In the Lebanon war, Israel lacked political objectives, thus the Winograd report asserts that the army led the government. The IDF staff knew what should be done on a tactical level, but the lack of strategic planning doomed the war to indecision. I argued that in July 2006.

Hamas plays the northern scenario in the south and piggybacks on Hezbollah’s every move: digs tunnels, brings dozens of tons of explosives, launches massive numbers of cheap primitive missiles, and openly trains its quasi-government militia. Just like Hezbollah, Hamas won the elections and nurtures popular loyalty through welfare programs, the clear and appealing objective of reclaiming Arab land and punishing the Jewish state, and an anti-foreign-influence anti-corruption stance. Hamas and Hezbollah tested Israel’s nerves with low-level violations of cease-fire while hiding behind supportive Arab civilians.

Israel reacts to Hamas just like she reacted to Hezbollah: with a sledgehammer against a sliver. Dead Arab civilians make great advertisements for the guerrillas. In Gaza and Lebanon, Israel fought ostensibly over nothing: Hamas and Hezbollah demanded what Israel had already agreed to – a withdrawal from Arab lands. Hezbollah had only demanded the ridiculously small Shebaa farms and perhaps the Golan Heights, which even the lame hawk Lieberman agreed to return to Syria. Hamas demands Israeli withdrawal from Judea and Samaria, which Israel has agreed to long ago.

If Israel withdraws from Shebaa, the Golan Heights, Judea, and Samaria, peace won’t ensue. Hamas and Hezbollah have no reason to abandon the tactics that have proved so effective. If rocket attacks forced Israel to abandon relatively huge territories, then all the more will the continued shelling make Israel transfer East Jerusalem to the Palestinians, especially since they control much of it, anyway. Hamas and Hezbollah have no reason to end the attacks, but will resume them after every Israeli injustice from the closure of her borders to Palestinian migrant workers to prosecution of Arab traitors like Bishara. Israel confronts Hamas and Hezbollah superficially over nothing - things that are already agreed to – but substantially over everything.

Minuscule Israel cannot sustain wars. Even primitive Arab militias shell her cities. Iran and Syria could surely do better than that with their arsenals of mid- and long-range missiles. Israel’s only feasible choice is credible deterrence. Whether the enemy’s demands are sensible or not,doesn’t matter. Israel has to periodically remind her enemies that attacks on her cities are a big no-no. Retaliatory bombing of south Lebanon or Gaza won’t solve the political problem of Israel’s half-hearted withdrawal from the territories. In strategic terms, the IDF’s incursion in Gaza will achieve nothing: Hamas, a popular party, cannot be eradicated with a gentlemanly invasion; only massive, cruel repression of civilians will eradicate popular support for the insurgents. In strategic terms, a military operation in Gaza could drive a lesson back home to Arabs: don’t shell Israel.

The Israeli government resists the invasion of Gaza because of the international pressure to continue the peace process under the fire. Hamas and Hezbollah, faithful to their voters, don’t give way to international pressure, which therefore concentrates on Israel. Foreign governments don’t care about Israeli security, and Israeli rulers value their European contacts and American aid above Jewish interests. The invasion of Gaza would stamp the destruction of Gush Katif as a security error: the settlements provided a security belt for Israel proper, and the army was protecting Israel rather than the settlers. In the garbled political milieu of Israel, brainwashed voters would keep silent about a withdrawal from Judea and Samaria even after the military operation in Gaza, but leftists don’t want to take chances, and so they try to avoid the invasion.

Hamas has overplayed its hand. It’s not a Hezbollah. Hamas lacks a reliable supplier of weapons, such as Syria is for Hezbollah. Gaza’s external borders are short compared to Lebanon’s, and the IDF can substantially close off Hamas’ arms trafficking. Hamas lacks Hebollah’s independent financing such as heroin, and will run out of funds soon after the IDF takes over Gaza. In Lebanon, the IDF relied mostly on army intelligence, but in Gaza, the Shabak will efficiently identify the guerrillas. In Lebanon-2006, the IDF had to do the entire job itself; in Gaza, Israel will have Abu Mazen’s equivalent of the South Lebanon Army, trigger-happy against Hamas members.

