Rahm Emanuel's Rabbi is Nutty

Or his former rabbi, rather. Specifically because of his political views regarding Israel.

Lopatin ... developed some nonconformist ideas, such as "one state, democratic, Jewish and Palestinian."

According to his philosophy, there would first be "a moratorium on the demolition of Arab houses in Jerusalem, in exchange for official U.S. recognition of the right to build for natural Jewish growth in Jewish settlements in the West Bank." This would be followed by "the immediate return of Gilad Shalit; release of Palestinian prisoners; U.S. commuting Jonathan Pollard and sending him to Israel."

Ultimately, he envisages a situation where Jews and Arabs will live anywhere they desire in the Land of Israel - the Jews will be able to live in all quarters of the Old City, and if they wish also in Bethlehem, Nablus and Gaza, while the Palestinians will be able to purchase property, not only in the West Bank but also in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and anywhere else. The Law of Return, he believes, should be applicable not only to Jews but also to Arabs. Israel, he says, would be able to improve its demographic balance "by letting in potentially millions of Africans, Asians and South Americans who self-identify as Jewish even if they cannot prove their Jewish descent."

While I suppose as a human rights advocate, I have no problem with it (except for the obvious point that Jews and Arabs can no more live together in peace in a state than any other two ethnic groups; you need the hundreds-plus with no state ethnic identity and an assimilating culture like in the U.S. for that to work well).

But I don't see how this would amount to anything other than a recipe for the destruction of the Jewish state, if it allows Arabs to return. Perhaps the rabbi doesn't realize how many of them have been kept in shit conditions by Syria, Lebanon and to some extent Jordan who'd come to Israel for the welfare state if nothing else. (not THAT many would be needed to collapse the state, less than for demographic imperilment)

So Will You Make the Necessary Moves to Solve it?

Netanyahu reads the numbers on the wall

"We are in trouble," Netanyahu said at an economic conference in Tel Aviv.

He called into doubt the ability of Israeli students to compete in the modern global economy, and the Israeli educational system's failure to adequately teach a core curriculum to both Haredi and Arab students. "We need to focus on core subjects that allow the general Israeli population to assimilate into the work force...and they need basic knowledge in math, computer science, and languages."

This, if I recall correctly, basically word for word echoes what the somewhat more left-wing (and quite a bit more actively secular) Yair Lapid said several months ago on Ynet, which I and probably others were hoping would lead to a real integrationism. My point is that there seems to basically be a consensus on the education issue among the non-religious parties (at least the Zionist ones; whether Hadash or Balad would accept even a smidgeon more of state guidance in the Arab education system, even for significantly more funding, is questionable).

What Separates Habayit Hayehudi from the Ichud Haleumi

Especially neo-Kachists (although they're also members of the original Kach) like Ben-Ari, Ben-Gvir and Marzel; it was almost certainly Kfar Tapuach (the Kahane stronghold) whose settlers did this despicable act.

Anyway, Uri Orbach both condemns the mosque burning without reservation and realizes that from a practical standpoint, it's going to hurt his ideological goals.

While those ideological goals (certainly on not giving up an inch of the Land of the Israel) are shared between the two parties, I don't think the Ichud Haleumi realizes this last part, and that makes all the difference.

Is Kadima Finally Realizing that anti-Haredization Is a Good Electoral Strategy?

At least since the parking lot riots and Bibi's support for a two-state solution, I've wondered why Kadima has not moved more aggressively to at least adopt some Shinuiesque principles.

While being too aggressively secular is going to limit the number of votes, taking a more assertive stance against Haredi excess/isolationism/parasitism/etc. is only going to hurt among people who would never vote for Kadima anyway, while it will quite likely help among nearly all Hilonim and Masoretim and even among many Datim (though they're obviously very unlikely to support Kadima for other reasons).

Mind you, Livni's choice to risk (and as it happened, lose) the ability to become prime minister rather than sell out to Shas and UTJ should have been enough to convince people. However, it wasn't much in the Kadima platform and secular-religious issues were less prominent at the time. Additionally, Yisrael Beitenu had not yet sold itself out pretty much fully to Shas and UTJ, and they WERE making secular-relgious issues part of their platform.

At any rate, Kadima has been taking positive actions in the secular-religious realm lately that will hopefully be emphasized at the (admittedly probably rather distant) next elections.

Plesner-Haredi
"National Service" Taking Place in Yeshivas

MK Yohanan Plesner brought to light some serious chutzpah on the part of the Haredim regarding the national service option under the Tal Law (the need to repeal/greatly modify that law is another issue).

This data indicates that ultra-Orthodox individuals who take this path don't actually take part in secular civil service, which goes against the intention of the law that allows them to forgo military service in favor of civil service. The Tal Law was meant to direct religious youth toward service with Israel's fire department, police or hospitals.

Under the clause that encourages "volunteerism for welfare purposes" Haredi youths opt to volunteer at Haredi yeshivas, and receive payment for their service from the state.

