Despite millennia of persecution and exile, the Jewish people – characterized by their historical resilience and survival often attributed to a divine covenant, enduring faith, and a mission to be a “light unto the nations” – is once more at war. It is at times like these, that renown writers, reaching into the soul of their people, prefer to express their thoughts and emotions not in prose but in poetry. So, it was for this esteemed former editor of The Jerusalem Post and Jerusalem Report, Steve Linde, who this Purim, penned this poignant poem below. David E. Kaplan Editor, Lay of the Land
There is a flame that runs through time, An ancient, ever-lasting rhyme. A people small, a story vast, An echo rising from the past.
It burns in stone and desert sand, In songs and prayers across the land. In exiles forced to wander far, Yet guided by a constant star.
Strange how this flame reveals its power. For some, it warms the darkest hour. For others, it ignites disdain And turns old hatred into flame.
One word can stir the air with spite, Old myths repeated day and night. The ancient blame, the poisoned art Of hurling lies at Jewish hearts.
They dress falsehood in robes of truth, Recycling slanders long uncouth. As if a scattered people few Could bend the world the way they do.
Yet rising too across the earth Are voices proving human worth. A hand extended, calm and strong: “You are not alone. You still belong.”
From distant shores and crowded streets, From quiet homes where conscience beats, Come words of courage, clear and bright, A simple stand for what is right.
For every cry of rage and scorn, Another light is quietly born. A candle lit, a flag unfurled, A sign of hope across the world.
So still the paradox remains: Two currents running through our veins. One born of darkness, fear and blame, One guarding justice like a flame.
And though the shadows sometimes rise, The flame endures. It never dies.
Steve Linde Purim March 4, 2026
About the poet:
Steve Linde, the JNS features editor, is a former editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Report and The Jerusalem Post and a former director at Kol Yisrael, Israel Radio’s English News. Born in Harare, Zimbabwe, he grew up in Durban, South Africa and has graduate degrees in sociology and journalism, the latter from the University of California at Berkeley. He made aliyah in 1988, served in the IDF Artillery Corps and lives in Jerusalem.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
Being a woman in Iran means enduring barbaric inhuman behavior in every facet of life.
By Marziyeh Amirizadeh
While we celebrated the International Women day on March 8th, we must remember the many brave Iranian women who have endured decades of hardships under the harsh rules of Islam, imposed on them by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Today we are seeing the fruits of their struggles and suffering, praying that by the time you read this the Islamic Republic will have fallen – but the job is not done, and their suffering has not ended.
Under Islamic rules, Iranian women have been subjugated and suppressed for more than 47 years since the satanic Ayatollah Khomeini took power in Iran. Iranian women lost all their rights after the revolution in 1979. The regime started suppressing women systematically and publicly through many misogynist laws making women and women’s rights only half of that of men. The humiliation of women under the Islamic Republic runs deep in the regime’s DNA:
– Women are forced to wear a hijab from the age of seven.
– Iranian women cannot sing or dance in public, or have custody of their children after getting divorced.
– Women cannot travel or obtain a passport without the permission of their fathers or their husbands.
– Women cannot get government jobs or hold other important positions.
Under rulings of the Islamic regime, women are treated like property of men. Their testimony in court is equal half of that of men because under Islam, a woman’s brain is considered half of that of men. Women’s inheritance is half of men. However, under these same Islamic rules, girls as young as nine are mature enough to be married to old men because their prophet Mohammed married his wife, Aishia, at the age of seven.
Murdered by the State. Demonstrators protest in September 2024 in New York outside United Nations headquarters against the Iranian government behind placards featuring the faces of women who have been executed in Iran. (Photo: AP Photo/Stefan Jeremiah)
Many Iranian girls and women have been murdered by their fathers, brothers, or husbands in what they call “honor killings” for which the men face no severe consequences because under Islamic rules there is no capital punishment against a male who kills their female relative for the purpose of their honor. One of my personal examples is most telling. After I talked to my brother about my conversion to Christianity, he talked to a mullah about his confusion between Islam and Christianity and mentioned my conversion to Christianity. The mullah told my brother to kill me, and he promised him there will be no punishment for him under the law of “honor killing.” There are countless other examples.
Hundreds of thousands of Iranian women have been arrested in the streets, beaten up in public by “morality police”, and humiliated only because of not having a proper Islamic hijab. One prominent example is Mahsa Amini who was murdered in 2022 for allowing her hair to show. She was beaten mercilessly after her arrest, went into a coma, and died at the hands of her torturers.
Fighting Back. An Iranian woman protests the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who died after being detained by the morality police in Tehran in September 2022 for improperly wearing a hijab. Her death ignited protests that exposed the regime’s use of sexual violence as a weapon of repression. (Photo: obtained by AP)
The Islamic regime also deliberately disfigures the face of many Iranian women by throwing acid at them, or shooting them, for disobeying the Islamic rules and not following the “proper” Islamic dress code. We have seen that abundantly during the recent protests across Iran.
Many Iranian women were raped in prison and were subject of sexual abuse by prison authorities. I personally witnessed this kind of abuse during my imprisonment at Evin prison in 2009 where I was sentenced to death by hanging just for being a Christian. One of my cellmates who got a job at the prison clinic, found the real job was to go there every day and to give sexual pleasure to prison authorities and government officials. They threatened her if she refused, they would kill her. I went through many psychological pressures and hardships to deny my faith in Jesus. I witnessed the execution of my best friend, Shirin Alamhooli, and many of my cellmates. I heard many stories of rape and sexual abuse from my cellmates who did not have any voices. I witnessed the torture and humiliation of women regularly.
Beauties and the Beasts. Former Iranian prisoners, the writer, (left), and Maryam Rostampour (right) were sentenced to death in 2009 for spreading the message of Christianity but were finally released following intense international pressure. Many of their friends and cellmates were executed.
