Gary Willigis a veteran member of the Arutz Sheva Staff.
Ariel, today is your fifth birthday. I wish I could say happy birthday, but this birthday is anything but happy. Instead of celebrating with friends and family, instead of party hats, cakes, and presents, you are being held captive in Gaza by evil people along with your parents and baby brother.
You have spent nearly a fifth of your life in captivity, and little Kfir has spent more than half his life as a hostage. The whole world owes you so much more, beginning with an apology, an apology that will never come, because the world does not care about Jews. So I will apologize to you instead.
Ariel, I’m sorry that instead of learning to read and write in kindergarten, you are a prisoner, denied all the rights children around the world take for granted.
I’m sorry that instead of watching your baby brother learn to walk and talk in a loving home, you are forced to watch him grow in a world of darkness and hate.
I’m sorry that you do not have your father to comfort you in these dark times, despite the fact that he is also being held captive.
I’m sorry this country's intelligence failed to see the signs of an impending attack and massacre, leaving you and your family unprotected when the butchers stormed the border.
I’m sorry the world’s oldest hatred, antisemitism, is as prevalent and potent as ever. It is a hatred that spares no one, not even babies and children like you and Kfir.
I’m sorry the world is full of antisemites who rejoice at your suffering, who think that you and Kfir deserve to have these atrocities committed against you just because you are Jewish children, who tear down posters of you and Kfir because their hearts are so full of hate that they cannot abide the idea that Jewish babies and toddlers deserve empathy or even sympathy.
I’m sorry the world is full of people who care more about your captors, the people who kidnapped you and the people who continue to hold you, than they do about you. People like Francesca Albanese, Karim Khan, Antonio Guterres, and so many more who seek to punish the Jewish State for trying to rescue you and for attempting to punish those who kidnapped you.
I’m sorry the West is led by weak men like Joe Biden who seek to appease Iran, the masters your captors answer to, rather than give Israel the proper support it needs to free you and ensure that what has happened to you never happens to another Jewish child ever again.
I’m sorry there is so little courage in this world to confront evil and not to pander to it, shrink away from it, or pretend it doesn’t exist. Cowardice is the norm. The good stand by and allow evil to triumph.
I’m sorry the world has changed so little since the days Anne Frank hid in an attic and Jewish children were abandoned by an uncaring world to the gas chambers crematoria.
I’m sorry all I have to offer you are words and the promise that you are not forgotten.
Ariel, I and the entire people of Israel pray every day for your return, for a miracle that brings you and your entire family out of the world of darkness and back into the world of light. We pray that you can once again dress as Batman, play with your friends, go to school, and live life to the fullest. We pray that you and Kfir are raised by your loving parents in your own home and not in a tunnel underneath Gaza or the home of an evil man. We pray that you get to experience all the joys of being a child again.
We pray that long before your sixth birthday, you will smell and taste the air of freedom. On that day, we will say “Shehecheeyanu v'kiyimanu vihigiyanu lizman hazeh.” “Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, who has granted us life, sustained us and enabled us to reach this day.”