Economic Experiment

It is taking place these days in Israel. This year we had two elections and the third is scheduled for January - February. So we have no active government taking decisions nor passing laws till the next government, around June 2020. Is it good or bad?

Apparently it is excellent. A small irritation with Gaza fade away in days and we have peace. The economic activity is accelerating and the GNP is growing at 4% p.a. Faster than the USA and Europe. Only China and India are growing faster.  TASE, the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, is fantastic: it has added 10% in the last three months. Israelis are feeling rich and I am worried that my daughters will spend the inheritance I shall leave on fashion items. Oy!

Louis Vuitton

H&M

Hermès

Gucci

Prada

Chanel

February, 1938

The Gathering Storm, written by Churchill immediately after the war with all the documents of both sides, provides a masterful analysis of what the war really was about. In chapter 15 "The Rape of Austria" he quotes the protocol of Hitler's directive to the chiefs of the armed forces. Germany must have living space. It could be best found in Eastern Europe - Poland, White Russia, Ukraine. To obtain this would involve a major war and incidentally, the extermination of the people living in those parts.

Neurath, Fritsch, Blomberg, the General Staff were all alarmed by this policy. On February 4, 1938 Hitler dismissed Fritsch. Blomberg fell out because an inappropriate marriage. The Fuehrer assumed both political and military powers, and almost immediately, Austria was annexed, then Czechoslovakia and half Poland. The extermination policy was fully implemented on the Jews, the weakest sector, while the preparations already in place to extend it to the general population.

Hitler meant what he said and moved very fast. Churchill warns us "not to look down the decent, well-meaning British leaders" - but I could not make sense of his reasons for why not to.

P.S.:  Chamberlain et al tried to deflect Hitler's aggressiveness and waited, and waited, hoping that someone else - the Austrians, the Czechs, the French, the Poles, etc. - would resist and so let them enter the arena with Hitler already engaged in a war. In the end, that was what happened with the Russians forced to confront Hitler. Churchill did follow the strategy of his predecessors, of avoiding direct confrontation with the Germans and letting others - ultimately the Russians and Americans - to fight the war. Anyway, the war ended with Britain impoverished and exhausted. 

Enjoying Winter in the Campus

Winter in the University of Ariel. It has grown in twenty years to 16 thousand students. The Dept. of Engineering is now a Faculty. Grosso modo, ten percent of the visible students are female Muslims - well kept and modernly dressed, with the hair covered. Another ten percent are religious married Jewish women, with their fantastic turbans. I cannot classify the males, they all look alike as Balkan highway robbers, dressed in black. Here and there one can distinguish blond hair and pallid faces - Slav immigrants. The student body (and the population in general) has been moving towards a non-specific South Syrian type. IQ=92? That is not what the virgin bride dreamt of (An idiom that makes much sense but only in Hungarian).   זה מה שיש ועם זה אתה חייב לנצח (Hebrew Army Slang: That is what you have and with that you have to conquer).   

My Mother in Rochlitz

A group of 180 Hungarian Jewish women were selected in Auschwitz and taken to Rochlitz, where they were taught to work as machinists in an airplane factory. My mother (above) and her two sisters were there and survived. From Rochlitz they were walked 400 km to the West (the guards were running from approaching the Red Army) and were liberated by the Americans. She said that the guards allowed them to beg food from the people. 

Noya

She did not want me to take a picture of her so she hides under the kitchen table. She has pink-white porcelain skin and reddish, curly "African antenna" hair. A fantastic genetic recombination. Granddaughter number two. 

Can a Palestinian Muslim become a Jew?

Judaism has no Pope with a phone line to the Creator. Notwithstanding, we managed to maintain some uniformity, which is constantly being challenged by new interpreters of the Torah. The State has an official Chief Rabbinate, itself divided into two ethnic traditions, the Ashkenazi and the Sepharadi. But there are Rabbis who declared themselves Judges (in religious issues) and have courts and write opinions and sentences. Rabbi Nissim Karelitz (pic) declared himself a Posek (Doctor of Religion) and established a respected religious court in the city of Bnei Brak. Many brought their problems to him to be judged. He died this year at age 93.

Everybody knows that many of the inhabitants of Hebron were, a couple of generations ago, practicing Jews. They were forced to submit to the Islam (literally, submission) under the Turkish Sultanate, and on the surface, they have merged with the Arab Muslim majority. One Hebronite decided to return to his ancestors' faith and tribe, and Rabbi Karelitz converted him to Judaism.

Now, this is a very delicate issue, because Muslims cannot just choose another religion and those who do, are ipso facto beheaded. But that will be his problem, not mine. Judaism is not missionary and converts are not desired. But the High Court of Justice of Israel, a secular institution, had officially recognized the authority of Karelitz, including the right to convert non-Jews, and that makes the problem mine and national. As a convert, the Hebronite is entitled to Israeli citizenship and its White Colonialist "privileges'. (Like being beaten in the Vari Hall of York University, for being a Zionist.)

What do I think? The boy keeps all the mitzvot, which I do not. He is a kosher Jew. By blood, he may be more closer to Abraham of the Bible than I am. Abraham spent much time in Hebron.

Now the convert has been jailed by the Palestinian Authority and submitted to Islamic brainwashing. For some reason, unknown to this blogger, thousands are attracted to Judaism and would convert if made easier. If this Palestinian Arab becomes one of us and survives, well... it is complicated.

Heavyweight Champion

Wilder. World Champion by Knockout.