Even if we offer the Palestinians Tel Aviv as the capital of Palestine they will find a reason not to sign on peace settlement

  --- Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman

As we walked by an Arab worker fixing the tiling in a sidewalk, he was suffering from "plumber's crack syndrome" where the seat of his pants rides down way too far as he bends over.. my daughter saw him stick his hands in his pants as well.

My daughter said to her friend she was walking with, "Ewww, if he was a yehudi, and he was my cousin and he wanted to hug me I wouldn't hug him"..

At least she has some standards...

Bet Shemesh residents - hold on to your property.

De Marker's weekend magazine had a piece on the up and coming real estate markets in Israel. De Marker is the leading financial paper in Israel. De Marker found the three top locations and called them the thee top cities in Israel's future. Hold on to your hats - the three cities are Yavne, Hadera and Bet Shemesh.

De Marker found that real estate prices in these three cities are still reasonable, they are located near major regions, and with improved train systems to each of them it is easy and quick to get to the center of the country for work purposes.

Despite attempts to drive prices downward so as to help young couple be able to afford apartments, if Bet Shemesh (and the others) really becomes one of the most desirable cities in the country, you can bet your bottom dollar that prices will continue to rise.

Mayor Moshe Abutbol said that the city is planning for the major growth that Bet Shemesh is about to go through. They are planning by building new city infrastructure, hastening the repaving of the main highways - 38 and 10,  growing the Industrial areas at the edges of the city, educational institutions, a huge conference center is being built at an investment of 32 million shekels, attempts to get a hospital built, along with other projects. Abutbol called on the national government to also recognize the awesome growth and recognize the new reality in the area of Bet Shemesh as the city of the future and plan [and fund] accordingly.

I have decided, as I have mentioned before, that we are a completely racist society, even if people only care about everyone else's racism. Sure, there are individuals who are not racists, but overall we are mostly racist.

There is the general racism we all know about that has been in the media a lot recently - secular not letting religious live in their neighborhoods, religious not letting secular live in their neighborhoods, Jews not letting Arabs.., Everyone (religious and secular) against the Sudanese refugees and Illegals, etc..

There is also the racism that you will usually not here about in the media as it is hardly mentioned, if at all, and when mentioned it is downplayed and the story passes quickly. While Israel is being called racist because it is trying to find a solution to the Sudanese problem, and the way some people relate to Arabs and Palestinians, Mahmoud Abbas the other day dropped a bombshell that seemed to have passed almost unnoticed. Nobody seems to care that he said that in a future Palestinian state no Israelis would be allowed. "We won't agree to the presence of one Israeli in it" he said.

I wonder what would the reaction be if Israel announced that No Arabs, or at least no Palestinians, will be allowed any longer in Israel. I could even go with No Arabs because almost none of the other Arab countries let Israelis (or Jews for the most part) in. Maybe Egyptians and Jordanians can come visit, as we have peace with them and they usually let Jews in for short visits.

Nobody cares though, because only Arabs can't be victims of racism.

Last week a Palestinian shepherd lost a bunch of sheep from his flock when they went up in flames. Not with the spontaneous combustion that Dave Barry used to write about so frequently, but he blamed it on a group of settlers having set the fire that burned 17 of his sheep alive.

The leftist organizations immediately jumped on the poor shepherd's story and lambasted Israel through the international media for allowing the settlers to continue destroying the lives of the poor Palestinians while terrorizing their fields, their flock and their olive trees.

Some questions arose during the questioning, as the shepherd changed his story a couple of times regarding who burned the sheep.  According to Srugim, when he was taken for questioning to continue the investigation, he ended up admitting that he had done it himself by mistake. He was burning weeds in his field when the fire got out of control. When his sheep caught flame, he decided to rectify the situation by blaming it on the settlers. The leftists immediately jumped to blame the Israelis without even bothering to check what actually happened.

Unfortunately corrections never make headlines, Only the initial accusations do. Well, at least the shepherd must have had a good lamb shwarma for lunch that day before he went on his blood libel.

I dont know where this came from, but it is cute..

The latest pashkevil around RBS, and it has been a while since they put up a local issue pashkevil (national issue ones go up regularly) is against TOV.

