According to the Talmud (Tractate Eruvin), a person’s character can be judged in three forms of behavior: koso, his cup, how he acts after drinking; keeso, his wallet, how he conducts his business and spends his money; and kaaso, his anger, how he controls his temper.
A community can also be judged by these standards.
Last week, during the Days of Judgment, the Jewish community passed the keeso test, and the Palestinians failed.
On the Sunday before Yom Kippur, Ari Fuld, a 45-year-old native of Queens and father of four children, was fatally stabbed by a 17-year-old Palestinian terrorist near his West Bank Efrat community.
Friends and family of Mr. Fuld, a veteran of the Israeli Army and well-known pro-Israel activist, immediately started an online, crowd-funding GoFundMe campaign to raise money for his family.
By midweek this week the campaign had raised more than $1 million from some 9,000 contributors to the fund (gofundme.com/ari-fuld).
At the same time, the Palestinian Authority announced its own monetary contribution in the wake of Mr. Fuld’s murder — the PA made an advance payment of about $3,300 to the family of Khalil Jabarin, Mr. Fuld’s murderer. (The Palestinians consider such payments to be part of their national resistance to Israel’s policies in the West Bank.)
The payment was part of the PA’s Martyrs Fund, which sends monthly stipends to the families of Palestinian Arabs who are killed, injured or imprisoned as a result of their actions against Israel — attacks, riots, suicide missions or other fatal attacks on Jews. The more brutal the attack or murder, the more money the family receives.
Israel this summer passed a law that will deduct from the money it sends to the PA (collected from taxes and tariffs) the amount that the PA allots to terrorist families. In March, President Trump signed the Taylor Force Act, which will cut U.S. payments to the PA by about one-third until the stipends to terrorists’ families cease.
PA officials have declared that such financial pressure is unlikely to dissuade the Palestinians’ representatives from glorifying the members of their ranks who take Jewish lives.
In the last week, two communities faced the keeso test. Each one, the Jews and Palestinians, showed how their money reflects their moral priorities. A Jewish family that has lost its husband and father, will, because of wide support, not face financial ruin. And a Palestinian, whose son spilled Jewish blood, will benefit financially from the fatal attack.
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