Soccer Dad

Despair and hope / 2001 and 2009

Back in 2001, Yossi Klein Halevi wrote State of Despair for the August 6 issue of the New Republic (no link available):

Rachel Dahan left her native Kiryat Shemonah 18 years ago and settled in her husband's town, Sderot, near the Gaza border. Dahan calls herself a "shelter child"--part of a generation of children who regarded shelters as an extension of home and, as a result, suffered disorders like bed-wetting and an inability to concentrate. Only in Sderot did she gradually stop having nightmares. But then, in April, mortars fired from Gaza fell in Sderot. Though no one was hurt, Dahan is sure Katyushas will follow. She sees the familiar symptoms of trauma beginning among her five children, who cling to her, afraid of any loud noise. "Where should I run to now? My husband was afraid to live in Kiryat Shemonah. But what's the difference anymore? The whole country has become Kiryat Shemonah."

For a while after the current violence began, we pretended there were two Israels. There was the safe Israel inhabited by those who supposedly care only about "drinking wine with cheese," as Uzi Landau, the right-wing minister of internal security, contemptuously put it. And there was the Israel under siege--settlements, border towns, Jerusalem. Then came the Tel Aviv bombing in June. The Friday-night attack on a discotheque on the Tel Aviv beach--the ultimate symbol of a normalized Israel that has transcended Jewish history--ended the illusion of immune space. People still go to restaurants and concerts, but the pretense of two Israels is over. From Kiryat Shemonah to Netanyah to Sderot you hear the same refrain: For the
Palestinians, we are all settlers.

Now in the Wall Street Journal he writes in The return of Israel's existential dread.

If Israel were to launch a pre-emptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities, Tehran's two terrorist allies on our borders--Hezbollah and Hamas--would almost certainly renew attacks against the Israeli home front. And Tel Aviv would be hit by Iranian long-range missiles.

On the other hand, if Israel refrains from attacking Iran and international efforts to stop its nuclearization fail, the results along our border would likely be even more catastrophic. Hezbollah and Hamas would be emboldened politically and psychologically. The threat of a nuclear attack on Tel Aviv would become a permanent part of Israeli reality. This would do incalculable damage to Israel's sense of security.

It seems that in eight years, not much has changed. Israel is still at the mercy of enemies to its north and south. The main difference is that now Iran's role in threatening Israel is more open.

Given the efforts to tie Israel's hands and prevent it from defending itself, it's good to know that the IDF's chief of staff, realizes that Israel cannot depend on any other country. (h/t Hashmonean) Gen. Ashkenazi said

"Our legitimate fight against terror organizations that disrupt the lives of our citizens has provided pretext for anti-Semitic attacks by Holocaust deniers and other hostile elements, who legitimize every atrocity committed against the citizens of Israel."

Ashkenazi added, "From this place, from whence our brothers and sisters were led to the gas chambers without cause or reason but for their Jewish faith, we say to all haters, deniers, and bringers of malice with our heads held high: We are here. The people of Israel have risen and rejuvenated in their country and they demand their independence and security."

This recalls a similar speech given at the same train platform, back in 2001.

It is the right of the Jewish people, after years of suffering and privation, to be the masters of our fate and to let no one control the fate of our people. We will preserve this right more than anything.

In the quiet that prevails here, which allows a short respite from the flow of troubles, I am committed, as a man, as a Jew, and as the Prime Minister of the State of Israel, to ensuring the future of the Jewish people, of each and every Jew, in the country and around the world. I do not forget, even for a moment, that every time we find ourselves obliged to realize our right to defend our security - we will do so vigorously and with courage.

Maly, Hala and Abraham Bobkar will never return from that journey, just as six million Jews - including 1.5 million children - will not. We must see to it that Jewish children will never again depart on such journeys.

What's remarkable is that even as the threat against Israel has coalesced, the idea that Israel has the right to defend itself, is not taken for granted but must be enunciated and defended by Israel's leaders.

Crossposted at Yourish.