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| my dorm window |
Many wonderful
friends and family members have been contacting me to make sure Hadossa and I
are okay here in Israel during this time of war. I so appreciate your love and
concern for us. I have decided to let you know how things have been going this
past week. Last Wednesday, November 14, 2012, Israel finally started defending
herself from Gaza attacks after patiently tolerating a continual bombardment of
rockets for many years. Has this affected us? Absolutely. Let me start by
saying that what we have been through is NOTHING compared to what people are
going through in the south. We have friends in Ashdod who spend most of their time
in the safe room of their apartment. They hear sirens 20 times a day or more. A
rocket landed close enough to their building to shatter 12 floors of glass
below their apartment. They are on the 14th floor. They are barely keeping
their sanity. I don't want to overdramatize what we have been experiencing here
in Tel Aviv. I am fully aware that people closer to Gaza are suffering to a far
greater extent. However, life in Tel Aviv is getting very tense.
Last Thursday, the
day after the Pillar of Cloud (defense) started, Hadossa had just arrived in
Tel Aviv by train from Haifa to stay with me for a few days and was walking
down the street in the dark with her suitcase rolling along behind her. I was
at the dorm waiting for her when I realized there were sirens going off
outside. It was 6:39 PM. These aren't
ordinary ambulance sirens. The long blasts rise and fall in pitch with obnoxious
force. I told my roommate that we needed to get to the shelter at the bottom of
the building. We ran down the stairs and found the dark entrance to the shelter.
The sirens stopped and we heard some kind of blast somewhere far away. I went
outside to listen. Everything was quiet. I needed to find Hadossa. My roommate
returned to the dorm and I went out to the street. I tried calling her but the
phones weren't working. I tried again and again. I would have walked down the
street to find her but there was a chance she might have gotten on a bus from
the train station, and so I didn't know if she would be on the road somewhere
or on a bus. So all I could do was wait. After what seemed like forever, but
was probably only 2-3 minutes, she finally answered the phone and explained
that when the sirens went off, she ran with a group of people in between some
buildings on the Tel Aviv University campus. She had to leave her suitcase on
the sidewalk. She came out and got her suitcase and it turned out that she was
only a short distance from me across the street. We walked back to the dorms,
thankful that all was well. It was the first time in 21 years that Tel Aviv had
experienced the sirens. That was Thursday.
On Friday, Hadossa
and I went up to Haifa to take a bed to her apartment. Yes, we took a bed on a
bus and then a train. It was a fun adventure. A friend of hers from Technion
met us at the train station in Haifa and gave us a ride with the bed to her
apartment. It is a nice little folding bed I bought at IKEA. We set up the bed
and then returned to Tel Aviv by train. We had just returned to the dorm and
were discussing whether or not to take a nap or go grocery shopping. The
supermarket closes at 2:30 PM on Fridays so we decided to go shopping since we
were running out of time. We descended the stairs of my building and had just
opened the door to go outside at 1:33 PM when the sirens went off. We quickly
went back into the building and found the door to the bomb shelter. This time
we went in. Other people were entering and a small crowd gathered. Strangely
enough, the shelter seems to have been serving as a storage room for a large
quantity of used items, as if from a rummage sale. It is full of dishes,
artwork, books, home decor, appliances, and all kinds of old household items,
nothing that appeared to have much value. We found places to stand amidst the junk
and waited. We heard some loud explosions that shook the air. We waited. The
sirens stopped. We finally came out of the shelter. That was Friday.
On Saturday, Hadossa
and I were relaxing in the dorm. Hadossa had headphones on, listening to music,
while I laid on my bed reading. It was some time late in the afternoon right
around the end of Shabbat. I heard the sirens and jumped up from the bed.
Hadossa didn't hear them because of her headphones. She realized that I was
moving quickly towards the door and then followed suit. One of my roommates was
home and joined us on the stairs. We found most of the same crowd from Friday
gathered again in the shelter. I explored the shelter a little and found a
bathroom, two shower rooms, some sinks and more used appliances. The sirens had
stopped. Our little crowd kept talking and getting to know one another. Finally
we emerged from the depths and ascended back to our rooms.
