Gush Katif revenants thought they'd be back in a matter of days
Wednesday was five years since the expulsion of all Jewish residents of Gaza and of four towns in northern Samaria.I was not in Israel at the time. My mother was dying and I was in Boston with other things on my mind.
Still, in retrospect, I am incredulous that anyone could have been so naive as to believe what these women apparently believed. Maybe this explains why so many people left Gaza like sheep being herded out to pasture (I'm intentionally not using the other analogy with sheep - it's too inflammatory).
She spoke with The Jerusalem Post as she and her next-door neighbor Tamar Maman waited for the start of a small ceremony held on Thursday night in Ein Tzurim to mark five years almost to the day, according to the Hebrew date, since they were pulled from their homes in Netzer Hazani, in Gush Katif.How could these people have believed that the IDF sent 10,000 troops to get them to leave for a few days? Once they had been expelled, what ever made them think that Ariel Sharon would let them go back in a few days? Before another Israeli government tries this (God forbid) in Judea and Samaria, we need to get some of these people's feet back on the ground and awaken them to reality.
The Western date was August 18, 2005.
Already on the 17th, the IDF began forcibly removing families from 21 Gaza settlements.
The Gaza withdrawal was followed by the removal of four settlements in northern Samaria.
Reminders of Nezter Hazani were everywhere in Ein Tzurim on Thursday.
Behind Yisraeli and Mamon on the wall of the community center hung a large handmade quilt with squares depicting scenes from the Gaza community.
On top of it were the words, “In Netzer we fully believe in God.”
Maman said the anniversary had crept up on her.
“How has it been that long?” she asked. “It is a long time without a home.”
When the soldiers walked Maman out of her home, “I was naive,” she recalled.
She thought that within a few days, for sure a few months, either she would be allowed to return, or in the worst case, the government would provide her with a new one.
The night before they left, her children wrote messages on the walls, as many families did.
“I allowed it, thinking when we return, I will have to repaint anyway,” Maman said.
It was only eight months later, when it was time to get ready for Pessah 2006 and they were still crammed into hotel rooms, as were many of the evacuees who were waiting for modular homes, that the penny dropped that her future was elsewhere.
Yisraeli said she, too, had been certain when she left her Netzer Hazani home that she would return in a matter of days.
Even when the soldiers knocked on her door and sat in her house for hours trying to persuade her to leave, she didn’t believe that it was her last day in her home.
She only left after a rabbi and a social worker came and insisted that she had to go.
Now she shakes her head with regret.
“If I had to do it over again, I would insist that they drag me out by my hair,” she said.
Anyone who was there want to comment? I'm shocked.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:27 PM
4 Comments:
I don't think they ever expected a Jewish government to behave like Nazis towards the Jews.
No government in history uprooted its own people from their homes and deprived them of their livelihood for purely racist reasons. The Jews sadly are the first, in spite of what the Holocaust should have taught them.
I don't expect the Israeli government in our generation to fully make amends to them.
Has anything been learned from the uprooting of the Gush Katif to prevent a recurrence of it from happening again?
I don't think so.
Carl- LATMATV's Tribal Update this week presents a two-fer: a discussion about how "wrong" the media was about this week's expulsion of the revanants from Gaza that happened five years ago this week and about how a Tel Aviv Bohemian uses "art" to criticize the alleged evils of Israel's occupation.
Its here: LatmaTV Tribal Update: "Disengagement Denial
Watch it all
Carl,
Your criticism of the Gush Katif expelees pains me.
If one looks beyond their words and carefully considers the context of the situation they were in - one can discern the deeply rooted underlying devotion to our God and our Country that so many of them displayed by holding on and refusing to cooperate with the agents of destruction.
They were well aware of "reality" - but to them the loss of their possessions was so insignificant compared with the loss of their home, their livelihood, but most of all the realization that it was our own corrupt and evil government that was doing this to them.
I have only admiration and awe at their strength and fortitude. I wish that I could reach that level of commitment, and cognition of true reality that they had/have.
- David
David,
I'm sorry it pains you but it's reality. They bought into their own rhetoric about love winning out. It didn't and it was clear from the outset that it wouldn't. Once Sharon got away with ignoring the results of the Likud poll the die was cast.
To be clear - I am NOT criticizing them for not taking the compensation and leaving. That took fortitude and strength. But to actually believe that the government would bring them back in a few days.... Just plain naive.
If the government tries the same trick again, no one will go that quietly.
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