Self-Defense

This column was originally written for the Hatchet, but they decided not to print it because they do not want to publish opinions dealing with national/international events.

Fifteen seconds. That’s how long the residents of Sderot, Israel, have to find shelter between the time when a siren announces, “Code Red” and the time a rocket – or a rocket barrage – hits their city. For years, this has been happening daily in Sderot and other communities in Israel’s southern region, with only a few short lulls in between. Some days, the siren would sound only a couple times; others, eight to ten.

Imagine living like that for many years – in a democratic country. Imagine your country’s sovereignty and your security being regularly violated by terrorists. Imagine the effect on your physical, material and mental wellbeing if your city was constantly attacked with rocket barrages that were meant to terrorize, destroy and kill. What would you expect of your democratically-elected government?

No sane person enjoys war. During this latest conflict, I tried to keep in touch with my anxious family and friends in Israel. My cousins, who live in the coastal city of Ashdod, were directly affected by Hamas’ longer-range rockets. Ironically, the Palestinian terrorist group had stockpiled these rockets during the six-month ceasefire that had existed between it and Israel, a ceasefire which nevertheless saw occasional rocket salvos by Hamas and its allies.

Over the past couple weeks, my cousins in Ashdod experienced a taste of what Sderot residents had been going through for years. About two times every day, residents of the city would hear sirens and would have to run for shelter. Since Ashdod is farther than Sderot from the border with Gaza, residents had more time to hide before the rockets hit: 45 seconds. The tension was high, and the streets were almost completely empty of pedestrians. My relatives told me the story of one woman who, unable to find a bomb shelter in time, hid at a bus stop. Seconds later, a missile slammed into the platform, killing her.

I also spoke with my other cousins who live outside of Tel Aviv, the largest metropolitan area in Israel, which is 20 miles north of Ashdod and out of range of the Hamas rocket danger zone. At the time of writing, the danger zone posed a threat to around 1 million Israelis. These cousins, like many Israelis, were constantly glued to the news. Life can be tense when you live in a country that experiences war all too often.

These people – my relatives and other ordinary Israelis – did not enjoy war. They sat and watched worriedly for developments, or ran into bomb shelters after hearing a siren. But one thing could confidently be said: most of them supported their government’s decision to try to put an end to the terror which Israel’s southern residents had been forced to live with for years.

Citizens of any democratic country could not be expected to quietly continue living under the conditions that Israel’s southern communities had experienced for so long. Yet the UN was silent on Israeli suffering and diplomacy with Hamas was impossible. Something had to be done. And Hamas, after ending the ceasefire, provoked Israel’s government to act responsibly and accountably towards its citizens, and do what any other democratic country in a similar situation would do: defend itself.