The ease of invasion makes it easy to ruin. If the government, satisfied with the immediate result of stopping the rocket attacks, decides to end the invasion without substantially eradicating Hamas, Arabs would claim a victory as they did in Lebanon. Israel should invade Gaza only if she firmly resolves to crush Hamas.

Countries release prisoners under two scenarios: insignificant criminals through amnesty and POW’s after wars. Amnesty is much criticized because if a sentence term could be reduced, then the original long sentence was unjustified. Civilized countries have mostly switched to a parole system, and pardon criminals individually after elaborate investigations.

POW’s are generally exchanged after a war’s end, whether formally with a peace treaty or de facto with a conclusive armistice. Releasing them earlier brings hardened and hating fighters into the enemy’s ranks. Tactical POW exchanges sometimes take place after inconclusive battles for expediency’s sake, so that each side doesn’t have to maintain an approximately equivalent number of the enemy’s prisoners. Unable to maintain POW camps, armies shoot or starve prisoners. Unilateral POW releases never happen in wartime.

Is Israel at war with the Palestinians? Those in Israeli jails answer in the affirmative. Heroes at home, they won’t lead a pastoral life after release, but will involve themselves in the anti-Israeli struggle. By far most of the guerrillas Israel has released in earlier exchanges have joined the ranks of fighting organizations.

Some POW’s are never released, but held as trophies or hostages. Barghouti might not have been involved in the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade attacks on Jews, and Israel could have sentenced him as a nod to Arafat, but now Barghouti is both a trophy prisoner and a valuable hostage, and must remain in jail. Israel needs the resolve to use its Arab hostages.

Some POW’s are sentenced for war crimes rather than repatriated after the war ends. Though most Palestinian insurgents in Israeli jails committed terrorist acts of war, several are guilty of war crimes, such as the deliberate murder of children.

Whether a prisoner release, euphemistically called an “exchange,” shows Israel goodwill or not is irrelevant. The Palestinian reaction to the ostensible goodwill is what matters. And they will recognize the swap as a hard-won concession, not goodwill. Arabs will be proud of their achievement and prompted to repeat the tactical victory. Swaps make Israelis into soft targets for hostage-taking by the Palestinians to press any of their demands. Swaps embolden guerrillas who are virtually assured of returning home after Israel catches them.

Disproportional prisoner swaps serve the government’s PR needs. Bringing back Cpl.Shalit is a PR achievement for Kadima, though worthless in military or security terms. The exchange values the media darling Shalit’s life on par with the hundreds of Jewish lives taken – and more yet to be taken - by the released terrorists. Shalit now becomes more important than scores of other Jews later. A publicized life costs many inconspicuous lives.

The exchange runs against the basic Jewish value of justice. Punishments must be meted out no matter what, on rich and poor alike, and certainly on enemies. Criminals should not be spared, even if Israel would enjoy flooding Palestine with Arab gangsters.
Judaism prescribed buying out kidnapped Jews in a different situation. Kidnappers profited in either case: sell the Jew back to his nation or sell him away as a slave. Then, a buyout did not prompt the kidnappers to more activity than they would otherwise undertake anyway. Today, kidnapping Israeli soldiers is unprofitable per se, and only a prisoners’ swaps make it profitable, thus provoking the kidnapping.

The Israeli problem of having too many prisoners reminds us of Biblical punishments. The ancient Jews had no concept of long-term incarceration. The idea of keeping criminals for years and decades on the public account was alien to their practical minds. Inflicting a bruise for a bruise might seem harsh to moralists, though many Jews would venture to carry out the punishments. Public lashing and execution remain meaningful options. The Torah unequivocally prescribes death for murderers: “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed” (Gen9:6). The commandment is not qualified by the aesthetics of execution, its expediency in solving crimes, or the morality of taking human lives. Execution is only about justice: justice to the victims and justice to the murderers. Errors happen, but in the worst case scenario Israel would execute a member of an enemy military group not directly involved in the murder of Jews. I can live with that. The Israeli government can live with that, too; it killed scores of innocent civilians in Lebanon and Gaza. And don’t start that “we-have-no-Sanhedrin” rant. Israeli courts sentence Jews to years in jail for killing Arabs in self-defense, and all the more so do they have the legal and moral jurisdiction to sentence Arabs to death for murdering Jews.

