I never get tired of posting this:

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

I will not be going to Fort Lee this year. I’ll be celebrating at Chesterfield County Fairgrounds with Sarah and family. (My big job of the day: Going to Chesterfield Berry Farm, an awesome produce place, and getting the corn.)

I have checked my email for the day, and will be filling out my electronic timesheet as soon as this post is done. For the rest of the day, well, it’s a holiday. I’ll be back after the fireworks. I hope my cobloggers are taking a break as well.

Writing about an industrial zone on the border of Gaza set to open nearly ten years ago, William Orme of the New York Times reported:

Now, hailed by all sides as the first tangible achievement of the current phase of the tortuous Israeli-Palestinian negotiating process, the Gaza Industrial Estate is expected to be operating before the end of the year. It will employ up to a thousand Palestinians, and eventually more, in several small-scale manufacturing ventures.What was hailed here as a diplomatic and economic breakthrough would almost anywhere else in the world be an unexceptional, small step in industrial development.

Still, it is a measure of the Gaza Strip’s isolation and economic desperation that this tentative, modest project looms so large for Palestinian planners.

Orme, of course, notes how Israel was likely to render the success of such a project unviable.

Gaza’s exports are routinely obstructed by border closings and security checks, further skewing a chronic trade imbalance. For every five trucks that arrive here from Israel, only one goes out, and it typically goes out very slowly.On a recent afternoon at the border checkpoint next to the industrial park, six Israeli customs inspectors examined a truckload of Gaza potatoes for hours, pallet by pallet, bag by bag, with hand-held metal detectors.

Unfortunately, one of the industrial zones bordering Gaza, Karni, was often the focus of terrorism.

In 2004 after Israel arrested an organizer of a terrorist attack in Ashdod where the terrorists were transported through Karni, Israel released some relevant information about the suspect:

Atallah noted that in the weeks prior to his arrest, the Hamas and Al-Aqsa Martyr Brigades tried to carry out another double suicide bombing into Israel, using the Karni crossing as the route for smuggling the suicide bombers. Atallah was responsible for arranging the release of the containers from the crossing; the suicide bombers were to be hidden under a double floor within a container. Atallah said that the terrorist organizations view the Karni crossing as a weak point, lacking full security checks, and providing an attractive route for smuggling terrorists into Israel. For that matter, the Hamas, assisted by Atallah, was planning to purchase trucks and establish a company for transporting containers from the Gaza Strip into Israel and use it as a guise for smuggling terrorists into Israel.

(emphasis mine)

In a 2006 briefing a UNRWA official said:

Recent incursions into the Karni industrial zone have left the infrastructure severely damaged. This usually vibrant area is now empty and quiet. Many of the companies will struggle to get started again. Some of them might not survive. Last month the offices of many Karni based Gazan companies were demolished, even the motherboards of their computers were taken away.”If violence stops there are other things to be done. This industrial zone has to be working again. Otherwise reconstruction will be unsustainable in Gaza”, Mr Grandi said.

The problem is that Karni became a focal point for attack because of its vulnerability. In fact the idea - logical on the face - that facilitating commerce and economic opportunity between the Palestinians and Israel would cement peace between them, has worked out quite the opposite so far.

I bring you this background because Tony Blair knows that he can bring peace to the Middle East by following this path right now.

Mr. Blair, a former British prime minister and now the representative of the so-called quartet of Middle East peacemakers — the United States, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union — announced plans for economic, social and security measures at a news conference. He said it would be “a mistake to think” that the political negotiations could work without changing the reality on the ground.That, he said, meant easing conditions for Palestinians in their daily lives while assuring Israelis their security.

Among the measures, which Mr. Blair said he had been discussing with Israeli defense officials, were efforts to ease the movement of Palestinian people and goods; the development of two industrial parks; approval for new building in Palestinian villages in areas under Israeli control; and the creation of a special Palestinian economic and security zone in and around Jenin, in the north, as a testing ground for the rest of the West Bank.

