The "road map is against the Torah" and "no Israeli government has the authority to give away a portion of Israel," declared a large group of Israeli rabbis that met in Jerusalem Sunday night.

The "emergency meeting" was sponsored by the Union of Rabbis for the Jewish People and the Land of Israel, a group created 10 years ago in response to the Oslo Accords. It includes both right-wing and centrist rabbis.

For almost three hours, well-known rabbinical leaders including former chief rabbis Mordechai Eliahu and Avraham Shapira spoke passionately to some 300 rabbis about the dangers posed by the road map and a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River.

They asked the rabbis to galvanize the public against it by speaking to their communities´ members here and abroad.

In a series of concluding remarks, the speakers urged the rabbis and the public to work against the road map, explaining that it endangers the lives of Jews in Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza Strip, and throughout the rest of Israel. They asked people to stand firm and not give up one inch of territory.

One rabbi stood up and in an impromptu manner said: "We are not talking about evacuation, we are talking about deportation."

In spite of the seriousness of the threat, the rabbis urged the public to refrain from violence in their struggle against the road map. Rabbi Haim Druckman said they are motivated in their fight not by political concerns, but by a deep desire to save lives.

Rabbi Elyakim Levanon, a member of the Rabbinical Council of Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza Strip, said: "I came here after feeling for several months... like a soldier coming from the battle. "We have never faced a danger as great as the one we face at this moment. The ground is burning under our feet... Go and awaken the public."

Rabbi Dov Lior, chairman of the Rabbinical Council of Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza Strip, cautioned against the type of false peace promised by the road map. There are organizations that refer to themselves as the "peace camp," as if they are the only ones who want peace, he said, adding: "We all want peace," but it won´t come by giving up a historical claim to the land.

Rabbi Sholom Gold said, "Nearly 10 years ago, in November 1993, two months after the handshake on the White House lawn, we gathered here for the first time in this hall to express our opposition to the Oslo Accords."

He said they were told to leave such matters to the politicians, the writers, the artists, and the opinion makers. "They were all wrong," he added. "Mr. President and Mr. Prime Minister, 10 years have passed and history is being replayed before our very eyes.

"The road map has brought the rabbis right back here to this same room so that we can raise the cry again... The Palestinian state will be a knife poised at the heart of Israel.

"This is not the security that you promised us... "Mr. Prime Minister, we are not occupiers, we are an ancient eternal people who have returned to our ancestral God-given home," Gold said. (© 1995-2003, The Jerusalem Post 06/24/03)