Once Israel stops taking prisoners, the issue of prisoners’ exchange will become moot.

The Israeli police conveniently charged the Likud’s treasurer with embezzlement, and silly embezzlement at that: she deposited forged checks into her mother’s bank account. Kadima hit Netanyahu in the soft spot: the touted financial genius didn’t notice millions being stolen from his own party. The police stunt was unnecessary: Netanyahu-the-economist is too hollow to poke.

Bibi had never studied economics in any depth. His degrees are in architecture and management, and he also studied political science when universities already burned with leftism. Netanyahu’s experience in business consulting, admired by Israelis, is negative advertising for him in America, where consultants are recognized as generally worthless, the subjects of myriad jokes.

As Finance Minister, Netanyahu presided over a booming economy, a late spillover from the American boom. Clinton and Netanyahu did not influence the economic successes of America and Israel. Netanyahu the prime minister presided over a bad economy – a consequence, as he ridiculously claims, of the downturn in Russian immigration. In fact, large immigration initially burdens the economy; by the time of Netanyahu’s prime ministry, earlier immigration had already started producing a beneficial effect.

Netanyahu followed the basic precepts of economic liberalism, known to every undergrad: privatization, deregulation, floating currency, decreased welfare, and lower taxes. He privatized state companies without bothering to create competition first. Oligarchic monopolies replaced the state monopolies. State-run companies – ill managed, thus with low profits – were valued on the cheap, and the oligarchs purchased our national assets at low prices. Acting properly, Netanyahu would have first changed the management of state-owned corporations, making them well profitable, deregulated the markets to allow competition to spring up, and only then – privatize. Commercial competitors would offer higher prices for government assets, and manage them more professionally than the oligarchs who lack appropriate business experience. Netanyahu later began breaking up the monopolies, but by then it was too late: de-monopolization should precede privatization.

One type of Netanyahu’s privatization was catastrophic: Jews and Arabs held about equal amount of land in private property, while the government controlled the rest. In 1997, Netanyahu opened up large-scale privatization of land in the Galilee and the South. The move uncritically served the ideals of economic liberalism and rationally catered to Netanyahu’s investor friends. Jews predictably didn’t rush to settle the Galilee, full of dangerous Arabs, or the inhospitable South. Netanyahu thus opened the floodgates of land purchases to Saudi-funded Israeli Arab organizations.

Israel also still has to live through banking deregulation. Failures of ill-conceived small banks are more than likely. Netanyahu smelled an obvious fact – that Bank of Israel practices are outdated – but did not know the cure. Instead of painstaking, slow deregulation, Netanyahu forcibly broke the earlier practices without building infrastructure for new ones. His political time horizon was short; he was cramming more reforms into his time in office. The rushed policy was especially dangerous in the small Israeli economy, and amplified stock market and currency swings.

Netanyahu danced to the IMF’s tune, forgetting that the IMF did not improve the long-term economic outlook in any country. On the contrary, countries like Japan and South Korea created closed, heavily, if informally, controlled markets, and regulated currencies, and achieved sustainable growth – and only then slowly opened themselves up to the world economy. Netanyahu’s wide opening of a weak Israeli economy resulted in colonization: foreign investors became major employers in Israel and the added value slipped away. Instead of fostering domestic hi-tech, as Japan and South Korea did, Israel welcomed foreign companies and satisfied herself with being their R&D labs; salaries remained in Israel, but the entrepreneurial profits flowed away. US hi-tech companies pay their employees in India a few times less than Americans for a reason: Indians have lower productivity. Israeli Jews are at least as efficient as their US colleagues, and salaries are lower Israel than in America only because of the Israeli government’s unprofessional economic policies.

