“The Tomb of the Patriarchs is a Palestinian Site”

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NUMBER OF DAYS UNTIL THE ISRAELI ELECTION: 6

ISRAELSTREET endorses NAFTALI BENNETT for Prime Minister

Head of “HaBayit HaYehudi” (The Jewish Home) political party

“We can’t have peace with the Palestinians. Enough. How long can we talk about this? We can only reach coexistence . . .”

UPDATES 6 pm Israel time Tuesday:

*Remember those “peaceful, non-violent” Palestinian and international “protesters” who set up the illegal E1 “outpost” back on Friday and then were “evacuated” on Sunday (an evacuation harshly condemned by world leaders such as U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon who branded the eviction of such peaceful protesters as “undemocratic.”). Today the so-called “protesters” have returned in force, clashing violently with Israeli security forces as they attempted to retake the “outpost”. Thus far, 17 have been arrested.

*Following the example set by Palestinian terrorists in Gaza who have assaulted the Gaza Border Fence everyday since Benjamin Netanyahu incredibly agreed to relinquish the 300 meter buffer zone, Palestinians in Judea and Samaria are now doing the same thing. This afternoon, a Palestinian was shot and killed attempting to breach the fence near Budrus.

*Rachel’s Tomb near Bethlehem has also become a daily scene of Palestinian terrorism as Jewish worshipers to the site are assaulted with mobs throwing “rocks” and other projectiles. Today a group of worshipers was trapped inside the Tomb until they could be rescued by IDF forces.

TODAY’S BLOG:

The Mosque that is built over the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. Note the steps leading up the site (picture source: holyland-pictures).

The incidents at Rachel’s Tomb over the last month have cast in stark relief the ongoing struggle over Jewish holy sites in Judea and Samaria. Yesterday, the Israeli government announced plans to invest in the rehabilitation of nine sites.

One of the sites is the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.

Jewish history (Genesis 23:16) informs us that the Cave and the field beside it were bought by Abraham and that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, and Leah–the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish people–are buried there (the only matriarch missing is Rachel who died in childbirth and was buried near Bethlehem).

The history of the Cave is too long to recount here, but suffice it to say that in 637 CE–some 1500 to 2000 years after Jews had established the Cave as a place of worship–Muslims arrived on the scene, conquered the land, and built a mosque on top of the Cave. Jews–even the ones living in Hebron–were not permitted to enter the Cave (though humiliatingly, they were permitted to climb a certain number of steps before being turned back).

By 1929, Jews could only ascend to the seventh step.

After Jews were massacred in Hebron in 1929, the British reacted by restricting Jewish access to the Cave even more. It was not until Israel retook Judea and Samaria in 1967 that greater Jewish access to one of Judaism’s holiest sites was attained. 

On February 21, 2010, Israel announced that it would list the Cave of the Patriarchs as a “national heritage site”. Immediately the world went crazy. In the U.S., the Obama Administration strenuously objected to the announcement charging that it torpedoed possible “peace talks”. PLO head Mahmoud Abbas threatened that such an Israeli move would set off a “religious war.”

All of which brings us to yesterday.

Nour Odeh, a PLO spokesman and assistant to Mahmoud Abbas, ranted this: “The Tomb of the Patriarchs is a Palestinian site, and the Palestinian Authority is the only one in charge of making any changes to it.”

A Palestinian site? As it turns out, the PLO, UNESCO, the United Nations, the European Union, the White House, and virtually all of the international community would have the world believe that virtually every Jewish holy site is a Palestinian site.

As for Israel, for once the government showed a little backbone. A spokesman for the Israeli cabinet, Zvi Hauser, had this to say: “You can’t change history. Many sites of the Bible took place in Judea and Samaria. As long as we’re in the territory, it’s our national and human moral obligation to take care of and preserve these sites.”

You can’t change history–but that is precisely what the world would like to do. It seems that Jewish history has no place in the world of 2013.

Addendum: You might be interested to know, dear reader, that the “rehabilitation” of the Cave of the Patriarchs that Israel would like to perform is simply to build a ramp for handicapped access.

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