THE HOSTAGE CRISIS IS NEARLY 80 YEARS OLD ......Part One

 The Hostage Crisis is Nearly 80 Years Old, or Why You Needn't Bother to Vote

Time to choose between Ben Gurion and Avraham Stern

A frum Jew walks into a treif restaurant.
Sits down.
Orders a cold salad.
Feels good.
Nothing wrong with a cold salad, right?
Encourages other frum Jews to do the same.
It's a treif restaurant, granted, but it's only a cold salad, right? So what's the big deal?

And then it hits him —
Hey, if enough of us come in and just order cold salads, maybe eventually we can convince the proprietor to stop serving shrimp fried rice and pork chops!  And maybe we can, like, take the place over and get a hechsher!
It's possible, right?
Even the Jewish thing to do, right?
And if it doesn't work out — hey, at least we tried, right? Put in our hishtadlut?
No one can say we don't care, or that we’re giving up on the establishment. After all, that would be negligent, right?
It’s our civic duty, right?

It's what G-d wants, right?

Notwithstanding the fact that it might be better to patronize a kosher restaurant, particularly one that’s struggling and where the food is known to be superior, even though it is a bit out of the way and requires some effort to travel there...
The question remains —

What, indeed, does G-d want?

Jewish and Israeli affairs pundit Lisa Liel, who pens the articulate and thoughtful (though demurely titled) What Does Lisa Say? is encouraging her fellow Jews to patronize a treif restaurant and order the apparently tasty “Feiglin Salad”.

When I dared suggest that there were better ways to spend her time, and that voting for Feiglin (or anyone else) would only end bitterly, and that, moreover, treif restaurants were not the answer to our nation's travails, she cast the following aspersions —

Maybe we shouldn't have supported the kings after David. After all, they screwed up over and over.

I'm sorry, Dean, but לא בשמים היא. Emuna without hishtadlut is lazy, and simply sitting back and washing your hands of things while we have the ability to act to improve the situation is negligent.

The State of Israel is *not* an illegitimate entity. It's a vehicle. And like any vehicle, it's neither good nor bad. Depends who's driving.

We have to do the best we can with what we have.

What [Dean Maughvet] wrote came from a deep pain, and a sense that there is no way to fix this country ourselves. And maybe there isn’t. But that’s not for us to decide. We have to keep trying, even if it seems pointless.

If God does send the messiah to rescue our sorry butts because we’d proved we couldn’t do the job ourselves, I would be mortified to have him find us sitting around and moaning, “We tried, but it was too damn hard.”

That’s why I’m not giving up.

Now that’s all fine and sweet sounding, and we’ll respond to her claims in short order, but first, a little history.

Consider…

The left, under Ben Gurion, et al. —

• won the War of Independence,
  
• won the Sinai Campaign,
  
• won the Six Day War, and
  
• (eventually) won the Yom Kippur War.
  

The Right, under the Likud, et al.

• gave away the Sinai,
  
• lost two (or three) wars in Lebanon,
  
• lost two (or three) intifadas,
  
• gave away Gaza,
  
• released over 1000 terrorists in the Gilad Shalit deal — a move that led directly to…
  
• "the worst attack on the Jewish nation since the Shoah" and…
  
• the subsequent Simchat Torah War against Hamas and Hizb'Allah and Iran and Yemen (and counting…) — with the “most right-wing government” in Israeli history in the driver's seat. And, yes, we’ve just lost that one, too.
  
• By the way, that fabled right-wing dynasty has also yet to repeal the hated Oslo Accords, despite being in power for 25 of the 30 years since the deal was signed.
  

And one wonders…

Why no one stops to consider that maybe it don't make a rat’s bucket who’s running the Knesset. After all, history (G-d) somehow manages in every instance to flip things upside-down regardless the election’s outcome.

One also wonders…

Why the same people who rail against our brothers overseas for not making aliyah, claiming they're not "paying attention to history" — to crusades and inquisitions and cossacks and pogroms and the dhimmi and shoas, etc. — don't apply the same historical standard to voting in Knesset elections?

Because if history is truly a faithful guide, shouldn’t it guide us in all matters?

And that said, how has voting for right-wing and religious parties improved our situation vis-à-vis our enemies — historically?

Answer: it hasn't.

And why?

Well, maybe because G-d wants us to learn that voting itself, and democracy itself are not the desirable state of affairs for Jews sovereign in their own land. That we should consider alternatives (like a king), and until we do, He's going to continue tripping up our efforts to elect this, that or the other party or leader, because it doesn't make a whit of difference “who’s driving,” as Lisa Liel suggests, rather —

Everything depends on the vehicle.

Below, we'll examine a couple of potent Jewish vehicular options that are currently available.

But before we do, let's consider the following —

You're a Jew.
You ostensibly believe in G-d.
You believe He guides the world, though, often, granted, His ways are unfathomable.

So, have you noticed that He appears to be constantly and deliberately noodging us AWAY from that Greek blasphemy called democracy?

Do you notice bichlal when He’s noodging you?

Do you ever stop to contemplate why, perhaps, certain unpleasant things recur in your life? Or how noodges sometimes morph into potches — or worse — when you continue merrily on your way, heedless of the warnings and admonitions and… noodges that He's continually sending?

Or do you ignore all that and just charge ahead KADIMA!, irrespective of what your Father in Heaven is trying to show you, of the messages and reprimands and inducements He's transmitting, the better to steer you in a direction that's best for you?

Is it too difficult to look outside the box, and consider that G-d, in his infinite concern for you, is suggesting a different course of action, because that would be, as Lisa Liel contends, like throwing your hands up, declaring defeat and giving up on a belief box (democracy) that you’ve dedicated so much of your life to?

So, better not to consider the noodges — rather, best to press on, “to keep trying, even if it seems pointless,” as Lisa suggests.

Hmm…

Is that really the better option?

Better than thinking?

Would it not be better at least to contemplate alternatives, reasons, different points of view — or no: just dismiss and double down and avoid thinking altogether?

Banging one’s head against a wall — for no reason — should now be considered a virtue?

That’s quite the slogan — “Don’t Think, Just Keep Trying.”

MASOCHISM AND THE LOVE OF ONE’S TORMENTORS

If your son’s an alcoholic — G-d forbid — and regularly requests money from you, and then uses it to get drunk time and time again, do you at any point cease giving it to him?
Do you at any point even consider the possibility of turning off the cash tap? Or do you just keep on, through all the pain and frustration, hoping that maybe one day he’ll use the money to take that bricklaying course (like he said he would), or take that cab to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting (like he said he would), or buy that jacket and tie to meet with Mr. Schwartz, who offered to speak with him about a concierge job across town (like he said he would).

Is there ANYTHING that would make you reconsider giving him your hard earned money time and time again?

And are you genuinely trying “to improve the situation” by continuing to plod robotically in the same direction?

I ask you, Lisa Liel… are you being realistic by repeating the same action over and over again and expecting different results?

Are you indeed, doing “the best you can with what you have” in such a case? Or are you, rather, mindlessly walking in circles because that’s what you’ve always done, and that’s what you’ve got to work with, and there’s no point getting off the carousel now because, well… they say you have to be on a carousel, and so, here you are, no point giving up, gotta put in your hishtadlut…?

Do not think!

Do not think!