One of the most obscene ways in which women are subjugated, there is a perversion under the Islamic rules it is not legitimate to execute a virgin. So according to a fatwa (religious command) by Ayatollah Khomeini, virgins must be raped before their execution. Under the Islamic rules, raping virgins before their execution prevents them from entering heaven. This law is just an excuse and a reward to prison authorities for having sexual pleasure with innocent women before executing them. Under Islamic rules women have zero value.
Behind Bars for Beliefs. Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison where peaceful activists, journalists, intellectuals, human rights lawyers and Christians like the writer were imprisoned, tortured, sexually abused and many executed.
When I think about International Women’s Day, it reminds me of the suffering of millions of Iranian women like me. It makes me sad because it reminds me how much I was disrespected and humiliated in my birth country. It reminds me how much Iranian women are insulted, disrespected, and have suffered. It reminds me many horrible memories of being insulted and punished in school, and even at home by my brothers who were brainwashed by the Islamic regime to see me and all women as inferior. It reminds me of the gross harassment by men who would look at me as a whore and the challenges I faced because I lived independently without being under a control of a man. It reminds me that I lived 30 years in Iran, but I never had a chance to travel around my beautiful country because hotels would not permit women to book a room alone.
War on Women. Iranian women prisoners sit at their cell in Tehran’s Evin prison. While allegations of sexual abuse and rape against Iran prison officials have been made by former female political prisoners, information about the alleged number of rapes committed by IRGC officials in Iran’s prisons remains unclear.
It reminds me of the terrible stories of my students who must accept the sick sexual advances and extortion by judges to be able to receive a divorce from their abusive husbands. I experienced that too. Under Islam, if women are abused or beaten by their husbands, there are no laws to defend them. There is a verse in the Koran (Al Nisa surah) that actually gives permission for men to beat their wives.
Despite all these misogynist Islamic laws, millions of Iranian women bravely fought against these harsh rules and did not submit. Many of them never gave up and tried to stand for their rights at any cost, even losing their lives.
This year alone, the Islamic regime killed over 32,000 protesters in just two days in January. The regime intentionally targeted young women and men who were beautiful and athletic to punish the families. They believe if you target the children, you have killed the parents as well – ensuring they will not stand up against the regime in the future.
We should not forget that the brave mothers of all these young children who were killed by the regime who have turned their mourning to another form of defiance against the regime. Instead of crying, many mothers displayed their defiance by dancing in the funeral of their children. It is unbelievable where they found the courage to turn their sorrow and mourning to dance, to tell the Islamic regime that even the death of their children cannot stop them fighting for their rights and freedom.
Brave Iranian Women Who Turned Their Mourning to Defiance (Dance) Against the Islamic Regime, 2026! Under Islamic rules, women are not allowed to sing and dance in public, but brave Iranian women are singing and dancing for their loved ones who were massacred in the nationwide uprising in January 2026. There are no more Islamic rituals or citation of Koran verses. This is another form of revolution against 47 years of indoctrination with Islamic laws
While dancing and singing in public is forbidden for Iranian women, the mothers and sisters of those who were murdered by the regime held back their tears and began to dance and sing loudly in public to show defiance. They stand as a symbol of courage for all women around the world.
Being a woman in Iran means enduring barbaric inhuman behavior in every facet of life. It means having remarkable strength, being made of steel, to survive all those brutalities one faces daily.
It is a shame that instead of making the Islamic regime accountable for what they do to Iranian women, the United Nations rewards them by giving them a seat to monitor women’s rights around the world. This is an obscene joke, and another type of insult against Iranian women by the clowns and buffoons at the UN to close their eyes to the misogyny and brutalities against Iranian women.
Defiance. Despite the threat of arrest and execution, an Iranian woman without a mandatory Islamic headscarf flashes a victory sign as two veiled women walk by at a market in Tehran in June 2024. (Photo: AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)
On International Women’s Day, we must remember brave Iranian women who have no rights and have been targets of discrimination and abuse for so many years. We must remember the high price that they are paying every day just to survive. We must remember many Iranian women who have no voice and their lives have been ruined by the Islamic regime. We must remember hundreds of thousands of mothers who are mourning for their children in hiding, while dancing in public to undermine and humiliate all the Islamic laws against them and say “No” to five decades of indoctrination.
My heart pains me this International Women’s Day when I think about all the atrocities Iranian women have suffered and are suffering still. My heart pains me when I remember, like millions of Iranian women, how much I was insulted, disrespected, and ignored just because of being born as a woman in Iran under the Islamic Republic government. I cannot hold back my tears for Iranian women who are still living under this tyranny and suppressions and are paying the price with their lives.
Reign of Terror. Activists in red ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ robes hold placards with portraits of women who were killed in Iran during an International Women’s Day demonstration in London in March 2023. (Photo: AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
I salute Iranian women on this day for being the true symbol of courageous resistance and dignity under the most barbaric Islamic rules imposed on them every day. I pray that they will have their relief, their rights, and freedom soon. It cannot come soon enough.
This International Woman’s Day we must not forget. We must be the voices of and bear witness for Iranian women. We must pray that by this time next year, Iran, and Iranian women, will be free.
About the writer:
Marziyeh Amirizadeh is an Iranian American who immigrated to the US after being sentenced to death in Iran for the crime of converting to Christianity. She endured months of mental and physical hardships and intense interrogation. She is author of two books (the latest, A Love Journey with God), public speaker, and columnist. She has shared her inspiring story throughout the United States and around the world, to bring awareness about the ongoing human rights violations and persecution of women and religious minorities in Iran, www.MarzisJourney.com.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
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Pulsating Purim. Israeli revelers dance and sing as they celebrate Purim in an underground parking garage in Tel Aviv while sheltering from Iranian missiles on March 2. Not only are the people’s spirits high, but so are Israeli stocks that have defied war panic with key indices like the TA-35 and TA-125 surging to record highs. (Photo: Erik Marmor/Getty Images)
ARTICLES
Please note there is a facility to comment beneath each article should you wish to express an opinion on the subject addressed.
