Shalom.
I know you are probably hearing on the news about the war we
are in.
I would like to share some things with you.
In the 80's an organization called PLO was in Lebanon
bombing the north of Israel on a daily basis. We went in to finish that, and
stayed for a long time, being afraid the bombing will renew itself.
6 years ago we left Lebanon. It was June, and it was literally overnight. We followed the UN decisions and came out of Lebanon, leaving soldiers along the border (on the Israeli side) and UN soldiers on the Lebanese border.
Peace was supposed to be now. One would think...
3 years ago 3 soldiers and a citizen were kidnapped into Lebanon by the Hezbollah. The 3 soldiers from the Israeli side, while the UN soldiers were watching and taking pictures, and the citizen from another country. All were held there for a long time, with us not knowing what's going on with them. Nothing. Against all humane criteria, and opposite to what we do (give prisoners humane treatment and the privilege to meet with outside people).
Nothing was known about them, until we gave hundreds of Arab
prisoners (who committed crimes!!) to Lebanon and received back 3 dead soldiers
(18 year old kids) and the citizen alive, but not well.
In reaction to that we did - nothing. We obeyed the UN and
prevented from reacting.
About a year ago rockets started to be fired towards Israel. We waited for the UN to react. NO reaction came. We waited for the Lebanese government to react. NO reaction came. The bombing continued.
We did nothing.
Until about 3 weeks ago, when 3 of our soldiers, while
patrolling near the border, inside the State of Israel, were shot at with
missiles and kidnapped. 5 more were killed.
We couldn't be quiet anymore. We went into Lebanon, who sat quietly up till now, and started to react, bombing any place which was and is being used by the Hezbollah, a terrorist organization, that has a goal: to have Islam, and only Islam, be in the world. Its first goal is to destroy the state of Israel. The only safe place we are supposed to have as Jews.
This war was forced on us. We do not want to be in Lebanon,
and we do not want to fight. We just want to live peacefully, not worrying
missiles might kill us, while falling into our homes.
Imagine your nearest border, friendly as it may be. Now
imagine your home gets blown up by someone from there. Would you sit quietly? Would
you allow it to happen?
Before we bomb anywhere in Lebanon, where rockets were fired
from, we let them know (through different methods) that they should leave, in case
civilians are there. Did anyone do it for us? To prevent families of Jews,
Arabs Bedouins and Druze, living in the North of Israel, from being killed?
Our soldiers, who are being killed there everyday trying to
do what NO ONE ELSE would do - eliminate all missiles from being fired from Lebanon
and falling in Israel. Where is everyone now? Where is the UN? Why is Kofi
Annan more busy saying we are too harsh than helping make the missiles stop?
Condemn the Lebanese government from
letting that happen? Instead he is blaming us for being there.
What other choice to we have? It stopped being the north of
Israel anymore. It is all of Israel. Our small country, which is only 7 hours
of driving from north to south, and 5 minutes by plane from west to east - is
all under attack.
A missile fell near my parents' home last night. A missile.
Provided by the Iranians. A missile. Can you imagine? Can you imagine hearing a
siren in the middle of the evening, needing to find an immediate safe place,
which you don't necessarily have, and wait for the drop to be heard? Can you
imagine hearing a huge BOOM not knowing where it is coming from, unable to make
a phone call, in case another one hits in the next moment?
I want you to stand by us. I want you to voice the survival
fight we are in. I want you to write a letter to your government urging the to
stand by us, and help us stop this war! This is what we want! Your support is a
lot to us, while feeling we are standing alone. Israel is only one part of the terrorism
against us all, as human beings. If it doesn't end well, it might be the
beginning of the Iranian- Hezbollah- El Kaida actions against
humanity.
Freedom from Hezbollah attacks is what we need to survive.
Our small country is all we have.
It is a fight for life.
Thank you,
Shalom-
Einat
"Many of you have written inquiring about our daughter
Jane and her family who live in Israel approximately 40 minutes west of
Jerusalem and how the war in Israel is affecting them. Below is her response to
my asking her what we can do from this end:"
"Literally thousands of people are fleeing the rockets,
missiles, war and terror in the North and South of Israel, for the relatively
safe havens of the central areas. The scenes are staggeringly reminiscent of
the Katrina refugees crisis. Traumatized, bedraggled, and many newly impoverished,
these families from Naharia, Haifa, Zefat, Tiberias....are desperately seeking
an alternative to risking death in their homes, or cowering in crowded,
sweltering and dangerous bomb-shelters.
In response to this urgent need, Lema'an Achai, together
with a community-wide alliance, have organized group accommodation (mattresses
on the classroom floors), food (three meals a day), and all basic necessities.
Furthermore, there are summer camps for the kids,
day-trips for the adults, and a system of 'buddy' families,
who help each refugee family with their laundry, showers and social needs.
So far three hundred and twenty seven people are being
sheltered - they do not have the means to stay in hotels; tomorrow the number
is expected to be over four hundred. The plan, if necessary, is to accommodate
over one thousand people, for one month.
Lema'an Achai and Deputy Mayor Shalom Lerner, have been
mandated to raise the funds for this massive humanitarian effort; there are currently
no Government Funds available (there's a war going on..) and so the money
either has to be raised privately, or the refugees will have to be sent back to
the rockets and terror. Meantime, the phone is constantly ringing with pleas
from families, indeed whole communities, now seeking refuge in Beit Shemesh.
