Well, unfortunately it has been a busy day here in Israel. Not the kind of busy that keeps me entertained here in Ofakim, but the kind of busy that keeps one checking the news and glued to ones phone.
My parents were here last week and while I would really like to put up a blog post about their trip, there are more pressing matters at hand.
You can read about what is going on here on a bunch of different websites, including: www.jpost.com, http://www.ynet.co.il/english/home/0,7340,L-3083,00.html or http://www.haaretz.com/ to get the stories and draw your own conclusions. Here is my summary of what has been happening:
It all started a long time ago, but this round of shit started really going crazy on Saturday. Throughout the morning on Saturday, 50 mortars were fired into Israel. Sunday, my parents and I were in Ashkelon and we heard a siren go off. We calmly moved towards the back of the restaurant that we were eating in and I tried to convince my parents that it was "just the weather". Well, it wasn't and we soon found out that a rocket had falled about 2 km from us. Luckily, no one was injured. As a general policy, Israel retaliates when its civilians are attacked. Other rockets and mortars were fired at Israel and on Tuesday, Israel retaliated. The IDF targeted one of the spots that the mortars were fired from which was in an olive or orange tree grove (I have read both things). A few dozen meters from the grove there are civilian homes and unfortunately, one of the mortars missed its target and exploded near one of the homes, killing 4 civilians. 3 were under 18 and one was a middle-aged man, apparently a family member of one of the children (again, I have heard conflicting reports, some saying it was an uncle, some a grandfather).
Over the course of last night and this morning, several longer range rockets were fired into Israel. Sometime last night, one was fired at Ashdod, which is a little bit north of Ashkelon. It hit southern Ashdod and again, thankfully there were no injuries reported. 2 were fired at Be'er Sheva, which is a few km west of where I live and one man was lightly injured by shrapnel.
On my way to school today, I called someone from my program who ensured me that they are on top of it and will keep us safe. Still, for the first time, I found myself looking for places to run if I heard the red alert alarm. I have never thought like that before, constantly looking for "where can I go to be safe" as I am walking to school. When I arrived at school, it was a few minutes after the 2nd rocket had falled in Be'er Sheva. My students and the staff that I encountered were visibly freaked out. A few of the students were teary, asking to call their parents who work in nearby Be'er Sheva to make sure that they were okay. Everyone was worried and concerned about family that they have in the area.
After several phone calls on behalf of the students in the class, the teacher I work with quieted the kids down. She assured the students that everything was okay. We know what to do if we hear the siren, she assured them. She told them that she was nervous too but there are procedures in place. The classroom that we are in is not the best room to be in, but its all the school has. The students are supposed to gather near the inner wall and stay as closely packed together against the wall as they can.
A few minutes later, the principal of the school came in. She asked the students to remain calm. "It won't help anyone if we all go into panic." She told them. They are the oldest students in the school and the younger students, including many of their brothers and sisters would need to see that they were calm. Some of the students wanted to go home, "but its safer there, we have a shelter room" some said. They were asked to remain calm again and were assured that they were in safe hands. I am sure that the school just did not want any of the students panicking and trying to walk home, as most of them do, which would be infinitely more dangerous.
"What can we do for them that is fun?" Cami asked me. I was freaked out as well and didn't know how to help the situation. I even asked Cami to explain the emergency procedures to me in English so that I was sure that I understood what would happen if we did in fact hear an alarm. We managed to distract the students for the rest of class by doing some work in their book while listening to music. Usually the students are not allowed to listen to music while they work, but it seemed to really calm them down. Every now and again Cami got a text or a call on her phone. At one point, she wrote in a notebook to me, in English (I guess she was worried that the students might even pick up a word or two of what she said in English) "Reut and her school heard the siren and have been moved inside a shelter." She was visibly freaked out but kept on teaching, trying to keep the students calm. When class was over and we had a break, I admitted to her that I was quite freaked out.
In the United States, I didn't have any experiences that come close to this. I remember the way that I felt on 9.11 and that was not nearly as close to my home as any of this. I remember the panic and fear that I felt when I thought that my Dad was on one of the planes that slammed into the twin towers and how that continued for a while as I tried desperately to get ahold of my Mom or any other family member who might actually know more details than I did about my Dads flight. All I knew was that that very morning, my Dad had gotten on a plane from DC towards California around the same time as the planes that struck the twin towers had taken off, also from DC towards California. I remember fearing for my family members that were in New York, unable to reach them either, hoping that they were also okay. Students in my class were in panic as we watched the news, waiting to hear more details. Many of my classmates had parents that worked in or near the Pentagon, which was also struck and was close to my house. At the time, we were not permitted to have cell phones with us at school, but the school said that anyone who had them could turn them on and try to contact loved ones. The policy changed in wake of the attacks and since that time, students are allowed to have cell phones with them in school.
That night we went out to dinner at a local deli. I went with my Mom, my best friend, Emily and her mom who is also one of my Mom's best friends. We found out that President Bush was coming to coming to address the nations from my highschool the next day. I begged my Mom not to make me go, fearing that this could be the site of another attack. A school full of students and the President? Not a chance I would go. My Mom allowed me to stay home from school the next day as we watched the tragedy unfold.
Today I remember that feeling of uncertainty all too well. To think of how far away the attack was from us and how much it scared us and to compare it to the situation here is pointless. They are such different situations and on such different scales.
To think that yesterday I was at the very spot where just 24 hours later a terror attack occurred is really something scary. Dozens are injured and I am sure even more are suffering from some kind of mental trauma. Hell, I am miles away and I think I am suffering some kind of mental trauma. However, this is life here. What are we told to do? Keep on going. Don't let anyone see the damage that they inflict on the people here when these kinds of terror attacks occur.
Behaving in this way - returning to daily life ASAP - is a double edged sword. On the one hand, Israelis do not want to be seen as being visually shaken by these types of things. If the terrorists know the kind of impact that they cause, its fuel to do more and more (as if there isn't enough fuel on that fire already?). However, the international community fails to see the impact that the political situation has on the people here. So, we pick up and the scars, the visual reminders of what happened here, are quickly covered. But as anyone who has suffered some kind of trauma knows, even if you heal on the outside, it doesn't mean the injuries are completely healed. The outside world barely notices when these things occur in Israel. For some reason or another, they justify it as something that either doesn't affect Israel or as something that Israel deserves due to the political situation. I can tell you this: The people and the children here do not deserve to grow up knowing this kind of fear on an almost daily basis.
How can we expect the children of Israel to grow up and try to find some kind of peaceful resolution when their childhood memories are filled with trips to bomb-shelters and panicked phone calls to family members? When instead of earthquake drills and tornado drills and fire alarms they have "red-alert" practice drills? And even worse, when there is just no warning and a bus explodes in front of them or around the block from them and glass and shrapnel fly through the air indiscriminately mauling everything in its path. And people die. All the time. Do we say, oh, they get used to it? Because honestly, to a certain extent they do. How is that normal? The fact that someone says to me "Its not new to them, but it still is difficult for them to understand"... of course its difficult for them to understand. But how crazy is it to realize that this is not new to them? How would any of us feel sending our brothers, sisters, children, off somewhere knowing that someone else will be responsible for making sure they make it to a bomb shelter in case that alarm goes off. Gives me the chills thinking about it.
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