PEACE TALKS MEAN ISRAELI ORPHANS/updates
Sorry, but there is no other way of summing it up. I would be surprised if the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to realize that agreeing to renew peace talks with the Palestinians will mean additional Israeli orphans. They are seven more this week and the negotiations have only started. Pregnant Talya Imes and her Yitzhak left 6 orphans. Kochava Even-Haim just one. Avishai Shendler was a newly wed. It is no wonder that Hundreds attend terror victims' funerals. The Shendler's daughter, Ruth, represented Israel's indomitable spirit when she addressed her parents:
Only two weeks ago you celebrated your 25th anniversary and promised to celebrate the 50th. 19 years you raised me . . . . Thank you, G-d for the wonderful parents.It has always been important for you to work on your relationship. It was so, this time. You went together. Mom, I promise you to take care of the family. To continue to do what was important to you, to keep the family together. I will support the little ones who will grow up without a mother and father . . . .
The youngest"little one" is but four years old. I thought about that when I read the vicious terror attack described as a natural disaster: Israeli settlers killed. By the way, those who wish to understand better these"settlers" should read Risa Miller's Welcome to Heavenly Heights. It shines an apolitical light on the daily lives of Orthodox American Jews who choose to live in the settlements.
I stumbled on her more recent novel My life before and after. It focuses on the collision between irreligious and newly religious American Jews. She is a most insightful writer able to deal with sensitive intra-Jewish issues with gentleness and humor.
But back to reality. Other leaders have to worry about the price of war, Israeli leaders have to worry about the price of talking peace, especially since the talks have yet to achieve any beneficial results for either Israelis or Palestinians.
Nor do I believe that these talks would have any other results. There are too many Islamists and leftists determined not to lose their favorite wedge issue and the rest of the world is too soft to wrangle it away from them. Oh, yes, G-d save us, Barack Obama, our hapless post American president needs something he can present as an achievement.
Hillary Clinton promises that the US will not impose a solution. Given the upcoming November elections, she may be telling the truth at the moment. The real test will come after November. In the meantime, let's hope we will not send too many additional Israelis to heaven.
Two Israelis wounded in second West Bank shooting attack in two days
PA and Abbas honor terrorist planner of Olympics massacre
Terror Attack Near Hebron: Not an Incident But a Revelation About What's Happening