Specifically, out of the 1070 doing national service (which to begin with is only a small portion of the many Haredi men not serving), 834 of them are volunteering at yeshivas. To add insult to injury, single Haredi men (if those exist) get 594 NIS per month, while an Israeli soldier gets between 400 and 430 NIS per month. (I assume they get housed and probably fed on state funds as well, since that seems like ever so barely enough to feed oneself, if that)

How Many Ayman Abu Aita's are there in Beit Sahour?

So Sacha Baron Cohen is being sued again. This time the plaintiff is not an entire country or a bunch of frat boys, but a Palestinian Christian named Ayman Abu Aita from Beit Sahour in the West Bank, near Bethlehem. Apparently he was labeled as "terrorist group leader al-aqsa martyrs brigade" in the Bruno movie.

In his complaint (scroll down), the following is said about Ayman Abu Aita:

In the top left corner, it gives his residence as Beit Sahour, Bethlehem, West Bank Palestine.

In the first part (Part I) Parties section of the complaint, it says:

That your plaintiff, viz., AYMAN ABU AITA, is a natural adult person, of Palestinian nationality, whom, at all times relevant herein, has been, and is presently domiciled in the village of Beit Sahour, West Bank, in the territory known as Palestine, supporting his wife and four children as a grocer, and is also a Board Member, as well as the Treasurer, of the Holy Land Trust, a charitable organization committed to promoting peace and reconciliation among Israelis and Palestinians, of all religious faiths, with your plaintiff being a Christian and member of congregant of the Greek Orthodox Church;

In the FACTUAL AVERMENTS section, it goes on to describe the Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade's designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (X-XIV), and says

XV.

That, as adverted to above, your plaintiff is a peace-loving person who abhors violence, and, prior to the publication and republication of the calumnies complained of herein, enjoyed a good reputation for honesty and a peaceable nature throughout his community in Bethlehem, as well as amongst his numerous relatives, friends and associates in the United States;

However, take a look at this article by Allan Sorensen from December 2006 (via Google Translate; I certainly can't read Danish) in Kristeligt Dagblad, which roughly translates to Christian Daily News.

This is the important part of the article. The original Danish is in italics.

Men det er kun den ene side af sagen, mener den 41-årige kristne palæstinenser Ayman abu Aita fra Bet Sahour. But it is only one side of the case, believes the 41-year-old Christian Palestinian Ayman Abu Aita of Bet Sahour. Han tilhører en hård kerne af kristne, der anser denne udlægning af situationen som vestlig propaganda. He belongs to a hard core of Christians who consider this interpretation of the situation as western propaganda. Og han bliver sur, når han hører påstande om, at de kristne i Betlehem-området ikke tager del i kampen mod Israel. And he gets angry when he hears allegations that Christians in the Bethlehem area does not take part in the struggle against Israel.



Ayman abu Aita har for længst droppet det kristne begreb om at vende den anden kind til. Ayman Abu Aita has long since abandoned the Christian concept of turning the other cheek. Han tror ikke, at palæstinenserne kan få deres egen selvstændige stat uden at bekæmpe Israel med vold. He does not believe that Palestinians can have their own independent state without fighting Israel with violence. Hans venner er både kristne og muslimer, og hans liv er en dramatisk fortælling om, hvordan hans kristne tro og billedet af Jesus på væggen i stuen ikke forhindrer ham i at være aktivist i en af de palæstinensiske bevægelser, der fører en væbnet og blodig kamp mod den israelske besættelse. His friends, both Christians and Muslims, and his life is a dramatic story about how his Christian faith and the image of Jesus on the wall in the room did not prevent him from being an activist in the Palestinian movement, leading an armed and bloody struggle against the Israeli occupation.

The article goes on to say that he spent two years in an Israeli prison.

So, the question is: How many Christian Palestinians are there from Beit Sahour named Ayman Abu Aita?'

Now, to be fair, Beit Sahour did have 12,367 residents according to the 2007 Palestinian Census, and it happens to be one of a tiny, tiny number of municipalities which still have a Christian majority (80%).

Unfortunately, I have not been able to find the suing Abu Aita's age; if they matched, that would greatly narrow things down.

I also have to note that the "Holy Land Trust" (which as far as I can tell, is legit, not to be confused with the terror-funding "Holy Land Foundation") gives his name as "Ayman Matya Jabra Abu Eita"

A search for this name leads to a book by the generally nutty Aaron Klein of WorldNetDaily.

In the Google Books preview, Klein says

A few weeks after 2006 Christmas celebrations, I returned to Bethlehem and met with Ayman Abu Eita, who was chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist group in Beit Sahur from 2001 until at least 2006. ... Abu Eita wants me to introduce him as the main representative of PA President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party in Beit Sahour.

