I am building Jewish life in the Jewish homeland. Brussels, Washington, Tehran, Doha, Moscow, and every other foreign capital can file their objections directly into the nearest toilet.
I am a settler.
There. I said the terrifying word.
Not a “resident of a disputed area.” Not an “obstacle to peace.” Not an apologetic Jew trembling behind a stack of international-law reports while some European bureaucrat explains my own history to me.
A settler.
I settle the land. I build a home. I raise Jewish children. I plant trees, hang a mezuzah, pay taxes, sit in traffic, complain about the price of groceries, and help continue the most astonishing national resurrection in human history.
If that makes some diplomat choke on his subsidized Brussels espresso, he should order a smaller cup.
I live in Efrat, among the hills of Judea. Not “the West Bank,” as though this land were an overdraft invented by a British cartographer. Judea.
The place from which the word Jew comes.
That awkward little fact tends to ruin the colonialism lecture.
Jews are supposedly foreign occupiers in Judea. Apparently penguins are also foreign occupiers of Antarctica, Greeks have no connection to Greece, and the Italians had better explain what they are doing in Rome.
You cannot colonize the land that gave your people its name.
We did not discover Hebrew inscriptions buried beneath Warsaw. King David did not rule from Johannesburg. The prophets did not wander around Brooklyn. The Maccabees did not fight in Brussels, although Brussels could certainly use the exercise.
Our language, faith, calendar, prayers, archaeology, national memory, and sacred texts all point here. Jerusalem. Hebron. Shiloh. Beit El. Bethlehem. The Judean hills.
For two thousand years, Jews faced Jerusalem while praying. Now that we have returned, the world demands that we face the airport.
Go to hell.
Gush Etzion Is Not a Colonial Outpost
Jewish communities were established in Gush Etzion before the State of Israel existed. Kfar Etzion fell in May 1948, one day before Israel declared independence. Its defenders were massacred. The surviving Jewish residents were expelled, and their homes were destroyed.
For nineteen years, Jews could not return.
Then, after 1967, the children of those expelled families came home.
The international community looked at Jews returning to land from which Jews had been violently driven and announced: “Illegal settlers.”
Of course it did.
Apparently Jewish history comes with an expiration date, and it is always set by the people who expelled us.
When Jews are homeless, the world pities us. When Jews return home, the world condemns us. When Jews are murdered, officials express concern. When Jews prevent themselves from being murdered, the same officials demand restraint.
It is the oldest scam in international politics: first deny Jews security, then denounce Jews for securing themselves.
I am finished participating in it.
I Do Not Require Permission
I do not need approval from the European Union.
Europe had centuries to demonstrate its concern for Jewish safety. The Yelp review is not encouraging.
I do not need approval from the United Nations, a building where dictatorships, terror sponsors, and professional human-rights frauds gather to place Israel on trial between catered lunches.
I do not need approval from Washington, Moscow, Beijing, London, Paris, Tehran, Ankara, Doha, Riyadh, or Amman.
Foreign governments may pursue their interests. Israel must pursue ours.
My children’s lives are not diplomatic poker chips. My home is not a bargaining concession. My presence in Judea is not something a foreign secretary may suspend between breakfast and a press conference.
And I certainly will not accept moral instruction from governments that fund Palestinian incitement, embrace Jew-hating regimes, ignore the persecution of Christians across the Middle East, and then suddenly discover their humanitarian conscience when a Jewish family adds a bedroom.
The same world that barely notices rockets aimed at Israeli children develops the eyesight of a hawk when Jews pour concrete.
Screw that.
Yes, God Is Part of This
I believe the God of Israel commanded the Jewish people to inherit, cultivate, protect, and settle this land.
I am not embarrassed by that belief.
The covenant did not require ratification in Brussels. The Almighty did not submit it for public comment at the United Nations. Abraham did not wait for a zoning permit from Belgium before walking through the hills of Judea.
Secular readers do not have to share my theology. The historical claim remains. The archaeological record remains. The Jewish people remain.
That is what infuriates our enemies most.
We remain.
Empires conquered us. Armies scattered us. Churches tried to replace us. Islamic rulers subordinated us. Europe butchered us. Soviet tyranny imprisoned us. Arab governments expelled ancient Jewish communities.
Yet here we are—speaking Hebrew, defending Jerusalem, raising Jewish families, and building homes on the same ridges where our ancestors walked.
That is not colonialism.
That is return.
Spare Me Another “Land for Peace” Experiment
Israel withdrew from Gaza.
We uprooted Jewish communities, removed every soldier, demolished Jewish homes, and handed the territory over. The result was not Singapore on the Mediterranean.
It was Hamas rule, rockets, terror tunnels, and October 7.
Now the diplomatic geniuses who helped sell that catastrophe want Israel to repeat the experiment in the hills overlooking Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Ben-Gurion Airport.
Absolutely not.
I will not gamble my children’s lives on another internationally financed fantasy. I will not support turning the biblical heartland into a terror state because foreign governments need something impressive to announce at a summit.
We already watched that movie.
The ending was written in blood.
My “Extremist” Agenda
Here is my supposedly extreme program:
Jewish families should be allowed to live in Judea.
Israel should build homes, roads, schools, synagogues, clinics, farms, factories, and universities.
Israel should apply sovereignty instead of treating Jewish communities as temporary bargaining chips.
Terror networks should be dismantled. Innocent people should be protected. Murder should never be rewarded with territory, money, diplomatic recognition, or a better public-relations campaign.
That is my radical position.
Build civilization. Defend life. Reward peace. Defeat terrorism. Stop apologizing.
My house is not an act of violence. My child waiting at a bus stop is not a war crime. My mezuzah is not a provocation.
And no, being a settler is not a license to become a thug. I need no masked mob, no vandal, and no coward attacking innocent people. My claim is strong enough to stand in daylight.
Our answer is construction, not chaos.
Permanence, not apology.
Sovereignty, not surrender.
Call Me Whatever You Want
“Settler” was supposed to be an insult.
I accept it as a title of honor.
Settlers drain swamps, cultivate rocky hillsides, establish towns, raise families, defend roads, rescue ancient vineyards, revive dead languages, and turn memory into reality.
Settlers build.
That is why the word frightens people who expected the Jews to remain scattered, dependent, grateful, and quiet.
We are none of those things anymore.
So foreign ministries may issue their condemnations. Diplomats may wag their fingers. Activists may march around Western cities chanting the slogans of movements that would throw them off rooftops. Academics may publish another six-thousand-word explanation of why Jews are indigenous everywhere except their indigenous homeland.
They can all shove it.
I am not asking permission to exist.
I am not asking permission to be Jewish.
I am not asking permission to live in Judea.
I am home.
I will build. I will plant. I will pray. I will vote. I will defend democracy. I will raise Jewish children who know exactly who they are and precisely where they belong.
Call me an obstacle.
Call me an extremist.
Call me a settler.
Just don’t call me temporary.
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