Every act of terror and murder by Arabs is usually reported in the press as somehow related to the "Hebrew Massacre" by Dr. Goldstein last Purim. Recently, the New York Times even reported that the Arabs and their left-wing Jewish allies had the chutzpah to demand that the house of Dr. Goldstein in Kiryat Arba be sealed or demolished, complaining that "Israel had not touched the Kiryat Arba apartment of Dr. Baruch Goldstein, the Israeli settler who machine-gunned 29 Palestinians to death in Hebron in February and was himself killed."

In other words, the leftists and the Arabs are trying to "justify" any murder act against Jews with the "reasoning" that, after all, the Jews are also murderers, witness Dr. Goldstein and his "unprovoked massacre."

This dangerous canard must stop. The leftist press, starting with the New York Times, has deliberately suppressed the truth about the Goldstein incident by simply refusing to publish the blue-ribbon Shamgar Commission's report on its investigation in Hebron. This report clearly shows that Dr. Goldstein's act was not an unprovoked act of violence, but a pre-emptive strike against a looming Arab pogrom of the Jewish population of Hebron. Here is what the report says, and its conclusions should be repeated again and again.

"The investigation verifies the claim of the residents of Kiryat Arba that Goldstein acted to forestall a massacre. It should be pointed out that a day before the massacre, a proclamation was distributed in Hebron from a terrorist organization saying that a terrorist act would take place within one or two days. There is also an official verification of calls for the murder of Jews within the area of the Cave. On February 12, 1994, in the course of the Friday services in the Cave of the Patriarchs, Sheik Tayassir Tamimi gave a sermon, which was recorded by the civil administration: "For those who fly the flag of the armed struggle and those who kill, their deeds are writ in gold, theirs are exalted acts in the battle between believers and the infidels."

With the history of Arab pogroms in Hebron -- including in our days the 1929 pogrom, which claimed 69 Jewish lives -- Dr. Goldstein was fully justified to expect the worst. It is time to reveal the truth. Dr. Goldstein was not a murderer who killed Arabs without provocation nor did he want to derail the "peace" process. He wanted to save lives. And in fact he did save lives on a mass scale, because the Arabs were thwarted in their plan to kill Jews wholesale on that Purim day.

The New York Times, which published over 80 articles accusing Goldstein of unprovoked murders, should do the honorable thing and publish a full retraction and correction of the facts. Likewise, the leftist Jews who took the Goldstein incident as an excuse to launch their campaign demanding the disarming of the Jewish settlers, thereby ensuring their suicide, should admit their bias and unfounded conclusions arrived at without even the decency of waiting for the results of the painstaking investigation of the Shamgar Commission. But, as the Talmud says, "Ha'sinah meqalqelet et ha'shura"). Their hatred for anything or anyone exhibiting Jewish patriotism led them to try to crucify all nationalistic Jews in the settlements.

I received the following letter from Dr. Goldstein's father, Irwin:

Dear Dr. Lehmann,

Thank you so much for your wonderful writings. It was balm to our ravaged hearts. Perhaps someday our leaders will remove the blinders from their eyes, stop running with the deluded, persecuting pack and find the integrity to print the truth about Baruch's, z"t"l, final act of self-sacrifice. We pray that, as the season of miracles draws near, they will allow themselves to see the light, May G-d bless you.

With heartfelt gratitude,
Irwin Yisrael Goldstein

In light of the total distortion of the Goldstein act, the Arabs have not the slightest right to invoke the memory of his self-defense in the face of Arab aggression and violence. Arab murders remain unprovoked acts of sheer religious intolerance and hostility to anyone who is not a Moslem. It is intolerance and racism in the worst form -- even outdoing Hitler's anti-Semitism.

Many of the atrocious misjudgments and misstatements by Shimon Peres, the foreign minister in the Rabin Government, must be attributed to his Marxist upbringing and background. To a Marxist, everything can be explained through "historical materialism," i.e., the idea that the world is driven by strictly material considerations. Marxist materialism leaves no room for spiritual, religious factors.

When recent terrorism and violence broke out on an unprecedented scale in the Palestinian community, whether triggered by the PLO or Hamas, Peres pontificated -- as he has often done in the past when facing similar crises -- that all we need to do is to stuff the Palestinians with vast amounts of money -- and violence and terrorism will vanish. What a misreading of Islam and the Moslem world!

Anybody who saw the shattering TV documentary by Steven Emerson, "Jihad in America," knows that it is the religious leaders -- the sheiks and mullahs -- who egg on the masses to murder Jews. These murders usually take place on a Friday, the holy day in Islam, as religious "sacrifices."

Either Peres does not know, or he wants to keep it secret from his electorate, that the violence and terrorism we witness is driven by sheer unadulterated religious zeal and hatred. "When you kill a Jew you come nearer to G-d," was the outcry of the latest suicide bomber from Gaza. Would he have become a peaceful lamb if Peres had stuffed enough money into his pockets to overcome any real or imagined economic ills? Of course not. When will Peres start telling his people the truth?