(1)
WHY THE WAR AGAINST IRAN IS NOT ONLY RIGHT BUT ESSENTIAL
Since its inception, the Islamic Republic has been deceiving and lying to the West as its centrifuges churned away enriching uranium to a level only required for a weapons program. By Marziyeh Amirizadeh
(who survived Tehran’s infamous prison under a death sentence)
Bargaining, Bluffing, Buying Time.Ready to once again lie and deceive, Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi smiles on route to the first round of talks with the USA in Geneva. Within days, the US called his bluff and the Ayatollah lay under rubble, his regime likely to follow.
How Western countries can confront the challengers of growing unassimilated immigrant populations. By Neville Berman
The New Wave. As a result of French President Sarkozy banning the right to wear full-face veils in public spaces, he lost the presidential election with well over 90% of the Muslims – who made up 8% of the population – voting against him. As the Muslim vote determined who became President of France, mass Muslim movements may well determine the future of Europe.
THE ROEDEAN-KING DAVID ‘AFFAIR’ – A MARATHON MATCH
How a cancelled school tennis match escalated into a wider political battle over Israel, antisemitism, and boycotts. By Marika Sboros
Back to Court. While the two schools have tried to move on following an apology and a promise to resume play, this “affair” is not going away with South Africa’s anti-Israel lobby hell-bent on turninga girls tennis match ”… into an international propaganda tool.”
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
How Western countries can confront the challengers of growing unassimilated immigrant populations.
By Neville Berman
Despite the enormous improvement in the material lifestyle of the 21st century, millions of people have not shared in the abundant wealth created by technology and innovation. Many countries are in reality failed states, unable to provide jobs, sufficient food for their population and repay loans to international aid agencies such as the World Bank. With no foreseeable prospect of a better life in the countries of their birth, millions of people are risking their lives in attempting to immigrate to other parts of the world. The vast majority of these immigrants are economic migrants seeking better opportunities for themselves and their families. They normally have low marketable skills, little or no financial resources, and are unfamiliar with the language, culture or religious practices of the countries that they are desperately trying to reach.
Chancing the Channel. Migrants sit on a dinghy as they wait to cross the English Channel from France. (Photo: Getty/Carl Court)
Most countries in the western world are running on financial deficits that are reaching alarming proportions. Interest payments on debt have become a major issue in the budgets of almost all western countries. Countries are cutting social services to their own population, while at the same time providing new immigrants with free housing, health care, educational assistance, and direct financial aid. The inevitable clash between the local population and the new immigrants is tearing countries apart. Hatred is on the rise. Immigration has become a hot topic that will play an important role in future elections in the western world. There is almost zero immigration going the other way.
Greener Pastures. This photo taken at a Spanish enclave on Morocco’s Mediterranean coast, encapsulates a visual clash of cultures as migrants from North Africa scale a fence to reach Europe while one golfer is in mid-swing, while another gazes in bewilderment as if under surprise attack. (Photo: Jose Palazon/Reuters)
What is happening all over the Western world is that new immigrants usually live in low-income areas just outside major cities. Many of these new immigrants cannot find jobs. The areas that they live in soon take on a different character to what existed before, and end up becoming a no-go area for local police. This scenario is replicating across the Western world.
All Aboard. Uncertain which country in Europe they might eventually end up residing, some 500 passengers on this boat crossing from Libya to Italy. What is ‘certain’ is that Europe is changing as a result. (Photo: Massimo Sestini).
Children born in a country normally enjoy a right of citizenship. While exposed in their home environment to the language of their parents, they then spend their formative years in local schools that inculcate the language, culture, values and heritage of their adopted country into their lifestyle. At the age of 18, they are granted the right to vote in local and national elections. On the other hand, what happens with immigrants is that five years after they are granted the legal right to live in the country, they are granted citizenship. Provided they are over the age of 18, they are entitled to vote. After five years of living in a country, they usually still communicate with their family in the language of their birth, and are probably not fully integrated into the local customs, values and culture of the country. In many cases their religious beliefs are foreign to the accepted religious practices of the majority of the local population.
All Western countries are democracies that hold elections for public office. The increase in the proportion of the immigrant population with the right to vote, can be the determining factor in who gets elected. In the case of France, President Sarkozy banned the right to wear full-face veils known as burqas in public spaces. The result was that over 90% of the Muslims, who made up 8% of the population, voted against him in the 2012 French presidential election. Sarkozy lost the election by a 3.2% margin. Clearly the Muslim vote determined who became President of France. Political parties across Europe took note of what happened in France. They started pandering to the Muslim community in their countries, in order to have a better chance of being elected. The question that arises is what can be done to alleviate the problems described above?
Paris ‘Street Scene’. It’s not artists anymore that tell the story of the “city of Lights”. Taking over public areas, Friday prayers on the pavement in Goutte d’Or,18th arrondissement, Paris. (Photo: William Daniels/Panos Pictures)
The first suggestion that I would like to make is to grant citizenship only to people who have lived in the country for 18 years and not 5 years. After eighteen years of living in the country they will probably be more integrated into the country and more acclimatized to local norms, values and customs than after only 5 years of living in the country. If locally born citizens need to wait 18 years before they get the right to vote, it seems reasonable that foreign immigrants should also need to wait for 18 years before acquiring the right to vote. The second suggestion is that during the 18 years of acclimatization, they will be subject to mandatory deportation if convicted of a crime that involves a prison sentence of more than 2 years. This will act as a deterrent against engaging in criminal activity by the immigrant population. During the 18 years of waiting to be a citizen, a Purple Passport should be issued to all legal immigrants who wish to travel in and out of the country. This passport will not grant any rights of citizenship to the holder of the passport.
Cultural Clash. Standing in the way of integration, Muslims demonstrate in the UK demanding the introduction of Sharia Law.
