It’s warming up in Jerusalem. A new Jewish month begins. Iyar...the month of healing.
It’s been a long harsh winter and everybody is ready for a semblance of normal life. School resumed, businesses are trying to awaken from a deep and overwhelming slumber. For far too many of them between corona and October seventh, there is nothing to revive. And the government “assistance" to small businesses is never enough.
Pesach passed and the hope of renewed business was extinguished by the cancellation of almost all flights. Then they were rescheduled. No revival then, but now hopes for the summer.
The seemingly good news, ceasefire! Husbands, fathers, and sons come home after endless reserve duty. Great! But they do not come home unscathed, to say the least. And the injured are being “rehabilitated", and those that gave up their lives...and their families? What does ceasefire mean to them?
And who are “they" that decide this? Our allies, our government, or the warlords?
Did anyone ask us..."we the people" whether we agree to this?
We are not fools. We understand only too well that ceasefire means nothing to terrorists. It only gives them time to reorganize until the next round.
And, experience has taught us there is always the next round. Our enemies are relentless in their hatred of the Jewish state and since life means little to them, this war of jihad will continue until we too become relentless, until our enemies are on their knees, and nobody stops us.
Can we become militarily self sufficient enough to actually be a sovereign nation and make our own decisions based on our self interest? We are not there yet, but with conviction I have no doubt it is possible. It is only a question of time. And being self sufficient regarding weaponry.
And some have chosen to leave “for a while", seeking more calm, more consistency and safety for their children, more opportunity and less taxes. There are large Israeli communities in almost every major city, LA, Toronto, Miami, and smaller ones in Portugal, Germany, and even in Costa Rica and Mexico, to name just a few. Can we lure them back? Who knows?
No serious Israeli thinks this ceasefire makes any sense. This seems to be a concession to our good friend Trump. I think he announced it before even our prime minister which should make it clear who is calling the shots. Is our relationship so symbiotic that we can no longer make decisions and speak for ourselves?
Is Lebanon willing to agree to new borders? The Litani River no less? Or as reported are they going to try to rebuild the bridges destroyed and force us out of Lebanon yet again?
We all know Lebanon was a majority Christian country. Hariri as president tried to keep all the factions together and he was assassinated in 2005 in a truck bombing by Hezbollah and Syrian forces. So some things never change. Why would they now?
What the west does not fully understand is that the war declared by the Muslim Brotherhood to which all terrorists adhere, is in order to extend its control over the entire globe. Yes there are proxies that we know and terrorist cells globally that we don’t yet know. And their infiltration and abuse of the liberal welfare systems globally are well known as well. Many wives, many children, and overwhelming every place they move. And numbers speak boldly. The mayors of London, Paris, Berlin and now NY are Muslim...this is no coincidence. This is intention and spreading.
So as Israelis, fighting for our survival and sovereignty, we feel like we too are an American proxy at the forefront of this war drama on our doorstep. Trump sees what is coming, and clearly understands who is with us, and who is not! The “teams" are rapidly lining up. Iran, China, Russia versus the free world. America, and Israel primarily.
How does this war end in victory? The million of trillion dollar question?
Clearly the regime in Iran must fall and that will never happen through negotiations.
Either the Iranian people will rise up, and at the rate they are being slaughtered, it is hard to know just how viable that option is. The other option is we, the US and Israel, continuing to knock out their infrastructure until they submit. Being a “holy war" from the mullahs perspective makes that option less likely.
So to what end a ceasefire?
That is the question today on everybody’s mind.
The pause...everyone is enjoying the pause...but everybody also knows this war is far from over.