Adir Zik Passes Away
IsraelNationalNews.com Monday, February 7, 2005

Arutz-7 commentator and icon Adir Zik passed away on
Sunday after a long battle with cancer. He championed the battle for
maintaining the integrity of the Land of Israel for the People of Israel.

A lover of Israel, a man who exemplified a love of the
Torah, the Holy Land, and G-d's people, Zik, 66, made his case every Friday
with a morning program on Arutz-7 - first on the radio, and then continuing
over the internet.

The program "Adir's Fireworks" - based on the meaning of
the Hebrew word zik - he spread a message of Torah, truth and unyielding
compromise, accompanied by a call for total dedication for the glorification
of the Land of Israel and the Chosen People. He warned against the dangers
threatening the State of Israel following the 1993 Oslo Agreement, and never
let up until he died.

Adir Zik's opinions earned him many a political nemesis.
He railed against the bias of the media, which he commonly called
"tishkoret" instead of "tikshoret" ("lies" instead of "media"). He
popularized the term "Bolshevik government" when he used it to refer to the
Labor Rabin-Peres regime and its methods of putting down its political
opponents.

Zik was also one of the leaders of the campaign against
agent-provocateur Avishai Raviv and his employment by the General Security
Service against the nationalist camp. In November 1997, government ministers
called for a criminal investigation into the affair after he wrote an
article in HaTzofeh listing 58 questions about the Rabin assassination.
Among the questions he asked were: Who instructed the police to close 15
criminal files against Avishai Raviv concerning damage inflicted upon Arabs
and Jews? Who instructed Avishai Raviv to take credit (in the name of his
"Jewish" organization Eyal) for the murder of an Arab in Halhoul (which was
later found to have been perpetrated by an Arab)? How did it happen that an
amateur photographer just happened to film the murder of Rabin, including
many seconds of footage of Yigal Amir?

Adir Zik became a "returnee" to observant Judaism at a
young age, after asking his parents to send him to a religious school. He
later studied film in the University of California, and helped found Israel
Television in the 1960's. He produced and directed many films throughout his
career.

His program "Zikukim Shel Adir," which he broadcast for 15
years, was far and away the most widely listened-to on Arutz-7. Of late, he
also wrote a weekly column for the B'Sheva newspaper. He established and ran
a charity fund for needy residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

Adir said on one of his recent programs that, after he
contracted cancer of the throat and did not respond to treatment, he
gathered his family together - his wife, six children and eight
grandchildren - and told them: "The Zik family has never taken part - and I
hope will never take part - in the uprooting of Jews from their homes, not
in Poland, not in Russia, and not in Romania, and not in the Land of
Israel."

He often said that his mentor and teacher was Rabbi Tzvi
Yehuda HaCohen Kook.

In his last column in B'Sheva, this past week, Zik wrote,
"A difficult case of pneumonia has brought me to the Hadassah Medical Center
in Ein Karem... I, like the other patients here, am enveloped by kindness
and mitzvot [Torah commandments] without limits. Ezer Mizion, other
organizations, private people - all stream to here day and night and try to
help. My family members here receive food and clothing from the
organizations working here. Four times a day people come with musical
instruments to play and raise our spirits in the oncological ward. On
Shabbat, there are prayers and meals for whoever stays here. Righteous Jews
pass through and recite the Kiddush in every room, and everything is done
modestly... All they ask is that they allow us to perform this mitzvah. I am
receiving excellent medical care - and am enveloped Jewish chessed
(kindness). Shabbat Shalom, Jews. With G-d's help, we will win!"

Zik found an open door in many Hassidic courts, in the
National Religious camp and in many secular kibbutzim. His funeral will be
held at 4 PM Monday, leaving from the Sanhedria funeral home in Jerusalem to
the Mt. of Olives. Thousands are expected.