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The Dwindling Hostage Count
I was recently invited to join friends for dinner. On entering their living room I saw a poster on one of the armchairs. It contained the image of Uriel Baruch, a young Israeli man taken
hostage by Hamas.
https://forward.com/forward-newsletters/looking-forward/569286/there-are-240-hostages-in-gaza-one-is-uriel-baruch/
“Have you met Uriel?” I was asked. I looked at the poster and then for somewhere to sit. “Oh, please sit in the armchair - Uriel's happy to make room for you.” The poster was moved to a kitchen chair. Behind me was a flame burning in a 7-day candle. I looked at my host inquisitively. “A candle will stay burning until all the hostages come home,” I was told with a stern look. “They are always with us”.
Following a deal in November, which saw about a third of the hostages released by Hamas, 136 Israelis have remained in captivity. They remain in the minds of most people in Israel and Jews globally. Bring Them Home has been a rallying cry throughout the country.
Hersh Goldberg is one of those still held.
A few weeks ago I walked past his parents’ home in Jerusalem. Their balcony is adorned with an enormous number, for all in the neighbourhood to see, representing the number of days he's been in captivity. Each morning his mother updates the number. After 100 days had passed, his parents requested that people wear this number as a badge on their clothing. “We cannot forget them”. At an engagement party I went to last week, many of the guests wore this badge of honour. Before making a celebratory speech to his friends, the groom began with one moment of silence for the captives and the soldiers looking for them in Gaza, and made a prayer for their safety.
On February 6 it was announced that approximately 32 of the remaining hostages were known to have perished.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/06/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-hostages-dead.html
This news only serves to increase the anxiety of Israelis who know that the longer they remain in captive conditions the lower their chances of survival, and time is running out.
This became even more poignant (if that were possible) after evidence - both testimony and forensic evidence - started coming out of the sexual abuse and assault of girls and women in Hamas captivity.
Note that three films are currently in production on this issue.
The implications of all this are horrific. Everyone here is sick to the stomach from what is going on, and is partially paralysed by a feeling of helplessness. Protests are increasing in intensity for the Government to ‘bring the hostages home’ by any means.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/02/17/hostage-family-protest-israel-netanyahu/
Politicians (you know who I mean) are accused of making strategic decisions based on self-interest, at the expense of reaching a deal facilitating the release of the hostages; assuming, of course, that such a deal is possible.
None of this is helped, of course, by the fact that the radio news here is aired with music in the background, which increases in intensity as each item is read out by the broadcaster. Many have taken to only looking at the print media, or foregoing the news altogether.
To relieve my anxiety from the stream of news I focus on my budgies, Dov Ber and Chaya Mushka. They have also experienced a little stress lately, so I spent a week building them a larger aviary, and then some toys to play with. With radio interviews blaring in the background, the birds chirp loudly as if to drown out the constant hum of awful information.
I even went to buy them a treat. “I’ve got one packet of budgie treats left,” said the pet store owner, reaching up to the shelf, “but it’s past its use-by date. You can have it for free.” I thanked him and looked at the date marked on the packet. 7-10-23. A chill went down my spine.
In early February, newly elected Argentine President Javier Milei visited Israel. A colourful character, he has announced his intention to convert to Judaism.
During his visit, the Argentine President was taken to the Western Wall where, with tears in his eyes, he prayed for the welfare and release of hostages held by Hamas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96pybR_stUM
Days later, on February 12, the Israeli military announced that two hostages, held captive in Rafah, had been rescued in a special operation by the IDF. Both hostages were of Argentinian descent.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/02/12/israel-hostage-rescue-rafah/
This was a major coup for the military and for the government, and everyone in the country felt a surge of excitement. But the feeling didn’t last long. It did not lead to a slew of hostages being saved. On the contrary; Hamas is more wary than ever of such operations, and concern for the remaining hostages' safety has grown significantly.
Facts on the Ground
Almost all Israeli media reports since October 7 have focused on the Hamas attack and its aftermath. Video footage filmed by Hamas fighters, Israeli soldiers, dog-mounted cameras from the army’s canine unit and aerial photography have all been aired. Released captives have spoken about the conditions they endured in Gaza, whether in the custody of hostile Gazan families, in deep underground tunnels, or in dedicated secure areas in Gazan hospitals.
As Israel’s mission in Gaza proceeded, much material was collected that provided significant information. This has included clues about the hostages, their conditions and whereabouts. The sources of data are varied: interrogation of Hamas fighters who have surrendered, abandoned Hamas computers (with files of prisoner lists, sentry lists, fighter lists, battalion details, battle strategies and instructions, etc.), security camera footage from the tunnels, and more.