Will Mr. Blair’s initiatives pay off? The experience in Gaza shows that rather improving the lives of the Palestinians, the economic zones may well become targets for opportunistic terrorists. This is not to say that his effort will fail. Still past experience tells us that Mr. Blair’s good intentions notwithstanding, the implementation of his plan may well make matters worse.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Way to conduct negotiations, Hamas.

Hamas has threatened an “unprecedented escalation” against Israel if it does not agree soon to the Egyptian-mediated cease-fire offer, the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat reported Sunday.

[...] “All options are open. The ball is in the Israeli court,” Abu Zuhri said, adding that if Israel continues its procrastination, aggression and blockade of Gaza, “it may lead to unprecedented escalation.”

Gee, it’s almost as if they didn’t hear a word Jimmy Carter said to them.

Then again, it’s not like they haven’t used these tactics in the past.

In the meantime, the kassam rocket fire continues. And terrorist groups say they won’t agree to the truce, and leave themselves a loophole wide enough to drive a car-bomb through. They “reserve the right” to respond to “Israeli aggression,” code for the IDF taking out terrorists who, say, launch kassams into Israel. The thing that PIJ does all the time.

The thing that bothers me is that Olmert is apparently going to accept this truce, knowing full well Hamas wants only to rearm and regroup.

On the other hand, Olmert may finally be facing a scandal big enough to force him out. Since Israelis don’t think he’s worth getting rid of for his abysmal defense record, maybe his corruption will finally do it.

Here’s hoping. Israel deserves better leadership than she’s got.

A happy and kosher Passover to all of my Jewish readers.

“In every generation, they rise up against us, but the Holy One, blessed be He, rescues us from their hands.”

We will recite those words tonight. They have never lost their meaning. I’m afraid they never will.

But we’re still here. And we’ll still be here, when Hamas is as obscure—and dead—as the Hittites.

The week in review of the NYT Jan 17 - 23, 1993 reported on the law that allowed Israelis to talk to the PLO like this:

On the right, the dismayed opposition warned that a group bent on Israel’s destruction had been handed legitimacy. Indeed, even before Parliament acted, the P.L.O. was looking relatively good to Israelis who worry more about Hamas, the militant fundamentalist rivals of the P.L.O.

Or consider this analysis from the same time from the Christian Science Monitor. ( US Policy Can Curb Arab Extremes, Richard C. Hottelet., Feb 10, 1993)

Five years of the Arab uprising, the intifada, have shown that military power is no solution. Instead, force has helped to build the Frankenstein’s monster of Islamic extremism. It menaces not only Israel but also Arab states whose economic distress, population pressure, incompetence and corruption have made them vulnerable to demagoguery in the cloak of religious revival. In fact, Israel , moderate Arabs, and the PLO have a common deadly enemy in Islamist radicalism.

The PLO was presented as a moderate bulwark against the extremism of Hamas. Of course, what was perhaps relative moderation (the PLO or its main constituent Fatah and its leader Yasser Arafat was willing under certain circumstances to claim that he was willing to live in peace with Israel; Hamas never made such pronouncements.)

Now the question that is before the Washington Post is whether Israel (and the world) should deal with Hamas.

Rice’s actions underscore the nuanced series of signals that are typical of Middle East diplomacy, but they also highlight the central role today of Hamas, formally called the Islamic Resistance Movement, in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Now some experts — and even Israelis — are questioning whether the isolation of Hamas continues to make sense.A bipartisan group of foreign-policy luminaries, including former national security advisers Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft, issued a statement before the Annapolis peace talks in November that said, “As to Hamas, we believe a genuine dialogue with the organization is far preferable to its isolation.” The group suggested that an initial approach could be made by envoys for the United Nations or the Quartet, a peace-monitoring group. “Prompting a cease-fire between Israel and Gaza would be a good starting point,” the statement said.

Rice’s predecessor, Colin L. Powell, last year told National Public Radio that some way must be found to talk to Hamas, arguing, “I don’t think you can just cast them into outer darkness and try to find a solution to the problems of the region without taking into account the standing that Hamas has in the Palestinian community.” An aide said last week he retains that view.