The current revaluation of the shekel is a consequence of reckless liberalization. The oligarchic sector of the economy – large export companies and major foreign investors – grows and brings foreign currencies into Israel, while most people are relatively poor and therefore consumer imports remain low. The systemic distortions of the Israeli economy parallel those in other quickly liberalized markets, such as Ukraine: the GDP is concentrated in a few big companies, and income distribution is highly unequal with oligarchs controlling the lion’s share, the poor being extremely poor, and the middle class income outpaced by unusually high and rising prices. Netanyahu concentrated his deregulation efforts on big business, not – properly – on small companies. His target income tax rate of 35% is the highest practical level in developed economies, while Israeli post-socialist economy can only develop meaningfully with income tax of no more than 15%. Low income tax is especially important for developing the middle class’ purchasing capacity.

Netanyahu’s superficial economic policies guarantee a systemic crisis such as that encountered by most countries that observe the IMF’s recommendations.

According to the Law of Return, every Jew has a right to live in Israel, with or without its citizenship, for any period of time. Israel won't change the law of return to punish the settlers at least because the policy is not to touch it. Any revision of the law cannot avoid addressing the return of the Arabs demanded by the extreme left.

Israeli banking system will continue to serve Judeans as it serves other foreigners. Israel is unlikely to impose sanctions on Judea, and even then Judea could rely on foreign and Internet banks. Eventually, Judea will have its own bank offices. Deregulated economy will draw investment and financial infrastructure.

Local workers, such as teachers will have to rely on local incomes. Parents will pay for schools, and foreign donors will help. The settlers will negotiate tax repatriation agreement, such as the one enjoyed by Palestinians. But ultimately the Jews of Judea will have to become self-sufficient, if they want a state of their own. They won't be poorer than Israelis thirty years ago. Ancient Judea was poorer than Israel. Judea can position herself as a tax haven for Israelis, sort of San Marino.

Introduction of avodah ivrit (Made by Jews) label will go a long way toward creating Judean economy. The polite Israelis cannot ask their grocers whether the produce is grown by Jews or Arabs, but will support Judean produce once it is clearly marked. Leftists, too, might support a campaign which aims at making Jews a nation of workers. Besides, leftists hate Arabs no less than the right-wing Jews do.

Palestine so far lacks a law that restricts land sales. The earlier Jordanian law banned land sales to Israelis rather than the Jews. After peace treaty with Israel, Jordan barred all non-Arab citizens from controlling the land in the kingdom. Palestine will adopt a similar approach. Here comes the Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons. It is a so integral part of the international law that Palestine won’t be able to breach the convention, whether Palestine signs it or not. Article 13 – stateless people enjoy same legal status as aliens generally; stateless Jews will have property rights in Palestine on par with non-Palestinian Arabs. Article 26 provides for the freedom of movement within the host state; Jews can settle anywhere, including their current places of residence. To evict stateless refugees is impossible. Palestine depends on the EU and US for aid, and won’t grossly violate a basic human rights convention. For the same reason, Palestine won’t cut water, electricity, and road access to the settlements. Besieged Jewish villagers would look too good on the TV screens in America. Israeli public opinion will switch to supporting Jewish villagers if Arabs try to evict them. Israelis accept the IDF, but not the Arabs evicting Jewish settlers.

Living in stateless status under Palestinian jurisdiction is a temporary solution. The settlers shrink from fighting Israeli police, and need time to gather the will to fight the Palestinians. Jews also need time to accumulate weapons. That task is impossible to carry out on a meaningful scale while Shabak reigns in the settlements. Ultimately, Jews stay in the settlements because fighting Palestine to establish Judea is easier than carving Judea out of Israel. Thus, yes, we must be prepared to fight: a weak Palestine rather than strong Israel, as stateless Jews defending themselves against Arab attacks rather than Israeli occupiers. Stateless Jewish existence under Arab control won’t last long: though many settlers would gladly accept dhimmitude in return for continuing living in their houses and religious autonomy, nationalist Palestinians have outlived the Islamic sanction of dhimmitude. Two or three years divide mass abandoning of Israeli citizenship from the creation of the State of Judea.

