It's not over yet...

The title sounds more dramatic than what I have to say, but it's the closest I can come to finding something suitable without spending hours trying to find something snappier or more apt - I do enough of that during work hours!



On several occasions, I have been intending to write about something and then before I actually get to the keyboard, I get a message along the same lines from someone else. That's what happened this evening. I got two e-mails from a friend which covered the subjects I wanted to talk about. One was a very moving e-mail written by a mother entitled "My son came home". Doesn't that just say it all? The prayer of every parent that sends a son (or daughter) to the army... Somehow, automatically, it set me thinking of those who didn't come home, not only in this war, but in previous wars too. Wars don't just end, and we don't just go back to normal when the agreements are reached. Especially in Israel, where there are very few families whose lives have not been affected by the various military campaigns. There are many families whose lives will never be the same, and as the politicians try to work out how long the cease-fire will last, it must make them wonder what it was all for. Did we go to war just to 'gain' a cease-fire? Hopefully, a lot of what we're hearing from the other side is just rhetoric.



However, what I wanted to talk about was in fact those who "came home". As the boys go back to their homes and slowly begin to work through what they have just experienced, it is becoming quite obvious that they have all been in situations when they wondered if they'd come out of them alive. They've seen things that you and I (thankfully) have only seen in films or read about in books or newspapers. As I said in an earlier post, remember - two years ago these boys were finishing high school. We are often portrayed as a belligerent and militaristic country. I have not spoken to, or heard of, one soldier who went into Gaza looking for a fight. On the contrary, none of them wanted to go there and they were all glad to get out. It was just something they had to do. Israel is not belligerent by nature - the 'belligerence' that others see is just one of man's basic needs (and rights) - to defend himself in order to survive. One of our leading politicans recently said something along the lines of 'When the other side lays down its weapons, there will be no violence; when we lay down our weapons, there will be no Israel'. Somehow that seems to get lost in the reporting...



In my friend's other e-mail, which was a general update of the situation, she did the count that every parent in Israel does. Her oldest son has eight years to go before he will be called up. My son has less than two years. I'm sure I speak for her too when I say that I would much rather be counting the number of years before they go to university and not to the army. However, why am not so optimistic?