So in fifteen years Hamas has gone from being beyond the pale to being essential. This begs two questions: Has Hamas changed and has Israel’s decision to talk to the PLO benefited Israel at all?

The answer to the first question is “yes.” Hamas has changed. Now it has territory and rockets, two things that it didn’t have 15 years ago. In other ways it hasn’t changed. It still seeks Israel’s destruction unwilling to offer more than a temporary truce to Israel.

Haniyeh said “all of the factions are involved,” signaling that Hamas’ call for a halt to the fighting has the support of smaller militant groups that have often scuttled cease-fire attempts in the past.Haniyeh used the word “tahdia,” or calm, to describe the informal cease-fire he sought. He did not use the Arabic word “hudna,” which is interpreted as a more formal truce. Both terms denote a temporary cease-fire rather than a permanent peace, but even the subtle differences between the words has led to fierce debate among Arabs in past cease-fire efforts.

So Hamas’s “moderation” now doesn’t even come to the level of Fatah’s selective recognition of Israel’s right to exist. And yet now dealing with it is being touted as essential to stability in the Middle East.

Did negotiating with the PLO and the subsequent Oslo Accords help Israel? The answer is almost certainly, “no.”

Using a simple measure, terrorist fatalities in Israel since 1967, we see that since Oslo, the quietest time for Israel was from 1997 to 1999 and again since 2006. The immediate effect of Oslo hurt Israel’s security. Arafat who was bound to fight terror, instead cultivated Hamas, Islamic Jihad and of course, groups affiliated with Fatah to carry out terror against Israel. Despite his promises and his rehabilitation, he remained committed to armed struggle against Israel.

Also since Oslo the standard of living of Palestinians has decreased because Arafat was too involved in accumulating power and wealthy for himself and his cronies and not building a peaceful infrastructure. So it’s not only Israel that’s suffered.

Now the world is arguing that Israel ought to deal with Hamas. Not because it’s moderated its stance but because it’s the only way to avoid worse violence. Well Israel tried that route 15 years ago and demonstrated that empowering a terror group will not moderate it. It will empower and embolden it to continue its violent ways.

Fatah, to many, now is powerless and I’m guessing that there’s a reason for that. After 2002, terror deaths in Israel declined. This was due to Israel’s Operation Defensive Shield. Israel facing a terror war, fought back. The toll was high. But Israel effectively destroyed the terror infrastructure in the West Bank. In other words, there was a military solution to the terror. If Fatah had not been committed to terror in the post-Oslo period, it would still be at near or full strength. Last year’s revolt of Hamas against Fatah in Gaza demonstrated the degree to which Fatah was weakened by Israel.

Writing in Time Magazine, Tim McGuirk argues:

For Olmert, negotiating a deal that stops rocket fire with organizations regarded as terrorists by Israel and the U.S. certainly beats the alternative: another air and ground offensive in Gaza that would end up with scores of Palestinian civilians and many Israeli soldiers dead, but wouldn’t necessarily stop the rockets.

If Israel’s experience with Fatah is instructive, it shows that terror groups can be defeated militarily. It also shows that negotiating with terror groups gives the terrorists the opportunity to organize, arm and attack. Talking with Hamas will not bring peace. It will bring a stronger Hamas. Israel needs to make a decision to wipe out Hamas, not coddle it.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

A happy and a healthy new year to all my readers.

I am rejoicing in the fact that I found no need to drink myself silly last night. I was up at 9 a.m. this morning (and a late morning that is for me!), completely hangover-free.

There’s something to be said for middle age.

(Ow. It hurt me to type those words.)

I also have some happy news: Tig has regained more than half a pound, and spent several hours yesterday sleeping in my lap. And he once again purrs when I ask him if he wants a “snug” (that’s when I pick him up and hold him for a minute or two while he purrs; it’s a snuggle and a hug), and he purrs when I pick him up. He wasn’t purring much at all the last week. He was also outside most of the day yesterday after we got back from the vet. They gave him another dose of subcutaneous IV fluids, which help wash some toxins out of his kidneys.