Jews need to reject the existing Council of Settlements, the government’s quisling. Instead, settlers should elect the council by direct vote. The act of voting will accord the new council a parliament-like status. The council’s executive office will evolve into the government of Judea. Settlers should also elect a chief rabbi who will act as president of Judea. Kahane once said, “Plan for elections is a guarantee of a Palestinian state.” So is the plan for election in the settlements a guarantee of Judea.

Readers asked and we listened: Selected articles from Obadiah's 2006 blog are now available in print at http://www.lulu.com/content/818157 for $8.53 only. Enjoy!

The campaign to abandon Israeli citizenship should not replace the attempts to change Israeli course. Realistically, however, Israeli course could only be changed through revolt. Leftists and Arabs form electoral majority and vote coherently. Israelis resigned to have ethnic-blind atheist state. Palestinians de facto created their state and could announce it any moment without Israeli approval. Most countries will recognize independent Palestine, and Israel will eventually follow the suit. Revolt is a viable option but very strong Shabak infiltrates anti-government organizations quickly, and subservient courts sentence Jewish suspects on no evidence. Revolutionaries in other countries faced similar problems, though to a lesser degree than in small, interconnected, totalitarian Israel. Few revolutions succeeded. Revolt is an option, but uncertain option.

While striving to change Israel by any means, Jews must prepare for the worst. If a Palestinian state is created and Israel continues down its leftist-oligarchic path, Jews need an exit strategy. First, we must be able to stay in Judea and Samaria. Second, we need a realistic option to attain autonomy or sovereignty. Jews will find it easier to confront Palestinian state than Israel. Palestinian security is weaker than Israeli, especially in terms of infiltrating Jewish organizations. Many Jews shrink from shooting other Jews, even the leftists, but have no problem opposing hostile Arabs. World opinion will side with the leftists in case of right-wing Jewish revolt, but many Gentiles and most foreign Jews will side with the Jews who revolted against Arabs.
Jews who abandon Israeli citizenship could stay in Palestine as stateless people. They are citizens of no state, and Palestinian government could evict them nowhere. Israel cannot pull stateless Jews out of the settlements because of the lack of jurisdiction. The world cannot object to stateless Jews remaining in Palestine, just like the Arabs live in Israel.

Once the Jews anchor themselves in Palestine, conflicts with Arabs will follow. With no Arabs killed by the IDF, world media will switch to showing Jewish villagers killed by the Arabs. Palestinian state will fail and slip into violence. Jews will expand security arrangements, increase autonomy of their villages, and slowly establish a network of refugee camps which is a state in all but name. Then we will only need to proclaim independence and connect the townships into a state of Judea.

The best crime is a legal one that uses loopholes. Abandoning Israeli citizenship is a loophole neither Israel nor the Palestinians can do anything about. They will know our next moves and still could not counteract them. In a couple of years, Jews can establish a state of Judea in Palestine and eventually push Arabs from the entire Judea and Samaria with Hebron-like attitude.

Islamic reaction to Israel’s archeological dig near Al Aqsa shows a peculiar trait. Even more than Galut Jews, Muslims suffer from a siege mentality. Muslims’ fear unmistakably surfaces in hundreds of pronouncements, articles, and cartoons that depict a minor dig as a mine so huge that Al Aqsa invariably falls down. Some Arab editors and readers recognized that as hyperbole, but most accepted the frightening “fact”: Jews are destroying Haram ash-Sharif. The Muslim world’s reaction to quite inoffensive Danish cartoons was of the same stock: a hyper-reaction of fear.

Muslims are backward but not fools, and more practical than the West burdened with its idealistic morality. They understand they lag behind the civilized world and stand no chance in an economic race or a military confrontation. They know what they would have done if the positions were reversed: conquer, kill, and loot – and wait for the West to do the same. The West, as Muslims see it, plays devilish game with them: pays for oil rather than taking it by force, sells them weapons, shows them respect and generally behaves nicely – presumably lulling their vigilance before a major thrust. The nicer the West is to them, the more suspicious the Muslims are. Typical of their siege mentality, they hate everyone, but especially benefactors. They simultaneously suffer from paranoia and try to identify with potential executioners, thus imitating the West.

