When Benjamin Netanyahu entered the Great Synagogue in Paris accompanied by French President François Hollande, he felt at home. The man who had to make his way to the ranks of world leaders at the protest rally in which some three million people marched through the streets of Paris.
What hasn't been said and written about this trip? About the French mistake and Netanyahu's shame, and about the expenses of this trip that cost the taxpayer about 700,000 NIS. When the media decided to cover Netanyahu's trip to Paris, it already gave the public a comprehensive account of Netanyahu's trips around the world during this short term, which amounted to about 7.5 million NIS. .
But all this headache was worth it for five minutes of peace when Benjamin Netanyahu and his entourage entered the synagogue, where he was greeted with chants of "Bibi Bibi" and "Israel." There was a man in the audience who shouted at him, "Bibi help us." Anyone who happened to be there would have thought that he had not come to a synagogue but to a major Likud event. The public showered Netanyahu with a warmth and love that he does not receive in Israel. And Netanyahu responded to the audience. His face, flushed with pleasure, said it all.
So what if the French didn't want Netanyahu to come, and as a result of Netanyahu's arrival at the rally in Paris they were forced to invite Abbas, the chairman of the Palestinian Authority? So what if the chairman of the PA is a man for whom terrorism is synonymous - the man who can teach world leaders how to massacre boys and children just because they are Jewish (the massacre in Ma'alot is attributed to Abbas as one of the people who carried out this attack)?
When Israeli media outlets asked for a response to Netanyahu's visit, the French embassy chose to respond: "It would be wrong to discuss this while the prime minister is in France." They dodged with diplomatic elegance.
The Brilliant Mirpok
However, alongside the elegant evasion, as the heads of state began their parade from the boulevard, named after one of the French thinkers, Netanyahu found himself standing in the second row behind French President Hollande and German Chancellor Merkel.
The march began to move forward, hundreds of photographers and media personnel broadcast the rally live. In the first row marched 23 leaders and prime ministers from around the world, and Netanyahu was in the second row. Bibi, a graduate of the Sayeret, adopted the skills that only Israelis have in such situations: he flanked to the right to shake the hand of the President of Mali, Ibrahim Keita, and while shaking hands, elbowed himself into a place in the first row.
Netanyahu's brilliant maneuver gave the parade an Israeli flavor. There is no doubt that Israeli leaders have always known the law of the land. The embarrassing thing about this story is that it has become a national and international affair. Not like that famous story about one of the junior rabbis who called a newspaper editorial office and asked to speak to the editor, and in the conversation told him that his secretary had sent the editor important news and was asking him to add the title of Rabbi Gaon to his name, and not the initials (Rahag) as the newspaper had done until now.
The editor was embarrassed and the rabbi's secretary was even more embarrassed. At the end of the conversation, the secretary asked the rabbi, "Honorable Rabbi, don't you think it's disrespectful of you to humiliate yourself like this in front of a young editor and ask for this?" And the rabbi replied, "Tomorrow morning, thousands of people will receive the newspaper and see the title attached to my name. But only one knows what the price of humiliation was." The rabbi replied.
In the story with Netanyahu, an entire nation knew what Netanyahu did to stand in line with world leaders.
The threat to Europe
About a year ago, I published a major magazine article about the great threat facing the European continent. In the magazine article, I cited a comprehensive report by one of the population management organizations in Europe, which paints a worrying picture - Europe is slowly becoming a Muslim continent.
Entire cities are being taken over by Muslim immigrants. When I visited Brussels, the capital of Belgium, a short time ago, there were neighborhoods that the hosts explained to me they did not enter even during the day. In Paris, there are many neighborhoods where the police and law and order have no grip. The Jews and local French have left, and immigrants from Islamic countries have taken their place.
On Rosh Hashanah Eve, I went with a Haredi press delegation to England and Ireland. During my visit to England, I met with the leaders of the Muslim community. Only when you get there and see the extent of the activity of the Muslim community in London do you realize that Europe is changing shape. Muslims live in London where Jews lived 80 years ago, except that the Jews got rich and moved to the prestigious suburbs of the city, and Muslims took their place. The synagogue located next door also serves as silent testimony to the vibrant Jewish life that used to be there.
