Henry Kissinger Dies at 100 Blocked Military to Israel During Yom Kippur War

 

 Henry Kissinger, the Jewish child refugee who defined American foreign policy during the 1970's while turning his back on his People, had died. He was 100.

*Born in Germany to a frum family,* he escaped with his parents in the 1930s and immigrated to the United States. His ties to the Washington Heights kehilla of Adath Yeshurun frayed as he climbed the ladder of success, and were cut completely when he married out of the faith. As such, he will not be buried by the kehilla's chevra kaddisha.

Kissinger, as President Nixon's nation security advisor, forced Israel to cede most of the territory out gained in the 1967 Six Day War, and later tried blocking military aid when Israel was attacked by seven Arab countries in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. He denied this in an interview earlier this year but historians say that the story is true but he was overridden by Nixon.

After Nixon resigned, Kissinger became secretary of state to President Ford. He proved to be one of the most effective diplomats of the 20th century, opening up China to the West in 1971 and engineering a detente with the Soviet Union. This helped bring about the end to the Vietnam War and to contain the Communist world.

He earned the wrath of many for supporting massive bombing campaigns in Vietnam and Cambodia, backing the authoritarian regime of Chile’s Augusto Pinochet and turning a blind eye to genocide in East Timor and Bangladesh.

In 1973, Kissinger engineered a lasting peace between Israel and Egypt after the Yom Kippur War by acting as an intermediary as part of “shuttle diplomacy” to resolve the conflict.