Talking to Muslim societies is useless. In their warped mentality, the best intentions look like the worst threats. They are frightened to death, thus ready to die, preferably apocalyptically. They wait to deliver a blow to the West, even a suicidal blow.

Baruch Marzel is the most wonderful guide I’ve ever met. In fact, he is not just a guide, but also leader of Jewish National Front Party, a former right hand of Rav Meir Kahane.

Listen to the story of Arab animals murdering a Jewish doctor during the 1929 Hebron massacre of the Jews. They couldn’t break into his well-fortified house, but the doctor of pure heart opened the door to a screaming pregnant Arab bitch, at which point the Arab mob stormed his house. See the photo of his surviving daughter, whose brain is leaking from her broken head. There is no photo of the doctor’s wife, whose hands and legs were cut off, or of their daughter who fought Arab rapists until they slit her throat. See the photos of Jews, rabbis and doctors, shining with otherworldly purity – murdered by Arabs. Look at Hadassah hospital, which treated Arabs for free until they raped and massacred the nurses. The Arabs who slaughter each other today in Iraq, will they hesitate to slaughter Jews again?

Learn how Moshe Dayan sent Jewish troops to stop fleeing Arabs and asked them to come back to live in Judea and Samaria, how Dayan gave the keys to the Tomb of the Patriarchs to a local imam who couldn’t believe his eyes. The Arabs expected the Jews to avenge the blood of the Hebron victims, and fled. The Jews didn’t care.

Hear the story of the new Jewish presence in Hebron: how outgoing Defense Minister Moshe Arens gave the Jews 30 hours to build a settlement, and how Rabin, in his first act as Defense Minister, stopped the construction. Listen to the story of the Jewish women who broke the Israeli army’s blockade of Hebron – a blockade against Jews – and held a building for 13 months together with their children, isolated from husbands.

Meet the people happy to live for decades in caravans at the foot of the preserved stairs by which Abraham entered Hebron. Meet these Jews, who live in extreme poverty, but are the happiest human beings on earth.

See Jews driving with open windows and Jewish children playing fearlessly in the streets of Hebron – while Arabs close their windows with bars. Understand how 600 Jews stand tall against 120,000 Arabs. It isn’t easy or safe, and you will see AK-74 bullet holes in their houses’ walls and meager furniture.

If lucky, you will see a demonstration by Peace Now scum demanding that the Jews be evicted from Hebron, King David’s seat of power. You will notice how the peaceniks push the Arabs into the front ranks of demonstrators and incite them to threaten the Jews. Watch soldiers coming to shake Baruch’s hand in admiration.

Visit nearby outposts – Jewish houses on the most ancient Jewish land, which the government proclaimed illegal – and pay attention to the tons of books. Warriors, farmers, scholars.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe that Adam and Eve are buried in Hebron. This is our land. Please consider helping the Jews there. As of now, they lack money to legally buy enough guns.

We're starting a different type of tours to Israel, sort of "Sharon tours" where Arik bused Israelis to Golans to show that Jewish cities lie at shooting distance. Our tours will show real Israel rather than Tel Aviv beaches with happy homosexuals. You will meet real religious Jews, settlers, and Arabs, hear real stories, and see the real life.

Everyone is welcome, regardless of age and religion. The trip is a great Jewish education for your children duing summer vacation. Tours are planned for seven days, $680 per person. Schedule is flexible; groups of 20-40 people can set their own dates. Security will be good: armored bus, armed guard.

