Gary Cooperberg, January 5, 2006

In today’s Jerusalem Post, commentator Larry Derfner, lashes out at the Jewish Community in Hebron. Not merely does he label the entire community as "a pack of crazies," but he goes so far as to declare that even Jews who come to visit Hebron are abnormal.

What would cause a logical thinking Jew to make such outrageous statements? Can he really believe that the tens of thousands of Jews who flock to Hebron on Succot and Passover, not to mention Parshat Chayey Sara, are somehow "abnormal. He also "claims that the Jews in Hebron have such powers of persuasion as to be able to transform all normal tourists into crazy fanatics as well. If this were true I would expect that these Jewish Mezmers would be flocking to the Knesset to transform our self-hating leaders into good observant Jews. And maybe even have a talk with a few Jerusalem Post commentators as well.

What apparently bothered Derfner was the Israel television reporting of the attempt by Israeli police to serve eviction notices to Jews living in the area of the Hebron market without proper governmental approval. It is only political pressure, which has prevented the government from granting this approval since the properties in question are clearly Jewish properties. Yet Derfner jumps on the bandwagon of the self-haters who prefer to appease our Arab enemies rather than to be honest about the facts. It was Arabs who stole these, and many more, properties from Jews in Hebron and not the other way around. Arab squatters first murdered the Jews and then took over their property. Why then would a Jewish government think to throw out Jewish redeemers of Jewish property and hand it back to the thieving murderers?

He then has the chutzpa to suggest that if Jews have the right to return to Jewish properties in Hebron, then Arabs should have the right to return to Arab properties Jerusalem and elsewhere in Israel. What he blithely fails to acknowledge is the fact that Arabs abandoned those properties in the belief that the Jews would be defeated in war and that the properties would then be returned to them. How dare he compare the voluntary desertion of enemies of the Jewish people from the Jewish homeland to the massacre of Jews by Arab enemies?

And then, to bring home his point that Hebron Jews are fanatic crazies, he labels and libels Dr. Baruch Goldstein as an example of Jewish terrorism. Baruch Goldstein did not send his children to blow themselves up in an Arab market place. He personally risked and gave his life to prevent an intended slaughter of Jews by those very "innocent" worshipers whom he gunned down as they were chanting "slaughter the Jews" during their ritual frenzies prior to murdering Jews. It is a deliberate wicked slander to suggest that Dr. Goldstein simply murdered peaceful worshipers at prayer. Derfner is either totally ignorant of the facts, or a rabid self-hater. When he calls people deceitful he would do well to look deeply into the mirror. For it is he who is deceiving both himself and his readers with his crude and outrageous suggestions.

Gary Cooperberg, a resident of the Jewish community in Hebron, Israel, is the founder and director of Project Shofar.

Copyright © 2006 Gary Cooperberg