CHOCHMAS NASHIM: TOLDOT AND TERRORISM
By: Suri Davis
Genesis 26:11 The king of Canaan, Avimelech saw that Isaac and Rivka were settling the land, that they were husband and wife, and clearly thought that his nation would harm Isaac, and so Avimelech directed that no one “touch” Isaac or Rivka. That year Isaac sowed grain and he reaped a hundredfold more than he expected, G-d blessed him. He owned flocks and herds and many business enterprises and the Philistines envied him. They blocked up all the wells tht his father’s servants had dug in the days of his father Avraham and filled them with earth. Avimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you have become much more powerful than we. So Isaac left.
When the Jews were given the land of Israel in 1948 it was a vast swampland filled with malaria. G-d blessed the land in the hands of the Jews and the Palestinians seeth with envy. Those who are at peace with us in Israel, prosper in all fields and industry, those whom the Palestinian leadership have injected with hate, hate the Jews more than they love themselves.
When the Israeli government convinced/coerced the residents of Gush Katif in the Gaza to leave, they hoped for the promised peace. They left their homes, buildings, houses of worship and industry in tact so the Palestinians could arrive and prosper in the region as they had, but the Palestinian leadership needed its people to continue their suffering as part of the agenda to blame Jews for all, and so before the Palestinian masses could enter, the leaders entered and destroyed any viable hope of prosperity in the region by destroying all that was there on the very first day it was handed over.
The paradigm was written on the wall in this week’s Torah portion. Isaac prospered and was willing to share his prosperity with those around him, but their jealousy could not abide by Isaac’s prosperity, and he was forced to leave, but not before the Philistines took possession of the desert wells which were built by Isaac’s father, Abraham, and filled the wells in so no one could enjoy them, not Isaac, nor the Philistines, such was their actions controlled by their envy.
There is no obvious solution to this millennia issue, Esau and Jacob were fighting each other’s nature in utero, and Esau’s jealousy of Isaac continues to this very day, when Arabs terrorized Jewish adults, teenagers and children for no other reason that their jealousy, saying “what’s mine is mine, and whats yours is mine.”
It is a sad day for all Jews as we struggle through the millennia of exile from our religious homeland. On this Rosh Chodesh in which the tabulating of holidays is performed and Thanksgiving, where we take a moment to contemplate all the good G-d provides us daily, we understand that terror is at the hands of man, and G-d knows the greater picture of why this had to happen to the people who lost their lives, were maimed and their families who are pained.
Happy Thanksgiving
Gutten Chodesh
Shabbat shalom
-Suri