US President George W. Bush arrived at Ben Gurion International Airport shortly before noon, and was welcomed warmly by President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and a host of dozens of dignitaries.

Notable in his absence at the well-orchestrated red-carpet ceremony was Pensioners Affairs Minister Rafi Eitan, who was Jonathan Pollard's handler in the 1980s when he headed the Israeli Intelligence Lakam Bureau.  Commentators raised the possibility that his absence was linked to a desire not to irk the visting President Bush with a reminder about Pollard – but this appears to be untrue, as Eitan is invited to a special gathering with Bush later on today.

Issues on the agenda between Bush and his hosts will likely include the Iranian threat, Israel's position vis-à-vis the talks with the Palestinian Authority and the possibility of a future Palestinian state, and – in some meetings - Jonathan Pollard.  Olmert has given no indication as to whether he will bring up the topic with Bush.

Following earlier reports that Bush did not plan on meeting with Opposition Leader and ex-Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, staffers from Bush's office contacted Netanyahu and asked to schedule a meeting with him.  It has long been a tradition that visiting dignitaries meet with Israel's opposition leader.

Many Jerusalem streets were closed to traffic for close to an hour in honor of Bush's visit – but the resulting traffic jams were smaller than expected.  This was because many Jerusalemites simply decided to stay home today, in anticipation of the difficulties Bush's visit would cause.  Video from some 150 cameras, photographing intersections around the city and arriving at the traffic headquarters on the Givat Mordechai overpass atop Menachem Begin Highway, shows that the roads are relatively empty.

Only 29 cars that were parked in forbidden areas were towed away over the night.  Motorists had been warned beforehand not to park in certain areas along the expected route of President Bush from the Givat Ram University campus helicopter landing pad to the King David Hotel.

Thursday and Friday, as well, many streets will be closed intermittently, in order to allow Bush's motorcade to pass unhindered and safely.  On Thursday, Bush will likely fly by helicopter to Ramallah, just north of Jerusalem, and no roads to the nearby Jewish towns of Beit El and Psagot are expected to be affected.  Bush is to leave Israel on Friday.

Sderot and the western Negev are under attack. Shortly before 8:00 this morning, a round of five rockets and shells were fired at Israel, including three towards Ashkelon.  Within two hours, another four had been fired, for a total of nine.

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Two Kassams were fired towards Kibbutz Shaar HaNegev last night, causing no damage.

One of this morning's rockets hit a house in Sderot, destroying a bed in which a child had been sleeping shortly beforehand.  Three people were treated for shock, including the boy's mother  She had run to safety in the building's shelter with her three-week-old baby.   

The boy's uncle, who arrived at the scene, tearfully told Army Radio, "It destroyed my young nephew's bed!  How much longer can we take this? How much longer can we remain strong!?  We feel abandoned!"

"Why Did Bush Bother Coming?"
A rabbi from the Sderot Yeshivat Hesder who lives very close to the building that was hit told Arutz-7, "I was in my room preparing for a class when I heard the Color Red warning alert.  Within seconds, I heard a tremendous boom right nearby.  It was very frightening.  It was known all along that the visit would bring this response - so why did he come? Instead of solving the problem by enabling Israel to fight the terrorists, he is making it worse!"

IDF Hits Terror Cell
An IDF force fired a rocket at a Kassam launching cell in northern Gaza earlier this morning, killing one terrorists and wounding six others, including two mortally.  An Islamic Jihad spokesman said the wounded terrorists managed to fire off several shells towards Israel before they were hit.
 

The IDF has caught another PA police officer involved in terrorist attacks. Nine new Fatah terrorists are now joining the PA to preclude arrest.

The IDF Spokesman said Tuesday that a terrorist arrested in the Samaria village of Kfar Kadum Monday was responsible for a series of shooting attacks.  Fatah member Moussa Ahmed Daoud Akel was responsible for a shooting attack in October, 2007, in which an Israeli civilian was seriously wounded.

