A Parent’s Pride and Fear: My Three IDF Reservists
Soldiers wait to be called, and their parents die a little bit inside during this wait.
Our three sons are infantrymen, reserve soldiers who expect to be called to active duty to finish the business of putting the Palestinian terrorists out of business. They are ready, literally, to answer the call. They left their cell phones within easy reach on the Sabbath so their unit commanders would have no trouble reaching them
Sara and I are proud parents who did our national service a while back, but we both know a few things about speaking to and/or fighting with Arabs. We know defeating Hamas and jihad is not something you can accomplish from the air. But going in on the ground means exposing your soldiers — especially your infantry — to risk.
Daniel, 28, who just got engaged this month, also trained as a medic. He has been looking at places for a wedding in May. Yoni, 26, the jazz pianist in the family, is from the “engineer” branch where they have taught his dexterous fingers to prepare and to dismantle devices more destructive than a piano. Lately, he has been attached to some hush-hush infantry unit whose name he will not tell us.
Elad, our 23-year-old, is from the elite sayeret (patrol) units of the Golani brigade, where the boys love to snack on barbed wire and go on 70-mile hikes with a full pack. Elad’s idea of a good time is doing push-ups and pull-ups — a regimen that he inflicted on his campers last summer in Camp Ramah, where he was the sports counselor.
None of the boys has a military career or thought of one, and none of them is especially bellicose or spends spare time tracking and hunting animals, but they have each been trained to fight to protect their country from external invasion and from the more insidious threat of terror.
Sara and I know what wars are like. Sara’s brother Yossi nearly burned to death when his vehicle was hit by a Syrian anti-tank missile in the 1973 war. He was knocked out, ammunition inside his armored personnel carrier (APC) exploding around him. Fortunately, Yossi regained consciousness and pulled himself out.
It took him months to recover from burns over his whole body, and he still carries some shrapnel in his chest. Well past his 50th birthday, he was a reserve infantry colonel doing almost 60 days a year of active reserve duty.
I was a war correspondent for Israeli Army Radio — Galei Tzahal — in Lebanon during the 1982 war, and this gave me a chance to go all over Lebanon using my Arabic, French, and English to get some interviews off the beaten path.
Israel overturned the PLO terror state in Beirut and southern Lebanon, which was similar in many ways to the terror state run by Hamas in today’s Gaza Strip. One almost never got real news out of Lebanon in 1980-82 that the PLO did not like, and one almost never sees a report from Gaza today that Hamas does not like.
The PLO and the Syrians browbeat the Western press corps in Beirut. People like Tom Friedman and John Kifner of the New York Times and Robert Fisk, then of the London Times, and reporters from the Associated Press and Reuters did not probe too hard into PLO or Syrian actions nor report how some reporters were harassed or even killed.
Kifner was among a group of reporters kidnapped by a Palestinian group, but he did not report it until an Israeli official embarrassed him by going public with the story.
Like Kifner, Friedman also pretended the PLO was a benevolent presence.
Friedman and Fisk willingly believed much of obviously false Palestinian claims about Israeli participation at the Sabra-Shatila massacre, with Fisk also describing Israelis as behaving like Nazis. Somehow, neither man showed much enterprise reporting on Syrian massacres of Syrians in 1980 and 1982. I wonder why. (Today, Friedman likes to claim that he invented the term “Hama Rules” for Syria’s Hama massacre, but that really only took place when Friedman wrote his book about Lebanon when he was safely outside Lebanon.)
These same “intrepid” reporters lovingly passed on every bit of PLO propaganda, including the farcical nonsense that Israeli bombings had caused 600,000 homeless in southern Lebanon, when the entire population of southern Lebanon did not even reach that number. (A fuller description of how the press interacts with terrorists appears in my book on terror.)
After the 1982 war, we discovered how the PLO kept the population of southern Lebanon under its thumb, and I suspect that if Hamas gets sharply curtailed, we may suddenly discover that whole apartment complexes in Gaza City have been built atop concrete bunkers housing Grad missiles and Fajr-5 rockets.
Indeed, wars are won by the infantry, not from the air. G-d bless you and your sons. May HaShem protect them.
The question is rather philosophical : Israel has to do again what he ounce did with PLO in Lebanon.Why again ? Why Sharon did this unbelievable stupid unilateral withdrawal from Gush Katif and the philadelphy corridor ? Why do Israel only reacts to the arab-islamic agenda ? Why our strategic thinking is almost crippled by waiting for the “peace-in our lifetime ” ( Chamberlain’s dixit 1938) which is the narrative of 4/5th of Israelis medias +politicians while at the same time the iranian nuclear program is running at full speed. Israel s running after a mirage , while waiting for a crude reality awakening with iran going nuclear power .Since 1993 Israel has stalled , it’s pretty obvious but a country stalled is doomed to breakup , or slow grinding.
Raphael, ALL good questions…and as to the expulsion/destruction of Gush Katif – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/06/22/the-bitter-fruits-of-disengagement/
Truth be told, our leaders will be the death of us, and this is why we are where we are.
Islamic barbarians LIVE to kill Jews, but our leaders are mandated to protect us – at all costs! However, they are incapable of standing strong, in front of international pressure, a pressure which will NEVER support Israel’s attainment of victory.
