"Lubavitch Lunatics" - The Real Story

Late last night I received an instant message from a former colleague at Yachad. It was a link to this picture.
When I saw it, I immediately thought of my post earlier in the day. Yes, this was clearly one of the Lubavitch protesters who, after infiltrating Gush Katif to protest the disengagment, threatened to commit mass suicide.

My friend told me that this was her cousin, a Lubavitcher chasid who's not a resident of Israel but of Crown Heights, Brooklyn. She said that they were not actually going to commit suicide but were merely using the threat as a way to get more troops to the area which would (somehow-I didn't understand this part) allow more protesters to get into the area. You see, it was an empty threat. An empty threat of suicide. So that made it ok she told me.

She said so what if he doesn't live in Israel, let alone Gush Katif? It's his land just like it's my land and he happens to be more passionate about it than I am. He doesn't think the government is doing the right thing and he's going to do everything in his power to prevent it from happening she told me.

I tried to explain that threatening suicide will not solve anything, aside from bad PR. If they did kill themselves it would be the biggest tragedy of the entire operation. And if they're just using it as a ploy and the world comes to think that all settlers are crazy and suicidal when it's only the ones who come from America who are that crazy, then that's a person that Israel doesn't need on its soil. There are ways to protest things effectively; suicide is not one of those ways. We always say that Judaism, as compared to the Arabs, values life. This is not how we show it.