Please express interest in the comments below or email me at dsimkin <> samsonblinded <> org

Day one

Gush Etzion, Judia
view from Mount Neve Daniel, visiting the namesake settlement
view Separation Barrier, Rachel's Tomb, Bethlehem
discussion of regional demography
Herodion palace
Kfar Etzion settlement; Ancient Judea movie
Bat-Ayn settlement, meeting with Moti Karpel (Zo Arzeinu) and Nadja Matar (Women in Green)
spend night in Kiryat Arba

Day two

South Hebron mountain
Maon cheese farm
meet Yehoshafat Tor, settler farmer
Hebron, Beit-Hadassa
development of Jewish Hebron since 1967, local history museum, Jewish Quarter
meet Noam, press secretary of Hebron municipality
Ancient District: Tel-Rumeida, Yishai's (David's) lands, tomb of Yishai and Ruth (King David's grandmother)
the incredible tour guide, Baruch Marzel, head of Jewish National Front Party and a close associate of Rav Meir Kahane
Mearat ha-Machpela, tomb of the patriarchs
prayer
meet residents of Beit Shalom, a strategic house purchased from Arabs and contested by Israeli government

Day three
Samaria
"illegal outposts" (Jewish settlements) Givat Asaf, Megron, and Amona (!)
meet Israel Harel or Uri Elizur
mount Shilo and the namesake settlement
Rahelim region, outposts of Itzhar and Itamar (that's like visiting City of David, folks!)
Karnei-Shomron, meet Rav Michael Ben-Ari, PhD, board member of Jewish Front
Ariel, meeting in college with Israel Hanukoglo

Day four
going north
Mount Meron, tombs of Rashbi (author of Zohar) and Maimonides
history of bar Kochba's revolt, death of 24,000 Rabbi Akiva's students
Golan Heights
Nov settlement
meet Michael Ben-Chorin, President of the State of Judea under Rav Kahane
Druze village
walking the vicinity

Day five
going south
Sderot, Netivot
Kfar-Maimon, history of Gush Katif destruction and resistance
checkpoint Kisufim where Lena Bosinov immolated herself to protest the eviction of Jews from Gaza
meet Rav Wolpe (a maverick Chabadnick who keeps alive the Rebbe's rejection of the Palestinian state)
temporary settlement of Nitzanim, meet Gush Katif evictees
night in Hebron

Day six
Jerusalem
ascending the Temple Mount
Hasmonean Tunnel (government mood permitting) under the Temple Mount
Jewish Quarter
Jewish enclaves in Muslim Quarter
Mount Scopus, the Western Wall
Institute for Temple Reconstruction
exhibition of the Temple's utensils
Rav Yehuda Kroiser's lesson in Rav Kahane's yeshiva "The Jewish Idea"

Day seven
Shabbat with Jewish families
(depending on the day of group's arrival, Shabbat could fall on another day)

Days eight-ten, optional
Arab villages in Galilee (not tourist spots)
archeological sites

Jerusalem archeological museum
Yad Vashem (Holocaust museum)

Dead Sea. Qumran

Israel conducts an unseen occupation. The occupier cares about the occupied and takes nothing in return. Israel arms and finances the PLO, provides Palestinians with municipal services and jobs in Israel – and suffers from suicide bombers and rockets. The occupation is senseless. Either annex the lands and drive the Arabs out of there, or retract from Judea and Samaria and let Arabs have a state there. A Palestinian state could be dealt with much more efficiently than now. Israel could wall it off, stop labor migration, and impose debilitating tariffs on Palestinian imports. Gaza could be virtually closed off by charging substantial transportation fees and requiring the transit foreigners to obtain Israeli medical insurance. Israel will find it politically easier to retaliate against a sovereign state rather than Arab civilians living under her occupation.

Whether Palestine recognizes Israel or not is irrelevant. Peace or non-belligerency, some Arabs will continue to fight Israel. Properly, Israel should concede to the Palestinian state only on the condition of peace treaty with the entire Muslim world, but the government does not insist on that scenario. Besides, Muslim countries could violate the peace treaty easily.

The return of the 1948 refugees is not a great obstacle. Most will be unable to prove their grandparents’ place of residency. Years-long bureaucratic procedure of immigration would discourage the others.

Division of Jerusalem also is not a critical point. To all purposes, Arabs now control the Temple Mount and East Jerusalem.
Either create a Jew-only state which includes Judea and Samaria, or give the Arabs what is de facto theirs, anyway. What the heck…