Rachel Ullman had the following to say to Mrs. Cohen:
I think that whenever there is an attack in Israel people should respond. I believe the response should be to do the exact opposite of what the terror attacks try to accomplish. Terrorists try to instill fear in peoples' lives, so by taking a bus (if there was a bus attack) we are showing that the terrosits' actions will not keep us from continuing our day to day activities. How can we restrict ourselves from doing things if those restrictions may increase? Say an attack happens in a cafe (chas v'shalom), so we decide to no longer go to cafes. Then the same thing happens on a bus, in a mall, etc. To what extent will we really restrict ourselves? Obviously this is much easier said than done, and my opinion may not be completely valid since I'm not living in Israel/going through these situations, but I do believe that we can't let these fears of 'what will happen next?' control our lives.
Also, I thought your last comment, "When I am in America and hear of attacks in Israel I always feel guilty that I'm living a comfortable life, while our brethren in Israel have to endure hardships. But this time, I’m here too, and I can share in their burden.", really spoke to me. After hearing about the last attack in Israel, I was talking to a friend and said that I wasn't sure why I always felt this way, but whenever an attack happens I have an even greater want to be in Israel(she looked at me like I was crazy). To me this seems totally counterintuitive, but it's really what I think. I know I can't do much to help the situation and even if I was in Israel I probably wouldn't be able to do much either, I would still feel guilty that I wasn't there. Just the fact that I would be one more person in Israel, showing that the terrorist attacks wouldn't keep us from living there, that would seem worth it. It's also possible that the reason I believe all of this is because I haven't experienced what it is like to live there. Although, I do think my beliefs would be pretty similar if I was there.
1 comment:
Rachel, I appreciate your response and I thought you made some important points. I agree with you that the response to terror should be the opposite of what that terror is trying to accomplish. If they are trying to scare me away from something, then (within reason) I will continue to do it, because I can’t let terror succeed. And, like you wrote, how much can one restrict oneself? If I stop taking buses, and I stop going to the mall, or other very public places, and I restrict myself with where I will travel in Israel, then I may as well not be here.
As an update to my post of two weeks ago, we have continued with life as usual. My older kids were taking buses the very next day and we made a decision that we can’t allow that attack to affect our routine. This Shabbos our Israeli relatives are having a large family get-together which will be held in southern Israel, in one of the yishuvim near the border of Aza and Egypt. We thought about whether we should stay home because of the rocket attacks in that general area, but decided that it is important to us that we go. We spoke with our kids about it and explained that there is a possibility of a rocket attack and that we might have to spend part of Shabbos in a bomb shelter, and to my surprise all our kids, even the younger ones, had no hesitation about going. To a certain extent the idea of it has become somewhat matter of fact for them – from the beginning of the school year they have had fire drills, just like in America. Except fire drills in Israel also include drills for what to do in case of earthquake, rocket or bomb attacks, and terrorists in the building – so they have all had practice with running to a bomb shelter in under 45 seconds, as well as other techniques.
I pray that things will be quiet, and neither they, nor anyone else will have to act on those drills in a real-life situation. But in the meantime, we are here, and we can’t be scared away.
Post a Comment