By Ze’ev Ben-Yechiel
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has reportedly offered to give PA President Mahmoud Abbas part of the Sinai Peninsula adjacent to Gaza to establish a contiguous Palestinian state in those areas. United States President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were also notified of the plan, according to a report today (Monday, August 9) on Galei Tzahal (IDF Radio). Although there has been no official confirmation of the proposal, news of the initiative met with approval from Israeli leaders.
Abbas, meanwhile, is reported to have categorically rejected the plan, which entails a demilitarized PA state located on lands encompassing five times the current area of the Gaza Strip. The state, referred to as “Greater Gaza,” would contain PA citizens and Palestinian refugees living in other countries. The offer would also enable Arab cities in Judea and Samaria to retain PA autonomy, on condition that Abbas maintains a viable administration in those areas.
On the network’s “Good Morning Israel” radio program this morning, Science and Technology Minister Yaakov Peri expressed cautious enthusiasm for the plan. The cabinet member and former head of the Shin Bet security service was surprised by what he thought was a generous solution for peace between Israel and the Palestinians plan.
Sisi’s plan would require Abbas to give up his demand for a full return to pre-1967 borders, in exchange for a total land area in the Sinai greater than what the PA would have to relinquish in Judea and Samaria. Israeli experts have raised questions about why Abbas would reject the opportunity for an expanded bi-territorial PA-controlled Palestinian state, one that would allow him to retake a much larger Gaza from Hamas while still allowing for PA autonomy in its core jurisdictions.
Arab media outlets first reported the offer as coming from an unidentified senior Egyptian official, while the Egyptian Foreign Ministry denied that it came from Sisi, stating that it was proposed some time ago by deposed President Mohammed Morsi. A number of years ago Egypt rejected a similar plan by a group of Israeli academics led by Giora Eiland, former head of Israel’s National Security Council.
In response to today’s report, Minister of Knesset Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) supported the direction of the proposal, saying that “the solution to the Palestinian problem must be regional and cannot fall on Israel’s shoulders alone.”
Tazpit News Agency
In one of Rav Shlomo Brevda’s zt”l Droshes that he pointed out, that as much as we admire the men who learn Torah (we surely all do), we should admire their spouses and any spouse taking care of the home even more.
The men feel the tremendous pleasure of Toiling in Torah. Working on a difficult piece an eventually seeing even a drop of light can be a tremendous feeling of ecstasy.
However, what satisfaction do the women feel? She works hard day and night and then the kids get hurt and she* has to calm them, clean them, make supper, clean the house, laundry, Pesach clean too…….
A woman who encourages their spouses to go and learn Torah while they take care of the home will get the fullest reward of learning Torah on the highest level in the world to come!
Rav Brevda zt”l concluded this point by assuring that he has a very good source for this. He recalled that he heard it from Rav Aharon Kotler,z.t.l. 65 years ago (1949) the Rosh Hayeshivah and founder of the Lakewood Yeshiva the following.
Rav Aharon said that men get a Sippuk-sense of fulfillment from learning Torah. What do the women get? We sometimes “Batul”-waste our time in middle of learning-but women are constantly busy, non stop, they dont have Bain Hazmanim to wake up late like some men do etc.
Rav Aharon zt”l stressed that the women will share in the reward for our learning Torah but they wont share in any part of our Bitul Torah.
Rav Brevda recalls that some of the “Yunger-Leit”-members of the Kolel in Lakewood where surprised and ask Rav Aharon for clarification, “Are you saying that my wife will get more out of my own Torah learning than I will?
Rav Aharon answered emphatically, “Yah!! Gleib Mir Vos Ich Zog!!-Yes!!! Believe me what I say!! Women are sacrificing more than men, especially in our generation. They are fully assured that they will be rewarded in full. We can never be sure if we have fully fulfilled our Tachlis in this world.
Smart cookie, this al-Sisi guy. He wants to neutralize Hamas, which by now is a dictatorship ruling by force, so he simply offers people the opportunity to move. “You want a nice house? Move over here into this nice Greater Gaza (where Hamas is prevented from having any power).” If he can convince the international aid donors to rebuild in the annex instead of the original Gaza, he will have solved the Hamas problem for good (for him and for us, too).
to # 1-Chizuk for Chodesh Elul:
Vus redzt de? I tink you ansered the rung kveshtion or maybe you just plain tzimisht? ken zain.
Moshelle was unavailable for comment so he gave his own shtikel.