TOV, led by Eli Friedman, runs the Iryah's department for strengthening youth. Hamachlaka L'ha'atzamat Ha'Noar. As part of their work, they published a chidon, a quiz of sorts, called "Chidon HaShabbos", on the halachos of Shabbos, for the local schools.

In response, his opponents plastered the neighborhood with pashkevils:
The pashkevil talks about the purity of the schools and comes along a party that is founded on rebellion against the gedolim, and therefore the schools, educators and parents should not participate in this chidon, and advertising publications should not publicize it either.

I note that they did not write that they found controversial content in the chidon making it inappropriate, just that the people who published it are rebels.

With the campaign for Jonathan Pollard's release getting into high gear and finally picking up steam after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced he would formally request the U.S. pardon (grant clemency) to Jonathan Pollard, Israel's Chief Rabbi, Rav Yona Metzger, called this afternoon for the public to write letters, to send to US President Barak Obama, on behalf of Jonathan Pollard.

Rav Metzger met with Esther Pollard, Jonathan's wife, and she described Jonathan's situation and health in prison.

Rav Metzger said people should begin flooding the White House with letters, requesting they free Jonathan Pollard immediately, and he showed Esther Pollard that he himself has already begun drafting a letter to President Obama.

Pollard has been in jail long enough. Anything you do now, now that Israel is formally making the request, has a chance like never before to have an effect on his situation.

Contact information is taken from the Justice For JP site:

Braving the cold weather, four men from the Hasidic Jewish community in Monsey picketed Monday afternoon just outside of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point to protest gays serving openly in the military.


Solomon Diamant, one of the protesters, said they were appalled by the Senate vote that ended the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy.


"Only God can establish what's wrong and what's right. We cannot uproot his rules," Diamant said. "The whole LGBT agenda is evil," using the abbreviation for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender.


One of the protest banners stated that ending the gay ban in the military "breaks the morale and undermines the fighting ability of our devoted self-sacrificing soldiers who give their lives for us and for our country. Those who are imposing this on our troops are supporting America's greatest enemies and destroying the country . Please keep our country faithful to the biblical values upon which it was founded."


Another sign stated: "I want our troops to have divine assistance. Don't downgrade moral standards."


Jim Fox, a West Point spokesman, said the protesters were outside of the academy's property and therefore, he would not comment on their appeals.


"We understand that there were four individuals outside of our Thayer Gate in the village of Highland Falls, exercising their rights to peacefully protest," Fox said.


Diamant said he and others have been protesting not only the repeal of the ban on gays in the military but also other issues involving LGBT, such as gay marriages. They have traveled to Albany, Trenton and Washington to voice their opposition to LGBT causes.


"Accepting LGBT is against God," said Rabbi Yosef Rosenberg. "It's a betrayal against mankind."


The debate over gays in the military has been settled with a historic decision to allow them to serve openly, but big questions lie ahead about how and when the change will take place, how troops will accept it and whether it will hamper the U.S. military's effort in Afghanistan and Iraq.


President Barack Obama is expected to sign into law this week the legislation that passed the Senate on Saturday, an act some believe will carry social implications as profound as President Harry S. Truman's 1948 executive order to end racial segregation in the military.


The new law probably won't go into practice for months.

Then again, four people don't exactly make much of a hafgana...

There are plenty of non-Jews in Israel who celebrate Christmas. There are also many Israelis who enjoy holiday parties, and/or greeting people with holiday wishes (perhaps based in humor and irony), and even light symbols of the holidays.

Using Christmas trees is taking it too far. This has been determined by the Rabbanut. Rav Eliyahu Shlesinger, the rav of the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem and the rav in charge of the national kashrus division of the Rabbanut.

Rav Shlesinger has said that any kosher hotel or hall that displays a Christmas tree will lose its kashrut certification.

Rav Shlesinger said, "A hotel that receives certification must be a Jewish hotel. It is impossible that in a place that has a hechsher there should be a Christian Christmas tree. We are proud to be living here in the State of Israel that is a Jewish state. It is completely illogical that in a place that has kashrut certification, and even mehadrin kashrus, they will act according to the Christian customs."