Akel was a member of the PA police force in Ramallah at the time of both the attack and his arrest. The same force has received training from American General Keith Dayton and weapons supplied or facilitated by Israel. Members of the PA police have been responsible for two fatal shooting attacks in recent months, in which Israeli citizens Achikam Amichai, David Rubin, and Ido Zoldan were murdered.

Akel turned himself in to Israeli troops Monday night after troops surrounded his house for several hours and threatened to destroy the building if he did not come out.  He has been handed over to security services for interrogation. 

The Next Generation
Nine more wanted Fatah terrorists in Shechem have agreed to turn in their weapons to Palestinian Authority forces in the hopes of gaining protection from Israeli arrest and eventually becoming PA police themselves, according to Arab affairs reporter Khaled Abu Toameh of the Jerusalem Post. The terrorists will spend three months in a PA security installation, and will then be incorporated into the PA police force, as is standard under PA protocols. 

The terrorists’ decision to turn themselves in comes shortly after IDF troops held a three-day operation in Shechem and arrested several Fatah terrorists.  The operation led PA head Salam Fayyad to ask all remaining armed Fatah terrorists who are wanted by Israel to join the armed PA police force instead.

Homesh First Accuses Gov’t
Members of the Homesh First movement responded Tuesday to the arrest of the PA policeman who carried out the October shooting attack on Israeli civilians by accusing the government of assisting terrorists.  “[The government] is a partner to the shedding of Jewish blood by giving weapons and reviving the terrorist army,” the group said. Homesh First activists called on the government to fight terrorists and not Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria.

Border Police Hesitant to Cooperate With PA
Border police officers spoke to Arutz-7 on Tuesday after Defense Minister Ehud Barak reportedly discussed the possibility of joint Israeli-Palestinian Authority patrols in Judea and Samaria with PA head Salam Fayyad.  The officers said they would refuse to take part in joint patrols if such an order was given, and expressed anger at the government.

The officers mentioned the murder of Yossi Tabaja, who was killed by his PA patrol partner in 2000.  “For us it’s even worse than the murders that were carried out with the weapons we gave the PA,” they said.  “Here not only did we give the policemen the weapon, but the government of Israel put the victim—that is to say, us—in the jeep with the murderer.”

Border Police commanders responded to the statements by their subordinates by saying that they had not received any orders involving joint patrols.  If they were ordered to carry out joint patrols, they would do so, they said, adding: “We do not choose our missions.”

Maayana Miskin contributed to this report

Former border police officer Mordechai Mehager, part of the Yassam riot police unit, insists that police officers who clashed with demonstrators in Amona in early 2006 were told to use violence. 

Mehager is facing a lawsuit filed by Yishai Greenbaum, a young activist who says Mehager beat him with a club for two full minutes on his head, arms and legs, leaving him with a permanent handicap.  Mehager was identified from video footage in which he is seen beating nonviolent protestors with a police club.

The suit was filed by Yesha Human Rights Organization lawyer Chaim Cohen, who wrote in the petition that, “the accused – officer Mehager – exceeded the authority granted to him by law and police regulations, acting in an independent manner and exercising excessive force without justification. Alternatively, if it turns out that the accused received ‘orders from above,’ then we are dealing with unacceptable orders whose implementation should have been refused.”

Mordechai Mehager

Simultaneously, a police Machash (Internal Affairs) investigation examined the incident and it was decided to indict Mehager pending the outcome of the civil trial.

State prosecutors declined to offer Mehager the defense and immunity normally afforded civil servants and stated that if he is fined, he will be required to pay the damages himself.  Prosecutors explicitly conceded that Mehager used excessive force against Greenbaum in its response to the petition.

Mehager has now come out in force against the police, saying that what caused the violence was orders telling police officers to use their clubs whenever necessary.

Mehager’s lawyer has filed a motion seeking a subpoena of police records and archives, saying he is playing the role of scapegoat to satisfy political elements on behalf of the police. “The preparations for the eviction consisted of a week’s worth of vague briefings, yet clear instructions were given that in any case of need batons should be used,” Mehager testified. He added that if the orders were indeed illegal, it should be those who gave them that are put on trial and made to compensate the victims.

