18% of Likud Central Committee Votes on Amendments
Excerpts;
“On December 20, Likud chairman Binyamin Netanyahu’s first day on the job, he announced that he was embarking on a quest to rid the party of ‘criminal and negative elements.'”
“Two weeks later, the former mobsters are still in the Likud central committee and neither Feiglin nor any of his allies have been banished from the party.”
“The central committee voted on Sunday to prevent a Likud member who has been convicted of a crime and sentenced to at least three months in jail from running for the Likud’s Knesset slate and party institutions in the future, but the proposal had no immediate impact.”
“Likud director-general Arik Brami said the Likud spent NIS 150,000 to rent two buildings in the Tel Aviv Fairgrounds, pay for security and set up a computer system to count the votes. Only 550 people, 18.2 percent of the central committee’s 3,000 members, came out to vote on a sunny day in Tel Aviv. Two hours of speeches that were expected before the vote were canceled because no one volunteered to speak.”
“One of the reasons for the low voter turnout was that Feiglin announced in the press conference that he was willing to drop his candidacy for the Likud’s Knesset slate. Before leaving the race, Feiglin is waiting for a decision by the head of the Likud’s election committee, Judge Zvi Cohen, on whether he could have run legally had he wanted to.”
“The proposal reviewed by the central committee allows Cohen to permit convicted felons to run if he decides that their crime lacked moral turpitude. Cohen will rule on Monday which Knesset candidates who have been imprisoned will be allowed to run.”
“The judge is expected to give his okay to Feiglin, who was convicted in 1997 of ‘seditious acts and publications and unlawful assembly’ during his protests of the Oslo Accords, as well as former prisoners of Zion Natan Sharansky and Yuli Edelstein and former prime minister Yitzhak Shamir, who was imprisoned by the British and is likely to be placed in the ceremonial 120th slot on the Likud list.”
For the complete story of which the editorial below is read in context, click here.
Who’s the Fascist? Feiglin? His foes?
Excerpts;
“In one stroke, Feiglin … hinted that an entire generation of Likud leaders, a group that includes Netanyahu, Livnat, Uzi Landau and a host of others, may have owed some of their prominence to a toch of nepotism, as their parents were proteges and lieutenants of the founders of right-Revisionist Zionism.”
“Some of his followers have been less charitable, suggesting that it is not Feiglin who is anti-democratic and in favor of the ways and means of fascism, but rather his political opponents.”
Excerpts;
“The national phenomenon called ‘The No Spin Zone’ is associated with Long Island native Bill O’Reilly, who joined the Fox News Channel as the anchor/host of The O’Reilly Factor in 1996. Today, he is the most-watched cable news program in the USA and the powerful in America duck for cover as the rigidly enforced ‘No Spin Zone’ deals with issues in a straightforward, analytic and provocative manner. Both of O’Reilly’s nonfiction books, The O’Reilly Factor and The No Spin Zone, were No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list.”
“I cannot say the same about Israeli news and television. On a recent visit to Israel, I was jolted by the level of derision and cynicism on the part of journalists directed towards their interviewees. This was especially true if the hapless interviewee was opposed to ceding land to the PLO.”
“The above is indicative of a deeper malaise that Jews world-wide are confronted with post-Disengagement. The word ‘disengagement’ is a sanitized term that was utilized to legitimize throwing people out of their homes and communities. The destruction of Gush Katif must serve as a clear and present warning to the rest of world Jewry as to what happens when fascism in Israel parades as democracy and nationalism.”
“More importantly, and of immediate concern, is that we must respond to the muted cry of the thousands of uprooted men woman and children of Gush Katif, whose lives were shattered by a barbaric and cruel political leadership. Now, everything must be done to alleviate their immediate suffering and wretched homelessness.”
“The deliberate silence and disinterest being shown to the Jews of Gush Katif by the elected government of Israel and by the majority of communal organizations in the USA and their leadership mirrors the world-wide silence on the pronouncements of the new Iranian Hitler and his cohorts from Saudi Arabia.”
The Right Minority and the Wrong Majority
Excerpts:
“One should never feel that one is wrong simply because the majority disagrees with one’s position. A brief review of Jewish history, replete with such cases, illustrates the rule that the minority is invariably correct and all too often has to save the majority from itself.”
“The majority of Israel were G-d fearing Jews, but did not have the courage of their beliefs to fight back. It took a minor country priest in Modi’in by the name of Matithias (Matityahu), the son of Yochanan, the former High Priest, together with his seven sons, to lead a revolt that subsequently saved the nation of Israel from the Assyrian Greeks.”
“But it should be noted that the revolt that began in Modi’in was a guerrilla war fought by a mere 600 committed Jewish soldiers under the Maccabee banner. Their war lasted for three and a half years before they succeeded in entering Jerusalem and liberating the Holy Temple, including the now celebrated miracle of the oil, for which we light the Chanukah menorah today. During that three and half year period, they fought alone, without popular support from the non-Hellenist Jewish majority. Only after the liberation of the Temple did the majority join the valiant minority and continue the war of liberation against the domination of the Assyrian Greeks – physically and culturally – for another twenty seven years, until final victory.”