After the terrible tragedy in Kfar Qana - again - (the last time was in 1996, when 102 civilians were killed during Israel's "Grapes of Wrath" operation), what can I write? Except to say:
Enough - on both sides!
And since I have a report from "Marsh" in Kiryat Shmona, I'll post it because this is what the army is fighting to prevent.
Except, as somebody once famously said, "fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity".
Excuse my French, but I trust the sentiment is clear.
This evening, as usual, the army gave its press briefing.
Of the three Israeli stations, only one showed it in full.
It did not go out live on the foreign stations, not even interpreted on CNN.
This war is not about press briefings and press conferences.
It is about pictures. Sounds. And images.
And hatred.
An acquaintance was visiting us with her dog this evening.
Here is a selection of some of the statements she made:
"I don't trust the Arabs."
"I've heard they tie bombs to their babies, to make them look like that, so that when the cameras came along, they got all these horrible shots."
"The Israelis told them to leave, and they didn't. In any case, if they didn't, they were families of the Hizbollah and they deserved what they got - women and children."
"What do you expect of the Arabs?"
My husband David told her that he didn't want to and didn't need to hear the hate, and to stop talking all this hate - that this was his house, and he didn't want to hear it.
He had told her before, and she wasn't listening.
"I'm tired of hearing about all this hate."
She took her dog and left.
A posting from Marsh in Kiryat Shmona
July 29, 2006
Dear Friends,
I've told you all about the loud artillery, and the shattering noise of the incoming Katyushot. Sometimes, especially late at night when it's quiet, you not only hear the artillery being fired off, but a very distant thud denoting its landing in Lebanon.
If it's quiet enough, you can even hear the Katyushot being fired from Lebanon. That's what happened this morning.
Around 6:30 a.m., they announced that we should go into the shelters - Kiryat Shmona's equivalent of sirens. Consequently, whoever might have been out and about wasn't, and it was very, very quiet. A little after 7:00 a.m., I heard the distant blast of the rockets being fired. As I came into my room and looked out the window, the first shell landed a couple of blocks away. The second landed on the building opposite mine, a mall (that can now be said openly - I refrained from doing so until the media covered it). I saw the shell hit in an explosive burst of light, making a small hole in the roof, and shattering the plastic panels that serve as its sun roof. The noise itself was devastating. I immediately called the municipality's "war room" to report on it: with no damage from the outside, no one on the street would know that the building had been hit. It took them a while to absorb what I was telling them; a few minutes later, I saw the police and fire departments arrive.
By my calculations, it fell into the open mall part, and not into any of the stores; from what I saw on the news, my assessment was correct, although the damage to at least one store on the upper floor is considerable. No one was in the building or the vicinity: it was 7:12 in the morning, before the mall opens, and people had heeded the warnings.
What with one thing and another, I only walked into the kitchen about an hour later. I immediately noticed that the small pantry off the kitchen had sunlight streaming in. The pantry has louvered plastic shutters, which I keep closed because this is the pigeon headquarters for town, and I don't want to find myself eating feather garnish on my meals. The shock wave from the blast, 11 stories below, across a parking lot and a 2-way street, had knocked out all of the slats of plastic on one panel, and about half of those on the adjacent panel. Then I noticed that 2 of the 10 glass slats in the small louvered kitchen window had also been knocked out. One slat, in fact, is still balanced on the outside of the window. The kitchen and adjoining pantry are in a deep niche of the building, and I assume the shock waves echoed inside the niche, thereby magnifying the effect.
There was no other damage, nor any plastic or glass inside the apartment. I suppose that all of the apartments on my line had similar damage; I know my downstairs neighbor did. I covered the gap with plastic, so the pigeons don't decide to make my apartment their headquarters, and went to the neighborhood center where I've been volunteering (more below).
Much later in the day, I managed to call the "property tax" office, to report on the damage. I almost felt guilty in doing so; so much more serious damage has been done, including a house in Kiryat Shmona sustaining a direct hit today and suffering extensive damage. However, if the property tax people aren't called immediately, no compensation can be made, and with more than just a few slats out, compensation will be necessary to replace them. The person answering my call sounded exhausted and harried. The property tax people send an assessor out as soon as they can, and he said they'd try to get someone out today or tomorrow, but he couldn't promise that. I assured him that there was no hurry, it wasn't a major problem - I just needed to replace the slats before the winter started, and I thanked him for their hard work. The property tax people are pretty universally vilified for their supposedly low assessments on damage, and sometimes for their insensitivity, but in the past two weeks, they've been doing yeomen's work. At any rate, I'll be able to report to you on the process from a very personal point of view.
The Neighborhood Center
You may recall that the high school in which the neighborhood center operates was also hit, late in the day on Thursday. Because part of the building didn't have electricity, the maintenance man was concerned that there might be live, dangerous wires somewhere, and so he shut off the electricity in the entire building. On Friday, the wing in which the center operates was turned back on. We still didn't have phones in the offices, so none of the neighborhood people could call us. Although Bezeq [the phone company] sent a repairman, he couldn't find the phone box, or where the cable had been cut by the Katyusha. Friday was only a half day, and so none of this was critical.
Today, with everything gearing up again, we needed electricity in the rest of the building, especially since the shelter in the adjoining wing serves as the bedroom for the many young volunteers who keep the children in the shelters busy. They'd left on Thursday, but by this afternoon, there were already 50 of them. When I left the center at around 3:30, the electricians were still to get there, the Bezeq man, aided by the maintenance man, had finally located the phone box and promised that at least some of the phones would be working tomorrow.
We delivered all the meals to the incapacitated who can't get out. Many people on the social services list who usually come to pick up their meals didn't come today; evidently, they've left town. Since the phones weren't working, we were unable to call them and find out if they're here or not. Judging from my neighbor, who stayed until today but who was packing when I got home, and others I saw hurrying to the bus station, a lot more families seem to be leaving today.
There's still another reason for people to leave: several of our young family men have received call-up notices. One of the two assistant principals at the school, who had worked in the neighborhood center last week, called today: he's already been called up. Amir, the principal, also received a call-up notice, although the mayor is trying to get it cancelled. It really is important for key people like Amir to stay here. BTW, Amir served in a fighting unit, by choice.
Right now, after several more barrages and an afternoon of outgoing artillery, it's beautifully peaceful here during a lull, as the sun sets. Would that it could stay this way, for everyone.
Marsh
