Why Iron Dome is not enough
I'd like you to meet Gitty. I found Gitty's picture on the Facebook page of Tzippy Diskind Yarom. Tzippy is a well-known Israeli journalist. Her father is my cousin, and I was a regular in her grandparents' house when I was in yeshiva here 35 years ago. So Gitty is a distant cousin of mine (her grandfather is my third cousin, but we're very close). With Tzippy's permission, I am going to share Gitty's story with you.
This is Gitty, my oldest niece. A very cute girl, and generally a happy girl, as you can see in the photo. (I partly hid her face because her mother doesn't want her photo to be on the net. There are bad people out there, you know). She is 8 years old, just like my youngest daughter. She is very smart, she helps her mother, she could watch the children while her mother is resting, she likes to feel "big". But every now and then I notice that although she looks very mature, she acts like a baby. Last week I asked my sister - her mother - why is she such a baby, in a bothering way.
She said: "Gitty is a baby and not a baby. Gitty is Ashdodian".
Yes, Gitty lives in Ashdod, a shouthern city in Israel, which ever since late PM Sharon evacuated Gush Katif and let the terrorist from Gaza strip get closer to there, is suffering from missiles every once in a while. The people of the very same strip of land which is under a palestinian govermemt since 1993 (Oslo agreements) and for the last 8 years is totally clear of jewish/israeli people - yet they still attack us "because of the occupation". Gitty had experienced A LOT of missile attacks on her city, and more than once the missiles hit very close areas to her home: on the same street, on the next block... She and her siblings could tell you by the power of the "boom" they hear how close was it.
And Gitty is traumatized. Constantly teriffied of the possibility that when she is outside, the sirens would go on and she would have no where to run and hide. And yes, even at home, if her father is asleep she is afraid to stay with him because what if there would be missiles and he sleeps!
Gitty is not a baby at all. She is a traumatized girl who understands very well the reality she lives in and suffers from it.Read the whole thing. Would you want to live like this?
Labels: Ashdod, Gaza, Hamas rockets, Iron Dome, Palestinian terrorism, Palestinian terrorists
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:35 PM
1 Comments:
This is absolutely spot-on. For all its technical excllence, as a long-term 'deterrence' mechanism the Iron Dome is a total catastrophe for Israel. Apart from the incredible expense - and the fact that the number of rockets that still get through ensure that daily life is no less disrupted - putting your faith in a system like this is an acceptance of permanent cowering of an entire state to a bunch of terrorists.
No other country in the world would accept, even in principle, the concept of the Iron Dome as a long term defence/deterrent, because no other country in the world would accept a situation where it is subjected to continuous unprovoked rocket attacks from a bullying neighbour.
Still the Iron Dome could now be the focus for a new type of demonstration - see:
http://edgar1981.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/iron-dome-new-idea-for-st-james-church.html
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