Friends of Itamar

Leah’s Blog – Parashat BalaK 2023

Leah’s Blog – Balak June 2023

One day a few years ago as we were driving from Abilene to Midland I turned to Moshe and said laughing, “What in heck are we doing here!” Someone had given us a tip about a great man, Dick S., that loves Israel with a passion and that we should try and meet him. We had just come down from Albuquerque to Texas, meeting people with entirely other lives than our own, that the chances of that happening were about one in a billion. What would I, a Jewish girl from Brooklyn New York that decided to move out to Israel’s heartland and live there for many years without even venturing out of it be doing on this long dusty dry road decorated with hundreds of oil rigs? If I had the time I could write a manifest about the life and times of a Jewish settler, and that of a woman no less. It would be about how it seems we are constantly thrown under the bus, cursed by mainstream media, world governments and leaders and have dealings that are not too pretty even with our own government here in Israel. Yet the flipside of that is the blessings that came and come out of the apparent truth most are blinded to. Those blessings are the people that are clear sighted and know truth, identify with it and us and want to support, our dear friends. In fact, these little greenhorns (us) were quite baffled in the beginning of our journeys out seeking help for our community when we discovered that most (not all) of our fellow Jews were not on our side.

I was more than happy to make clear the facts about how Israel has been settling for the last 3,500 years, about how the so called “West Bank, a derogatory term used to rebrand the heartland of Israel and show plainly on the map where it really is, especially to the ignorant and to the opposing side. Preaching to the choir did and does strengthen important bonds, yet the objective is to prove and put doubt beyond. So, we reached Dick who was happy to come to our speaking event there in Midland and who later committed to helping. A small crowd gathered, no one we knew obviously but all who came to this event wanted to bless and be blessed. Dick, a tall strong man stooped down to us and said- “I’ve been blessed because I bless Israel!” He showed us the many projects he helps from hospitals to schools here. This is our story. This is the manifest. Parshat Balak is all about how to view Israel- we can look at her skin deep and see a lot of faults and believe a lot of lies, or we can focus on a deeper call, a Divine Providence which made her, Israel, separate from other nations. How do we relate to her? The deeper we look into her roots and history, the more we can ignore the glitches that happen here and focus on the process of the developing story of redemption. Israel stands glorious, this is clear to the eye. How goodly are your tents!

Again, in a pro BDS promotion, the present administration in the State Department has all but fabricated a blood libel against Jewish settlers in this heartland. The statement – ” we will not stand by and watch innocent people be hurt by the wild settlers”, couldn’t be further from the truth. Jewish people are being murdered here on a weekly basis. Why is the truth being twisted. I thought we were through with dragging around and showing how in fact the opposite is the case and that we do not educate to hate and murder, we are the ones being shot at. We are the ones having our car windows bashed. This sick campaign of anti-Semitic aggression against law abiding innocent citizens must stop.  This is no less than the Protocol of the Elders of Zion. We are so tired of being the scapegoat and they are so barking up the wrong tree. This is about the terror against us. And now I turn to American Rabbis and ask and say: “אל תעמוד על דם רעך”- “DO NOT STAND ON THE BLOOD OF YOUR BROTHERS!”

Curses turn to blessings- “How beautiful are your tents, Jacob,
your dwelling places, Israel! (Numbers 24:5)

“Enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes. For you will spread out to the right and to the left; your descendants will inherit nations and settle in their desolate cities.

(Isaiah 54:2)

Shabbat shalom, Leah