The Yesha Human Rights Organization said it awaits the decision by Police Internal Affairs to file a criminal indictment against Mehager. The group pointed out that there are far more active civil cases against violent police officers from Amona than there are Internal Affairs investigations and lamented the fact that the cases continue to drag on for months with no progress.

More than 2,000 people braved intermittent showers and cool temperatures Tuesday to form a human chain along the walls of Jerusalem's Old City. The unique protest was meant to send a clear, loud message to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and US President George W. Bush ahead of the latter's visit to Israel: Jerusalem is the eternal capital of Israel and the Jewish People, and must not be divided.[video:123028]

The protest, organized by the One Jerusalem organization, included a cross-cultural and cross-generational mix of native and immigrant Israelis, yeshiva students, professionals and blue-collar workers, Jerusalemites and residents of nearly every section of the country. Dozens of participants carried large Israeli flags as organizers stretched flag strings along the Old City wall near Jaffa Gate and passed out gold ribbons – an echo of the orange ribbons associated with the anti-Disengagement campaign two-and-a-half years ago. The new ribbons are intended to show solidarity with Jerusalem as a united city and Israel's capital.

Of course, no protest rally would be complete without appearances by politicians and other public figures, and Tuesday's gathering was no exception. Notable figures in the rain included former Prisoner of Zion and former Knesset Member Natan Sharansky, MK Yisrael Katz (Likud), Jerusalem City Council Member Nir Barkat and Yechiel Leiter, a former Chief of Staff to Binyamin Netanyahu, One Jerusalem spokesman and veteran Yesha leader.

As the human chain broke into a short rally in favor of a united Jerusalem, Leiter stirred the already-energized crowd by quoting former Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert's comments from a protest rally held on January 8, 2001 – eight years to the day (according to the Gregorian calendar) before Tuesday's gathering. Then, Olmert pleaded with then-President Bill Clinton not to pressure Israel into dividing Jerusalem: "Please, Mr. President. Do not lend your hand to dividing Jerusalem," he said. Organizers estimated that 400,000 people attended that rally, making it the largest demonstration the capital has ever seen.

Leiter continued to denounce the current prime minister for not only agreeing to divide the Holy City, but for asking for Bush's help to implement the plan, and said a majority of Israelis opposed such a move.

"We are here to tell President Bush that Ehud Olmert does not represent the Israeli public with regard to Jerusalem," he told the crowd. "We are also here to tell our own parliamentarians that we will be watching. In two weeks the Knesset Laws Committee will begin debating a law to require a special parliamentary majority of 80 MKs to approve any changes to Jerusalem's municipal boundaries. We will be watching to see who votes in favor of the law, who votes against and who abstains. And we will act accordingly on Election Day." 

Leiter's words clearly found a mark with many audience members. 19-year-old Elisha Breningstall, a native of Minneapolis, Minnesota who now studies at the Netiv Aryeh yeshiva next door to the Western Wall, cited both historical and security reasons for coming to the rally.

"I am 100 percent against giving up any part of the Land of Israel, especially in Jerusalem," he told Arutz-7. "For 19 years, the Jordanians controlled our holiest places, and no Jews were allowed to set foot on them. Today, Moslems can visit al-Aqsa Mosque whenever they want. How could we even think about reverting to the former scenario?

"Furthermore," he said, "look at what's happened in Sderot. We gave away our land and now there is a constant rain of Kassam rockets on the city. It's a direct result of Disengagement."

In contrast to many, or even most, political protest rallies, the event had something of a non-political feel, perhaps due to the presence of hundreds of teenagers from Jerusalem and around the country. Many sang songs about Jerusalem and there was even a bit of dancing despite the rain, giving the event a marked sense of joy and celebration, rather than the tension that often surrounds "traditional" political rallies.