Amongst other things, an Israeli car stolen by Hamas during its massacre of Israeli citizens was found by troops in the Nasser Hospital parking lot in Gaza. This, despite claims that hospitals are humanitarian safe zones and not used by terrorists.
And let’s not forget the plethora of children’s books found in the bedrooms of regular Gazan homes. Below are photos I took of a report shown on Israeli TV showing pages from a variety of children’s books found by soldiers, glorifying attacks on Jews.
For more details, listen to the following interview with a man who grew up in Gaza and escaped its culture of death against Jews. He came to Israel to verify what he had been taught and to see Jews for himself. This led him to convert to Judaism. As distinct from Jewish boys - who are circumcised with the blessing that they should be raised to observe Jewish law, get married, and do good deeds - Gazan newborns are paraded with a knife beside them in the hope that they will grow up to kill Jews. According to him, the culture of murdering Jews is so pervasive that there are no innocent civilians in Gaza. Anyone who disagrees with the genocide of Jews has long ago been either executed as a collaborator with Israel, or has moved overseas.
https://youtu.be/qbCuOSSc9j0?si=sClD3U9scLubgcEY
Conflicting Terms of Reference
A fundamental driver of anti-Israel opinion is the misunderstanding of occupation. Protaganists have a sense that the Hamas massacre of innocent Israeli civilians (both Jewish and Arab) was justified resistance to Israel’s purported ‘occupation’ of Arab land.
Western well-wishers believe that hostilities will end when the occupied territories - evidently something Jews stole from Arabs - are returned. (Note that a new expression - Jewed - which I first heard in Australia, refers to unfairly taking property that belongs to another.) These well-wishers have no idea if these occupied territories mean Gaza, Judea, the West Bank, Samaria (yes, I know it’s the same thing), Palestine (whatever that is), and pretty much everything from the river to the sea. In the same breath they declare that Israel can stay where it is. After all a 2 state solution sounds fair, doesn’t it?
By contrast, the Arabs have a clear agenda. Israel and the Jews must go. Everything from the river to the sea - i.e.: the West Bank, Gaza and the entire State of Israel - is occupied and must become an Arab state called Palestine.
To them it is not relevant that the West Bank is governed by the elected Palestinian Authority and Gaza by its elected government Hamas, except insofar as these two bodies are the leading
crusaders for the destrucion of Israel. Nor is it considered relevant that much of British Palestine was given over by the British to the Hashemite tribe for the creation of the country Transjordan (today known as Jordan). Imagine if the British had had the foresight to name it Arab Palestine...
Israel sees itself as a country with western values, while also understanding what the Arab Palestinians mean when they talk.
But as long as there are such conflicting terms of reference, and the West allows anti-Semitic undertones to blind its agenda, Israel will be abused by both the East and the West.
Genocide
Much of the international media spins the Israel-Hamas conflict in the most ridiculous terms. The accusation of genocide has been bandied about so much that, in my opinion, it has lost most of its meaning.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/brazil-lula-israel-gaza-genocide-holocaust_n_65d2913be4b0ce1bdc39fc2e
Israel has been bashed, and battered, and even dragged to the International Court on accusations of - you guessed it - genocide.
https://www.npr.org/2024/01/26/1227078791/icj-israel-genocide-gaza-palestinians-south-africa
When Brazil’s president Lula de Silva (see the link above) accused Israel of genocide, he was driven by anti-Semitism. How so? By wilfully mis-framing Israel’s operations in Gaza as retaliation for the initial Hamas attack, and not as a defensive action preventing future attacks that have been promised by Hamas, de Silva wrongly portrayed Israel as motivated by genocidal intent. The same is true for South Africa and others.
For the sake of broad-mindedness, I follow a variety of news services, including those hostile to Israel. The latter all have one thing in common: a misunderstanding of facts and how they work. Sometimes my head spins as I try to untangle the confused logic they spew. And each time I’m dumbfounded by the credence given to them. As it turns out, I am the stupid one for thinking that most people think logically and critically consider the veracity of things they are told.
In these news services the main character of our story - Hamas - is either mentioned only in passing or not at all, and is generally not deemed relevant of judgement, even when that group openly states it will continue to carry out similar massacres on Israeli citizens in the future.
Nature, Nurture, and PTSD
With climate change bringing us a warmer winter than usual, I was pleased when a week of stormy weather hit our shores. These days the nightly forecast includes weather conditions expected in Gaza and the Hermon, for the benefit of any soldiers serving who are listening. I thought of our soldiers, sloshing around in the Gazan mud, unable to change their clothes for days at a time.
