ISRAEL IN CRISIS: Olmert to Split Jerusalem!

Jerusalem- The Wailing Wall
June 7, 1967

(Azure)

Sometime around 10:15 on the morning of June 7, 1967…
The first reservist paratroopers of Brigade 55 broke through the Lion’s Gate leading into the Old City of Jerusalem and reached the narrow enclave of the Western Wall. Having just fought a fierce two-day battle in the streets of east Jerusalem, they grieved for lost friends, and grieved as well for their own lost innocence in what for many was their first experience of combat. They leaned against the Wall, some in exhaustion, some in prayer. Several wept, instinctively connecting to the Wall’s tradition of mourning the destruction of the Temple and the loss of Jewish sovereignty—precisely at the moment when Jewish sovereignty over Jerusalem had been restored.

Several hours later, Yitzhak Yifat, a twenty-four-year-old reservist about to begin medical school, reached the Wall. As part of the brigade’s 66th Battalion, he and his friends had fought in the Six Day War’s toughest battle: Intimate combat against elite Jordanian Legionnaires in the trenches of Ammunition Hill, on the road to Mount Scopus. Something in their faces—perhaps a combination of exhaustion and uplift—caught the eye of news photographer David Rubinger. He lay on the ground and photographed the paratroopers, who appeared, in the subsequent photograph, almost statuesque. Though the newspaper captions claimed the paratroopers were gazing up at the Wall, they were in fact standing with their backs to it, looking off into the distance, at an object or a scene beyond the photograph’s reach.

Yifat is the centerpoint of the photograph, and not only because he is physically positioned there. Among his friends, only Yifat’s face is truly memorable; the faces around him seem to blur into his. Partly that is because he alone has removed his helmet, revealing the civilian beneath the soldier. Yifat also allows himself to appear vulnerable: While the men around him are tight-lipped, suppressing emotion, his mouth is open, as if trying to express the ineffable.

“The Photograph: A Search For June 1967”
Yossi Klein Halevi
Azure
Summer 2007

But, this will all change if the Olmert Government has its way.
Jerusalem will be split.

Benjamin Netanyahu gave a riveting speech today blasting the Olmert Government at the opening of the Knesset.
One Jerusalem and The Jerusalem Post reported:

At the opening of the Knesset Winter Session, Likud Chairman Binyamin Netanyahu lashed out at the government’s policy, claiming that its strategy would eventually lead to an Iranian terrorist presence in Jerusalem and the rest of Israel.

“The unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon created an Iranian outpost – from which Israel is being attacked – in the North, and the unilateral pullout from Gaza created a second Iranian base in Gaza, ‘Hamastan,'” Netanyahu said. “And now the government is planning a third withdrawal – from Judea and Samaria – that will lead to a third Iranian outpost.”

Netanyahu quoted statements made by Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert before the withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza, respectively, saying the two had promised security, while Israel was in actuality served with aggression and terror.

“Giving Hamas half of Jerusalem will make the rest of Jerusalem unlivable,” Netanyahu said. “Giving up Judea and Samaria will transfer the areas controlling the coastal plain into the hands of Hamas, leading to Kassams…on Tel Aviv.”

“According to the government’s plans, Israel will pull back to the 67′ borders. Obviously, this is the plan and any attempts to disguise it are futile,” he said. “We are facing an exact replica of the government’s plan at the Camp David summit in 2000.”

“This is no way to make peace,” the former prime minister lamented.

There is much more on the Fight for Jerusalem HERE.

Israel Matzav reports on the latest doomed “road map” for peace.

Please, sign the petition to save Jerusalem HERE if you have not already done so.

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Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

You can email Jim Hoft here, and read more of Jim Hoft's articles here.

 

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