One group of ninth-grade girls who traveled by bus from Rechovot to attend the rally were clearly in awe of the fact they were standing in the shadow of the Jerusalem; another group of teenaged boys organized a minyan (prayer group) for the afternoon service. One man in his fifties or sixties wore a shirt declaring, "I am a settler from Givatayim," referring to a middle-class suburb of Tel Aviv. An uninitiated passer-by could easily have come away with the impression that several thousand people had spontaneously gathered to celebrate Jerusalem, rather than come to deliver a potent political message.

At the end of the day, the most compelling message of the afternoon did not come from the central stage or from any of the polished speeches by accomplished public figures in attendance. Rather, the centrality of Jerusalem to the Jewish people was best expressed by 14-year-old Frima Bubis, a resident of the capital's Har Nof neighborhood.

"The reality of what our soldiers went through so that we could be here today," she told Arutz-7, "is why I'm here today. When you live in Jerusalem, it's easy to forget about it or to get all caught up in politics. But when you think about what it was like before those critical six days (the 1967 Six Day War), what they went through for us – it really hits home, and brings the point home for a lot of people."

(Photos: Josh Shamsi, Arutz-7 Photojournalist)

Thousands of Land of Israel activists held a vigil in Jerusalem’s Har Homa neighborhood Tuesday night, defiantly declaring they would continue to build in Jerusalem as well as Judea and Samaria.

The protest came a day before the visit of United States President George Bush and took place in what was thought to be a “safe” Jerusalem neighborhood until building there recently came under criticism from the US State Department and was halted mid-way.

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A flatbed truck laden with building supplies was the podium for the evening's speeches.

The protest took place at a muddy building site.

Residents of the diverse neighborhood came out in force.

Daniella Weiss (L) and Nadia Matar (R)

Activists repeatedly highlighted the irony that a mainstream Jerusalem neighborhood now finds itself in the same situation as even the most far-flung hilltop community, even though Israel annexed all of Jerusalem following the 1967 Six Day War. The two-pronged message was that nobody has the right to divide Jerusalem and that building will continue, with or without the approval of either the Israeli or American government, in Jerusalem as well as Judea and Samaria.

The speeches were given from the back of a flatbed truck loaded with building supplies. “We will not stop building this land for a second!” declared Nadia Matar of the Women in Green.

Ariel Zilber between musical numbers.

A flag reading "The Land of Israel for the Nation of Israel" waves from a city bus leaving Har Homa.

The rabbi of Har Homa said that they had no particular love for their neighborhood more than the rest of the land of Israel, but that it was a privilege that they are now on the front lines alongside those living on hilltop towns in Judea and Samaria.

Musical interludes were provided by folk/pop legend Ariel Zilber. Despite being cold, wet, and muddy, the crowd kept breaking out in dance.

Although initially it was announced that trucks laden with building supplies would depart, for new hilltop communities across Judea and Samaria, from the scene of the event, four of the seven trucks were dispatched directly in order to thwart police plans to intercept them.

Activists cheered for the communities they helped build when they were showcased on a large movie screen. Placards with the names of the different new hilltops were held aloft by young activists. Following the protest, the activists traveled to the various locations in Judea and Samaria, where they began building several new communities that were established in recent months. A new community was established during the day Tuesday as well, near Pasgot, overlooking Ramallah. 

"Mitzpe HaEe, near Psagot" - founded earlier Tuesday.

A view of the crowd from one of the trucks of building supplies.

"Shvut Ami - erected Sukkot 5768"

A photo exhibit of the new hilltop community of Harchivi. Activists sponsor bricks to be used for building.

A billboard advertises homes to be built in Har Homa; construction has been frozen.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert recently announced that he would freeze Jewish construction in all of Judea and Samaria, and that all new building projects in the Jerusalem area would require his personal approval. The PA has demanded that Israel stop building in Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem, and, further, destroy existing communities in order to make the area free of Jews prior to the creation of a PA state.   

Kiryat Arba Chief Rabbi Dov Lior speaks aboard the truck of building supplies.

Rabbi Daniel Shilo of the Yesha Rabbis' Council.

Matar receives phone calls all evening from activists already building the communities.

