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July 24, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: On the road again --- and again and again

Richard Z. Chesnoff: Mideast Refugees --- Failure vs. Success

JWisdom:: Word power is about more than vocabulary by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

July 23, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: The Mufti of Jerusalem's Nazi ideology lives on among contemporary Islamists

The Kosher Gourmet by Joe Gray: Smoked paprika turkey meatballs simmered in red wine and tomato sauce

JWisdom:: 'Routine' doesn't need to mean ‘rote’ By Rabbi David Aaron

July 22, 2008

Yossi Klein Halevi: Dear Barack Obama

Elliot B. Gertel: Eli Stone: Self-indulgent, arrogant corporate attorney as modern-day prophet

JWisdom:: Three Weeks - Nine Days - One Purpose by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

July 21, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Spending your kids' money

Mitch Albom: A grim exchange illustrates a key difference

JWisdom:: The Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith: Hammered on the Anvil --- Severed by the Sickle by Rabbi Nosson Scherman

July 18, 2008

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: The Sanctification and Importance of Time

Caroline B. Glick: US wants it absolutely clear it has no intention of attacking Iran's nuclear installations

Mona Charen: What can you say about a people who welcome a child murderer as a hero?

JWisdom:: Living a dog's life, dawg? by Rabbi Dovid Gross

July 17, 2008

Steven Emerson: Deals with devils

Libby Lazewnik: One Step at a Time

JWisdom:: Leader the follower? by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

July 16, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Poaching humans

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Meaty pasta salad with summer berries perfect for warm evenings

JWisdom:: Keeping A Secret by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

July 15, 2008

Dennis Prager: False Equation: Opposing Same-Sex Marriage and Opposing Interracial Marriage

Joel Greenberg: Researchers look to Israeli circumcision program to help combat AIDS 'Alternatives' to Logic Won't Work

JWisdom:: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part V: Why Judaism ISN'T Spiritual by Rabbi David Aaron

July 14, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: A warning from Canada to those who value life

Jonathan Tobin: 'Alternatives' to Logic Won't Work

JWisdom:: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Poland's Unique Antisemitism, Part II

July 11, 2008

Rabbi Francis Nataf: It's hard to be humble when you're great

Caroline B. Glick: A tale of two hostages

JWisdom:: Profane for Prophet by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

July 8, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q. Duty to save gullible from themselves?

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Islamists have the West just where they want us

JWisdom:: Putting the Spirit Back into Spirituality, Part 3: The Fully Loaded Human Being by Rabbi Dovid Gross

July 3, 2008

Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski: A spiritual budget (TOUCHING!)

Jeff Jacoby: Israel still paying for its defeat

JWisdom:: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part IV by Rabbi David Aaron

JWisdom:: The Moses Method by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

July 2, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Appeasers Make Poor Patriots

The Kosher Gourmet By Kathleen Purvis: Slaw, y'all: For BBQs or Sabbath dinner, these southern recipes are something else!

JWisdom:: Rabbi Mordechai Becher: Jewish Rx for A Simpler Life

July 1, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q. I think it's important to leave a legacy to my children. How much should I save towards this end?

Paul Greenberg:A President who is history deficient?

JWisdom:: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Poland's Unique Antisemitism

June 30, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: Remembering the architect of Torah Judaism for the modern world

Abe Novick: Hulk: Still a Jew?

JWisdom: : Putting the Spirit Back into Spirituality, Part 2: The Abandoned Child

June 26, 2008

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Quantum leap to evil

Caroline B. Glick: Victimized families must not be allowed to dictate policy

June 25, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Today in Biblical History: King Jeroboam of Israel prevents pilgrimage to Jerusalem

Jonathan Tobin: Real Friends and Real Enemies

JWisdom: Raping of reason By Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 25, 2008

Steven Emerson: Kristof: Never Mind the Terrorists

Stratfor Intelligence Briefing: Mediterranean Flyover: Telegraphing an Israeli Punch?

JWisdom: Rabbi David Aaron: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part III

June 24, 2008

Caroline B. Glick: What were they thinking!?