Having opened the Pandora's Box to Moslem violence, it is incumbent on the Rabin-Peres team to come to grips with the fundamental problem. Islam and its attitude of hostility and intolerance to all infidels, whether Christian or Jewish. Only when the Koran and Islam are studied from the start, can a basis for accommodation be found between the Islam of today and other religions. There is ample evidence that in the beginning of Islam none of this hatred existed. To establish this I need only remind you of Mohammed's statement in the Koran (sura 17:105), I said to the children of Israel, Dwell ye in the Land, and when the days of the latter promise come, I will take you out again from among all the peoples." This was not said by Theodore Herzl, but by Mohammed in the name of Allah! The Land he promised the children of Israel included, of course, Jerusalem and Hebron!

Until the Rabin government understands the underlying religious factors, they will probably pour vast amounts of money collected by the United Jewish Appeal, Israel Bonds, Jewish National Fund, etc. -- intended for the benefit of Jews in Israel -- into the bottomless coffers of Arafat and his chums in the mistaken belief that this will pacify the Palestinian terrorists. Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, a well-known scholar, has published in the Wall Street Journal and the Jerusalem Post her finding that Arafat has deposited billions of dollars in private accounts, while he pleads poverty and goes around the world begging for more funds. The General Accounting Office of the U.S. government is already investigating these leads.

The New York Times graphically sized up the situation recently. Arafat wants money in unmarked bills handed to him without receipt or accountability, stacked in brown envelopes, and deposited in front of his door.

It must be hoped that neither the president nor Congress will be conned by either Rabin or Arafat into releasing American taxpayers' money to the PLO, in circumvention of the new Foreign Appropriations Bill, which, under the Specter-Shelby amendment, bans any payment to the PLO until it has complied with each and every commitment Arafat made before the entire world on the White House Lawn on September 13, 1993. The Peace Accord Monitoring Group, established by both political parties, will hopefully see to that.

Hundreds of rabbis who have seen a recent pro-Rabin ad signed by 19 "Orthodox" rabbis have voiced their opposition to its contents -- from the "centrist" rabbis, such as Rabbi Emanuel Rackman, to "right-wing" rabbis, including among many others, Rabbi Ahron Soloveitchik, Rabbi Avraham Hecht and the 500 rabbis of the Iggud Harabbanim, and Rav Schapiro, the former Chief Rabbi of Israel. This general opposition and criticism of those who signed the "Zahav" appeal will no doubt soon take formal shape. To make peace with the dismantling of Israel and its piece-by-piece surrender to the PLO certainly is, and will always remain, totally abhorrent to Orthodoxy. The 2,000-year-old dream and prayer for the return to Zion and Jerusalem is not about to be abandoned by the lures of a 2-year-old secular government.

To be marginalized when the truth is on your side is nothing new to authentic Jewry? Did the Maccabees mind being marginalized by the Hellinists? Did Orthodoxy mind being marginalized by the Reform during the 19th century?

The Trojan Horse ploy is being practiced on an ever-growing scale by the Israeli diplomats. Whether by strong-arm methods or not, they have recently imposed their spokesmen on audiences that are in opposition to the Rabin policies. For example, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America was thrown into turmoil when the Israeli Consulate General imposed on them Yossi Beilin as a speaker at their annual Thanksgiving convention. Beilin, who has publicly declared that he would not object to his children marrying non-Jews, in hardly the speaker you would expect at an Orthodox gathering of the OU type. This incident created a heated controversy inside the OU leadership -- which is probably what the Peres diplomats aimed at to begin with. Similarly, the forthcoming ZOA banquet on December 11 -- a very important event -- may have to swallow Ambassador Rabinovich as a guest, the man who has said that Syria can be trusted as Israel's contracting agent to watch over South Lebanon -- a statement that makes as much sense as contracting the fox to watch the chickens.

Another appalling facet of these outrageous tactics came to light recently when a prominent Jewish weekly reported that the Israeli Consulate General in New York had persuaded the corporate giant, American Telephone and Telegraph, to stop advertising in its paper because of its independent editorial policy, which is critical of the PLO-Rabin policies. Ultimately this boycott is no different from the Arab boycott of Israel, which the same consulate is fighting! But, luckily, there a re alternatives to AT&T, such as MCI and Sprint.

The first-ever joint press conference by leaders of the Christian communities of the Middle East and Africa and leaders of pro-Israel Jewish organizations will take place at noon this Sunday in the Uris room of the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Manhattan.

A statement will be read at the press conference, calling on Israel to not give up the Golan Heights and to retain, Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem.

The Christian communities that will be represented at the press conference live scattered throughout the Middle East and Africa, with the biggest concentrations in Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt and the Sudan. The Christian communities have suffered persecution at the hands of Moslem governments in these countries.

They have reached out to Jewish groups who strive for a strong Israel, because they see their own fate as being closely linked to that of Israel, which is also threatened by Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. Among the attacks that Moslems have waged against Christians are the mass murders of Sudanese Christians, the burning of churches in Lebanon and Egypt and forced conversions to Islam throughout the area.

Representatives of Congress are expected to attend the press conference.

The press conference will be led by the following Christian leaders: Dr. Shawki for the Coptic American Association; Dr. Sargon Dadesho of the Assyrian (Iraqi) National Congress; Dr. Waled Phares, President of the World Lebanese Organization; and Moses Akol of the Sudan Human Rights Association. The following Jewish organizations will be represented: Zionist Organization of America; Likud America; Pro-Israel; Jewish Action Alliance; World Committee for Israel; and Conference of Supporters of Israel.

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