Cassi Creek: All over
the state of Israel, men and women are at their marshal points, weapons ready,
listening for the order to push forward into contested territory. The statistics show the IDF as the dominant
force in the Middle East. Statistics fail
to realize that the cold calculations which govern the deployment of military
units along a battlefront are derived from the actions of men and women who
will go into battle not knowing whether or not they will return.
Israel is a
small nation and the cost of even a small war in terms of lives, is
brutal. Every Israeli will know someone
who falls in combat. There, war is
always personal and never to be taken lightly.
There is no “all volunteer” escape clause such as we know here in the
United States. When the sirens scream,
everyone hears. When the fallen are
buried, everyone chants the Mourners’ Khaddish.”
Israel has
been at war since the Labor Zionists and the other groups of Zionists began the
massive project of reclaiming land destroyed by neglect, geology, geography,
while simultaneously resurrecting a nation that was supposedly wiped from existence
by Rome. More recently, the UN partition
decision in 1947 was the trigger for the more modern chain of wars. Israel knows how to exist as a nation at
war. It has always been one. It is a nation created with PTSD. What it lacks now, and has lacked for at
least 64 years, is an opportunity to live at peace.
Along the
border with Gaza, up and down the length of Israel, its soldiers are prepared to
fight for its existence yet again. The
older reservists know what they will face, the younger troops have yet to
learn. Ballistic, un-aimed rockets are
launched from Gaza, intentionally targeting civilians. Hamas forces launch another barrage and then
take shelter in schools, hospitals, any place that will cause an international
outcry when Israel targets the rocket teams.
Eventually, someone on one side or the other is going to issue an order
that will trigger a higher level of violence.
Until then,
the waiting is the hardest part.
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