Yesterday was Tisha B’Av or the ninth of the month of Av. I’ve written about the 9th of Av or Tisha B’Av a few times. But a quick refresher from Chabad.org 18 Tisha B’Av Facts Every Jew Should Know Just a bit
- Tisha B’Av Is the Saddest Day of the Jewish Calendar
Tisha B’Av, the 9th day of the month of Av (Jul. 26-27, 2023), is the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. Referred to by the prophet as “the fifth [month] fast,”1 it is second in severity only to Yom Kippur, which is mandated in the Torah.
- It Commemorates Several Tragic Events
Both Holy Temples in Jerusalem were destroyed on this date. The First Temple was burned by the Babylonians in 423 BCE and the Second Temple fell to the Romans in 70 CE, unleashing a period of suffering from which our nation has never fully recovered.
In fact, the tragedies of the 9th of Av predate the destruction of the Temples: this was the date upon which the spies returned from the Promised Land with frightening reports and the Israelites balked at the prospect of entering the land.
In 133 CE, the Bar Kochba revolt against the Romans ended in defeat. The Jews of Betar were butchered on the 9th of Av and the Temple Mount was plowed on the same date.
Later on in our history, many more catastrophic events happened on this day, including the 1290 expulsion of England’s Jews and the 1492 banishment of all Jews from Spain.
Also events that affected the whole world, as in the start of both world wars.
But this is more about why the temples were destroyed. As Rabbi Tovia says in the following clip, some will say the Babylonians did it (The First Temple) some will say the Romans did it (The Second Temple) but no, actually it was because of the hatred we had for each other.
Baseless hatred. This is probably something that should have a bit of rumination as both Israel and America are bitterly divided right now. There are similarities. The fomenting of hatred and division is coming from the left in both countries now and it’s reaching a fever pitch.
In Israel the division is manufactured by the left and financed by NGOs, the US State Department (tax dollars that haven’t yet been laundered in Ukraine) George Soros and the like. They have admitted that, just not the amounts. The vehicle chosen for this is something called “Judicial Reform” and it is sorely needed.
Moshe Feiglin made the comment recently that “The left would be willing to burn down the country just as long it would be them standing on top of the ashes proclaiming they’re taking over the power.”
The IDF like the American military has been taken over by the left. IDF doctors are also threatening to not show up to work. The IDF including the upper echelon are apparently willing to abandon their country for their devotion to the left, a country with no borders and a religion unto itself. Before American readers feel to smug about this, may I just say Mark Miley, Lloyd Austin and Rachel Levine? Those are strong military leaders? To the left the goal is to demolish the more conservative right, not protect their country.
I listened to a podcast recently and I really wanted to have this column done before the 9th of Av, but that didn’t happen.
So in case you don’t want to listen to the whole thing, here are my points. Judicial reform; in Israel no one including the left is questioning the results of the election they lost. They don’t use voting machines or have drop boxes. It was an honest election. The left lost as most knew they would. So the left does what the left does, they hold their activist Supreme Court so they know they can still get their way. The Israeli Supreme Court is not elected, the members of the Knesset are, by the people. The Knesset make the kind of laws they said they would when they were campaigning. For example, Israel has illegal invaders as well. The illegal invaders have made South Tel Aviv very dangerous, which is bad because that’s where the Central bus terminal is, but even without that, it’s scary. So, the Knesset passed a law, if you’re an illegal invader you no longer get Israeli tax dollars to support you. Go home. They were trying to remove some of the incentives for the illegal invaders to hang around. Yea!! At one time 80% of the Knesset has talked about judicial reform, including the left. The Israeli Supreme Court said nope you can’t do that. Think of a Supreme Court made up of Sotomayors, Jackson Brown, Kagen and the like. You know, useless stupid people that lie. Their whole court is like that. So really, the average Israeli citizens have no representation. Meanwhile the MSM and the leftwing Non-Governmental Organizations who flood Israel with money and influence have convince far too many citizens that their elected officials, that they voted for, being able to pass and implement laws is a threat to democracy. So they are out in the street disrupting lives and traffic, threatening law makers and generally acting the fool. And as Dr. Mordechai notes, the protests against the law and the attempt to overthrow the elected government was in place before the election even happened. It gets really interesting at 4:24 in. Ok, the whole thing is interesting.
In America, we have a President that has clearly betrayed our country. Every decision, every statement harms average Americans and aids either a country that has given his crime family large amounts of money or the illegal invaders flooding our country, many of them young single men of military age. How long before New York looks like France burning? Where and when will the first acts of terrorism occur that the left will try to use to limit the rights of law abiding citizens occur?
I recently heard or read a statement that a certain percentage of viewers of CNN and MSNBC are unaware of any of the Biden crime family’s activities. Unaware! And having in the past had a conversation with consumers of those type of “information” outlets I can tell you pretty confidently that any attempts to offer information or an alternative viewpoint will be met with a parrot like croak of “Fox news talking point”. That’s all they can say. Unless their quoting a medical paper written in Rolling Stone magazine. I’m not even making that one up.
Wayne Allen Root makes the case that the national divorce is already happening. That productive responsible citizens are fleeing blue states with their high taxes, crime, and corruption for red states. I’m sure they are, if they are fortunate enough to have the means to flee.
But it’s more about the mindset of those that choose to live in the left’s alternative reality where Hunter Biden, who has been selling access to his father for years is just a poor boy with a “problem” and his Dad the president is just standing by his son, “A father’s love” according to the harpies on The View and the left wing propaganda outlets. Nope, a corrupt family hanging together. And no matter how much evidence is presented, they will be unaware of it.
There is a reason for the divisive hatred boiling in both countries. And it’s all stemming from the left, they foment and feed it. And the propaganda arm disseminates it. Yes, neither country really has a functional military or an actual justice system. America is functioning more as a banana republic than a serious country at this point. But I find it incredibly sad that the day after the 9th of Av both countries are so bitterly divided, and in both countries, it comes from the same direction. Both countries were founded on G-dly principles and the left is trying to destroy that as much as anything I think, as they try to take down both countries. Moshe Feiglin is correct and this bitter division has cost dearly before. Have we learned nothing? I believe, I truly do, we need to pray for Israel to accept their sovereignty and build the Third Temple. I think that would be a good first step in beginning to right the world.