Trump forced Netanyahu to do the deal in order for Trump to brag that it happened because of his threat that "all Hell would break loose" if a deal was not done by January 20.

 I am posting Rabbi Dov's essay after the ceasefire "deal" has been announced. As a parent and a human, of course, I am conflicted. Having said that, Dov's essay has very much merit in my eyes.PM

 

Catastrophe

 

To save 33 tragically kidnaped hostages (and they won't all be alive), Israel will be consigning thousands of Jews to their future deaths. This is not "maybe." This is guaranteed. It happens every time.

Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer - Jan. 14, 2025

 

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Hostage CrisisNegotationsRabbi Prof. Dov Fischer

• 2 minutes

They are talking about inking a deal between Netanyahu and Hamas. As I write, the deal is not yet done. In the Talmud, Masekhet (Tractate) Brakhot, King Chizkiyah (Hezekiah) actually lectures the Prophet Yishaya (Isaiah), who had been sent to him by G-d to tell him that his life soon would be over.

The King, upon learning the sin for which he was being punished, declared his repentance. The Prophet said it was too late; the decree had been issued. The King responded with a fundamental Jewish concept: even when a Jew has a murderer’s knife pressed on his throat, it still is not too late to pray. Accordingly, until such a Netanyahu-Hamas deal is done, it is not too late to pray. Even if — G-d forbid — such a deal is inked, it will not be too late to pray.

Or to act.

The media reports say Israel will be agreeing to a three-phase deal. Phase One would include (i) an immediate six-week ceasefire, (ii) the Arab release of 33 (but not all) of their kidnaped hostages, some alive and some dead, and (iii) Israel releasing hundreds of convicted Arab murderers. But, in Netanyahu’s show of great "fortitude", he will not release the corpse of Yahya Sinwar under any circumstances. Only living Arab murderers with documented blood on their hands, just waiting to get back in the game.

Much of Israel will be celebrating wildly. Dancing in the streets. Champagne, though not from Milchin, will be flowing. Cigars, though not from Milchin, will be puffing. Channels 11, 12, and 13 will be leading the celebrations. Front pages will cheer at least from Haaretz to Maariv to Yediot and maybe Makor Rishon.

Those who would cheer are fools.

They cheered after Sharon’s 2005 Disengagement, and they lived to weep while burying their children who died for the moment of joy 18 years earlier.

It is a HORRIBLE, TRAGIC deal. One Hundred of Israel’s leading rabbinic authorities have publicly declared what almost every Torah scholar who supports IDF service knows: The Halakha (Judaic law) forbids endangering the nation even for the precious mitzvah of redeeming the captives. Tractate Gittin sets forth laws and limits on Pidyon Shvuyim (Redeeming Captives). One does not — may not — pay just any price. The Shulchan Arukh (Code of Jewish Law), at 252:4, declares: “Captives are not to be ransomed at an unreasonable cost, for the safety of society.” Read the letter of the 100 Torah Sages here and see the [Hebrew] letter of organizations such as the Heroism Forum, Hope Forum, Reservists Forum and more.

 
The mainstream left-wing media in Israel, who brainwash half the population, are thrilled with the agreement. Much of the Likud government coalition love it, too, because Likud Members of Knesset (MKs) follow Netanyahu like lemmings. He dispenses their crumbs, committee assignments, ministries — even who gets to be a consul or ambassador in a country although he barely speaks their language, who gets a free trip to America at government expense, who gets to be on the next election list in a safe spot so as to build up a millionaire’s lifetime pension. So they will vote like lemmings as others did for Sharon.

The Haredi parties in the government coalition will support the deal not because the halakha demands Pidyon Shvuyim “at any cost” — it does not and they know it — but because, as the IDF soldiers come back from Gaza, it will reduce pressure on Haredim to shoulder their proper responsibility in the defense of the nation, beyond their incredibly holy and blessedly critical Torah learning, as do Yeshivat Hesder boys. Israel cannot survive without their Torah learning, their yeshivot and kollelim. Absolutely. But they don't want even the haredi young men who are not learning, of which there are many, to join the army. But the return of the soldiers will relieve their shoulders.

Meanwhile, Gideon Sa'ar's four votes will support it, too, so Sa'ar can remain Foreign Minister and take a shot at Bibi’s seat some day.

That leaves the two on the right, Smotrich's Religious Zionist Party (RZP) and Ben-Gvir's Otzmah. One does not bring down a right-wing-oriented Israeli government over a budget cut. However, one does do so over a perfidy to the nation and to future generations. Smotrich and Ben-Gvir surely will denounce the deal and will have their 14 MKs vote against it. However, it is not clear whether they will quit the Coalition. If they do, great. But what will that achieve? Will it risk losing momentum on further building in Judea and Samaria? Does that matter enough?

If Smotrich and Ben-Gvir remain in the Coalition but simply vote against this deal, the deal would pass easily anyway. The leftist opposition all will vote for it -- especially the two Arab parties. Lapid, who promised a safety net for the vote, may even offer to hand over some natural gas properties to Hamas. So, if Netanyahu proposes it, it will pass smoothly with more than 100 votes of the 120. Think back to the Gaza Disengagement. To all the retreats.

The deal would free 300 or more Hamas murderers right away, some held in prison for more than a decade. Some sentenced to 20 and more life sentences without parole. (What a joke!) So, to save 33 tragically kidnaped hostages (and they won't all be alive), Israel will be consigning thousands of Jews to their future deaths. This is not "maybe." This is guaranteed. It happens every time.

