Ariel Cohen
I arrived in Israel with plans to spend the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, with my daughter and son-in-law. Instead, we spent two nights in a bomb shelter. The first missile salvo was launched by Hezbollah from Lebanon. Then came nearly 200 ballistic missiles launched by Iran and aimed at Israel’s major cities and towns. On Monday, I had to shelter at the Ben Gurion airport as a Houthi missile hurtled toward Tel-Aviv. It was shot down. If not for the Arrow and Iron Dome defense systems and support from the U.S. Navy, thousands of Israelis would have been killed and wounded.
Israel is a vibrant country, but the entirety of Israeli society is deeply traumatized. Last October 7, fifty years after Egypt and Syria unleashed the Yom Kippur War, the Islamist Hamas organization, recognized as a terrorist by the U.S. and the EU, attacked Israel on yet another religious holiday. Instead of spending that day dancing and giving thanks for the gift of the Torah that is the central staff of Jewish life, Israelis woke up to the news of an orgiastic, bloody massacre.
In small agricultural communities near the Gaza border and at the nearby rave Nova music festival, Hamas and its Gazan supporters tortured, raped, and murdered some 1,200 men, women, and children. Over 240 hostages were dragged into the massive tunnel network built with stolen aid money under the Gaza Strip. A year later, roughly 100 of those hostages are still in Hamas’ hands, with several of them likely murdered by their captors.
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