Further searching gives a Greek Orthodox school in Beit Sahour, and lists a student as "Woroud Ayman Matia Abu-Eita", whose father is named Ayman; note again as above that the Holy Land Trust/Bruno Ayman Abu-Eita had "Matya" in his full long name.

For sites opposite to, but equally as nutty as Mr. Klein, if not more so.


"palcast.org" again refers to "Ayman Abu Eita" as being held for several years in Israeli prison

So I'd say that even if there are two or more Ayman Abu Aita's in Beit Sahour, Baron Cohen et. al have a mistaken identity-based defense. If not, they have the unvarnished truth as a defense; the truth can never be slander or libel.

Why Don't Arab-Israeli Women Work?

Okay, obviously, as with the ultra-Orthodox (Haredim), this is a broad generalization. Plenty of Arab-Israeli women work. Moreover (in part due to unfortunate discrimination that exists; more on this later), unemployment is higher in the Arab-Israeli sector, so that a larger percentage of Arab-Israeli women are in the "civilian labour force" than are actually working at present. This post looks at the numbers in the "civilian labour force" and the causes therein.

Among Jews in Israel (15 and up), 61.5% of men and 57.0% of women were in the civilian  labor force in 2008. The gap's extreme narrowness (which I think is quite probably smaller than the male/female gap in the U.S.) can be explained by several factors.

First of all, women are less likely to serve in the military at all and far less likely to become a career soldier than are men, and thus, plenty of men are working but are not in the "civilian labor force." Second of all, in the ultra-Orthodox community, the women have a much higher rate of employment than the men, because the men are too busy studying Torah/rioting, while taking care of the 12 children leaves plenty of free time for the women to work-and after the Shinui-Netanyahu welfare cuts (not deep enough for those who choose not to work, IMO), they need the money.

Among the "other religions" (which includes Arabs and the non-halakhically Jewish former Soviet Union immigrants), 63.8% of men work (higher than among Jewish men because of the Haredi men and because other than the Druze and some Bedouin, Arab-Israelis don't serve in the military). The lower levels of employment among males from "other religions" who are over 45 years old (86.2% Jews vs 74.9% "other religions" employed between 45 and 54, 74.9% Jews vs 48.2% of other religions employed between ages 55-64) has been described in the news as due to the (somewhat unfortunate) fact that Arabs are highly disproportionately employed in areas of manual labor, which become tough to do as one gets older (while office jobs, for instance are not, at least not when under 65)

However, only 26.2% of females from "other religions" are employed. Why is this? That is to say, what are the factors that have resulted in this situation?

One of the factors is quite probably religion. For "other religions", 45.8% of all Christian women were in the civilian labor force, while merely 18.3% of all Muslim women were in the civilian labor force. Now, this is probably partially due to higher work force partition among non-Arab Christians (who comprise 20% of the total Christian population in Israel). However, even if labor force partition among non-Arab Christian women was as high as 70%, 40% of Arab Christian women would be in the work force, still twice the percentage of Muslim women. So it's pretty clear that religion is playing a role; as noted above, this need not be the case, as in the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, the women work at a higher rate than the men.

Education seems to be a factor as well. Of women from other religions with 16+ years of schooling, 72.8% were in the civilian labour force, just a bit lower than the 78.9% of Jewish women with 16+ years of schooling in the labor force. However, only 48.1% of "other religion" women with 13-15 years of schooling were in the labor force vs. 65.7% of Jewish women, and only 24.2% with 11-12 years of schooling vs. 54.6% of Jewish women. Especially since 25% of women of "other religions" had more than 12 years of schooling vs 39% of Jewish women, this contributes greatly.

Unfortunately, it's hard to tell exactly the effect of having children.  This is because they look at everyone over 15 in the table with numbers of children.  However, this does not seem to be the lion's share of the problem by a long shot either. 24.5% of those with 1 child work compared to 30.5% with 2 children, 23.7% with 3 children and 17.6% with 4+ children.

This all implies that cultural norms and education are the biggest contributors to the lack of employment. Although admittedly, the high birthrate is also obviously a factor, it's not as big as I would've thought; i.e. having less children would not seem to come close to getting labor force participation to expected levels.


Of course, unemployment and underemployment is a whole other matter, to be discussed later.

Hanukkah Songs & Videos

עברית

Lichvod HaHanukkah   לכבוד החנוכה



Lyrics: Haim Nachman Bialik   חיים נחמן ביאליק

Melody: Folk עממי

Lichvod HaHanukkah

Al Hanissim על הניסים

Ancient

More Solemn Melody
Fun Melody-Dave Epstein Band



Yiddish

Oy Khanikhe

Kenny Hotz of Kenny v. Spenny (lyrics not entirely correct) 


Post-Modern English

Hanukkah Hey Ya

Eric Schwartz a.k.a Smooth E

Nefesh b'Nefesh's Flash Mob on Ben-Yehuda St, Jerusalem

Finally, last and most definitely least

The Hanukkah Song

HaRav Adam Sandler