To save one precious Jewish life who previously was taken hostage by Arabs (not his fault at all, but his father and the willing media's fault, and I feel bad for him that his name always is mentioned in this regard, so I won’t), Israel ultimately released a lop-sided thousand of these same types of Arab cutthroats. One was a guy named Yahya Sinwar. A whole bunch of Arab psychopaths like him. That led to Intifada in Judea and Samaria, to building of Hamas, to several deadly wars, and now to the over 2,000 who have died since October 7, 2023 (1,200 that day and over 800 Israeli soldiers since).

Yahya Sinwar in Gaza-remember him? Freed in Schalit deal

It is a terrible deal. It leaves Hamas alive to govern Gaza and to fight again in five years, with all their old pals back in the fray. Hamas will dance in the streets, a scene we see after every “ceasefire” that they regard as an Israeli “capitulation and surrender.” It eliminates the restored specter of Israeli invincibility and deterrence. It shows that Israel is afraid to win. It emboldens other Arabs. So the question is "Why"? Netanyahu always declared he would not leave without "Nitzachon Mushlam" ("Complete Victory"). My best guess:

Biden is irrelevant. He is out in less than a week. He cannot do anything. An embargo? Trump can overrule it his first day. A UN vote for a "Two State"? No UN vote matters, just as Obama's and Kerry's Security Council Resolution 2334 of December 2016 never ended up mattering, even though it was the Security Council, not just the General Assembly, declaring that Israel is barred from the eastern part of Jerusalem, even the Kotel. It meant nothing. Soon after, America was moving its embassy into Jerusalem and declaring that Israeli communities anywhere in Judea and Samaria are totally legal as long as Israel’s Supreme Court does not say otherwise.

So Biden and Blinken do not matter. Therefore, again, one asks: “Why the Netanyahu perfidy this time?”

I have only one guess that I can process. Nothing else is remotely conceivable to me. My guess. It is only a hunch:

Trump forced Netanyahu to do the deal in order for Trump to brag that it happened because of his threat that "all Hell would break loose" if a deal was not done by January 20. (Biden will brag, too, but that was like Jimmy Carter, of accursed memory, y'rakvu atzmotav, bragging that he freed the Iran hostages as Reagan was being sworn in.)

For Netanyahu to agree to such a terrible thing -- and he knows how disastrous this is -- I can only guess that, in return, Trump promised Netanyahu that, if Israel does the deal to make Trump look good, then Trump will assist Netanyahu in wiping out Iran's nuclear sites and maybe even in assassinating Khameini and maybe even in taking down the whole Iranian regime. (Trump would not send American troops because he is committed to avoiding all future ruinous wars that other presidents before him have entered. But he could send bunker-busting bombs and aerial support and all kinds of stuff, and twist NATO arms including Turkey, as when he assassinated Qassen Soleimani and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.)

Thus, maybe Netanyahu did an analysis: “If I let the 300 bestial Arab murderers out, that will lead to, say, the murder of 3,000-5,000 Jews over the next 10 years. On the other hand, if Iran's nuclear system is knocked out and Khameini is assassinated and the Khameini regime taken down, that will save more than multiples of 5,000 Jews who could get killed by Iranian nukes. It also could strangle all the Iranian proxies (Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthis, and Abbas in the AEJS, the Arab Entity in Judea and Samaria,)

That's my best guess. It offers the only rationale I can grasp. Netanyahu’s heart is in the right place, but Bibi likes to over-think himself into a cleverness that means well and that makes him proud that he is the smartest guy in the neighborhood — but is not. Like letting Qatar send Hamas a billion shekels a year so that Gaza and the AEJS each would be led by a competing murderous government that never would be able to unite as a pretextual “Palestine.” Or clever ceasefires that always kept the Arabs divided, with Hamas alive to threaten Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas). Clever. But it didn't work, did it?

A further wistful thought: And maybe Trump would agree to recognize Israeli annexation of Judea and Samaria? That would help make some sense of all this, but I don't think so. Ambassador Mike Huckabee would push for it. Secretary of State Marco Rubio would back it. So would Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Vivek Ramaswamy supports it, too. Musk could be persuaded. But I don’t think that’s in this deal’s background. Nor would even that justify this catastrophic deal.

My prayer is that Hamas somehow insanely will turn down and sabotage the proposed deal at the last moment. A similar hopeless moment came when Clinton forced an all-too-willing treacherous Ehud Barak to give Arafat 97% of the land he demanded for a country to be called "Palestine," including the eastern part of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, plus land within interior Israel in the primarily Arab-populated Galilee Triangle comprising territory equal in size to the 3% of Judea and Samaria Barak could not cede. Clinton and Barak offered Arafat -- on a silver platter -- a nightmare of a deal.

And, by G-d's miracle, He hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and Arafat turned down the deal. That made no sense then and is one of the greatest Divine Miracles I have seen in my lifetime, that Arafat turned down everything he asked for.

That's my hope. But we do not rely on miracles. And lightning does sometimes strike twice. Especially when Israeli prime ministers get the insane idea that they will be advancing Israeli security by giving Arabs territory that belongs to Israel and that Jewish, Druze, and even some Arab boys and girls died for on Israel’s behalf.

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