At Sukkoth 5772 (October 2011), reports announced the belated release of soldier Gilad Shalit, kidnapped from his border patrol in June 2006, in exchange for a thousand terrorists; humans paid to murder Jews. This exchange is the typical pattern established by the perennial client regime that rules the Jews of Israel with the values of Caesarea on behalf of their masters, the ruling oligarchies of the great powers. Most of those who care say 'what can you do, life comes first' and cite pikuach nefesh. In other words, tutored by the regime and the media that engrain its policies, they see no alternative to reinforcing the inclination of terrorists to kidnap Jews. This is so despite specific teachings that forbid such exchanges precisely for the practical disadvantages.
There is a simple alternative suggested by the traditions of Sukkoth hospitality as well as the teachings of the sages.
The seven shepherds of Israel are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph and David. Each is associated with one of the attributes of the earthly sefirot: kindness, strength, truth, victory, glory, righteousness and peace. On each night of Sukkoth, the corresponding 'guest' of our ancestors leads the others into the Sukkah. His particular quality is considered to be dominant on that evening and day although loving kindness – hospitality and blessing pervade the festival.
Gilad Shalit is our brother as it states: "we are all of us brothers, sons of one man." The brothers must not be divided and an injury to one of them, or to a sister, cannot be tolerated: "what, shall they treat our sister like a harlot!" The violation or tearing of any of the Children of Israel or of the Land that reflects and models their integrity "cannot be done" or accepted.
It is a well known saying that "those who are kind to the cruel will eventually be cruel to the kind." This typifies the State of Israel's dealings with its enemies, both those that surround it geographically and the distant ones that, overtly or covertly support and tutor the hostile neighbors and their incremental destruction of Israel by the 'peace process.' The reluctance or refusal to smite and defeat utterly Israel's proximate neighbors, most of them poaching on parts of the Promised Land, results in successive governments of Israel being cruel to its own kind. This is not only "less than kind," it is cruel and suicidal and the nations mean it to be so. In fulfillment of the prophecy, they afflict Israel "with a non-nation and a loathsome people."
It is halakha that "when they gather together to destroy you, rise up and kill them first." The Rambam elaborates similar imperatives in Hilkhot Melachim ("Laws of Kings and their Battles"). Preemptive wars to defend Israel and the Children of Israel are not simply options; Israel is commanded to fight them and there are no exemptions for such wars.
Students of Scripture are familiar with the failings of Ahab who loved his people and was a warrior and master of repentance. (His great sin was not controlling his idolatrous and image-loving wife). His greatest failing was when he took pity on the Despot of Damascus whom he had defeated in war. Rather than finish him off, he allowed himself to be taken in by Ben Hadad's cries of mercy and friendship. When Ahab heard these he exclaimed, "Ben Hadad, he is my brother!" This was kindness to the cruel, a perennial failing of the Kings of Israel that only David learned to avoid. Ben Hadad joined with the Assyrians and the resulting decades of aggression and attrition ended with the destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel.
The first two nights and days of Sukkoth are keyed by Avraham and Yitzhak, embodiments respectively of kindness and strength. Loving kindness for a son of Israel, Shalit can only be fulfilled by the strength (Gevurah) that punishes any assault against him or against any of the children of Israel. The pattern for this response was set by the master of chessed, Abraham himself when he pursued the kings who had kidnapped Lot, "deployed against them by night and smote them north of Damascus." That is kindness in action. Just as Isaac is "your only son, whom you love" so the quality of Gevurah is inseparable from Chessed just as Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are inseparable; the blessings and protection of the Avot are cited in the plural. This is a pattern repeated and emphasized in the attachment of Jacob to Joseph, the bond around which all of Israel is united in incipient nationhood.
Moreover, handing over Judea and Samaria to any gentiles and expelling or abandoning Jews there is like handing them over to be murdered by hostile goyim. This is forbidden, even when and especially when the rationale is 'peace' for the remaining Jews (Jerusalem Talmud Terumot 8). Rather, we are commanded to "blot out the memory of Amalek" (that is, to obliterate them as Saul did and Samuel completed (1 Samuel 15). The enemies of Israel are Amalek. We must blot them out and "not forget" (Deuteronomy 25:18, Exodus 17:16; Numbers 24:20). Releasing terrorists is like allowing Agag to live: it insures future murders and mass murders, not merely by the released terrorists but by all those who whet their lips at the release; not least the enablers of the beasts.
The qualities of Sukkoth and the Ushipizin ("guests") teach the response that should be made to kidnapping of Jews or terrorism against them. Kindness and strength are inseparable; all the qualities of the sefirot are essentially related and part of the unification of the Name. The proper response to the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit would have been, and should be in any and all future cases of attack: 'stand him alive before us tomorrow afternoon or we will destroy you utterly.' Then he would have been returned promptly, he would not have lost five and a half years of his life; his parents and family would not have endured agonies and Israel would not have been disgraced, its deterrence again exposed as a sham. Jews would not have been degraded which is the underlying mission of the powers and their perennial client regime that presumes to rule in Jerusalem with the values of Caesarea and perverts the dominion of Israel, and the true peace of the lips, of Aaron, into the endless attrition war of the "peace processes" the "high policies" of "the era of world peace" that Spengler aptly noted would be characterized with endless 'unofficial' wars and the rule of "the spindle side" (feminism and all the forms of goddess rapture with which the elites destroy the family, fragment and rule society) over the Avot.
True peace comes only with shaleim, the root of shalom. When the insight and ruling of Rabbi Meir of Rothenberg, of the Rambam and Arizal is heeded there will be peace, honor and life, the only kind of peace there can be as was demonstrated at Purim. This is the only way to lift up in light and joy the fallen booth of David for the permanent dwelling of all the Ushipizin with Israel forever.
