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Daniela Weiss
Photo: Ido Erez

Chutzpa and gentleness

Ariela Ringel-Hoffman has some harsh words for settler hardliner Daniela Weiss

“I only see gentleness,” said Daniela Weiss on Wednesday, referring to the conduct of young Jewish rioters who arrived to offer their support to residents of the disputed house in Hebron. Oh, how much satisfaction can one person convey. She took such pleasure in them: “What wonderful youths…gentleness, and consideration, and earnestness.”

 

“Our children, flesh of our flesh,” she called them. And all this, as if there are no cameras, as if there is no media, only her and them have remained on the streets of the city, the masked Daniela-style youths, anonymous heroes – and the only way for us to learn about their nature is through her testimony. As if all the outrageous and scary things we see on our television screams are merely the rotten creation of a hostile media.

 

Our children?! Those are her children, flesh of her flesh, violent weeds that grew in the flowerbeds that she has been nurturing and watering for three decades now – a source of pride and joy for the delusional Land of Israel

 

The 64-year-old Weiss has a long record: She was among the founders of the Gush Emunim settlement movement, served as chairman of its secretariat in the 1970s and as its secretary general in the 1980s – until she was ousted in the wake of a raid on the West Bank town of Qalqiliya in the wake of the murder of a settler family in 1987.

 

Several years later, Weiss was elected as the mayor of Kedumim. There she did not dry up any swamps, yet she did pave a road – the Daniela Road – to a new settlement she established outside Kedumim overnight, needless to say without the Israeli government’s approval.

 

And as always, today too, all she sees is gentleness and positivity. She is the tireless fighter, the one who connects to those youths, fitting like a glove. Meanwhile, the declarations of some settlers leaders, ranging from the ones talking about the youths who arrived “from the outside” – yet another puzzling term: Who are they? They’re not Jews from Eretz Israel? – to the ones who openly speak of the loss of control, while distancing themselves and criticizing the conduct of these youths, simply pass by her as if they were nothing but a warm breeze on a winter day.

 

She pays no heed to their definitions and words, and moreover, why should she listen to us, stunned residents of the center of the country, who are sitting on their comfortable couches and disapproving of her actions while she’s leading yet another glorious fight.

 

And really, what about us? We will apparently soon see that there is another way. We will see the same thing we have been seeing for 30 years now. Our soldiers, our sons, flesh of our flesh, fighting the rioters, being beaten and humiliated by them, while being forced to execute a decision that should have been executed a while ago – and meanwhile, they shall be dragging Daniela Weiss, just like the ones who did it before them, time and again, in this loathsome ritual.

 

She will no doubt be screaming at the top of her lungs, while teaching us yet another chapter on what it means to love this country - with confidence and gentleness.

 


פרסום ראשון: 12.04.08, 11:50
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