Homesh First's Boaz HaEtzni announces that it has now been half a year of continuous Jewish presence at Homesh, the N. Samarian community destroyed during the Disengagement.

A controversial poster produced by Baruch Marzel's Hazit group attracts the foreign press corps.

Nadia Matar addresses the crowd.

Ariel Zilber

A local resident sells cotton candy (called 'Granny's Hair' in Hebrew).

A new effort by MKs Effie Eitam and R' Yitzchak Levy to sign people up for their new Achi Party, which promises direct primaries.

Building materials to be used in building so-called unauthorized outposts.

A banner draped on the side of the trucks in honor of those who sponsored the building supplies.

A sign in French; one fifth of Har Homa's residents immigrated recently from France.

Rabbi David Wolpe of the SOS Israel organization.

One of the truck-drivers studies the weekly Torah portion during the protest.

A car headed for Mevaseret Adumim, the new community established in the so-called E-1 area adjacent to Maaleh Adumim.

The local B'nei Akiva youth groups declares: "We aren't moving from here."

 

The newly established communities (from north to south) are:

1) Maalot Halhul, next to Kiryat Arba
2) Givat HaEitam, next to Efrat
3) Netzer, between Elazar and Alon Shvut
4) Mevasseret Adumim, next to Maaleh Adumim
5) Maaleh Ha-Ay, next to Psagot
6) Maoz Esther, next to Kochav HaShachar
7) Givat Ha'or, next to Beit El
8) Shvut Ami, next to kedumim
9) Nofei Hashmonaim, next to Hashmonaim

At press time, police had confiscated building material near Efrat and were attempting to remove activists from Netzer. Police activity was also reporter at the Hevron Heroes outpost between Kiryat Arba and Hevron.

(Photos: Ezra HaLevi)

According to the 2007 Annual Report of the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute (JPPPI), a project of the Jewish Agency, 41 percent of all Jews now live in Israel.

At the beginning of 2007, the total world Jewish population was 13,155,000, an overall
Unlike their Diaspora brethren, Jews in Israel "have relatively high and steady birth rates."
growth rate of 0.5 percent over the previous year's figures. The Diaspora experienced a net decrease in population of 20,000 Jews, while Israel's Jewish population increased by 80,000 souls.

The report found that, unlike their Diaspora brethren, Jews in Israel "have relatively high and steady birth rates." Israel's 1.5 percent increase and the Diaspora's 0.2 percent decrease in Jewish population "continued the well established patterns of past years," according to the JPPPI report.

In 2004, the JPPPI reported that under 40 percent of world Jewry lived in Israel, while in 2002, according to Israeli government statistics, that figure was 37 percent. Projecting ahead, the latest JPPPI report showed that nearly 46 percent of the world's Jews will be found in Israel in the year 2020.

The largest single Jewish population bloc is that of North America, with 5.7 million people, according to JPPPI, but decreasing rapidly. However, there was a minor Jewish population increase in Canada by 2007. Nevertheless, assuming no radical migration changes, the North American Jewish population will be outstripped by Israel within the next decade or so, per JPPPI statistics.

Significant decreases in Jewish population were noted in Europe, Latin America and Africa. The JPPPI report further noted, "The overall Jewish population numbers in Europe are at a historic low. Due to emigration, assimilation and an aging population, many communities are set to shrink further or to vanish altogether." Germany's Jewish population, however, "continued to increase, but France and the United Kingdom['s] declined."

A Stable Nuclear Family is the Key
Analyzing the Israeli birthrates and increasing population figures, the 2007 JPPPI report determined that "a persisting preference for nuclear families with children stand behind an annual natural population increase of about 70,000."

JPPPI reported that 2006 saw the highest number of Jewish births ever recorded in the country (104,000). The Israeli birthrate, while still high compared to most of the West, is affected by the high birthrate of the Hareidi-religious population of Israel. According to JPPPI, Hareidi women have an average of 4.7 children, compared to 2.7 for the general Israeli Jewish population and 1.1 for Jewish women in the Diaspora. "In 2007, one of every three Jewish Israeli children registered in grade 1 is in one of the Hareidi school
Significant decreases in Jewish population were noted in Europe, Latin America and Africa.
systems," the report said.