Almost all countries are increasing the amount allocated in their defense budgets. They are doing this in order to deter and to be better able to defend themselves in the event of an attack by a potential enemy country. They are also increasing their budgets to defend against cyber-attacks that can cripple the smooth running of the country. What they are not taking into account is that one of the main threats facing many countries is not external but internal. There are many factors that lead to dissatisfaction, hatred and anarchy in a country. The right to free speech has become a license for hate speech. A disproportionate amount of hate speech can be attributed to the changing makeup of the country caused by mass immigration of people with different beliefs and values. It is time to think outside the box and adopt new measures that are aimed at preventing the disintegration of Western society from within. Across the Western world, democracy itself is under threat!
They Came, They Saw, They Conquer. Something Britains never thought they would see occur in their territory – dozens of Muslim protesters at a rally in 2014 in the Brick Lane area of London warning retailers that they face up to 40 lashes if they continue to sell alcohol.
INTO EXTRA TIME
While the suggestions expressed above may alleviate more than resolve, they will at least provide additional time for countries to formulate policies and programs that will seriously tackle the internal problems that they face. Like climate change and artificial intelligence that have the potential to lead to job losses and economic hardships for millions of people, so too will mass immigration of unskilled people that will not disappear in the near future. If anything, it is likely to increase.
Planning and managing this process needs to start now.
About the writer:
Accountant Neville Berman had an illustrious sporting career in South Africa, being twice awarded the South African State Presidents Award for Sport and was a three times winner of the South African Maccabi Sportsman of the Year Award. In 1978 he immigrated to the USA to coach the United States men’s field hockey team, whereafter, in 1981 he immigrated to Israel where he practiced as an accountant and then for 20 years was the Admin Manager at the American International School in Even Yehuda, Israel. He is married with two children and one granddaughter.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
01 March 2026 – From the shelter: Operations Lion’s Roar/Epic Fury.
02 March 2026 – Updates: Operations Lion’s Roar/Epic Fury.
03 March 2026 – Is the love affair between Qatar and Iran over? Your Operations Lion’s Roar/Epic Fury updates on The Israel Brief.
04 March 2026 – Under fire! Your Operations Lion’s Roar/Epic Fury on The Israel Brief.
05 March 2026 – SA case at the ICJ dealt a blow, updates on Operations Lion’s Roar/Epic Fury and more on The Israel Brief.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
Since its inception, the Islamic Republic has been deceiving and lying to the West as its centrifuges churned away enriching uranium to a level only required for a weapons program.
By Marziyeh Amirizadeh
Just a few months after I was born in Iran, the Islamic (Demonic) Revolution took place, hijacking the country of my birth and, today 90 million Iranians, giving birth to the Islamic Republic. Make no mistake, the Islamic Republic was conceived by evil, born in sin, and against the United States to the core of its DNA. Anyone who thinks that a war against the Islamic Republic and the ayatollahs is wrong, does not know the history and does not understand the dangerous threats that it poses to all Americans.
At its inception, the Islamic Republic never provoked people to chant “All for Allah” or “Sharia Now”. The chants that three generations of Iranians have been brainwashed by are “Death to America”. It’s not just a catchy slogan but the game plan of the Islamists. They mean it. They have demonstrated it in many ways for nearly five decades.
Americans must never forget the hijacking US embassy on November 4, 1979, when 66 Americans, including diplomats and other civilian personnel, were taken hostage at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, 52 of whom were held for more than 400 days until January 20, 1981.
The Islamic Republic is the head of the octopus of a global axis of terror that has been responsible for indoctrinating, funding, and arming countless Islamic terrorists who have the blood of thousands of Americans on their hands.
Extremist Islam is not compatible with American and western Judeo-Christian values and Democracy. They seek not just to live by Sharia law, which is non-Western and anti-democratic, they seek to impose it on others. Islam subjugates women and minorities through intolerant and even evil misogyny that affords women rights with half those of men. As a woman and a Christian, I experienced this in countless ways before and during my arrest and imprisonment because of my faith. Anyone who cherishes democratic values and gives Islamic regimes like Iran a pass, is undermining the very spirit of democratic values.
From the beginning, the Islamic regime has strived for nuclear weapons, deceiving and lying to the West as its centrifuges churned away to enrich uranium at a level that can only be used in a weapons program. A nuclear Iran under the ayatollahs is an existential threat to the US and the world because they will use it.
Neutralizing Nuclear. The war waged against Iran today is preventing the far more dangerous war with a nuclear Iran of tomorrow.
A nuclear Iran will also trigger a nuclear arms race in the Arab/Islamic world, none of which can be trusted to have this most dangerous weapon, and each of which would feel the need to have them to defend themselves from Iran. The global nuclear threat to human life, and the world’s environment, would be radical and irreversible.
Indeed, America’s first, second, and third priority should be protecting American lives and interests. Americans need to understand a decisive war on the ayatollahs and IRGC is not optional but essential. Yes, Iranians would be free which is also a good enough reason. But Americans would also be free of this threat that, if they achieve, they will use.
The Islamic regime has not only openly declared its hostility toward the United States and spent years attempting to expand its influence, funding networks and seeking to infiltrate systems that safeguard our democracy. Its reach has extended beyond its borders, even exploiting criminal channels through agents in the US and around the world who have infiltrated themselves into positions of influence in politics, civic roles, media, and more. Eliminating the Islamic regime influence will force its agents out of business. That cannot happen soon enough.
Buying Time. Ready to once again lie and deceive, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi smiles while on his way to the first round of talks with the USA in Geneva. Within days, the US called his bluff as war broke out. (Photo:Bild: -/Iranian Foreign Ministry/dpa/sda)
This is not just a geopolitical challenge — it is an ideological one. The danger lies not only in weapons, but in ideas designed to erode values from within. History shows that destructive ideologies, when ignored, spread quietly until they become far more dangerous than any conventional threat, more than missiles or bombs.
