Thursday, February 28, 2008

Shopping for Sderot

In the past few days, heavy bombing has increased not only over Sderot but also over Ashkelon. The army and the government say that this time they will "really" react, but so far nothing, except that public bomb shelters have been reopened.

Meanwhile, a new tradition has begun to support the stores and business owners in the area. People from all over the country are driving to Sderot to do their weekly grocery shopping, or to buy other items which apparently are cheaper than can be found in larger cities like Jerusalem or Tel Aviv.

I applaud the people of this country for supporting their brothers and sisters in business, but insist that we must take it at least several steps further. We must hold our leadership accountable and if they cannot find a solution to at least have quiet, if not a true peace, then someone else must be given the chance to succeed where they have obviously failed.

Maybe the next time George Bush or Dick Cheney visit our little country, they will actually visit Sderot, instead of taking a vacation at the taxpayers' expense, and ruining our economy.

Monday, February 25, 2008

Chiropractic is Not for Everyone

This morning I bumped into an old college friend, who told me that she had tried a Chiropractor in Tel Aviv, and that he had "ruined" her back and made her weak, and that the only solution has been dancing. Dance and self-care have brought her back to health, and she has nothing but contempt for my profession.

I explained to her that every Chiropractor, even those who studied in the same class and in the same school, brings their personality to the treatment and the approach to care. A particular method of a particular professional may not have worked for her, and I am sorry for her negative experience, but she cannot use this one incident to judge all of us.

Consider this:

Over 200,000 people die in hospitals each year, because of medical negligence and error.
Drug side-effects often make a condition worse, in an average of 1 in 500 cases.

Chiropractic can cause "damage" (muscle tension, pain) in 1 in 8,000,000 cases.
Those are pretty good odds, and it's all natural.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

The Monopoly Conspiracy, Update

The removal of Israel as a country from the Monopoly site must have aroused an uproar, because one day later, none of the 68 cities on the finalist list are identified with their respective entities.

For now, the political field has been evened, at least in the world of board games.

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

The Monopoly Conspiracy

Most of the civilized world has heard that Monopoly is constructing a Global game board, and their site (http://www.monopoly.com/) features a voting poll for various prominent and not-so-major cities around the world.

Happily, Jerusalem is one of the contenders and currently sits in fourth place, almost bringing it to Boardwalk status.

When I first entered the site, Jerusalem was listed as "Jerusalem, Israel," and I (as well as others I know) rejoiced in the fact that Israel was acknowledged as a country, and as the sovereign nation with Jerusalem as its capitol. Then today, when I logged on to continue voting and push Jerusalem (and New York City) up the charts, lo and behold, Jerusalem is now the only listed city out of 68 without a country. Like we are the Vatican or something, a floating island blessed by G-d in a sea of legitimate countries.

NB: Vatican City is not under consideration by Hasbro at the moment.

I can imagine that Hasbro, in its cowardice, fell prey to the pressure of the Arab countries and the general anti-Israel lobby. Allow me to point out a seemingly forgotten fact of history in the Middle East: most of the wars that Israel has fought and won were initiated by our Arab neighbors, and ignored by our civilized Western counterparts. Except for the more recent wars (Lebanon One and Two, the Intifada), Israel has come back against extreme odds and won the day, giving us victor's rights. Since when do the losers get to call a "do-over"?

Moreover, in 1948, the so-called Palestinian refugees fled their towns and abandoned their houses at the order of their Arab brothers, and not because the Jews pushed them out.

All of a sudden, Jerusalem does not belong to Israel, and we Israelis apparently do not have the right to defend ourselves and our land, land that was acquired by the blood of our soldiers and innocent citizens since the early 1900's. We Jews are being pushed off our land by our own government, eager to please our civilized Western counterparts who do not understand, nor have a real stake in our success or failure, as long as the oil keeps flowing.

Once Israel goes, no Jew in any "civilized country" around the globe will be safe.

I have not once in this blog entry mentioned the Biblical claim to the Land of Israel, because I am trying to appeal to all who have a potentially rational brain sitting inside their cranium: shut off the television, stop listening for a moment to your spiritual leaders or your ignorant next door neighbor. Step away from the American flag in which you wrap yourselves, thinking that it will protect you from another 9/11.

Would you ever sit idly by while your own government, or a random lame-duck political leader from another country far away tells you to allow yourself to be bombed and terrorized on a regular basis, tells you to give up your home and put your family in jeopardy because they say so?

Would you not take a stand when multiple Muslim and Christian leaders around the world preach their version of jihad, the end of your existence as a modern nation and as a people?

Take a stand right now, and put an end to the ridiculous double and triple standard being applied to Israel. Because after they come after us, you are ripe for the picking. In the eyes of today's terrorists, a heathen is a heathen is a heathen, and you are next.

Saturday, February 16, 2008

The Writing on the Wall

Israel experienced two earthquakes last week, and luckily - despite the shoddy quality level of constuction in many cities - no one was hurt and no property was damaged.

