Israeli Independence Day

Today is Israeli independence day.

62 years ago today David-Ben Gurion proclaimed the Independence of Israel from the British empire.

Less than a day later the newly formed country was attacked by five large Arab neighbours, Egypt, Trans-Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. The Zahal, or Israeli army, although out manned, out gunned and had little previous experience defeated the Arab army's. The Arabs went back licking there wounds and still remember this day as Nakba day, Catastrophe Day. Israelis have been in war ever since.

In 1956, in response to Egyptian aggression, Israeli troops crossed through the Sinai and took the Suez canal with the British and French. In 1967 Israel launched a pre-emptive strike against Egypt, and was attacked by Jordan and Syria. Israeli troops captured the Sinai peninsula, the Golan heights and east Jerusalem.

In 1976 Arab army's invaded Israel, nearly cutting her in half. Israeli troops struck back with weapons that were just air-lifted in by the United States, and chased the Arabs out. Then came the intifada, or uprisings. Palestinian cowards sent their children out and blew them up to kill Israelis.

Their goal?

To have peace. Peace!? What kind of a coward terrorist nation sends their children to be blown up? And we are just going to forget about that and give them Israeli lands? Lands Israeli's died protecting? A two state solution, as the plan for giving away Israeli lands is called, is no solution.

Just as the Arabs rejected giving the Jews a little parcel of land, the Palestinians won't settle until they've taken every last inch of Israeli lands and until ever Israeli is dead. Do we really want to give them land? A military? The ability to purchase weapons?

Terrorists controlling Gaza, known as hamas, would do any thing for WMD's (weapons of mass destruction), and they would readily use these against civilians. American President Obama is demanding Israel stops building in their own land. WHAT!?!? How many times has Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu demanded Americans stop building in American lands? Zero. Zero times. Huh.

Notice how Obama is president of the U.S., not Israel. Then what gives him the authority to demand they stop building in their own land? Nothing. Nothing at all. During a meeting with Netanyahu in Washington, D.C. Obama walked out. What!? We treat our enemy's with greater respect!

Please pray for Both governments, that they will go in the way the LORD wants them to.

Andrew

Yom HaShoah: Day of Rememberence

Yesterday was Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day. The name itself gets you thinking.

Why? Why remember possibly the greatest tragedy of mankind?

Why!? So it will never happen again.

If we remember what happened, if we remember the 11 million people murdered by the nazi empire, we can help to avoid it.

How?

By stopping it before it starts. By standing up for the minorites, the bullied, the unpopular. By doing this, we give the 11 million a voice, a chance to keep their story from being forgotten and repeated.

Last night we heard a survivor talk about her experiences, and she told us that by telling her story she avenged her family by showing the nazi failed. They failed to destroy the Jews, to destroy the weak, the infirm. They failed just as every one else has failed.

The survivors may never forget. Every day they wake up is Yom Hashoah. They may never forget, and we must never forget.

We also should remember the non-Jewish heroes of this time, the "righteous gentiles,'' as there called. Men and women such as Raul Wallenburg, who risked his life by giving Jews on their way to the camps Swiss passports, declaring the owner as a Swiss citizen, and thus may not be harmed.

He saved tens of thousands of Jews this way, however, sadly, he was captured by the Soviet army after the war and was accused of being an American spy and was murdered.

We must remember men like Schindler, who offered Jews about to be killed a job in his factory, saving there lives.

We must also remember Simon Wiesenthal, who after the war dedicated his life to tracking down nazi war criminals and bringing them to justice and Ii 1947 founded the Jewish Historical Documentation Center in Austria and began collecting what is now the world's largest archive of witness testimony and other evidence of Nazi war crimes.

We must never forget what happened, we must teach our children, their children and their children. We must never forget......

Bye bye, Mac and Leia

We recently sent our twin calves, Mac and Leia, to a pasture to fatten them up for butchering day.

Mac, the 'slow' calf that would have died if not for Molly tube feeding him until he got up to feed from his mama, was a real problem getting into the trailer. We had to have one person push him in while the other pulled.

Leia, seeing Mac eventually defeated, gave up her struggle soon and just walked in. We all really miss seeing them, but when were holding a big, juicy cheeseburger, we'll forget about it.

Pesach

Well, I haven't written in well, a really long time. Passover began on April 3rd and Unleavened Bread began onApril 4th and ended on April 10th.

We spent the previous week ridding our house of leaven: vacuuming, dusting, beating our rugs, cleaning our chair cushions {and believe me, they needed it. A family of three could have lived off the contents under the cushions and would have been quite happy}, ect.

We had a Seder with our church group on the first day of unleavened bread, and the rest of the week we tried not to eat any leavening, which, believe me, is not as easy as it sounds.

The day after the ending we had homemade pizza, which was greatly appreciated.

More Bummer Lambs!

Last Tuesday we dropped off our lambs to the butchers. It was especialy hard for Abby, who owned one of the lambs. She went most of the day crying, so we got some more lambs. Well, that's not the reason we got more, but it works.

Molly, Abby and I all got lambs on Saturday. Andrei and Viktor got their lambs the day after and Landon will get one soon.









Me feeding my lamb, Sneferu.

Canoeing in the back yard?

Recently, we have gotten a pond. How, you may ask? Some freak-flooding. Our creek flooded over, we had a large run off from the mountains and, well, who knows. Any way, we decided to get the most out of our 'pond.' Me and my dad pulled our canoe into the water and he let me paddle it. Soon the rest of the kids came and we had a great time. However, I walked in the water some, and since I didn't have the right shoes the water got in and almost froze my feet off, but hey. If your going to be stupid, you'd better be tough.

My Sister Kylie's Visit

A few days after my sister Kylie came for a visit from college, we went to the Museum of the Rockies to see it's new Jamestown maze. Each person was given a chart depicting one of the actual people who lived during that time, with markers for health, wealth, morale and food. Along the way were several challenges to lose or gain health, wealth, morale and food. If one of the markers reach the bottom of the chart, you die. I died. Twice. I know, pretty embarrassing.

Unfortunately, Kylie left Tuesday morning, real early to go back to college. We were all sad and can't wait for her to come back.