Most of you have probably never heard of a woman by the name of Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi. Most Israelis had until last week also never heard her cumbersome name mentioned in public. She is the recently fired and completely demoted JAG or Military Advocate General of the IDF. She came to recent prominence when it was discovered that she and a small cadre of associates were behind the release of doctored videos that purported to make it look as if IDF soldiers guarding Hamas “Nukhba” terrorists were raping and abusing them. Nothing would have been known if an associate of hers had not failed a polygraph test and the whole story unravelled. The initial videos and reports were a massive black eye for the IDF and Israel. People could crow, “Hamas bad, Israel bad, too.” An investigation was launched that besmirched the unit involved in guarding these murderers and rapists from October 7, 2023. Tomer-Yerushalmi on Monday faked a suicide, leaving a note and her abandoned car. She was found alive later, but she apparently threw her incriminating phone into the Mediterranean, where she made it look as if she had drowned herself. The question obviously is why did she invent a calumny on IDF soldiers that did so much internal and international damage? Divers and others are looking for that phone with a 250,000 shekel reward waiting for the winner.
Her actions fit into a pattern that one sees often on the Left. People ask why so many Jews in the U.S. support Democrats whose policies are often anti-Israel and anti-Jewish. Much of non-orthodox Jewry in the West has abandoned traditional Torah learning and commandment observance. They have misinterpreted a concept from the rabbinic literature called “tikun olam,” which can be loosely translated as fixing or healing the world. Thus, reform and conservative congregations see less in Sabbath and kosher observance and more in helping third-world illegal aliens or fighting “climate change.” Many of those slaughtered by Hamas in southern Israel had actively worked to get Gazans to Israeli hospitals or find them work in Israeli fields. The Gazans returned the kindness by burning them to death or torturing them prior to killing them. The smaller U.S. orthodox community breaks 90 percent for Donald Trump because he addresses issues important to this sector.
The former JAG apparently felt a need to even the playing field that had Palestinians as the bad guys and the hyper-careful IDF as the good guys. “See, we do bad things, too! They’re raping prisoners who have no self-defense!” It apparently was all a lie, but in the Left’s world, any means are legitimate for achieving some type of “tikun olam” — and this is not just for Jews. It was okay to invent charges against Donald Trump in order that he should not run again for president. It was okay to open the border to millions of illegal aliens so that the poor folks of the world could enjoy a Dodgers game and a nice house with a front lawn. The Left never cared that many suffered from a completely open border: the local communities and even distant locales like New York and Chicago found increased crime, stretched resources, and profound social displacements from illegals dumped in their vicinity. It did not matter. When the messianic Left wants something, the legality and the outcomes for others mean nothing.
This kind of demented thinking has caused and continues to cause enormous damage to the world. Even if one believes that the open U.S. border was for electoral advantage and the mass movement of immigrants into Europe was for labor, those who pushed these policies always spoke of “justice” — namely that those who had no right to enter a country and enjoy its benefits had to be taken in and given housing, money, phones and food. Illegal immigrants were treated better than veterans, and any attempt to point out the folly of bringing in millions of people who don’t work out in their new countries was labeled racism and closed mindedness. The Left, if one listens to them, is obsessed with ending poverty, differences between blacks and whites, and the like. But their policies are highly destructive because they are not based on reality or the benefit of the voters. Whereas a Republican candidate might stress more jobs at better wages, his Democratic opponent will want to simply give jobs to the undeserving as a means of penance over the past. The whole discussion of reparations from people who never owned a slave to people who never were slaves fits in with this misguided tikun olam. Lefties look around and see high levels of black poverty, crime, and disaffection. Instead of trying to encourage black families where children are born in wedlock and the father works and stays out of jail, they just imagine that a big, fat check will solve all of the problems that have plagued urban black communities for generations. After the money is spent, whites would be much poorer with no real change in black America.
The Democrats moving to the left so that AOC and Bernie Sanders are their standard bearers rather than say Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi from a decade ago has exacerbated this messianic thinking. New Yorkers have chosen a communist-Islamist to be mayor. What is his program? Free buses, rent control, free sex change surgeries, reduced policing, etc. All of it is pie-in-the-sky nonsense that the city can neither afford nor survive. Reduced policing might sound wonderful for criminals, but for victims of any race, less police means a less safe city. Increasing taxes on the rich only means that they will leave town and the city will have less money for basic services. Whereas Donald Trump and his people worry about issues that actually affect Americans’ lives, the Democrats propose ideal solutions that will only lead to worse outcomes on the ground. Bobby Kennedy works to get poisons out of our food. The Democrats work to get illegal aliens first-class medical coverage, which will eventually be paid for by John Q. Taxpayer.
People move to messianism when the world is too difficult for them to either comprehend or fix. In the distant past, Democrats were the party of workers, minorities, legal immigrants, and the rural poor. Their policies were meant to make the lives of these people better. As the party has moved to become the home of the ultrawealthy, poor, and college educated, it has abandoned its care for workers and the middle class. Its priorities are open borders, free stuff, and opportunities based on color or last name and not actual ability.
World leaders considered on the “Right” like Donald Trump, Bibi Netanyahu, and Javier Milei are focused on improving their economies for the benefit of citizens and strengthening armed forces for the protection of the homeland. They are not interested in unlimited illegal entries or giving out too much stuff for free. One might feel good about wishing to make the world better, but lefties rarely look at the damage they bring by pursuing their often demented policies and goals. Those Gazans who had worked in Israel provided Hamas detailed maps of the towns and specific houses in the areas overrun by the thousands of terrorists who entered on that black day. Putting illegal aliens up in nice hotels in Epping may make Keir Starmer feel warm all over, but he does not care about the citizens to whom he owes his allegiance and their very real fears of increased crime and mayhem. The Left likes to pat itself on the back for its faux righteousness. It is the regular people who pay for their dangerous ideas and policies.