He is obviously feeling better. Plus, we have finished with his course of antibiotics. Phew. No more pills.

I’m off to the movies today with Heidi and Sorena. Juno movie review to follow.

I saw Sweeney Todd this afternoon, in a theater that had a decent-sized crowd. I can see why Steven Sondheim gave the movie his blessings. It’s quite good. It has its flaws, but overall, I enjoyed it immensely.

Flaw number one is that Helena Bonham Carter is a great actor, but she can’t sing for squat. Tim Burton really needed to give the role of Mrs. Lovett to someone who can actually sing. Johnny Depp isn’t a great singer, but his voice was good enough for the film.

Flaw number two was that I was immensely peeved that the introduction and finale were both skipped. The film ended too abruptly, and I really, really missed the finale.

Other minor quibbles: I thought most of the songs were sung too slowly. The comedic songs, especially, weren’t as quick and funny as they could have been. And Helena Bonham Carter either doesn’t do comedy well, or didn’t get that Mrs. Lovett wasn’t a dark, tired, sad woman all the time. I guess I really can’t compare her to the Angela Lansbury version, since Angela won the Tony for her role. But she could have been a little funnier.

Really, though, I did like the film. I’ll probably see it again, or maybe even buy it, spurting blood from throats and all. Tim Burton might not have wanted to make it so bloody, though. I’ll bet a PG would have gotten him legions of Johnny Depp tween fans. It’s rated R. Sorena couldn’t get in to get us seats early; she had to come get me to get her past the ticket-taker.

Overall, today was a very good day. And I got some cash in the karma bank because we discovered someone had left his keys hanging out of the door of his Toyota convertible, so I left a note on the windshield and the keys at the box office. I imagine someone got a nice little present when they got out of their movie.

A merry Christmas to all of my Christian readers.

And a happy Festivus to all the Seinfeld fans out there.

I will be doing, for the first time in my life, a traditional Jewish Christmas dinner: I’m meeting a bunch of Jewish friends for Chinese food tomorrow night.

After going to the movies tomorrow afternoon, of course.

You can’t make stuff like this up.

BETHLEHEM, Dec 20 (Reuters) - Offended Bethlehem residents have painted over a satirical mural by graffiti artist Banksy that was meant to highlight their plight.

The elusive British street artist painted six images around the town revered as the birthplace of Jesus to help drum up tourism ahead of Christmas and to illustrate the hardships faced by Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.

But the irony behind a painting of an Israeli soldier checking a donkey’s identity papers — a jab at the Jewish state’s strict security measures — was lost on some locals, who found it offensive and painted over it.

“We’re humans here, not donkeys. This is insulting. I’m glad it was painted over,” said restaurant owner Nasri Canavati. Comparing someone to a donkey in Palestinian society is like calling them an idiot.

Banksy’s images have fetched hundreds of thousands of dollars at auction. His London spokeswoman said a U.S. buyer had reportedly offered $150,000 for a piece of wall in Bethlehem bearing another of his paintings, and estimated the donkey mural was worth at least tens of thousands of dollars.

This is on the heels of multiple stories discussing how great the tourism season is in Bethlehem this year. Let’s think as to why this year is different from the past seven years. Hm. What’s different? Thinkthinkthinkthinkthink.

According to the AFP, these are the reasons:

But falling levels of violence, revived peace talks and what Batarseh credits as encouragement from churches in promoting support for one of the holiest sites in Christendom is encouraging the tourists back en masse.

Hm. Let’s see. Church support? Naaah. That’s not it. Revived peace talks? Feh. Tourists don’t give a damn about Annapolis. Falling levels of violence? Gee, ya think? The fact that bombs aren’t going off on buses and in cafes and markets, bullets aren’t flying in Manger Square, and molotov cocktails aren’t being tossed at passing cars might—just might—have something to do with it.

