Monday
Yom Shnee
20 Tevet 5785
January 20 2025
UPDATE 9:30 AM ISRAEL TIME
The View From Ashdod
Emily, Doron, and Romy’s reunification with their parents last night:
As excited as we were to see Doron, Emily, and Romy released last night, and reunite with their families, there were a number of disconcerting aspects we cannot forget.
To begin with, as we watched the young women’s progress through Gaza toward freedom, the sheer number of Hamas terrorists on the streets was startling as was their sickening continued torment of our women–a fact not lost on many observers including former British prime minister Boris Johnson, Aviva Klompas, and every Israeli who watched on TV:
Second, we cannot forget scenes of thousands of Gazans returning to northern Gaza yesterday–even before the ceasefire went into effect. Wasn’t there supposed to be a “security mechanism” (an unnamed American company) in place to make sure that no terrorists returned to the area? What a joke. Any terrorist who wants to return to northern Gaza is able to–though how can anyone tell the difference between civilians and terrorists?
Third, we cannot forget that 90 Palestinian terrorists (30 per hostage) were released last night. 77 of them went to Judea and Samaria, and 13 went to eastern Jerusalem. Included in these were murderers of Israelis, “attempted murderers”, and those who carried out other attacks on our citizens. More murders, attempted murders, and other attacks will happen in the coming days and months.
Some Observations About President Trump
What can we say about President Trump? It is safe to say that his honeymoon with Israelis is over. While we hope that he will reverse some of the actions that Biden had taken (and threatened to take), most feel that he strong-armed Netanyahu into an agreement with Hamas that leaves Israel vulnerable to new attacks.
On the other hand, Trump has unquestionably surrounded himself in his administration with supporters of Israel who have already shown the change coming from Washington.
Take this snippet of an interview between new American Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and Fox newsperson Brian Kilmeade:
Kilmeade: “Do you believe that a two-state solution is the future?”
Huckabee: “No. We need to recognize that there was already a Palestinian state – it was called Gaza. Look how that ended. The Palestinians do not believe in the two-state solution, they want one state without Israel and that is not a solution. Israel has the right to their homeland, as they have had for 3500 years since the days of Abraham.
Huckabee’s comments could never have come from the mouth of anyone in the Biden Administration.
The Return of “Hakonceptzia”
Pesach Wolicki has written that since October 7th, Israeli leaders of all stripes have said that they no longer believe in “hakonceptzia – ‘the conception’ – the delusional paradigm that blinded Israeli leadership to the real intentions and scope of the threats to Israel from our enemies.”
Your humble servant was thinking about this today as I read:
*With the ceasefire, the IDF is accelerating repairs to the security fence between Gaza and Israel.
*Israel has apparently agreed to the PLO taking over administration of the Rafah Crossing–and Gaza.
*IDF Chief of Staff Halevi continues to try to promote army commanders who were directly responsible for the negligence leading up to October 7.
*A terrorist who participated in the October 7 massacre brutally attacked a female soldier (choked her and pulled her hair) as she tried to “humanely” hand him a blanket at the Yemeni field facility yesterday.
*The Red Cross informed Israel yesterday prior to the three women being being turned over to the IDF that their condition is “good.”
To sum it up, the IDF is repairing the high tech security fence which the low tech Hamas terrorists easily tore down on October 7; the PLO has bragged about participating in the October 7 massacre; the IDF general staff which was asleep on October 7 should have been replaced long ago; no humanity should be shown to monsters who butchered our people; nothing the Red Cross says can be believed (no one knows the physical and emotional trauma Emily, Doron, and Romy endured for 470 days not to mention the fact that two of Emily’s fingers were shot off and she was wearing a bandage last night).
If all of this is not illustrative of hakonceptzia, nothing is.
A student from Malawi, who had worked with an Israeli health volunteer in his country battling AIDS, came up to us as we walked down the street in the UC-Davis Picnic Day Parade and wanted to carry the Israeli flag.