He Ru Follow us: Make a7 your Homepage
      Free Daily Israel Report
      YouReport, Send us News & updates

      Arutz 7 Most Read Stories

      Check it Out

      Blogs


      Internet Videos of Gush Katif Expulsion Abound

      A number of movies, home-video and photo-montages are available on the internet, documenting the expulsion and mourning the destruction of Gush Katif. The following is a sampling of those clips.
      By Ezra HaLevi
      First Publish: 9/23/2005, 4:39 AM / Last Update: 9/21/2005, 6:49 PM


      An emotional video that has been making the rounds via email is a photo-montage of Gush Katif set to a classic Israeli song mourning the withdrawal from Yamit, remade and updated by hip-hop group Kele 6. Click here to view the video, the words of which are translated below:

      Zeh Haya Beiti

      This was my home
      With a garden and a chicken coop, it was my home
      It was yours, it was mine, it was ours
      With daybreak foreigners will live here
      An we, with all our memories, will disappear

      We battled so much
      That we forgot for what
      For me it’s a war
      For them its for profit
      For me it’s home
      For them it’s another line on a map
      Long ago this transformed into much more than just land
      Perhaps I don’t agree, but understand without a problem
      We made the desert bloom and this is what you give in return
      The memories didn’t die, they just moved apartments
      Yamit was resurrected

      My imagination plays flashbacks of my memories
      From the day I wrote my first verse
      Running against the clock
      Separating between dream and reality
      In my photo album, beautiful years
      Memories of a childhood, 100 percent
      Nothing will stop the time
      The clock ticks, the hands moving forward
      And I am growing distant, “There’s no place like home”
      It’s not just another line from the heroine in The Wizard of Oz

      This was my home
      With a garden and a chicken coop, it was my home
      It was yours, it was mine, it was ours
      With daybreak foreigners will live here
      And we, with all our memories, will disappear

      And now it is theirs
      We will no longer create memories there
      I remember the first night, the first kiss
      A separation without return
      Where I sweat from the heat
      Quarrels and reconciliation, everything happened just like that
      When we betrothed and I lifted you through our doorway
      Doubled over on the ground, taking a handful of earth
      This is my home, my childhood, my soul
      In the morning I rose and breathed in the air and the ash
      Between us until today, the house was part of the relationship
      Don’t believe that it’s finished now that all is taken
      Hand in hand we’ll always be and disappear like the wind

      This was my home
      With a garden and a chicken coop, it was my home
      It was yours, it was mine, it was ours
      With daybreak foreigners will live here
      And we, with all our memories, will disappear

      Lit candles will no longer be seen
      In the windows since we left
      Lit candles will no longer be seen
      In the windows since we left

      When you left, they went with you
      All the friends, with them we always laughed

      This was my home
      With a garden and a chicken coop, it was my home
      It was yours, it was mine, it was ours
      With daybreak foreigners will live here
      And we, with all our memories, will disappear

      This video clip (Click here to view-must wait for video to load and then push 'play') was produced by Shmuel Benamu and consists of photos of Gush Katif sites before and after they were destroyed, put to music.

      A 5-minute video clip (click here to view) was produced by Avi Abelow (friendsofnetzer@gmail.com). It provides a visual documentation of the explusion of the Jews of Netzer Chazani. The video covers the expulsion of the well-known Tucker family, including agricultural entrepreneur Anita Tucker, her children, and grandchildren.

      This clip (click here to view) is a Hebrew-language television program that was aired by Channel 10. It is an overview of the destroyed communities and documents their destruction. It features interviews with residents as they watch their homes being crushed under bulldozers. Another interesting aspect of the programs is its focus on the anti-expulsion leadership’s cooperation with the police and security forces to thwart active opposition to the withdrawal. Yesha Council members are seen arranging with police the time and manner in which the synagogue would be broken into and members of the Gush Katif municipality are seen strategizing with police on how to clear the masses of teenagers blocking N’vei Dekalim’s gate.

      The video also includes heart-wrenching scenes of intense prayer in the synagogues of both N’vei Dekalim and Netzarim prior to their being emptied of Jews by force.

      Arutz-7's INN TV has produced video documentation of the expulsion of several towns as well. Click here to view the expulsion of Netzer Hazani's Jews, click here to view (in Hebrew) the expulsion of Netzarim, click here to view (in Hebrew) the expulsion of Ganei Tal and click here to view (in Hebrew) the expulsion of Atzmona.

      Arutz-7’s Kobi Finkler also produced a short amateur clip of the desolation and destruction that the towns of Gush Katif have become. Click here to view.

      Though not a video, this site (click here to view) gives an in-depth look into the tent city many Gush Katif residents have been living in since their expulsion one month ago.

      Videos from before the expulsion include an interview with grandmother Sylvia Mandelbaum by freelance journalist Shlomo Wollins of IsraelReporter.com as she packed up her house and said goodbye to the home she built in the N’vei Dekalim sand dunes.

      Wollins also posted a clip (click here to view) of bereaved mother Bryna Hillberg speaking (in Hebrew) prior to the uprooting of her son, killed in Lebanon while serving in the IDF, from his grave.

      The heroic refusal (click here to view) of American oleh (immigrants to Israel) IDF Corporal Avi Bieber also remains archived and is a reminder of the fact that IDF soldiers could have said “no” - and that many indeed did. Avi has now been released from army jail and is considered a hero by many in the Land of Israel movement.