If we care about the world our children will inherit, we must take this threat seriously. America is facing an adversary that openly calls for its destruction, and works to influence minds against the very principles that define our nation. To have ignored such a threat would not have made it disappear; it would have allowed it – like a cancer – to grow stronger.
Americans and the West must understand that removing the Islamic regime is not only about saving the Iranian people, but also about protecting the world and the future of their children from a serious threat that is spreading rapidly globally.
The Islamic Republic constantly worked to undermine US National Security interests. They have the blood of thousands of Americans on their hands. They have penetrated the Middle East, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the United States. They have never stopped trying to achieve nuclear weapons, destabilizing the Middle East and the West. They sell cheap oil to China and drones and weapons to Russia, strengthening American adversaries.
Death on Display. May the nightmare soon come to an end like public executions in a bid to intimidate the Iranian people.
This is a historic opportunity to destroy them, and history and our children will not forgive us if we close our eyes to the threats that if not eliminated, future generations will inherit, or become victim to.
We cannot make a deal with an Islamic enemy that seek our destruction. They will lie, employing the Islamic principle of taqiyya, and hide their intentions at every turn, and wait to pounce until a leader of less fortitude is on the other side of the table. Defeating the Islamic Republic today is essential to defend humanity, preserve democracy and freedom for the future.
Brutal Crackdown. Iranian authorities responded to anti-government protests with an unprecedented deadly crackdown resulting in mass killings and serious injuries.
About the writer:
Marziyeh Amirizadeh is an Iranian American who immigrated to the US after being sentenced to death in Iran for the crime of converting to Christianity. She endured months of mental and physical hardships and intense interrogation. She is author of two books (the latest, A Love Journey with God), public speaker, and columnist. She has shared her inspiring story throughout the United States and around the world, to bring awareness about the ongoing human rights violations and persecution of women and religious minorities in Iran, www.MarzisJourney.com.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
If you think the dust has settled over the “Roedean affair” – as the cancelled tennis match between two top Johannesburg private schools (one of them Jewish), is being grandly called – then think again.
The “affair” became public knowledge within days of Roedean Girls High School refusing to play the scheduled match against King David Linksfield girls on February 3, 2026.
From that moment on, the anti-Israel lobby has been hard at working trying to turn a tennis match into an international propaganda tool.
It has not let go. The lobby appears determined to keep the “affair” moving in its desired direction, supported by extremist, Islamist, jihadist lobbies.
That’s despite both schools moving in the opposite direction. Both have gone past claims of antisemitism and back to their core business of educating children.
Roedean has resisted the lobby’s undisguised fury at its public (though prompted) written apology to King David on February 12. The apology does not admit antisemitism but acknowledges the “deep hurt” to the Jewish community.
Roedean showed good faith by promising to reschedule the match, which further infuriated the anti-Israel lobby. If Roedean honours its promise, the lobby will likely use it to maximise political capital for its own agendas.
The drivers of those agendas are not difficult to spot.
These include barely disguised calls for ongoing sports boycotts of King David schoolchildren; revival of claims of “genocide” and “baby killers” against Israel and Jews who support it, with “apartheid” slurs thrown in for good measure; and support for South Africa’s ill-fated, ongoing ICJ (International Criminal Court) lawsuit against Israel on a charge of genocide in Gaza.
Ironically, South Africa lodged the case against Israel just weeks after a genuine genocide attempt by Hamas in southern Israel on October 7, 2023.
Underpinning these drivers is the anti-Israel lobby’s pathological anti-Zionism.
Legal and historical scholars say that anti-Zionism is a modern mutation of the ancient virus of Jew hatred known euphemistically in modern English as antisemitism.
It is also the lifeblood of the supposedly “pro-Palestinian” movement.
I say, “supposedly” because of the Orwellian manipulation of language lobbyists indulge in to justify support for groups that clearly don’t give a fig for Palestinians.
Hamas is a prime example. Video evidence shows it diverting humanitarian aid in Gaza into its own coffers, thereby worsening poverty and starvation, and shooting civilians who try to access the aid.
It also routinely uses public executions to stifle dissent and oppress marginalised groups, including LGBTQ+ people.
Hamas does not typically employ the theatrical “rooftop execution” method associated with extremist groups, such as ISIS. Instead, it maintains a systemic environment of criminalisation, torture and extrajudicial killing of LGBTQ+ individuals in Gaza.
It boasts of using its own people as “human shields” in conflict zones. On October 26, 2023, Hamas’s Political Bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh declared in a Lebanese TV broadcast:
“The blood of the women, children and elderly …we are the ones who need this blood, so it awakens within us the revolutionary spirit …(and) resolve.”
Call me picky but I can think of adjectives other than “revolutionary” and “resolve” to describe spirits requiring such infusion to keep going.
Diabolical springs to mind.
I can also think of choice descriptions for Jews who voluntarily support groups that openly desire their destruction.
Unsurprisingly, among the first local anti-Zionist voices supporting Roedean and vilifying King David, was Jo Bluen, the public face of the bizarrely named South African Jews for a Free Palestine (SAJFP).
Bluen Morally Bankrupt. A Hamas admirer, Jo Bluen celebrates the death of Israelis soldiers killed in Gaza by inserting inverted red triangle in her social media posts. (Source Instagram. jo bluen (@jozi_blue) • Instagram photos and videos)
I say, “bizarrely named”, because there’s something unhinged about Jews voluntarily supporting groups whose goal is the same as Nazis intended for them in Germany.
The Nazis wanted to make their country “Judenrein” or “Judenfrei” – “cleansed” or “free” of Jews, according to the National Socialist term applied in the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question”. Hamas and cohorts work towards the same goal extended to the entire world.
The best Bluen says about Zionism is that it is “a fascist project” and “settler colonialisation”. The worst? She accuses King David of being “prepared to sacrifice its own children at the altar of a wild and violent zionism (sic) that is deeply racist and misogynistic.”
No matter: to anti-Israel lobbyists, facts are less important than rhetoric and theatrics.
