Backers of Jewish Settlements Put Squeeze on Netanyahu

[IndianaGreen]

Backers of Jewish Settlements Put Squeeze on Netanyahu

By Howard Schneider
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, May 28, 2009

JERUSALEM, May 27 -- Supporters of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank are increasing the pressure on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu as he steers between a government coalition that supports continued building in the area and President Obama's demand that it stop.

A group of rabbis who support expanding settlements gathered Wednesday in an outpost near Ramallah and issued a statement asking the government "not to destroy settlements while maltreating pioneers." The group, calling itself Rabbis of the Torah and the Land, also declared that Jewish law forbade police and troops from obeying orders to remove settlements.

Harel Cohen, the secretary of the organization, said the meeting was called to debate whether Netanyahu's plan to dismantle about two dozen settlement outposts means that he "has changed his opinions or whether he is just misleading the Americans."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/27/AR2009052702587.html?hpid=artslot

[Smith_3]

1. Jewish law.

Is that something like Sharia law?

[Howardx]

2. yes

[Behind the Aegis]

3. Only to the ignorant and lazy-minded.

[LeftishBrit]

4. If it were embodied in the government, it would be.

But this is an extremist group rebelling *against* the government. This brand of 'Jewish law' exists only in their wishful little minds.

[shaayecanaan]

5. the only real difference

is that shariah had the time to develop into essentially a fully fledged legal system - essentially an alternative to the common law of the Commonwealth. Halakha and canon law generally only apply to internal religious practices, except for in Israel, where it is allowed to govern family law.

The general law of Israel is made up largely of Ottoman French law as well as concepts (mainly equitable) inherited from the British.

[Vegasaurus]

6. When Jewish women are murdered for leaving the home without their husband

stoned, flogged, or maimed for "impropiety"

not allowed to own property, forced to have sex with their husbands against their will, or to be hit by their husbands legally

or when gay people in Israel are executed

or when a thief has their hand cut off

Or if any of the other hideous violations of human rights in sharia "law" happened in Israel, then you might have something to say.

For now, it just makes those who make the comparison sound ignorant.

[shaayecanaan]

7. Jewish law prescribes that gays are to be put to death...

children should be killed for scorning their parents, etc.

Jewish law is no more benevolent than Islamic law. The distinction is that the application of Jewish law in Israel is limited to marriage and divorce.

[shira]

8. the death penalty under Torah law hasn't been carried out by a Jewish court in at least 2000 years

It is generally accepted that one of the reasons for Israel's rare use of the death penalty is Jewish religious law. However, there is some debate as to whether Jewish law forbids capital punishment. Biblical law explicitly mandates the death penalty for 36 offenses, from murder and rape to idolatry and desecration of the Sabbath. Still, Jewish scholars since the beginning of the common era have developed such restrictive rules to prevent execution of the innocent that the death penalty has become de facto illegal. Most modern Jewish religious leaders and scholars believe that the death penalty should remain unused.

"It is better and more satisfactory to acquit a thousand guilty persons than to put a single innocent one to death."<2> Moses Maimonides argued that executing a defendant on anything less than absolute certainty would lead to a slippery slope of decreasing burdens of proof, until we would be convicting merely "according to the judge's caprice." His concern was maintaining popular respect for law, and he saw errors of commission as much more threatening than errors of omission.<3>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Israel

[shaayecanaan]

9. The Jews havent had a state in 2000 years...

obviously, its a bit difficult for a Beth Din to carry out a stoning in New Jersey, in the same way it would be for an Islamic court in the US to do the same thing. As Einstein said, traditional Jewish benevolence had less to do with the innate kindness of Jews than with the utter lack of Jewish political power for over 2000 years.

The Quran allows capital punishment only for murder, and "spreading mischief in the land" (traditionally taken to mean treason and sedition, although this has been interpreted rather widely). The Jewish Old Testament prescribes death and/or exile for all kinds of actions, many of which we would not view as criminal, or even immoral today (having sex with a woman whilst menstruating, wearing a garment with two types of fibres, etc).

The main reason Islamic theocracy has fared better than Christian or Jewish is not because the Quran is more pernicious than those other texts, but because it is actually more liberal, and therefore more sustainable as a legal system. A legal system which is required to kill children whenever they insult their parents is not going to survive very long, even if only because it ends up running out of children.

I'm not sure that the rabbis, if given control of the criminal justice system, wouldn't hesitate to point to Leviticus and say, "well, it says what it says".

[henank]

10. Once again a poster who has no idea of Jewish law

spouts self-righteously about ... Jewish law.

For the umpteenth time, Jewish law is NOT only based on what is written in the Pentateuch. The Oral Law - Mishna and Talmud - are an INSEPARABLE PART of Jewish law. The fact that they were only written down during the beginning of both Diasporas, Babylonian and Roman, makes them no less authentic. They have been passed from father to son since Mount Sinai. In the Talmud it specifically states that "a Sanhedrin who passed the death penalty once in 70 years was considered a cruel Sanhedrin". In practice the death penalty was almost NEVER instituted - mainly ebcause there are so many caveats and clauses in Jewish law PREVENTING exactly that.

