My almost three year old is due to being preschool in the upcoming month. She'll go from her English speaking home entertainment (me) to a class of thirty excited little Hebrew speaking girls.
She's already practicing her vocabulary. Zeh Sheli and Diiiiie (said whiningly) are already mainstays. A salad of Hebrew words peppers her conversations, and she delineates who is speaking which language with every interaction she crosses.
She also practices how to dash to the bomb shelter. How to go back to sleep after being woken up at 2am, and to recognize the bomb siren and compare it to an ambulance or fire or police siren. She looks for my neighbor, who holds her hand as we run down the stairs, and she reminds me before her bedtime that she's allowed out of bed right away if she hears the siren. She knows to run.
Because my country protects its children.
We have a place to hide and a warning sign. An Iron Dome. Our military aid comes after our social welfare in the priorities list--except, like now, when they're one and the same.
Israel is not occupying Gaza. We disengaged.
Israel is not killing Gazan children--Hamas is.
Anti-Zionism is a thinly veiled excuse for Anti-semitism--if it were only anti-Israel, there wouldn't be violence in France, English, New York and Miami.
If people cared about the lives of children, they would also have cared about the thousands of CIVILIAN victims in Iran, Lybia, Syria, Egypt, Sudan, Nigeria and Pakistan this year.
So I'm glad to be here. When theres a run on 220v appliances because other Jews feel safer with falling rockets than acts of hatred, I'll have my washing machine running.
And I'll thank G-d I have somewhere to run to.
And you, dear friend who told me you support Israel, but think the treatment of Palestinians is abhorrent--I'll think of you like the neighbors from Poland who stood by and watched. You're just as bad.
She's already practicing her vocabulary. Zeh Sheli and Diiiiie (said whiningly) are already mainstays. A salad of Hebrew words peppers her conversations, and she delineates who is speaking which language with every interaction she crosses.
She also practices how to dash to the bomb shelter. How to go back to sleep after being woken up at 2am, and to recognize the bomb siren and compare it to an ambulance or fire or police siren. She looks for my neighbor, who holds her hand as we run down the stairs, and she reminds me before her bedtime that she's allowed out of bed right away if she hears the siren. She knows to run.
Because my country protects its children.
We have a place to hide and a warning sign. An Iron Dome. Our military aid comes after our social welfare in the priorities list--except, like now, when they're one and the same.
Israel is not occupying Gaza. We disengaged.
Israel is not killing Gazan children--Hamas is.
Anti-Zionism is a thinly veiled excuse for Anti-semitism--if it were only anti-Israel, there wouldn't be violence in France, English, New York and Miami.
If people cared about the lives of children, they would also have cared about the thousands of CIVILIAN victims in Iran, Lybia, Syria, Egypt, Sudan, Nigeria and Pakistan this year.
So I'm glad to be here. When theres a run on 220v appliances because other Jews feel safer with falling rockets than acts of hatred, I'll have my washing machine running.
And I'll thank G-d I have somewhere to run to.
And you, dear friend who told me you support Israel, but think the treatment of Palestinians is abhorrent--I'll think of you like the neighbors from Poland who stood by and watched. You're just as bad.