Hadossa went back to
Haifa on Saturday night. Sunday morning at 8:15 AM I went to class at the
university. Our instructor told us that should anything happen, we needed to
gather in the hallway where there were no windows. She taught us linguistic
models for a little over two hours. At 10:29 AM the sirens went off. Not
everyone in the room heard them, but those of us near the window promptly rose
and started walking toward the door. We didn't have to say a word. Everyone
knew what that meant. We gathered in the hall. There were some booms. We waited
awhile. We went back to class. The rest of our classes were eventless in that
regard, but it was becoming apparent that our cohort is suffering from raw
nerves. We hear sirens all the time. A car engine revving up. A child yelling.
Everything starts sounding like a siren after awhile. After class that evening
I was eating dinner at my kitchen table. One of my roommates sat with me. We
were both absorbed in reading when the sirens began to call at 6:41 PM. We both
darted down the stairs. Same crowd. Same piles of junk. We chatted with our
shelter friends that we never see at any other time. There were some blasts. Then
silence. We returned to our dorms after awhile. Later that evening I caught a
train to Haifa. It was time to go visit Hadossa for a few days.
While I was
gone, there were no sirens in Tel Aviv. I came back Tuesday night went to
classes on Wednesday, which is today. At 12:03 PM a bus was bombed here in Tel
Aviv. An Arab woman threw the small bomb into the bus when it came to a stop.
Amazingly, though 27 people were injured, no one died. Baruch HaShem! Our cohort spent some
time this afternoon talking about how they are doing. No one wanted to take a
bus home. I only had to walk over to the dorms. But some people in my cohort
live close to where the explosion took place.
Now supposedly there
is a ceasefire happening. No one believes it is for real. Of course 12 Gazan rockets
were fired into Israel within the hour after the ceasefire supposedly took place.
It is hard to focus
on studying when all this is happening. All you want to do is cherish the
people you love. You only care about what really matters, and all that really
matters are those you love. I know that we are here in Israel for a reason. I was expecting all of this. When I made the decision to come
here, it was when everyone was talking about Israel going to war with Iran. I
made a commitment in my heart that whatever happens to Israel, I want to be
there, supporting my people and helping in whatever way I can. And now I am
here, finding myself loving Israel more than ever. The people here are so
strong. They smile and press on. They love each other dearly and hope for the
best each day. They don't whine. They try to remain positive. They
refuse to give up. I love these people more than I can ever express and I pray
continually that HaShem protects them from their enemies.
I am exceedingly amazed
at how tolerant and patient Israel is toward those who are non-Jewish. There
are many Arabs here and Israel walks on eggshells to maintain peaceful
relations with everyone. I see tolerance all around me. Arabs walk up and down
the street freely. Many attend the universities. An Arab girl has a key to our
dorm room and mops our floors once a week. Israel bends over backwards to make
sure that Arabs are given equal opportunities everywhere. One of my roommates
is a Muslim from Jordan. She is very sweet. She attends Tel Aviv University and
skypes with her family in Jordan regularly. My point is that the Arabs are not
being pushed around here. They are treated just like everyone else. But the
reality of such hate by groups like Hamas is seemingly impossible for Israelis to
face. How do you deal with this kind of treatment? There is no explanation, no way to put into words what is happening. Hate
like this makes no sense. It is so beyond anything rational that one can hardly
have a conversation about it. How do you begin to talk in human terms about
something so evil and inhumane? Israel has the power to wipe out Hamas, but do
you know why they hesitate? Because they love their people. They
hesitate to do anything to cause one more Israeli death. They value each other;
they treasure their own people. They don't want to lose a single life and they
are doing all they can to preserve their own people. The Holocaust is still too
fresh in their minds. They shrink back from doing anything in which they might
find themselves guilty of having not preserved their community members' lives.
While this reveals their deeper values of loving their people and loving life,
it also inhibits them from defending themselves against their vile enemies. May
HaShem destroy Israel's enemies and may He be glorified here in Israel forever.
Please pray for the people of Israel--for their protection and for them to
trust in HaShem. I love you all, my dear family and friends.
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| nice place for keeping safe |
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