During the thousand or so years of Jewish independence and/or self-rule, when the Rabbis had the chance to execute all the gays that it wanted, it never did.

Sharia anyone?

So stop quoting Leviticus and all its arcane laws. You understand nothing.

[shaayecanaan]

11. My father read the Babylonian Talmud in its original Aramaic...

he has also been retained as a translator for two modern translations of Daniel and one of Ezra.

"a Sanhedrin who passed the death penalty once in 70 years was considered a cruel Sanhedrin"

Actually, that particular passage is actually from the Mishnah. The Mishnah is part of the Talmud, which is constituted by the Mishnah and the "Gemara", which essentially, if imprecisely, refers to the Bablylonian Talmud. I only point this out because you seem rather confused when you state that the Oral Law comprises the "Mishna and Talmud", which is rather like saying an apple pie is made from apples and applesauce.

They have been passed from father to son since Mount Sinai.

Haha! Have they now? Along with your grandma's chicken soup recipe? Did they mention anything about the dinosaurs, by chance? They've always fascinated me, you know.

It is important to understand that the composition of the Talmud occurs after the destruction of the temple and the effective loss of Jewish sovereignty. The reason why Jewish scholars felt so free to impose restrictions on the imposition of the death penalty was because thereafter it mainly became a theoretical enterprise - obviously, Jews could not impose the death penalty on other Jews whilst they were living under the laws of another state. Indeed, the restrictions on the death penalty were politically expedient in the sense that they gave Jewish authorities an excuse for not doing what they practically could not do anyway.

The last occasion during which the Jews effectively governed themselves was the Hasmoneon kingdom. There isnt much to go on as far as imposition of the death penalty is concerned, I dont think Josephus talks about it very much anyway, but given that the major historical figures of the time were known for plying the sword rather liberally, its hard to imagine that the death penalty would have applied as sparingly as the Mishnah would require.

[henank]

12. So do my father, brothers, husband, sons..

So no big deal there.

"The Mishnah is part of the Talmud"
That's not quite precise either. The Mishna is the Oral Law written down. The Talmud in the Gemara expands on the Mishna.

"I only point this out because you seem rather confused when you state that the Oral Law comprises the "Mishna and Talmud", which is rather like saying an apple pie is made from apples and applesauce."
I simplified it for ignoramuses on this board. Apologies for not being clearer. I know exactly what the Torah, the Mishna, the Gemara and the Talmud are. I can post pictures of the bookcases in my house if you really want. My daughter is doing her matriculation in Mishna as I write. So please don't preach to me.

"They have been passed from father to son since Mount Sinai.

Haha! Have they now? Along with your grandma's chicken soup recipe? Did they mention anything about the dinosaurs, by chance? They've always fascinated me, you know."
I can't see the connection between one thing and another. What has chicken soup or dinosaurs got to do with the Talmud? Do you deny that the Oral Law was passed down from father to son? If it wasn't, how did it get written down in Babylon? Or are you implying (or asserting outright) that the Mishnaic and Talmudic Rabbis just made the whole thing up?

"The reason why Jewish scholars felt so free to impose restrictions on the imposition of the death penalty was because thereafter it mainly became a theoretical enterprise - obviously, Jews could not impose the death penalty on other Jews whilst they were living under the laws of another state. Indeed, the restrictions on the death penalty were politically expedient in the sense that they gave Jewish authorities an excuse for not doing what they practically could not do anyway."
But what about when the Jews did have sovereignty in their land for hundreds or thousands of years? Did it not deny the death penalty even then?

"given that the major historical figures of the time were known for plying the sword rather liberally, its hard to imagine that the death penalty would have applied as sparingly as the Mishnah would require."
Why? Who was murdered or put to death and by whom?

[shaayecanaan]

13. Your father, brother and sons all speak middle Aramaic?

That certainly shows an admirable devotion to learning the language of the Assyrians, as well as Daniel, Ezra and Jesus. My father is from a Syro-Aramaic village in Lebanon, so he speaks Syriac/Aramaic as his first language.

But what about when the Jews did have sovereignty in their land for hundreds or thousands of years? Did it not deny the death penalty even then?

I dare say not. You're talking about a period before rabbinical Judaism, when it was a much different religion. Only Josephus writes about this period, but its fair to say that if the bible imposed death for sodomites, its a fair guess that at least one sodomite was thereby put to death.

Or are you implying (or asserting outright) that the Mishnaic and Talmudic Rabbis just made the whole thing up?

I think most of us here are asserting that outright, Henank, at least I think that most of us are atheists here. Therefore, yes, they made it up. They pulled it out of their arse, the same way that Mohammed and the early Christians made it all up. I was making fun of you as you seem to be one of these people that believes that the world is 6000 years old and that Fred Flintstone actually rode a dinosaur to work every day. Atheists making fun of religious people is a tired old slam-dunk turkey-shoot, and for that I apologise.

[oberliner]

14. Most of us are athiests here?

Do you mean at DU or in IP or what?

Is that actually true?

I must say I have not noticed folks "making fun of religious people" here in this forum.