The Knesset had a fiery session in which they debated Netanyahu’s Israeli Land Administration reform bill. The bill is controversial because it makes much of the land in Israel available for sale rather than long-term lease.

Sale of the Holy Land grossly violates the Torah, which only allows it to be leased, and for no more than fifty years. Israel is so small that normal free-market expedience of private land ownership must give way to national feasibility: land sales could plausibly create a situation in which the Jewish nation as a whole owns next to no land in Central Israel.

The biggest problem with land sales is that they make the land available to Arabs. For twenty years, Saudis have pumped money into Israel Arab foundations to buy real estate in sensitive areas. Now Saudi money would buy land plots in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Yaffo to make them de facto non-Jewish land.

The leftist Attorney General opened a criminal investigation against the anonymous Jews who wrote a letter to Shamni, the IDF commander in Judea and Samaria. Shamni is infamous for his extreme cruelty toward the settlers, including outpost demolitions and eviction raids.

Somewhat childishly, the letter promised death to Shamni’s family, but went on to predict his eviction after the authors take power in the state.

Halacha leaves no doubt that Shamni indeed must be executed, like anyone else who abandons any piece of land which Jews control. Sanhedrin is unnecessary for the judgment: during emergencies, community rabbis are entitled to pronounce death sentences on those who endanger the Jewish masses. No such honest rabbi had arisen yet.

Arguably, the actions of Shamni & Co. fall even under milhemet mitzva, the obligatory war commandment: regardless of the Sanhedrin, kings, or rabbis every Jew has an individual obligation to go to war when the enemy wants to take away any land that we hold.

Traditionally, Jews have been thought of as enterprising people who greatly benefit their countries of residence. The Arab-controlled World Bank countered that stereotype with a new one: Jews are economically bad for their neighbors.

The WB again accused Israel of destroying the Palestinian economy with checkpoints. It remains unclear how the checkpoints are any more than a minor inconvenience for drivers, and what they have to do with business development.

In fact, Palestinians profit greatly from Israel: they steal water, electricity, and cars, take illegal jobs, and sell their tax-free produce here. Since 1948, Palestinians show the highest economic growth rate of all non-oil Arab countries.

But the World Bank does not care about facts.