On hearing the forecast, I took the opportunity to go flood-hunting in the desert and hopefully clear my head.
My windscreen wipers screeched rhythmically as I turned towards the desert, and the dark sky suddenly cleared. Within minutes I was heading south towards the Dead Sea, past the long suburbs of East Jerusalem on the ridge above me. Bedouin encampments replaced them as the hilly slopes became more barren. At sea level, I stopped off to visit my friend Ahmed, who gives camel rides to passing tourists. We stood in the winter sunshine shooting the breeze, and I thought of the constant accusations of apartheid leveled at Israel. Why don’t people come here to see for themselves?
I continued to the Dead Sea and turned south along its coastline. Radio reception was weak, but I could still make out a discussion on the main channel. The mother of a deceased soldier wanted to become a grandmother. She had posthumously had her son’s sperm harvested and frozen. Together with other grieving mothers, she had petitioned the authorities to clear the way for artificial insemination. The Knesset Health Committee has approved the process, for which legislation is now being prepared. While this has been available in Israel until now for widows who lost their partners, not so when the request came from the deceased’s parents.
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-780309#google_vignette
A few kilometres past Qumran I turned off the road and parked under the massive rocky cliffs of the Judean desert. A fast-flowing river, normally dry, rushed seaward. The rocky ground crunched underfoot as I followed the river, which carried the day’s rainfall from Jerusalem. In the distance, a thundering waterfall, with 3 levels, poured down the side of a cliff.
Two young men, returning along the valley to their car, walked towards me. One held a baby, the other an M16 rifle. We greeted each other and started chatting. Childhood friends, they had both just been released from serving in Gaza and came out to the desert for a break. “I come here to see the waterfall every winter,” said the one with an enormous, soft smile. His rifle dangled behind his back and he readjusted the strap across his chest.
We cooed at the sweet baby held by the other.
“Do you have any other kids?” I asked.
“Four others” he replied. I was taken aback. He must be older than I expected and was probably a reservist.
“How long were you in Gaza?” I asked.
“Four months” replied the father. He saw the expression on my face. “Yes, it was a long stint. I actually got out last week.”
“Wow! Have you managed to sleep yet, or are the kids hanging onto you all the time?”
He laughed. “Something like that.”
“Are you back at work? Is your job okay?” I have heard stories of reservists returning after long periods of military service, but their employers had needed to hire someone else when they were away fighting.
“I’m fine. At least now my wife can work while I take care of the kids. Beforehand she didn’t have any free time and couldn’t work properly.”
The implications of this war are so diverse and not discussed, especially abroad.
I didn’t want to ask him what he did during his four months, or what battalion he was in. Nonetheless, he told me of a few of the places he had served. Most of the Strip.
Gesturing towards the gorge and the river, I said “It must be surreal coming here after fighting in Gaza. Like being on a different planet. Good on you for keeping your sanity while experiencing the dissonance. I am always amazed how Israeli soldiers do their duty but, on returning, never discuss what they have seen and experienced.” He nodded in agreement.
“We are out there doing our thing so that the citizens of Israel can get on with their lives. We all have a part to play. Yours is to keep the country going. Otherwise there’s no point to what we are doing.”
His words were powerful.
I wished the two friends well and went on my way.
Later, I drove out to the shores of the Dead Sea to see some desert wildflowers.
The spot was secluded except for a rented caravan beside a swinging bench on a cliff, overlooking the blue water of the sea. In the distance, the mountains of Edom shone in the late afternoon sun. A young man sat silently in a chair by the caravan. Having returned from service in Gaza, he had sought somewhere to be alone and rented this spot from a local. It seemed perfect.
I could only imagine the tumultuous experiences in his head: explosions, bullets, heat, the barking of orders, constant tension making his pulse a deafening clamour, distinguishing between little boys running into his gunsights as they searched for their mothers, and others running into his gunsights as they lobbed grenades at him. And he would shoot, shoot, shoot, the bullets exploding beside his ear as the casings popped out of the rifle in succession.
As I have said, I can only imagine. But whatever the case, the still, quiet, desert air - silent apart from the periodic screech of a migrating bee-eater or the ubiquitous Tristram’s starling - is the perfect place to spend a few days to process an aspect of life that this young man has spared most of us from.
https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/our-soldiers/how-the-israeli-military-is-fighting-ptsd-at-its-core/
5 comments:
Very insightful. Must read!! Share this!!
Appreciate your perspective and experiences during these surreal, painful, and overwhelming times. All we can know is that we are on the right side of history and humanity.
Hang in there Big Al X
How terribly poignant
How terribly poignant
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