Before the Palestinian uprising broke out in September 2000, nearly a million tourists and Christian pilgrims visited Bethlehem each year.

Astonishing, isn’t it, how the media refuses to credit the real reason with the tourism revival? Just as the editors and writers must be dying this year because they can’t write their typical “Israel is killing Christmas” stories if the damned tourists show up in droves.

But fear not. They’re still pumping out the anti-fence stories, and pretending that Joseph and Mary (two nice Jewish kids with a baby Jewish boy) were Palestinians. And then there’s the Anti-Israel Nativity Scene available this year, complete with separation fence keeping the Wise Men out of Bethlehem.

I am officially done with winter. Even though it’s still autumn. And I live in a much milder climate than I used.

I will have more substantive things to say later today, but it’s work/dentist/work/work/work day, following a day and a half in Alexandria and NorVA for meetings, meetings, and party (with even some work thrown in).

Janet and Chris and I had a late Chanukah latkes party on Monday to make up for Janet having missed a few days the week before. I may be able to squeeze in one more excuse to make latkes before the end of the year. That would be my cooking them three times, and eating someone else’s latkes once. Score.

I know it’s after the holiday, but I found a new menorah picture that I thought you’d get a kick out of.

This sermon was written by Rabbi I.B. Koller, Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation B’nai Israel, Charleston, W.Va., and Rabbi Victor H. Urecki of B’nai Jacob Synagogue in Charleston, W. Va. I’ve been given permission to reprint their sermon. I think it’s fitting for the last night of Chanukah.

There is always a good reason for why Jews have the customs we have as a religion. At the same time, however, there is almost always a real reason for the customs we have as well. And when it comes to the dreidel and the latke, two particular objects of Chanukah we all know so well, the good reasons are not real and the real reasons are not good!

Next to the menorah, the shofar, and the Torah, the dreidel is perhaps the best known Jewish object. Here is what we do know about the dreidel. It is a four sided top with the Hebrew letters nun, gimel, hey, and shin. When you put the letters together, they form an acronym that stands for the phrase: “Nes Gadol Haya Sham” or “A great miracle happened there”. On Chanukah, it is customary to play a little gambling game using this top to celebrate this joyous holiday.

But why do Jews play dreidel? In other words, where does the dreidel come from? When did it start and why? Did Judah Maccabee start the tradition? Was it a custom created by the rabbis of the Talmud? If so, why a top and why gambling?

So here is the good reason for why we play dreidel, the reason we always hear. Dreidel was created a long time ago out of a need to be able to teach and pass on our faith when it had to be passed on in secret. During Roman times, when the study of Torah was outlawed, Jews had to find ways to fool the authorities and teach our faith when it was dangerous to do so. Thus, Jews created dreidel and other types of innocent games that could be played without arousing suspicion from the authorities. Dreidel conveyed the meaning and message of the holiday and allowed the story of Chanukah to be told without fear of discovery. Good reason.

Unfortunately, it is not the real reason. In fact, the dreidel originally had nothing to do with Chanukah and actually had more to do with the Christmas season!

Here is the real reason we play dreydl. In the winter (around Christmas time) in England and Ireland, a popular game called totum or teetotum was created. Totum was a game that started in the 1500’s to pass the time during the long winter season. Totum was a four sided top used for gambling with four letters – T (take all), H (take half), P (put down) and N (get nothing). In Eastern Europe, a similar game grew out of this totum and German letters were added to this pastime: – N (Nicht/ Nothing), G (Ganz/All), H (Halb/ Half), S (Shtel-in/ Put In). In Germany, the game was called “trundle” and when Jews started playing it, they put Hebrew letters on it and called it in Yiddish “varfl” ( to thrown in) or a “dreidel” (to spin).

So dreidel has its origins in England around Christmas time and later in Germany. Jews, therefore, who won’t buy or use German products or use anything associated with Christmas will have to rethink playing dreydl this year!

