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Archive 2003
Recent
Investments in Israel Illinois Teachers Pension Fund ($25MN), California Institute of Technology (Cal Tech) Pension Fund, Ontario State Employees Pension Fund, Bank of America, Harbor West and Japan’s NIF and Nippon have participated in the closing of $140MN by Israel’s Evergreen VC Fund. Evergreen’s success is due to the track record of the Israeli VC funds and in defiance of security concerns. Astute investors have noticed that the presence of the Dot.Com companies in Israel has been much slimmer than in the US, and that most Israeli technologies are solid engineering (production/export oriented) in nature (Globes, Sept. 15, 2003, The Marker, Sept. 14). (Full Report) The
Lessons Learned Upon the RESTRAINT AND LOW-INTENSITY WAR have been the wet dream of terrorists and the nightmare of democratic societies. Israel’s restraint has generated more terrorism, while eroding Israel’s posture of deterrence and – unnecessarily – undermining the confidence of Israelis – and of Israel’s friends – in Israel’s just cause as well as in Israel’s capabilities to overcome terrorism. (Full Commentary) The
Silence That Was a Thunderbolt Jimmy Carter, the peanut farmer, ran an austere White House. Consonant with his innate Calvinistic intuitions, he cast himself in the role of citizen-president. He banned Hail to the Chief, slashed the entertainment budget, sold the presidential yacht, pruned the limousine fleet, and generally rid his mansion of foppery, artifice, and pretentiousness. He even carried his own bag. (Full Commentary) Road
Map-Induced Homicide Bombing The
HORRIFIC HOMICIDE BOMBING has been induced by well-meaning policy-makers
in the US and Israel, who have chosen to sacrifice reality on
the altar of wishful thinking. Investing
in Israel According to JOSEPH HOGAN, GE-MEDICAL’S CEO AND PRESIDENT, "Security has had little impact on our decision to sustain investment in Israel. The track record of the last 4-5 years’ investment in Israel has been positive, and we look forward to the next 5 years… (Full Report) Shavuos:
Sssssh-vuos,
the Undated Anniversary Shavuos
is a late-Spring, early-Summer yomtov, and our only festival with
no well-defined date, despite its association with a singularly
imposing theophany, Sinai; a time when "no bird put forth
their song, no bird took wing, no ox gave bawl, no angel moved
a feather…the sea did not roar
no creature said a word." Remembrance
Day for the Fallen of Israel’s Wars and Israel Independence Day Securing
a Jewish Future in the FSU The story of post-Soviet Jewry is told through the many people who work every day with survivors of the Shoah, with young adults who are transforming life in Ukraine, and with the children who represent the future of the Jewish community. Rabbi Yakov Bleich, Chief Rabbi of Ukraine, has lived in Kyiv for 13 years. Rabbi Shmuel Kaminezki, Chief Rabbi of Dnepropetrovsk, has lived there for ten. They have built new lives and are raising their children there. Elsewhere, representatives of the Joint Distribution Committee, the Jewish Agency and the Israeli government, some of whom grew up in the FSU and made aliyah, have returned to Ukraine – frequently bringing Israeli-born family members with them – so life will be better for Jews in the 21st century than it was in the last. (Full Story) The REFORMulation
of Judaism In
response to the frequently asked question “Why could he or
she do things that you canât do? Arenât you both Jewish?” Purim:
Un
Peuple d’Elite A
sophisticated man slanders Jews for keeping Jewish holidays. He
then rolls the dice of hate so badly that he becomes responsible
for adding another Jewish festival to the very calendar that he
so despises; in fact, he single-handedly creates Purim, the zaniest
festival of them all, a lively and boisterous day of prayer and
parody, law and levity. (Full
Story)
Pesach:
Passing on Heritage The peak of Egyptian oppression occurred under the 67 year reign of Rameses 11. The Jews rejoiced at his death, prematurely it seems. For it was under the tyranny of his successor, Mernephtah, that "they cried to God," in an agonizing period of serfdom that lasted from 1522 to 1312 BC. This Pharaoh was a phony Pharaoh: according to the Midrash he would study the times of the tides of the Nile, and enter the water precisely the moment that the water began to rise, so that it should appear to be rising to honor him. (Full Story)
Passover
Reflections THOMAS JEFFERSON’s PROPOSAL FOR THE DESIGN OF THE OFFICIAL SEAL OF THE UNITED STATES FEATURED THE EXODUS FROM EGYPT: The parting of the sea, with Pharaoh’s chariots in pursuit and the motto "Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God." Jefferson considered Americans as the modern day Hebrews fleeing State controlled religion of 1600s England, and America as the modern day Promised Land. Just like many other Founding Fathers, Jefferson followed John Lock’s appreciation of the Old Testament (Lock read Hebrew!), as a key legal guideline for democratic societies. In fact, many colonists expressed their high regard for Judaism by teaching Hebrew (e.g. Harvard). (Full Story) |
The
Red Sea Revisited