Avi Perets This is Me

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1. 1. www.myrtlebeachonline.com

   www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 4/2/2007   Last Visited: 4/2/2007

   Rabbi Avi Perets of Temple Emanu-El in Myrtle Beach estimates about 60 new families have joined the temple in the past four years, nearly doubling the congregation's size to 155 families.
   
   He expects the temple to be full with 140 people for Seder, which they will hold Tuesday night. Many families will hold a Seder dinner in their homes tonight and go to the temple for another Seder Tuesday, Perets said.
   ...
   "We celebrate the idea that Jewish people now are free and still exist after 4,000 years," Perets said.

2. 2. Tyler Morning Telegraph

   www.tylerpaper.com/site/news.c - [Cached]

   Published on: 4/14/2002   Last Visited: 4/18/2002

   On the day Christians around the world were celebrating Good Friday, Rabbi Avi Perets nervously dialed his mother's Jerusalem telephone number.
   
   On March 29 an 18-year-old Palestinian female, wearing a belt of explosives around her waist, blew herself up at a grocery store about 200 yards from his childhood home.
   
   "When I saw the pictures on the news I was horrified. I recognized the supermarket - I shopped there as a child. My mother still goes there on a daily basis to do her grocery shopping," said Perets, rabbi of Tyler's conservative Jewish Congregation Ahavath Achim.
   
   For 50 years his mother has lived in the same house in the Kiryat Novel neighborhood in Jerusalem. She shopped one hour before the blast.
   
   "I called my mom. She was just terrible - she heard the bomb. All the windows in her house were shaken," he said.
   
   While his mother was fine, Perets had another shock in store.
   
   He recognized one of the dead as 55-year-old Haim Smadar, a former schoolmate of his and a guard stationed at the grocery store. According to the Jerusalem Post, police said Smadar thwarted greater loss of life - but sacrificed his own - by pushing the suicide bomber from the store's entrance.
   
   "He left a widow and four children," Perets said. "It has become hell there. Hell on earth."
   
   DEFENDING ISRAEL
   
   A medic in the Israeli Defense Forces from 1976 to 1979, Perets said he has seen the aftermath of more terrorist attacks than he wants to remember.
   
   "I still remember one time when terrorists hijacked a bus full of passengers and burned the entire bus. It was one of the worst scenes I have seen in my entire life," he said. The Palestinian Liberation Organization claimed responsibility for the 1977 Tel Aviv incident, he said. "As medics we went there to help, but the passengers were all burned to death. There was nothing we could do."
   
   For his family's sake and his country's sake, Perets says he wants peace.
   
   However, 19 months of fighting has left at least 450 Israelis and 1,500 Palestinians dead - at least 60 of them suicide bombers, according to the Associated Press.
   
   On March 29 - the same day the suicide bomber exploded herself near Perets' childhood home - Israel launched Operation Defensive Wall. While the Israeli government says sweeps have detained more than 4,000 Palestinians and netted large caches of weapons and explosives, reports of bulldozed homes and civilian casualties come from the West Bank daily.
   
   The military incursions have sparked violent anti-Israeli demonstrations in Cairo, Beirut and parts of Europe.
   ...
   Perets said the current struggle must be understood in terms of its history.
   
   In the late 19th century, Jewish pioneers began returning to the Holy Land. Though the land was under Ottoman, or Turkish, rule, Perets said the region was desolate and not heavily populated with Arabs.
   
   "There were swamps, mosquitoes and malaria. Many of the Jewish pioneers died but they made the land prosperous," Perets said.
   
   Subsequently, he said, Arabs began re-populating the region while Zionism, or the movement toward a Jewish homeland, also gained steam.
   
   In 1917, 400 years of Ottoman rule ended by British conquest. Perets said Zionist aspirations were fueled when Britain's Foreign Secretary Lord Balfour pledged support for the establishment of a "Jewish national home in Palestine" - the name by which the region was then known.
   
   Thirty years later, after World War II and the Holocaust, the United Nations created a plan to partition the region into two lands. "Only after the Holocaust did the rest of the world recognize the need for a Jewish state," Perets said.
   
   Ever since Israel was declared a state May 14, 1948, it has experienced varying levels of conflict with neighboring Arab countries and militant pro-Palestinian groups.
   
   Perets said less than two years ago, Israelis believed they were heading toward a peaceful solution with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
   ...
   Perets said many Israelis reached a turning point in 2000.
   
   "Many Israelis who were pro-peace are still pro-peace, but have become skeptical whether Arafat can deliver security," he said.
   
   The Israeli Army reported finding documents earlier this month in Arafat's Ramallah compound proving he approved payments to known terrorists.
   
   ...
   I think we will never know the answer to these questions unless he tries," Perets said.

3. 3. www.myrtlebeachonline.com

   www.myrtlebeachonline.com/news - [Cached]

   Published on: 12/4/2007   Last Visited: 12/4/2007

   They made the nine-candle menorahs - called a Hanukkah menorah or chanukiah - which celebrate the eight festival days and are different from the seven-candle menorah used the rest of the year, said Rabbi Avi Perets.
   ...
   Perets said the long-lasting oil is celebrated in other Hanukkah favorites such as the potato latkes and jelly doughnuts that are fried in oil. Both will be on the menu for Sunday's Hanukkah dinner expected to be attended by at least 120 people, he said.