In this War, Israel's friends and supporters are not being
asked to put their lives on the line. But they are being asked to help, to the utmost
of their ability, with meeting the costs of this humanitarian crisis in Israel.
Please donate generously to the dedicated Lema'an Achai "Refugee Relief Fund", specifically to meet these emergency needs:-
US Tax Deductible Donations:
Checks payable to: "US Friends of Lema'an Achai"
Memo line - "Refugee Relief"
PO Box 532, Oceanside, NY 11572-0532
or online at www.lemaanachai.org.
In the (happy!) event that any funds raised are not required
for Refugee Relief (the War finishes, the families go home...) they will be used
for other critical charitable services.
I can personally recommend this organization, and the whole
city of Beit Shemesh is mobilized to try and cope with this effort. We are running
around buying, collecting, laundering, etc. Many people in the North just got
in their cars and drove off – hence the 400 we currently have living in the
schools here. It's a very hard time. With the soldier casualties growing,
everyone is starting to know someone – one guy killed just got married 5 weeks
ago and is friends with many people we know…Israel is such a small country;
there's not much anonymity.
But the kids are watching "Dora the Explorer" and
playing with their friends and playing the piano and my boss is still doling
out the work and we've rescheduled our vacation (!! How strange is the world?)
to the Dead Sea – We love you very much.
-Jane"
Rabbi Michele Paskow writes:
The following is from Rabbi Edgar Nof, the rabbi at HAIFA's Reform synagogue. I met him and attended a lovely shabbat service there last year. He is a talented, caring and dedicated man, trying to build his community and help many people. Just wanted to share his comments so people can get a personal feel for what our brothers and sisters in Israel are experiencing during this very difficult time right now. We need to do all that we can to help the people of Israel to survive.
"Shalom! The Israeli television just reported that
since the beginning of the war 14 days
ago, more than 2700 katyushas fell in Israel (hitting more than 30 cities in
the North). The number of dead among soldiers and citizens is more than 20, and
hundreds are wounded.
"Yesterday was, relatively speaking, quiet, but since
this morning 16 katyushas landed in Haifa, with 25 wounded, resulting in a man
dying from a heart attack and 2 people seriously wounded.
"We ran to the Or Hadash shelter. One siren went on
when I was about to take a shower and another went on while eating breakfast
(at that point you have to decide very quickly what to do with the food in your
mouth - to swallow fast while running down to the shelter or to spend a few
valuable seconds spitting the food to the sink. Not an easy decision, believe
me!). Another siren caught me and Ariel while we were grocery shopping in the
supermarket. These are hard times in Haifa.
"As you probably know, many bar/bat mitzvah ceremonies
this summer are cancelled, as well as weddings and baby namings being moved to
the center of the country. There are no 'chugim' (classes, folk dancing and painting),
so we don't receive rent from them, either. Preschool and camp families want
their tuition refunded. On the other hand, we need to pay salaries of the 30
employees of Or Hadash. Today we had to throw away a week's worth of food for
the 100 children who would normally be at Or Hadash daily. We couldn't give it
away, since nobody came to work, as it is dangerous to be on the streets, or
even in a car. Those who are weak suffer the most. Today I was informed that
the father of a boy scheduled to have his bar mitzva in
September committed suicide. He suffered from depression all his life, and I'm ure
that the current situation didn't help. The 84 year old holocaust survivor whom
Or Hadash supports called me in distress. Another bar mitzva boy's father is
dying of cancer, and the family prays the war will end so that friends and
family will be able to attend his funeral. Even a memorial for the son of one
of our bereaved mothers was postponed, for fear that no one would come to the
cemetery. The 5 Gaberu orphans (from Ethiopia), that we adopted are in Ashdod,
at summer camp, so at least I have one less responsibility for them.
"My daughter Yael finished her summer camp with the
Progressive Movement in Ashkelon, but didn't return home like the rest of the teens.
Instead we all preferred that she will spend some extra time with her friends
in Jerusalem, even though we all miss her.
"Our Preschool Coordinator, Hila, who lives in Kiryat
Biyalik (a suburb of Haifa) was lucky. She was working at Or Hadash when a
missile hit her street, about one block away from her apartment. Fortunately, there
was no damage to her building.
"Media reports at least another week of fighting.
"For me, the sooner this ends, the better. I hope to
write you with news about a cease-fire next time,
Shalom,
Edgar"
This is from Howard Smithline, a college friend of Stu
Singer, who lives
on a kibbutz near the Lebanese border:
"I have been here for over 30 years and we never
experienced anything like this!
"It is now 12:10 AM and it is so noisy...there's a constant droning from the planes... explosions sharp and muffled from near and far... whooshing missiles ...and occasional machinegun fire...what a great way to spend the summer. I am located right in the middle of all this...man, this is a sick situation in a sick world.
"There are almost no kids here. My daughter and her
husband went with their kids to relatives in Tel Aviv as did most other people.
Just the noise from the artillery batteries very nearby can scare the **** out
of an adult, so imagine what it can do to little kids.
"This guy Nasrallah is your prototypical warlord. All
he cares about is Nasrallah the self-proclaimed savior of Lebanon and protector
of the Palestinians. But he really doesn't give a **** for Lebanon or the Palestinians
as long as he rules the roost. Anyhow, I never imagined I'd have an artillery
battery outside my window! Get me to the NY subway...now. It's a lot safer than
this place!
"Man's capacity to be cruel and inhuman blows my mind
as much today as it did 40 years ago when I was involved in the anti-war
movement!
"So how are you doing??
"Take care and thanks - Howard"