And so is Education
"Evidence from all over the world shows that children attending Jewish day schools are more likely to develop a Jewish identity," the 2007 JPPPI report declared.

Hence, researchers at the institute reported that the Jewish population abroad could be split into two groups: a religious population with a growing sense of connection to Israel and a non-religious population that has a higher rate of intermarriage and a weakening connection to Judaism and Israel. They called on Israel to do more to reach out to non-religious Jews living abroad.

Migration: An Insignificant Factor
Shifts in the distribution of world Jewry were barely influenced by international migration, as Jews left Israel and came to live in their old-new homeland in nearly equal numbers.

A total of 19,000 new immigrants went to Israel in 2006, 9 percent less than in 2005. There was an increase in Aliyah to Israel from North America and Europe overall, yet a decrease in immigration from France and the Slavic states. In any event, the JPPPI report said, "Immigration is significantly off-set by out-migration, leading to an international migration balance close to zero."

A delegation from the Judea and Samaria (Yesha) Rabbinic Council was blocked from ascending the Temple Mount on Tuesday morning.

Jerusalem police closed the Temple Mount to Jews, telling those who arrived that an ancient Muslim holiday was discovered to be taking place, thereby precluding entrance by Jews. They could not name the holiday when asked, however.

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“It seems that the Temple Mount, Judaism’s holiest site, will be the first thing to be handed to [U.S. President George W.] Bush on a silver platter,” read a statement to the media by the Movement to Prepare the Holy Temple.

The statement called for Jews all over the world to fight the possible transfer of control of the site to the Palestinian Authority in upcoming negotiations.

"The Jewish nation must oppose in every way the abandonment of the Temple Mount and Jerusalem to foreigners. We must be faithful and act with self-sacrifice against the initiatives of our enemies, both without and within.”

Former IDF Chief of Staff Moshe Levy died early Tuesday at the Emek Medical Center in Afula at the age of 71, ten days after suffering a stroke. He is survived by his wife and five children.

The tall soft-spoken “Moshe v’Hetzi” (“Moshe-and-a-Half” in Hebrew) as he was affectionately called by Israel’s founding father David Ben Gurion was born in Tel Aviv, the son of Iraqi immigrants.

He was the first Chief of Staff to have begun his military career in the Israel Defense Forces. Previous chiefs, and indeed most military professionals at the time, had begun in various defense groups that were operating prior to the birth of the Jewish State.

Drafted in 1954, the tall recruit served in two elite units, first in the Golani Brigades and then as a paratrooper. He parachuted in, as an officer, to the pivotal battle at the Mitla Pass in the Sinai Peninsula, during the 1956 war over the Suez Canal.

Levy continued to make his way through the ranks, achieving one command position after another, until he eventually was appointed by then-Defense Minister Moshe Arens to succeed Rafael Eitan as Israel’s 12th IDF Chief of Staff in 1983.

He served as the army’s top commander  for only one four-year term before leaving the IDF to return home to Kibbutz Beit Alfa in the Beit Shean Valley. 

It was during Levy’s reign as Chief of Staff that Israel’s “security buffer zone” was created in southern Lebanon in 1985 and the Nahal and Givati Brigades were born.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert eulogized Levy in a statement to the media, expressing his “profound sorrow” over the former Chief of Staff’s passing.

"Moshe Levy was a great fighter who served the State for many years and used all his energy and capabilities to further establish the strength of the IDF," Olmert said. "He led the IDF at a complex time and knew how to inspire others with his spirit and leadership."

"Even in recent years, he did not avoid public business and served as Chairman of the Board of Directors the Trans-Israel Highway Company. In this capacity, he used his experience and abilities to improve Israel's highways and establish better and safer roads. On behalf of the entire Government, I send condolences to Moshe Levy's family. I am honored that I was fortunate enough to work with him in recent years."