In a September 2025 article in an online magazine ironically titled Critical Thinking, Bluen accuses “Israel and its accomplices” of having “murdered nearly 700,000 Palestinians in the course of the genocide in under two years since 2023, half a million of whom are children.”
Even Hamas’s own thumb-sucked figures on the civilian and child casualty rates since October 7 never reached such stratospheric heights.
At most, the terror group claimed around 70,000 civilian deaths in Gaza. Its Ministry of Social Development proved that false with its plans in early February 2026 to pay stipends to “50,000 widowed families.” In other words, to the widows of 50,000 combatants!
Bluen, like Hamas, continues a practice that the Nazis introduced of distinguishing Jews and other groups in concentration camps with inverted red triangles. Hamas uses the symbol to identify Jewish and Israeli targets. Bluen adopted it on a social media post celebrating the deaths of IDF soldiers in Gaza.
Anti-Israel lobbyists often resort to pulling the race card when all rational argument fails them. Bluen is no exception.
She calls Zionism a “patriarchal white supremacy” and claims that King David deliberately “targeted” Roedean’s (first black) principal Phuti Mogale. That was probably news to Roedean’s leadership and Mogale, who reportedly resigned rather than waited to be pushed.
Bluen and others also criticise King David schools as bastions of Jewish exclusivity, yet not all its pupils are Jewish. King David Linksfield’s high school’s head girl in 2024 was a Chinese girl and not from a Jewish background. King David schools routinely accepted black children who were not allowed to attend state schools during the apartheid era.
On the global stage, “pro-Palestinian” Islamist activists continue to amplify voices supporting Roedean’s tennis boycott of King David.
New York-based journalist Azad Essa writes for Middle East Eye, an independent UK-based digital channel focusing on the Middle East, North Africa and the broader Muslim world.
Mad Hatter. Throwing his proverbial hat onto the court, former Al Jazeera, now New York-based journalist Azad Essa writing for Middle East Eye, praised the Roedean girls for refusing to play their King David counterparts accusing the Jewish Day School of “supporting apartheid and cheerleading a genocide.”
In an article on February 21, he frames the cancelled tennis match as a heroic, moral stand by the Roedean girls. He claims that they rightly refused to play King David schoolgirls because the school was “supporting apartheid and cheerleading a genocide.”
That’s a textbook study in the collective-guilt argument the anti-Israel lobby uses to demonise and delegitimise Israel.
Essa describes the King David school network as a tool of “settler-colonial ideology.” He quotes a parent comparing playing tennis at King David to “playing against a school still flying the apartheid flag.”
By this logic, Jewish schoolchildren are inherently complicit in the actions of a foreign state thousands of kilometres away simply by attending a particular school.
That’s not political activism. It’s the targeted exclusion of a specific community on the basis of their religion and cultural affiliation. It clearly violates South Africa’s Constitution.
In the South African Daily Maverick on February 25, Kalim Rajab, a Johannesburg-based, Oxford-educated corporate executive, plays the “Framing Game”. Rajab calls King David Linksfield’s “victory” over Roedean “pyrrhic”, with a “chilling” effect rather one that achieves due accountability.
He omits from his potted biography that he is Chair of the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF). The HSF honours one of South Africa’s most prominent and beloved Jewish anti-apartheid activists, who was also a committed supporter of Israel throughout her life.
Rajab writes, as one critic puts it, with the “measured cadence” of someone who has learned the most effective way to delegitimise a community’s experience of discrimination – by calling it a “strategy.”
He describes King David supporters as “successful in their strategy of framing the narrative as one where the school and its pupils were victimised because of their religion as opposed to any overt political ideology espoused.”
He uses the word “strategy” strategically – to transform victim into perpetrator and a factual description of the “affair” into an allegation of manipulation. Facts that emerged from leaked phone recordings between Roedean’s Mogale and King David head Lorraine Srage tell a different story.
Rajab then does something disturbing: he offers a tactical manual for future boycotts of King David schools and not just on sports fields. These could involve “silent peaceful protests by visiting schoolchildren, including wearing armbands, pins or bodywear to show Palestinian solidarity,” he helpfully writes.
Pupils could “conscientiously object to taking part in interactions with King David.”
Really? A columnist in a prominent South African publication advising on more effective boycotts of a Jewish school? What if columnists in mainstream South African publications published blueprints for boycotting Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Chinese or other schools?
Other fringe, local and usual-suspects ranged against King David include the Media Review Network’sIqbal Jassat and the ironically titled Jewish Democratic Initiative (JDI).
All show predictable, monomaniacal obsession with one issue, one state and one tribe.
What escapes them all is that Zionists are not cheerleaders for war or participants in any “evil”, as British writer, theologian and “English gentile” Mark Pickles puts it.
Pickles similarly tears through the “genocide” narrative with consummate ease. It is, after all, a modern iteration of the medieval “blood libel” – that Jews murder non-Jewish children (traditionally Christians) to use their blood for baking matzah during Passover.
Pickles argues that the genocide claim is “as irrational as it is evil…highly damaging and dangerous.” It aims to justify “the murder of Jews, and all attempts – economic, diplomatic, and kinetic – to destroy the sole Jewish nation.”
Groups and organisations with a notoriously long history of antisemitism continue to push the claim with impunity. Yet the “true perpetrators of genocidal intent,” he says, are Islamist factions whose founding documents explicitly call for the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews.
The premise on which the anti-Israel, “pro-Palestinian” lobby hope to sustain the Roedean “affair” is that Zionist Jews are “complicit in genocide“.
That’s a shaky, dangerous premise.
As Canadian anthropologist Adam Louis-Klein warns, it is a way to mark Jews as “fundamentally stained and evil.” Anti-Zionists aim to “escalate all accusations toward the genocide libel… until it hardens into a global consensus,” Louis-Klein writes.
In this “new doctrine”, the Holocaust is no longer remembered but is “overwritten” to serve contemporary agendas.