Oh, and don’t delve too deeply into the history of the latke, either. If you take some measure of pride in that Jewish delicacy, you will likely lose your appetite for it. Here, too, while the good reason is that the latke was created by Jews to celebrate the miracle of the “oil” (since the potato pancake is fried in oil), it actually didn’t start with us. The “latke” was actually a popular winter dish common throughout much of Poland centuries before Jews even got there. We took it and grafted it into our culture as well. Like the dreidel, the latke is not Biblical, Talmudic or even Jewish. It is no more Jewish than a hamburger.

(And don’t even ask me to tell you about Chanukah money or “Gelt”. I’m sorry to say that it, too, originally had nothing to do with Chanukah.)

Now, why am I doing this to our Chanukah traditions? Because I think this teaches us something very important about Judaism and Jewish survival.

Chanukah celebrates the story of the Jewish people rising up against those who would wanted to purge us of our heritage. It is the story of the Syrian-Greeks, in the year 165 B.C.E., defiling our Temple, trampling our religious way of life and demanding that we assimilate and become Hellenists. They wanted us to give up our identity and our religion.

You might think it ironic, therefore, that on this very holiday which celebrates victory over assimilation, that we play the dreidel game and eat latkes which are perfect examples of assimilation. After all, are we not using a game that was popularized by Christians and eating a delicacy from a culture that was not our own?

But my point is that Jews have survived because our people have been adept at making a distinction between assimilation and acculturation. Assimilation is the cultural absorption of a community into the main cultural body. Acculturation is adapting to new and different cultures and surroundings, being influenced but not swallowed up by those cultures. Acculturation is the only way to survive as a minority.

Jews have always had to battle to survive as a people. Christians, with nearly two billion followers, do not worry about their survival, nor do a billion Muslims, but the tiny Jewish minority of just under 14 million worldwide have always been embattled. When we weren’t being persecuted, we had to find ways to keep ourselves distinct and avoid disappearance. When we weren’t fleeing for our lives, we had to answer: how can we survive as a people without assimilating?

And for the last two thousand years, the Jewish religion has been able to survive precisely because Jews have successfully acculturated to society, adapting our heritage and faith to our surroundings. We like to think of Jews surviving because we were stubborn and refused to adapt to the surrounding cultures. Just the opposite! The truth of the matter is we successfully found ways to take aspects of every society we lived in and incorporate them into our own practices.

That is the meaning of dreidel, latke and a whole host of customs and tradition we do to this day. They were never part of the Torah, the Talmud or even the Codes of Jewish Law. They were traditions of the societies we lived in; we adopted them and adapted them into our world to be used to keep our faith and our people alive. We took the totum and made it a dreidel. That is not assimilation; that is acculturation and there is nothing wrong with that. Acculturation is the only way a minority can survive.

Think I am wrong? Look at how Jews took the German language, added Hebrew letters and created Yiddish; we also took Spanish, added Hebrew and created Ladino. Jews in Middle Eastern cultures created a more Eastern form of Jewish expression and Jews in Europe created a more Western influenced faith, from the foods we ate to the language we spoke to the prayers we recited. The religious “core” always stayed the same but the “trappings” changed to conform to the societies they were in.

The very key to our survival is found in the dreidel and the latke. The Jew didn’t assimilate, nor did he drop his heritage, but acculturated to the society he was in and found new ways to practice the faith of his ancestors. When faced with the challenge of survival, the Jew always acculturated as a way of maintaining his identity.

Look at what has happened to Chanukah in America, from the decorations that we have added as a result of Christmas to fancy menorahs that are more closely related to the American experience than anything seen by Judah Maccabee and his warriors. Purists may mortified by what they are seeing but I am not. I think it is the ongoing acculturation of our Jewish community, maintaining our cultural identity in a society that calls us to fully assimilate. Isolation is not an option and assimilation is cultural suicide; acculturation is how a people survives.

Acculturation is what Jews have done for centuries, from eating a Polish Potato Pancake and making it a Chanukah tradition, to taking a popular Christmas-time toy called totum and making a game that tells the story of Chanukah.

