroom of an old Cairo synagogue. Its members had deposited them there over many centuries. This collection of documents managed to be both heterogeneous and comprehensive at the same time.
Adina Hoffman is the author of “House of Windows: Portraits From a Jerusalem Neighborhood.” Peter Cole is a poet and translator. As they relate in their engaging book “Sacred Trash,” the materials in the storeroom included letters, wills, bills of lading, prayers, marriage contracts and writs of divorce, Bibles, money orders, court depositions, business inventories, leases, magic charms and receipts. One early examiner of the cache described the scene as a “battlefield of books.” The most recent deposits were made in the 19th century; there were fragments that dated back to the 10th century. Another early visitor described the scene thus: “For centuries, whitewash has tumbled” upon the documents “from the walls and ceiling; the sand of the desert has lodged in their folds and wrinkles; water from some unknown source has drenched them; they have squeezed and hurt each other.”
The challenge presented to researchers, to reconstruct documents out of fragments, remains akin to the challenge embraced by jigsaw enthusiasts, save that in the case of the Cairo cache, there were very many pieces, from very many puzzles, all mixed up together, in one great mess. Though scrutiny of this material continues, several books drawing on the documents have already illuminated the lives of Mediterranean Jewry. At least one masterpiece of scholarship and imaginative reconstruction owes its existence to the cache: “A Mediterranean Society,” the Israeli scholar S. D. Goitein’s five-volume study of medieval Jewish communities — in all their “quotidian glory,” Hoffman and Cole add. Goitein is one of the heroes of this book, one among several who committed themselves to the collection’s study. The story told by “Sacred Trash” is both lively and elevating; it is best read as an extended act of celebration of Cairo’s historical Jewish community, their documents and their documents’ 20th-century students (though the authors also find space to relate the less creditable activities of the storeroom’s plunderers, pillagers and looters).
The cache was known, and is still commonly referred to, as a “geniza.” This word, which is barely translatable, holds within it an ultimate statement about the worth of words and their place in Jewish life. It intimates the meaning “hidden” or “concealed.” But behind that notion, when applied specifically to manuscripts or books, two further, ostensibly contradictory meanings lurk. The works to be hidden or concealed have either a sacred or a subversive character. Those that are sacred are to be protected and preserved when no longer usable; works in that countercategory, which are subversive, and therefore fit only to be censored or suppressed, are to be put out of view. In neither case is the work accessible, but for quite opposing reasons. The one is to be treasured; the other, condemned. A geniza, then, serves the twofold purpose of preserving good things from harm and bad things from harming. Over time, “geniza” became the name for a place that held any redundant or obsolete documents. It was the great achievement of the men and women who worked on the Cairo texts to recover them from obsolescence. Where others saw rubbish, they found riches.
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(via Books - Image - NYTimes.com)

The Secret Life of Cairo’s Jews

About 120 years ago, a cache of manuscripts, mostly fragments, was discovered in the storeroom of an old Cairo synagogue. Its members had deposited them there over many centuries. This collection of documents managed to be both heterogeneous and comprehensive at the same time.

Adina Hoffman is the author of “House of Windows: Portraits From a Jerusalem Neighborhood.” Peter Cole is a poet and translator. As they relate in their engaging book “Sacred Trash,” the materials in the storeroom included letters, wills, bills of lading, prayers, marriage contracts and writs of divorce, Bibles, money orders, court depositions, business inventories, leases, magic charms and receipts. One early examiner of the cache described the scene as a “battlefield of books.” The most recent deposits were made in the 19th century; there were fragments that dated back to the 10th century. Another early visitor described the scene thus: “For centuries, whitewash has tumbled” upon the documents “from the walls and ceiling; the sand of the desert has lodged in their folds and wrinkles; water from some unknown source has drenched them; they have squeezed and hurt each other.”

The challenge presented to researchers, to reconstruct documents out of fragments, remains akin to the challenge embraced by jigsaw enthusiasts, save that in the case of the Cairo cache, there were very many pieces, from very many puzzles, all mixed up together, in one great mess. Though scrutiny of this material continues, several books drawing on the documents have already illuminated the lives of Mediterranean Jewry. At least one masterpiece of scholarship and imaginative reconstruction owes its existence to the cache: “A Mediterranean Society,” the Israeli scholar S. D. Goitein’s five-volume study of medieval Jewish communities — in all their “quotidian glory,” Hoffman and Cole add. Goitein is one of the heroes of this book, one among several who committed themselves to the collection’s study. The story told by “Sacred Trash” is both lively and elevating; it is best read as an extended act of celebration of Cairo’s historical Jewish community, their documents and their documents’ 20th-century students (though the authors also find space to relate the less creditable activities of the storeroom’s plunderers, pillagers and looters).

The cache was known, and is still commonly referred to, as a “geniza.” This word, which is barely translatable, holds within it an ultimate statement about the worth of words and their place in Jewish life. It intimates the meaning “hidden” or “concealed.” But behind that notion, when applied specifically to manuscripts or books, two further, ostensibly contradictory meanings lurk. The works to be hidden or concealed have either a sacred or a subversive character. Those that are sacred are to be protected and preserved when no longer usable; works in that countercategory, which are subversive, and therefore fit only to be censored or suppressed, are to be put out of view. In neither case is the work accessible, but for quite opposing reasons. The one is to be treasured; the other, condemned. A geniza, then, serves the twofold purpose of preserving good things from harm and bad things from harming. Over time, “geniza” became the name for a place that held any redundant or obsolete documents. It was the great achievement of the men and women who worked on the Cairo texts to recover them from obsolescence. Where others saw rubbish, they found riches.

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(via Books - Image - NYTimes.com)

ϟ In case you had any doubts

In case you have any doubts, the Muslim Brotherhood’s second in command has announced that his organization - which is currently the largest party in Egypt’s elections - will not recognize Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel.

The Muslim Brotherhood “did not sign the peace accords,” Rashad al-Bayoumi told the London-based newspaper. “We are allowed to ask the people or the elected parliament to express their opinion on the treaty, and (to find out) whether it compromised the people’s freedom and sovereignty.

“We will take the proper legal steps in dealing with the peace deal,” he added. “To me, it isn’t binding at all. The people will express their opinion on the matter.”

While the Brotherhood intends to temporarily honor Egypt’s international pacts, al-Bayoumi told noted, “each side has the right to reexamine the treaty.”



He stressed that under no circumstances will the Brotherhood recognize the State of Israel.

“Is rising to power conditional on recognizing Israel?” al-Bayoumi wondered. “That’s out of the question, no matter what the situation is. On no condition will we recognize Israel. It is an enemy entity, an exploiting, criminal occupier.”

According to al-Bayoumi, no member of the Muslim Brotherhood will ever meet with Israelis.

“I won’t allow myself to sit down with a criminal,” he said. “We won’t cooperate with Israel in any situation.”

The final stage in the elections is scheduled to take place on Tuesday and Wednesday.

So if each side has the right to reexamine the treaty, does that mean that Israel has the right to decide that it wants to go back to where we were in November 1977 and take the Sinai back? Of course not. That means that saying that each side can reexamine the treaty is a bit disingenuous.

And by the way, aren’t these the same people that the Obama administration told us were ‘secular’ and ‘moderate’?

What could go wrong?

(Source: israelmatzav.blogspot.com)

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