American detained in Jerusalem's Russian Compound
Nobody arrested me. I was DETAINED when I faithfully reported to
the police office at 9 a.m. Monday morning, January 9, 1996 (day
before my birthday) the day after The Jerusalem Post published
on their front page an article shedding light on what they were
doing in the dark.
After my initial interrogation of six and one half hours, the
Thursday before, I reported, as demanded, to the police station
Friday morning, Saturday morning, Sunday morning, and then
Monday morning the fellow who had actually been nice to me, he
said his name was Moshe, was ordered to serve me a deportation
order. He expected me to sign it and, APPALLED, I purposely
dropped the accursed paper from my hands and let it fall to the
floor where it belonged! I refused to sign it.
They put me in that dungeon called the Russian Compound, built
hundreds of years ago by the Turks, and which has since been
toured by Israeli parliament members saying it should be torn
down! I was in a cell made for ten and at one time we had twenty
one people in it, with mats lying all over the floor and bed
bugs crushed on the walls and everyone but me (by the grace of
God) had welts on them from their bites!
We had one "bathroom" for all of us in that cell: it was a
literal hole in the floor, and the shower pipe (no showerhead)
was just over that hole, and a filthy sink, and everyone had to
practically beg for toilet paper. I was there for over two weeks
before being dep
orted, after being brought before the Jerusalem
magistrate (who refused to release me, being represented by
famous Israeli lawyer Naftali Warzberger), and later before
Israel's High Court who agreed there was no reason I shouldn't
have been set free, that there was no risk of flight, but now
they were just going to deport me since my citizenship request
was denied.
The Temple Mount
Faithful paid for all my legal expenses, recognizing the
whole ordeal was politico-religious persecution against all of
us, yet the Leftists targeted little ol' me!
Is it a crime to have an abiding love for Israel? To believe
what's written in the Law and the Prophets concerning the Temple
and our responsibility to construct it? To mourn that it hasn't
been done yet? As the Jerusalem Talmud states: "every generation
in which the Temple has not been built is as if the Temple were
destroyed in it...." Isn't Israel's state emblem a gold menorah
in between two gold olive branches?
Must I remain in exile, ban
ished from the Land I love, because my hope, prayer, and
dream is for Israel to fulfill what that symbol represents: the
Temple and Israel's destiny to become a Light to all nations?