That’s the way we survive as a people!

The original, the one, the only: Adam Sandler and The Chanukah Song, straight from SNL.

This one was submitted by Sarah.

And now, in place of the lame Flash embed from Albino Blacksheep, Sarah found this rockin’ Chanukah video by a group that I would have rocked to during the 70s. Whoa. I’m sensing a little Grateful Dead, a little Mountain, a little Clapton, a little ZZ Top—complete with guitar solo and, uh, an Orthodox bass player. Kewl.

This spot used to hold the Flash embed code of “Hey Ya Hanukah.” I have removed it, because you don’t have a choice to play it or not. Every single time you load this page, the video loads and plays. Screw that. That’s not what “embed” should be used for. I am not interested in any more Albino Blacksheep videos if that’s how they try to push them on people.—Meryl

It’s got a beat you can dance to.

Reader chsw gave me this one, which started the trend of Chanukah/Hanukkah videos. It’s a Tom Lehrer cover with a little topping of South Park at the end.

Another one from Sabba Hillel, with some pretty great video.

This one’s audio only, but so worth it. Melvin and the Chipmunks sing a Chanukah song.

Sabba Hillel has sent a few more Chanukah videos. Here’s one that holds a more spiritual bent, yet still has a beat you can dance to:

A very pretty songfest by a choir in Edwardian dress singing a Chanukah medley (all two songs) plus Shalom Aleichem. Go figure.

Okay, I really can’t stand Bon Jovi, but I know a lot of you out there do. So here’s his version of the Adam Sandler Chanukah song.

Yes, really.

My Menorah: This one is going to sound really familiar to all you old fans of The Knack. (I wasn’t one of them.)

So how was your first night of Chanukah? Mine was latkes and music at the R household. I burned my finger in the oil (sigh) but not badly enough to do more than sting after an hour or so of aloe vera, ice water, Advil, and, um, wine.

Sam and his friends had a concert last night. I asked them to please sing a bit for me, and when they said they had a Jewish song, well, here’s part of it.

If you’re wondering why they paused from time to time, it’s because they were waiting for the rest of the choir to sing their parts.

It’s an extra Hanukkah treat for you all (and it was for me). They even sang it in English, but somehow, it seems more repetitive when you hear it translated.

This year we’re going to have something new for Hannukkah: A video each night. You can thank regular reader chsw, who sent me a link to the video I’ll be using on the sixth night.

Tonight’s video: How Do You Spell Hannuka? by the LeeVees.

And we’re putting it in during the day so you can all enjoy before you go home from work. (Oh, like you don’t all call from work.)

Found a funny bit in the JPost today about Christopher Hitchens’ ignorance of Judaism. This is the best part:

Hitchens’ avers that: “If one could nominate an absolutely tragic day in human history, it would be the occasion that is now commemorated by the vapid and annoying holiday known as Hanukka. For once, instead of Christianity plagiarizing from Judaism, the Jews borrow shamelessly from Christians in the pathetic hope of a celebration that coincides with “Christmas.”

What? Hanukka takes from Christians? Awesome! The Maccabees were time travelers!

A BRIEF Hanukka refresher: The festival is a celebration of the victory in 165 BCE of the Maccabees, over the armies of the Hellenistic Syrians led by Antiochus Epiphanes IV.

Oops. Hey, feel free to be an atheist, Hitch. But perhaps you should know what you’re talking about before putting it down.

I have a lot to be thankful for this year. I have a great job, I’m on my way to financial security, my family is all healthy, I have great friends, Tig and Gracie are happy and healthy (albeit always a bit neurotic), I’m working my way through the DVD of Heroes that Lynn gave me, the weather here in Richmond is in the 70s, my house is still pretty darned clean from the bat mitzvah, and, well, life is good.

This time last year, Gracie was three pounds underweight and recovering slowly from IBD, barely able to walk up the stairs without making me cringe at her skinniness and hesitation. She just zipped past me through the open patio door, because the wind kicked up and blew leaves around and frightened her. Tig’s outside sitting in the sun, ruler of all he surveys.