The situation is similar in the 'Religious Keepers' community in Brussels that I visited. The community that attracted the Jews of Brussels who returned to Belgium after World War II, which had good and prosperous days when the community institutions offered the local Jews three prayers, a system of Torah lessons for adults and young people, activities on weekdays and on Shabbat and on holy days, a kosher system and a purification bath - all of this stands desolate today.
The Chief Rabbi of Brussels, Rabbi Menachem Hadad, told me: "The Arabs took over the neighborhood, the local Jews left for the prestigious suburbs of the city, and some left for the world that is all good." Following this, Chief Rabbi Hadad founded the Me'in Hai community, which today has over 600 members, mostly young people.
The Netherlands already has a Muslim mayor. This is a testament to the changes taking place in Europe. However, the biggest shock is the return of Europeans who are fighting in the ranks of the murderous organization ISIS. These murderers are the ones who carried out the series of attacks in France. The terrorist who murdered the four Jews in a supermarket in Paris was photographed before his killing spree with the ISIS flag behind him. As of this writing, a large-scale manhunt is underway in London for a cell of a Muslim organization, but so far no one has been caught.
The enlightened Europe that speaks in terms of freedom, equality, and justice is today in a struggle against the global terrorism that is striking it, if it does not change direction within a few years.
Reform Rabbi and Women of the Western Wall
On Tuesday, internal elections were held in the Labor Party. The struggle for a place at the top was tough.
As it currently stands, MK Shelly Yachimovitz took third place, while MK Eitan Cabel, the faction chairman, took tenth place. The road to the Knesset was difficult for many of the incumbent Knesset members. As we can see, MKs Stav Shapir, Itzik Shmuli, and Meirav Michaeli are in the top ten - which makes the Labor Party a left-wing party, not a center-left one.
It is worth noting that over the past two years, Labor MKs have cooperated with the opposition's decisions regarding the recruitment of yeshiva students. However, it is important to remember that Stav Shafir worked together with the Women of the Western Wall. The leader of the Reform community in Israel is also running on the Labor list.
As you may recall, about three months ago I revealed that Shaul Mofaz was dissolving Kadima and joining the Labor Party. I mentioned to you that the party had large debts, and Mofaz fired the team of officials who were in the party. The floor in the office building that Kadima rented was also vacated. The person who led the move was the brother of party chairman Yitzhak Herzog, who served as Mofaz's military advisor when he was defense minister.
However, it turns out that this move is not going so quietly. About three weeks ago, MK Yuval Zellner and former MK Dr. Doron Avital filed a petition with the Kadima court, in which the court was asked to order the annulment of a series of decisions by MK Shaul Mofaz, which were made at a meeting that Mofaz illegally convened.
That meeting was convened in a sleight of hand, in violation of the bylaws, and all with the aim of legalizing the transfer of Kadima's party funding to the Labor Party, in exchange for securing Mofaz's place on the Labor list. To allow the chairman to pass the resolution, 160 members who were not from Mofaz's camp were "removed" from the council, which had 187 members, and over 20 associates were appointed to ensure an absolute majority.
The party's court ordered Mofaz to notify it before any agreement with another party, so that the court could convene urgently to decide on the petition. The court also sharply criticized Mofaz's conduct throughout the process, as he tried in every possible way to stall for time in order to prevent MK Zellner and former MK Avital from potentially competing against him for party leadership.
Mofaz, on the other hand, denied the authority of the court because, according to him, his term of office had long expired. In this state of affairs, and in Mofaz's view, the party does not have a court, which gives him extremely broad authority as a sole ruler.
The court, headed by former judge Yishai Levitt, ruled that it would not accept a situation in which Mofaz becomes the totalitarian ruler of the party and the organizing committee, and that the court would insist that the party remain democratic. On January 11, 2015, the court rejected Mofaz's request to cancel the hearing because the court lacked jurisdiction.
A request submitted yesterday reveals that after the court ruled against Mofaz, the latter announced an urgent meeting of the council the day before the hearing on the petition, in order to dismiss the court and select a new court in its place. Mofaz also announced that at this meeting he would submit the report of the organizing committee. In doing so, he is effectively ignoring the court's decisions up to now.
When I asked MK Eitan Cabel whether Mofaz would be the Labor Party's 'security expert', he replied: "Not just him, we are managing to arrive with a number of other senior officials.".
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