VOL. 40            NEWSLETTER           JUL./OCT. 2000

Dear Friends of Israel and “Or Tzion”,

Blessings, peace, safety, security, health and prosperity be yours this new year, and the joy and favor of G-d and of the Lord, with happiness and contentment in His service. May you be inscribed for a blessed and prosperous New Year.

My apologies for not writing a bi-monthly letter, but Or Tzion’s funds no longer suffice for that service.However, the letter will be sent out quarterly, until such time as the Lord increases Or Tzion’s budget. 

I hardly know where to begin, as there is much pertinent news. While I wish to avoid repeating what others have already written you, I desire to provide you with information relevant to our days in the light of Scriptures. As Israel is the divine “time-clock” by which we may know where we are in terms of prophetic timing, it is always necessary to focus on her.

Perhaps I should begin with Jerusalem. Presently Arafat's "government" (liars and men of lawlessness) is trying with all its might to rewrite Jerusalem's and all of the Land of Israel's history, unabashedly assisted by the European Union, Bill Clinton and the men who assured his re-election, and by the Arab League and Moslem World. 

The most recent Palestinian strides toward this goal are the PA’s school textbooks and curricula, their brazen claim to the Temple Mount and destruction of any Jewish presence on it, and their forging an alliance with “Christianity” to the utter exclusion of Judaism, pretending that a Jewish people never existed. 

When Karam Jamil, a Palestinian first grader in Beituniya, was asked about Jerusalem just a few miles away, he quickly answered: “It’s the capital of Palestine, and it’s where we pray.” Asked about Israel, neither Karam nor the whole first grade knew the answer, because their brand new civics textbooks make no mention of Israel at all, nor can Israel be found on the map on the classroom wall. That's hardly the "education for peace'' outlined in the Oslo peace agreements brokered in 1993.

In its chapter on tolerance, the sixth grade civics textbook used in Beituniya in Jamal Husam’s class shows a Muslim imam and a Catholic priest shaking hands, and includes passages from the New Testament and the Quran. Jews aren't mentioned! Husam denies that the text or his lessons are anti-Semitic, saying: “The Jews aren't even mentioned.” 

Exactly! Palestinian textbooks render Jews, especially Israeli ones, as non-existent!