By this time next year, I should be in my own home. And who knows what else the next year will bring?

It’s been a long, hard slog since I started this weblog in the spring of 2001. But things are going very, very well now. I’ve been giving thanks privately for a while. Time for some public thanks.

What have you got to be thankful for?

Last year, due to Gracie’s illness and having to either board her or pay someone to come by twice a day to give her her pills, I stayed in Richmond for Thanksgiving instead of spending it in NJ with my family. As soon as I said I was staying, Sarah invited me to the G. house’s Thanksgiving dinner. I asked what I could contribute to the dinner. She wouldn’t let me contribute a thing. She’s a great cook, so I wasn’t about to argue. Especially when the word “tzimmes” was mentioned, a dish I’d always wanted to try to make myself. Instead, I went to a chocolatier in Richmond called For the Love of Chocolate. They have an astonishing selection of chocolate and candy from all over the world. I picked up some candy for the kids, plain chocolates for those of us who like plain chocolates (present!), various percentages of cacao to see just how dark we could go (much past the low 70s and it’s too bitter for Sarah and me, but not Larry), and a little of the sugary stuff for me (I have a major sweet tooth that is my caloric downfall). And that was when I wasn’t nearly as flush financially as I am today.

The result of all those chocolates became what we started calling “the chocolate course.” It came after the main course and the dessert course.

You should see the bag o’ chocolates in my pantry this year. That isn’t even including the Mallomars I picked up at Costco last week.

I bought enough for a gathering about two or three times our size, I think.

The chocolate course is going to take several meals to consume. Oh, well. The truffles will stay at the G. house. But the sponge comes home with me.

From the creator of “The Internet is a Series of Tubes” PowerPoint comes:

A Thanksgiving Story.

An easy and meaningful fast to all my Jewish readers.

This blog will be going dark until after my Saturday night break-fast.

You wouldn’t want me blogging on an empty stomach, anyway. You have no idea how crabby I get by sundown.

As Jews all over the world fast and pray on this Day of Atonement, I would like to point out that Israel is forced to enact a full closure on the West Bank, and set her armed forces to the highest alerts—because today is the day that terrorists most crave murdering Jews.

And now is the time of year for me to say: If I offended any of you, I ask your forgiveness. It wasn’t intentional. (Unless you’re a Jew-hater. Then it was.) Yeah, I know, that’s probably not how it’s supposed to work. But I have a problem with forgiveness. I’m working on it.

If you’re not Jewish, and want to help out this Yom Kippur, donate food to your local food bank. They tend to always need peanut butter, canned fish, canned soups, vegetables, and pasta.

This is the time of year when I wish a sweet and happy and healthy new year to all of my Jewish friends and family. May you be inscribed in the Book of Life for nothing but good things this year.

We have a new rabbi this year, but as he arrived in August, I think he had little to do with setting up the High Holy Day services. We shall see how long things go this year.

In the meantime, I am with my favorite West End family for dinner tomorrow night, and will be making my once-a-year apple cake. I bake exactly one thing, and that’s it. In fact, I started baking it because my first year in Richmond, a lovely woman named Inge invited me for Rosh Hashana dinner on the first night, and the apple cake was a dessert. I got the recipe and have been making it ever since, mostly at Rosh Hashanah, but sometimes I make an extreme effort and have it twice in one year. (I don’t bake. I buy baked goods. Or get them from Sarah. I cook, but I don’t bake.)

This time next year, I hope to be able to hold my first Rosh Hashana dinner in my own home. Of course, there will be an apple cake.

Happy Fourth of July to my fellow Americans, and to my fellow Americans in spirit.

Long may she wave!

Every year on this date, I post this:

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

As is my custom, I’ll be heading out to Fort Lee to celebrate the Fourth on an Army base, surrounded by soldiers, flags, and extremely happy and patriotic Americans.

2005 pictures.
2004 pictures.

That’s it for the day. Go forth and enjoy!