And it is this lack of statesmanship which must be placed at their doorsteps. The onus is on them!
Hi Adina,though I praised your opinion, I would like to read the answer of the author.The continuous wearing of Israel’s will has turned into nihilist inertia.
Sharon did exactly what Beilin-Sarid were asking, but could not deliver being too leftists.That was the turning point , Hamas was elected and crushed in blood the PLO .Now we are UNABLE to wipe out Hamas, we are already looking for a truce, instead of looking for a regime change.We are UNABLE to retake the Philadephia corridor to stop the arms smuggling.Such a continued weakness is very damaging, especially in our relation with the USA, since who needs a weak ally , unable to call the shots ?
We have sufficient artillery and air power to do the job.
Why endanger our children and grandchildren when it is we who are under attack?
Menachem,
Yes, if I had my druthers the strip would be strafed…but the poohbahs in charge hew to Washington.
This is exactly why we are where we are; they are too terrified to do what must be done!
Because it is gravely immoral to kill innocent civilians, even if the enemy does.
It isn’t because of international opinion. First we’ll only survive here if we’re united, and being brutal similar to our enemies would divide the nation. Also we have a strong great army because Israeli parents allow their kids to be drafted. Believe me that wouldn’t be the case if they thought for a second that their children would be ordered to aim at civilians.
Michael, this blogger shares your heart stopping angst,pride too, as she too has two IDF reservists! But we/they have no choice, but to soldier on.
This tells my story – http://adinakutnicki.com/about/, and it explains why giving up is NEVER an option.And why I do what I do.
And to those who pooh pooh our angst, come and live a day in our shoes, as missiles fly over your head, and as your children go out to battle these barbaric monsters!
I’m currently reading Michael’s book, Battle for Our Minds: Western Elites and the Terror Threat. I can’t recommend it highly enough. What passes for “reporting” of the current Gaza conflict is but the latest example of what he documents in overwhelming, scrupulously sourced, detail not only of the mainstream news media’s failure to inform its readers/viewers of what’s truly happening in the Middle East but of its intentional and/or negligent misinformation/disinformation.
If George Orwell were alive today I imagine he would simply shake his head thinking to himself, plus ca change, plus la meme chose, the more things change the more they stay the same.
When will people who espouse Western values finally learn the painful lessons of the past century and realize that “united we stand, divided we fall”? When will those who purport to be “journalists” as opposed to what they really are, propagandists and cowards, grasp that feeding the crocodile so it eats them last is a myopic, dead-end strategy?
I fear that most people in the West will wake up and realize that this isn’t simply a war between Israel and Hamas or Israel and the Arab/Muslim world but between civilization and barbarism only after 9/11 is dwarfed by a far greater and far more deadly terrorist outrage or outrages, by which time it may be too late to successfully defeat the forces of darkness.
Israel truly is the canary in Western civilization’s mineshaft. If the U.S. and other supposed allies are unable or unwilling to stand beside her in this great struggle then they must at least stand aside and allow Israel to fight this latest battle unencumbered, a battle that anyone who lives in the real world and can see past their nose knows will surely and sadly be but one of many battles to come in the long war.
Just ordered your book.
Thank you for a good, intimate discussion of the problems Israel faces now.
“Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.” Golda Meir
Thank you, Michael, for writing so beautifully that, above all, we worry for our children.
Boachem B’Shalom
Greetings:
Back during my military daze, my favorite Platoon Sergeant told me about a statue of an infantryman with his rucksack and bayoneted rifle that was located at the Infantry Training Center at Fort Dix, New Jersey. The name of the statue he said was “The Ultimate Weapon”.
Sad but true.
Your story tugged at my heart. I pray you and your sons will be safe
AN YISROEL CHAI
As one of those “children” that went to war, I know the strain it put on my parents. I spent my week of R&R in Hawaii where I met my mother as it was the only way I could convince her I was alive and it wasn’t someone else writing her all those letters I had sent. I had her pretty well convinced I was in a safe place and we were walking along the beach when I was suddenly down and digging into the sand. Taking R&R in the first part of July wasn’t such a good idea after all.( danged fireworks!) Even after returning home it was a long time before I quit grabbing for my imaginary rifle whenever a car backfired. The look on my mother’s face when she saw me do that spoke volumes.
Dear Sara and Michael,
Every moment, while watching Israel on the news in California, I think of you… Involuntarily, a small unconcious prayer comes into my heart…asking the Almighty for an end to this madness, so your family and all other families in Israel remain safe from harm…R
I just returned from packing care packages to send to our soldiers. Many are near the border, sleeping in tents or tanks – ready to go into Gaza if necessary.
The desert nights are cold.
With Michael, I salute the people of Sderot and the other areas in the South
for their fortitude, I salute Sara and Michael and pray for their sons and all
our soldiers.
If anyone wishes to help – A Package From Home is a relible organization founded
by an American Ola (immigrant) which sends care packages of warm clothing, toiletries, cookies and letter from Israeli children. If you like to knit, they
also have a project knitting wool caps for the soldiers. Here is the link to
their web site for more info
http://www.apackagefromhome.org/
“you cannot defeat terror only by air strikes.” I dunno, seemed to bring a rather abrupt conclusion to that spot of bother we had with the Japanese.