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Guilty knowledge

JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Warping Innocence

June 23, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Diploma dilemma

Jeff Jacoby: A world without children

JWisdom: Rabbi Dovid Gross: Putting the Spirit Back into Spirituality --- Introduction

June 20, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: Man: The Crowning Glory of Creation

Caroline B. Glick: Israel's darkest week

JWisdom: We aren't worthy? by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 19, 2008

Rabbi Elazar Meisels: The saints who don't come marchin' in

Chris Christoff: Muslim woman demands an apology from Obama after camera snub

June 18, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Still Dancing Around Jerusalem

The Kosher Gourmet by Steve Petusevsky: Chilled fruit and vegetable soups

JWisdom: Souls Need A Check Up? by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

June 17, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: Baby Einstein

Caroline B. Glick: Bush's rhetoric, Bush's policies

JWisdom: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part II by Rabbi David Aaron

June 16, 2008

Varda Branfman: Bob Dylan, won't you please come home?

Diana West: Academic dares to question the 'religion of peace'

JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Positive Backfire

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review August 2, 2006 / 8 Menachem-Av, 5766

Poor Lebanon

By Paul Greenberg


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Has any country ever been so ill-served by its leadership as Lebanon?


Well, there is the always a-borning, never-quite-born state reserved for the Arabs of Palestine. In Abba Eban's famous phrase, its leaders — all the way back to the Grand Mufti — have never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity for peace. Lebanon's leaders must run them a close second.


For years the Lebanese have given Hezbollah's killers safe harbor and cheered them on when they marched in the streets. They've turned whole neighborhoods and large swaths of that beautiful country over to this state-within-a-state, and have done little but step aside as Lebanon became one big terrorist arms depot.


Beirut's power brokers even took Hezbollah into the country's Cabinet and made it part of their governing coalition. It was the start of a beautiful friendship.


None of Hezbollah's murderous attacks — whether on a Marine barracks in Beirut or a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires — were enough to disturb this delicate, ever closer détente cordiale .


So long as the Lebanese economy revived, and the reconstruction of the country after its disastrous civil war could proceed apace, what business was all that extraneous gore to Beirut's boulevardiers?


Lebanon's government never did get around to carrying out the United Nations resolution restoring its sovereignty over the south of the country, which became a staging area for Hezbollah's raids into Israel.


There was no hurry. All those years, it was only other people who were being blown apart. Surely none of that blood would splatter on the simple sharkskin splendor of a Beirut business suit . . . .


And now this. The state-within-a-state turned out to have not just an army within an army, but a foreign policy of its own, too. Which now has dragged the whole country into a devastating war.


Cities, airports, army barracks, television stations, beaches, highways . . . all lie in ruins. Bodies are pulled from the wreckage, as if this were some horrible aftermath of a suicide bombing in Jerusalem. Refugees stream steadily northward. A vast exodus is taking place, and humanitarian convoys must be organized. And all poor Lebanon did was let evil take root.


The result: pain, suffering, chaos. For wherever Hezbollah was in Lebanon, fire and blood now have followed, and Lebanon's leaders let it go everywhere.


Who knew those Katyushas imported from Iran via Syria would actually be fired?


Even if there were an occasional raid into Israel, and then a pro forma response from across the border, it would end there. It was assumed the Israelis would just go on and take it as they've always taken it. That was the gentleman's agreement, wasn't it? And now this . . . .


Hezbollah has been firing a hundred rockets a day at northern Israel. It embeds its rocket launchers within Lebanon's civilian population, close to schools, mosques, houses, markets and apartment buildings. And terrible things happen. Because, despite the leaflets dropped by Israelis urging people to leave southern Lebanon, many families inevitably chose to stay — or are unable to get out on roads under attack. Destruction rains from the air and it doesn't strike only military targets.


In the latest and worst incident, scores of innocent people, including women and children, perished when Israeli missiles struck an apartment building at Qana in southern Lebanon not far from Tyre — all within Hezbollah's rocket-launching belt. According to the Israeli military, the target was Hezbollah launchers only a couple of hundred meters from the apartment building, and the Israelis had no indication the building was occupied. None of which makes the spilling of innocent blood easier to accept. And now even a theoretical truce in the air war has broken down.


The U.N.'s Security Council, which did nothing to stop Hezbollah's depredations for years, met in emergency session, and eloquent speeches were made about the innocent victims of this latest calamity — as if Hezbollah's presence in Lebanon had nothing to do with it. Particularly impressive was the air of injured innocence and moral outrage assumed by the distinguished delegate from Lebanon. It was the kind of performance the practiced accomplices of terrorism have perfected by now.


One has to wonder: Can it be that Lebanon's leaders thought their policies would cause the deaths only of Israeli innocents?

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

JWR contributor Paul Greenberg, editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. Send your comments by clicking here.

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