Some may argue that this is the Higher Power's way of sending us a message, that all is not right with our actions and with the legacy we are creating. This is not a new invention, the Torah states that if we Jews deserve to be on the land of Israel, the land and its people will be blessed, and the rain will fall at the proper time. If, however, we have overstayed our welcome, the land will literally "evict" us.

The rain, in fact, has not come, and for the past several years running, Israel faces a drought situation.

No worries with the eviction notice, our Prime Minister has already pledged to give away land, and most notably Jerusalem, even while his authority teeters on the brink of getting his ass kicked out of office, and into jail.

So why would G-d be angry?

Could it be that bombings upon the residents of Sderot worsen exponentially, and the government has attempted nothing to protect them from our enemies? We grin like the Cheshire Cat, now that a major international terrorist has been removed, but we in Israel and Jews around the world have only begun to feel the reprocussions.

Could it be the fact that the number of families living in poverty has risen significantly in the last two years, with no viable economic solution to alieve the suffering of these children? The poorest of all cities in Israel, Jerusalem is currently led by the Ultra-Orthodox anti-Zionist Mayor, Uri Lupolianski. The Mayor claims that he was "forced" to get involved and grant special political and economic favors to his Ultra Orthodox community, and yet these families do not seem to benefit from his special treatment.

Could it be the blatant evidence of corruption that surrounds Olmert and his entire coaltion; and the inability for anyone to actually be a man (or a woman) and say " I screwed up, I am taking my marbles and my giant ego home and letting someone else try." Forget for a moment the cowardice of the Labour Party, or the vascilation of the Shas party, who are waiting for "real proof" that Olmert will act against their core values. Perhaps Rav Ovadia Yosef will wait until Jerusalem becomes the capital of Bush's Palestine, and we Jews are floating in our rafts in the sea.

AB Yehoshua, an outspoken Leftist Israeli author, stated this week that he does not believe in the Two-State solution, because quite simply, Jews and Arabs do not share the same culture, language or value system. Dividing up this small country and giving over chunks to the Palestinians only gives them more area from which to launch their attacks.

How many days have the kidnapped soldiers been taken, with no word of their health or whereabouts?! It's OK, by the time they come home ( if they ever come home) we will have destroyed the land so much through pollution, pesticides and neglect, that no one will be able to breathe the air, drink the water or eat the food.

We elected these politicians who care only about their own acquistion and maintenance of power, and in a way we deserve what we get. Until we citizens choose to rise up and demand a revolution, maybe we should start packing.

But pack wisely, the raft doesn't hold much.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

The Spring Roll Strike

Israel's Asian restaurants refused to serve spring rolls yesterday, to protest the government's plans to sabotage the employment of foreign chefs. "Today there is no egg roll, and in two weeks there will be no sushi and noodles." Considered part of the "foreign worker" problem, Asian cooks will be purged from theme restaurants, unless of course you are willing to pay twice the average national salary to keep them on.

The Israeli argument states that non-Asians can be trained to achieve the same high quality results. This initiative comes at a time when speciality restaurants are opening fast and furious all over the country, and when the slide of the dollar allows people to splurge more often on luxuries, like a sushi dinner.

The argument falls apart when you consider the essential laziness and elitism of the modern Israel. The same time that Israelis complain about unemployment, they refuse to fill jobs such as elderly care-takers, a market dominated by men and women from the Philipines, brought over both legally and illegally. These foreign workers take better care of the Israeli aging generation, our parents and our grandparents, than any Israeli would choose to do for their own family member.

This is not the Israeli who came over to British Palestine by boat from Europe, who dug out swamps and built houses for Jews, brick by brick.

So please don't take away my expert sushi makers, and instead think about a reasonable, fair and effectively implemented policy that will benefit Israel in the long run.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

The Week After Winograd

Ehud Barak of the Labour Party will not be leaving the government and will not call for early elections. So pleased he is with his actions (NOT!), that when the Knesset members gathered to discuss the results of the report, Barak was conspicuously missing from his seat, stating that he did not want to give the impression that he was relieving Olmert of his responsibility and failure during the war.

The day after the report was released, a poll revealed that if elections were held now, Netanyahu (Likud) would receive 30% of the vote; Olmert (Kadima), in his shame, would still garner approximately 18% of the vote; and Barak would come in a pitiful third, with approximately 14% of the vote. Had Barak left the coalition before Wednesday, January 30th, the results would have been significantly higher in Barak's favor, because his actions would have shown that he has a line he will not cross for the sake of holding onto power.

Olmert takes every opportunity the press gives him to laud the conclusions of the Winograd Committee Final Report, and sits pretty in the Prime Minister's office, ready to give away the country to those who would kill us. Since the issue of the report, more cities within Israeli territory have suffered from bombings, injuries and human fatalities.

At least one of the members of the committee has announced to the press that they were indeed more inclined to soften the blow on Olmert, because several members did not want to hand the country over to Netanyahu and the parties on the right. Now a State Commission must be chosen to investigate the impropriety of the acts and conclusions of the Winograd people, Olmert's cronies. If, however, more of Olmert's good friends land conveniently in this group of dedicated and supposedly objective citizens, we can expect more of the same.

In other words, more bombs and no political bombshells.