Rav Shlesinger stressed that the Rabbanut is only laying down this law regarding the outer symbols of Christmas - no tree. If people wish to have private parties, that is their business and the Rabbanut has no say in that. The Rabbanut cannot tell people all year round when they can or cannot have parties, even if it is on a Christian holiday. The Rabbanut statement is regarding the Christmas decorations alone (specifically the tree).

I think this new beauty pageant is just great. Really swell.

From JPost:

They may not wish for world peace; but in the Emirates, camel beauty queens are at least as prestigious as their human counterparts.


Over 20,000 camels and their owners from across the Gulf have converged on Abu-Dhabi's western region to participate in the Al-Mazayin camel beauty competition in the desert town of Dhafra.


The stakes are high as some 800 camel owners are vying for cash prizes of up to 35 million UAE Dirhams ($9.5 million). Sheikh Muhammad Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu-Dhabi, funds the competition which takes place at periodic intervals.


"This is the only animal we love," Salem Al-Mazroui, director of the Al-Dhafra festival which hosts the beauty pageant, told The Media Line. He explained that the competition was an opportunity to show gratitude to camels.


"A Bedouin could not survive in the past without camels, so now we want to give back to them," Al-Mazroui said.


Once the main means of transport in the simmering Arabian desert, the camel remains an important cultural icon and a source of pride for Gulf Arabs.


"Camels were our first means of transport, which is why people have grown attached to them," Ahmad Kheiri, an employee at the Al-Ain company for animal feed in Abu-Dhabi, told The Media Line. "Today people mostly use camels for racing, meat and milk."


The Al-Mazayin beauty competition includes two categories: one for light-skinned camels called Asayel, and the other for dark-skinned camels called Majahim. Camels are judged by a panel of experts from Gulf countries, who use a 100 point scale to evaluate the animals. Specific physical attributes such as nose shape, head size, whiskers and ear erection are taken into account, as well as general fitness, size and hair shine.


Al-Mazroui said that camel beauty pageants were initiated 20 years ago, as cultivators began mixing species in order to breed faster camels for racing. Sheikh Khalifah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of the UAE and Emir of Abu Dhabi, endorsed the beauty pageant as a way of maintaining the pure-bread Arabian camel, Al-Mazroui added.


"In the past, people focused only on racing and speed, but no longer," he said.


On the sidelines of the beauty pageant, camel racing and camel-milking competitions are also taking place, as well as a market where camels will be traded.


A quality camel can bring its owner a hefty sum. A white rare breed named Nomas was recently sold in a camel festival in Saudi Arabia for 3 million Saudi Riyals ($800,000), the Saudi daily Sharq reported.


According to the Sudan-based Arab Organization for Agricultural Development (AOAD), some 378,000 camels inhabited the United Arab Emirates in 2008. But in the Middle East, it is the poorer countries which tend to have more camels.


Out of a total of nearly 16 million camels in the entire Middle East and North Africa, war-torn Somalia leads by far with over 7 million camels, followed by Sudan with 4.4 million.


Muhammad Khalaf Al-Mazrouei, director general of the Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage, stressed the role of the camel beauty pageant in preserving the historical heritage of the Emirates, despite its quickly developing economy.


"In the face of the challenges of cultural erosion, which is being caused by increasing globalization, Abu Dhabi has chosen to take a balanced approach in its attitudes towards tradition and progress," he said in a press statement.


"The philosophy of the desert holds a great draw to us; exciting us and making us long to return to it whenever we can. The desert represents our cultural roots, and signifies the values that are important to us," he said.

1. I am amazed how much camels cost. 
2. I see that just like discrimination is a problem among humans, even by animals we cannot get away from it - they have segregation between "light" and "dark" camels.
3. While camels seem to be very expensive, somehow the poorest countries have the most of them..
4. This beauty pageant is to show gratitude to the camels. Opponents to human beauty pageants cite the exploitation of women. Is this how they show their gratitude to camels, by exploiting them like this?
5. The prize for the pageant is nearly $10 million! For a camel beauty pageant. Amazing. And how does giving a camel owner 10 million dollars show gratitude to the camel?
6. I wonder if they ever ask the camels contestants for their opinions on world matters, just to get juicy quotes from them..