“Aren’t you afraid to live in Israel” is the most common question I get these days from my friends on Facebook who live in Chutz L’Aretz [outside of Israel].
They continue, “It’s so dangerous, the Arabs want to kill you. Aren’t you afraid to go outside? What about your grandchildren, aren’t you afraid for them? Why don’t you go back to Canada for awhile?”
My answer to each question is the same. “We are not afraid. Israel is our homeland. Twenty-one years ago, my husband, son and I came home from Canada [our daughter’s came a few years earlier to attend a one year seminary program, fell in love with the country and didn’t come back to Canada] and we will never allow anyone to chase us out of our homeland.
We have faith in G-d that He will protect us and we have faith in our army, the IDF, who serve our country with pride and honour.” Presently, we have a grandson serving in a tank unit. Two other grandsons have finished their services and are now reservists.
I pray that Hashem will watch over each and every chayal and chayalot [soldiers] and keep them safe.
My family and I have lived in the Negev, in the South for the past ten years. We live 9km [about 5 ½ miles] from Gaza. We have been the recipient of many Grad Missiles. Some exploding not far from our home.
We hear IAF jets and helicopters pretty regularly, the drone buzzes in our ear for hours. We hear the booms from Gaza and we hear our IDF responding when an arab tries to infiltrate the security fence and get into one of the border kibbutzim.
Truth be told, we love the South and wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.
We haven’t any special self defense training. We follow the instructions of our army and Pikud H’Oref [Israel Home front].
We don’t allow Hamas terror to keep us from doing what we need to do. We take taxis, buses and tremp [hitchhike].
We keep our eyes and ears open and on occasion have called the police when we saw a large package left unattended.
Fortunately, each package was not a bomb. The police told us they would rather be called for nothing, than allow a package to blow and cause possible injuries.
Many years ago, when we lived not far from Jerusalem, my then 17-year-old son was in a terror attack on the Ben Yehuda promenade in Jerusalem. He lost a friend that day and had glass slivers in his neck.
The next day, he told me that he wanted to go back to the terror site. He said that Jerusalem is our city and if I’m afraid to go to Jerusalem, the terrorist win. He was right, we let him go.
As I post this blog, Jerusalem has seen three serious Arab terror attacks in the past couple of hours.
Innocent Israelis, going about their business stabbed and or shot. Why you ask? Because they are Jews and Israelis. One 13 year old boy was riding his bike when the terrorist attacked him. He is now fighting for his life. Is this normal?
We have a democratically elected government and I pray that Hashem gives them the wisdom and strength to use a strong hand to end this terror, whatever that may entail and not worry about the outside world, what Obama will say, the UN [Useless Nations], or the EU.
We have every right to defend ourselves like every other country in the world would do. No government anywhere would allow their citizens to be under attack day and night.
That’s all for now. Feel free to comment and share.