This linguistic capture is likely what anti-Israel lobbyists hope will sustain the Roedean “affair” in their direction. The “quiet, student-led”, principled stance they claim to want will be the implementation of a hateful dogma against Jews.
It means that the time has come, as New York Times Jewish columnist Bret Stephens argues, for Jewish communities to end their “perpetual apology machine” in pro-Israel advocacy.
Change Gears. New York Times Jewish columnist Bret Stephens urges Jewish communities to shift from “perpetual” apology mode to “unapologetic Jewish confidence”.
He calls for a shift toward “unapologetic Jewish confidence” and “moral clarity” over Israel’s existence and right to defend itself.
The shift is now more necessary than ever because, as British-Jewish columnist and Man Booker Prize-winning author, Howard Jacobson said:
“Jews will never be forgiven for the Holocaust.”
Feature picture: Empty Court. In early February, when a group of girls from Jewish King David High School in Johannesburg travelled to nearby Roedean Girls High School girls’ school for a tennis match, they found no one at the courts.
About the writer:
Marika Sboros is a South African freelance investigative journalist with decades of experience writing fulltime for the country’s top media titles on a wide range of topics. She started her career as a hard-news reporter in the newsroom of the now defunct Rand Daily Mail, a campaigning anti-government newspaper during the worst excesses of the apartheid era. She commutes between South Africa and the UK.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
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As we ‘celebrate’ Purim during war this week, the Biblical story of the defeat of Haman, who plotted to annihilate the Jewish people, feels more like a news headline than ancienthistory.
Megillah in the Miklat. Israel’s news channel 12 interview kids in Purim costumes in a miklat (bomb shelter).
ARTICLES
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ANC AMNESIA
A Beit Berl Project – As South Africa’s leadership engages in state-sponsored antisemitism, it should remember Israel’s unique contribution in its transition to post-Apartheid By David E. Kaplan
Pulsating Partnership. Seen here at Beit Berl in Israel in the 1990s are participants from South Africa on a Leadership and Community Development Program together with local South Africans, including former member of uMkhonto weSizwe Arthur Goldreich (bottom left).
The heroism of Master Sergeant Roddie Edmonds By Andrew Fox
Defying Distancing. While people today across the world ‘distance’ themselves from Jews, the writer recalls a time when a brave NCO in a POW camp with a Nazi gun pointed at his head, refused to identify the Jews under his command, answering: “We are all Jews here.”
Indigenous and Sovereignty are in most cases mutually exclusive. By Neville Berman
Concluding a Contract. The Old Testament is embedded in European culture and art as reflected here in this 18th century graphic by William Hogarth depicting Abraham purchasing a field from a Hittite in Hebron to be used as a family tomb.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
23 February 2026 – Multiple countries want UN Rapporteur, Albanese gone and more on The Israel Brief.
24 February 2026 – Military build up continues, which UK party has been called “racist” and more on The Israel Brief.
25 February 2026 – Israel welcomes a major friend and Ally and more on The Israel Brief.
26 February 2026 – Israel and India significantly upgrade ties and which celebrity couple is on the moron list? This and more on The Israel Brief.
24 February 2026 – Rolene Marks talks to Rob Schilling on WINA The Schilling Show about a possible Iranian attack, the situation in Iran and more.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
Indigenous and Sovereignty are in most cases mutually exclusive.
By Neville Berman
On February 18, the Israeli Foreign Minister, Gideon Saar addressed the UN Security Council on Israel’s right to the biblical land of Israel. He stated that the Jewish people are the indigenous people of the land of Israel. He then asked a question of how is it possible that Jewish presence on its ancestral land is seen as a violation of international law? The delegates were left in stunned silence as the logic of Jewish claims to the land of Israel were clearly articulated. This article is about whether Jews are in fact indigenous to the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, and whether they have the right to sovereignty over the land. It is based on the narrative as described in the Torah.
The Torah is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus. Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. It is the basis of monotheism and western civilization.
According to the Torah, Abram who later became Abraham was born in Mesopotamia in 1,813 BCE. He is described as an Ivri. He married Sarah, who remained childless during a woman’s normal child bearing years. With his wife’s approval Abraham fathered a child with his wife’s maidservant, named Hagar. She was not Jewish and the child was named Ishmael. When Abraham was 70 years old, he received the Covenant from G-d. Five years after this epic event, Abraham moved to Canaan, where in accordance with an important part of the Covenant, he circumcised himself as well as his firstborn son Ishmael, who was then 13 years old. At the age of 90, Sarah miraculously gave birth to her only son called Isaac. G-d promised Abraham that both his sons, Ishmael and Isaac, would be the progenitors of great nations.
Contact Concluded. A 18 century graphic by William Hogarth depicting Abraham buying a field from Ephron the Hittite which included the cave of Machpelah in Hebron to be used as a family tomb.
Using the dates above, we can conclude that monotheism began when Abraham received the Covenant 3,769 years ago. This is the number of years between when Abraham received the Covenant and the current year of 2026. After his marriage to Sarah, they became the first monotheistic Hebrew couple. Sarah had a son with Abraham named Isaac. Isaac married Rebecca, and they had a son named Jacob. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are considered the three Patriarchs of what would become Judaism. Sarah is considered the first of the four Jewish Matriarchs. After Sarah’s death, Abraham purchased a tomb in Hebron known as the cave of Machpelah, for her burial. The cave was purchased from Ephron the Hittite at an exorbitant price. In the book of Genesis, Abraham confessed that he is:
a stranger and a resident among you.
Heavenly Hebron. The Cave of Machpelah in Hebron is the world’s most ancient Jewish site and the second holiest place for the Jewish people, after the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The cave and the adjoining field were purchased by Abraham some 3700 years ago and it is where he, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca and Leah are all buried in the same Cave of Machpelah. These are considered the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish people.
The purchase of the site is highly significant. The cave became the burial site of all three Patriarchs and three of the four Matriarchs of the people that became known as Hebrews, then Israelites and finally Jews. The fact that Abraham had to purchase the burial site, indicates that people previously lived there, and were the owners of the property. They were Hittites, who were pagans. Indigenous people do not need to buy land from someone who lived there before they arrived.
Stamp of Sovereignty. “I hold up a jug handle from the Kingdom of Judea, 2700 years ago. It has a stamp of the Jewish king on it,” says Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar in an explosive address on the 19th February 2026 before the UN Security Council session on the Middle East. He strongly argued that “No other nation, in any other place in the world, has a stronger right than our historical and documented right to the land of the Bible”.
Part of the narrative of Judaism is their exodus from Egypt. For hundreds of years Jews lived in bondage in Egypt. After suffering 10 plagues including the last plague of the deaths of all first-born Egyptian males, Pharaoh finally relented, and allowed Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. After the Red Sea miraculously parted to allow the Israelites to escape the advancing Egyptian army, the Israelites journeyed to Mount Sinai, where Moses received the Ten Commandments from G-d. Moses then led the Israelites towards the land that G-d had promised to the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Before entering the land Moses sent out 12 spies, one from each tribe of Israel, to spy out the land. After 40 days they returned.
All twelve spies reported that the area was harsh and occupied. Only two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, reported that with the help of G-d, they would be able to conquer the land. After all the miracles that Moses and the Israelites had personally witnessed, it seems surprising that they were hesitant to enter the land that G-d had promised to the seeds of the Patriarchs. Probably, due to this hesitancy, Moses and the Israelites were then required to wander in the desert for 40 years. Only when the next generation was considered worthy of entering Canaan, were the Israelites allowed to enter Canaan. Moses never entered Canaan and he died in 1,273 BCE.
Tumbling to Trumpets. Well-fortified Jericho is the first city that Joshua’s Israelite forces encounter and according to the Bible, falls in a miraculous manner following the march around the walls with the Ark of the Covenant once a day for six days, and on the seventh day and seventh lap they blow ram’s horn trumpets and shout really loud causing the walls to crumble.
Joshua led the Israelites across the Jordan River into Canaan, and was instructed by G-d to wipe out the Canaanites. The first city Joshua attacked was Jericho. Remnants of pottery found in Jericho have been carbon dated to be over 5,000 years old. From this, it can be concluded that people were living in Jericho for over a thousand years before Joshua conquered the land. The vast majority of the Canaanites were wiped out by Joshua. The Israelites would eventually become known as Jews and Canaan was renamed Judea. It is important to note that indigenous people do not need to conquer land that others inhabit.
To cut a long story short, the Romans conquered Judea, and renamed the area Palaestina. Over the course of time, it became known as Palestine, and finally in 1948, the Jews renamed it the Land of Israel. This name is based on the fact that Jacob was also referred to by the name Israel.
If Indigenous people are defined as the original inhabitants of a region, then from the events mentioned above, it appears that Jews are not indigenous to the land of Israel. The question now arises whether Jews have the right to sovereignty over the land.
The Right of Jews to sovereignty over the land of Israel, is primarily based on G-d’s promise of the land to the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. This promise is repeated several times in the Torah. This right was never promised to the seed of Ishmael, or anyone else. The claim of sovereignty is supported by over 3,000 years of Jews living in the land, as well as the building of the First Temple that was destroyed by the Babylonians and the Second Temple destroyed by the Romans. Both Temples were built by Jews on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem that is the present site of the Mosque in Jerusalem. The United Nations approval of Resolution 181 in 1947, known as the Partition Plan of Palestine, merely confirmed the right of Jews to sovereignty over a sliver of the biblical land of Israel. The victories in the War of Independence in 1948, and the Six Day War in June 1967, further extended the right of Jewish sovereignty over the land. This is the same right claimed by America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and many other countries that gained sovereignty by subjugating the land by conquest.
History Unearthed. Excavation of King David’s palace in Jerusalem. According to the Hebrew Bible, the name “City of David” was applied to Jerusalem after its conquest by King David in 1000 BCE.
Sovereignty involves granting citizenship to the people living in the area. Israel cannot remain a Jewish and democratic state with a majority of Palestinian citizens. To avoid this scenario, Israel should not extend sovereignty to areas with large Palestinian populations in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and Gaza. What it can do, is to place the large Jewish settlement blocks in the West Bank under Israeli sovereignty. These large settlements are all situated in the biblical land of Israel.
The saga of the return of diaspora Jews to their ancestral homeland is a testament to the fulfilment of G-d’s promise of the land to the seeds of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The Jews have survived exile after exile, and thousands of years of blood libels, persecution and demonization. They have never abandoned their belief in one G-d and their devotion to Jerusalem. They have miraculously returned to their ancestral land, and have resuscitated Hebrew as a spoken language. They have made the desert bloom. They have established what has been metaphorically described as the villa in the jungle. It is not utopia, and has many serious problems and faults that still need to be resolved in the fullness of time.
Archeological digs in Jerusalem, and many other sites, have confirmed that Jews have lived in the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea for thousands of years. From the above, it appears that there is a compelling case for Jewish sovereignty over the land of Israel based on three claims. The first is the promise by G-d of the land to the seed of the Jewish Patriarchs, the second is over 3.000 years of Jews living in the land, and the third is conquest, both ancient and modern. No other sovereign country can claim all three of the above. I will end with the following message from G-d from the book of Genesis:
I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you, I will curse.
Unearthing Jewish Life in Ancient Times. The Excavation of King David’s Palace
About the writer:
Accountant Neville Berman had an illustrious sporting career in South Africa, being twice awarded the South African State Presidents Award for Sport and was a three times winner of the South African Maccabi Sportsman of the Year Award. In 1978 he immigrated to the USA to coach the United States men’s field hockey team, whereafter, in 1981 he immigrated to Israel where he practiced as an accountant and then for 20 years was the Admin Manager at the American International School in Even Yehuda, Israel. He is married with two children and one granddaughter.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
