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Opinion

The 21st century Holocaust happening in real time before our eyes

Relatives of Israelis held hostage by Hamas terrorists in Gaza and supporters protest for their release, September 4, 2024. (Photo: Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)

Trusting bloodthirsty terrorists is what got Israel into the mess she’s in right now. The foolish belief that a group like Hamas could replace the ineffective Palestinian Authority, as suitable peace partners, now reveals the insane level of naivete that was displayed by our leaders and security establishment, who should have known better but placated the powers that be.

For that, we have paid a steep price and continue to reap the predictable regrets, which come with putting faith in those who hate humanity and partner with the powers of darkness.

The shocking news that six of our hostages were murdered, in cold blood, as bullets were shot into the back of their heads, became the straw that broke the camel’s back, causing Israelis to collectively shriek in horror, realizing all the more, the type of barbaric animals with whom we are dealing, pushed them to the brink. Demanding that we make an immediate deal with Hamas, they were willing to put aside the cost of their own security. Because leaving the others behind is just too much for our wounded consciences, which already know that we did not do enough to save those precious six souls, let alone the others who still remain.

After coming to the conclusion that, morally speaking, we have no other alternative, Hamas terrorists have predictably just upped the ante – by demanding an even larger number of prisoners be released from Israeli prisons. Is anyone surprised?

Actually yes!  One person wrote a text, blaming “the globalist progressive left in Israel” for causing that added revision, as a result of their massive protests, which expressed the urgency of an immediate deal. At a time when Israel, more than ever, needs to stand united and unified in their resolve to beat this diabolical monster, the blame game, against a segment of our population, is continuing to be played. 

The only problem is that there is no “progressive left” in Israel, unlike so many other countries these days. If there was such a thing, right-wing governments wouldn’t keep getting elected over and over again. The Labor Party wouldn’t be defunct, as it has been, for over 15 years already, and Bibi Netanyahu would not be the longest-sitting Prime Minister in the history of the state. 

Gone are the two Ehuds (Barak and Ehud Olmert), who represented the more left-leaning governments, abandoned for centrists, such as Yesh Atid (Yair Lapid) and Blue and White (Benny Gantz). 

Most popular today, among the right-wing contingency are Naftali Bennett and Avigdor Lieberman, both of whom are more moderate, the latter already having refused to work within an ultra-religious coalition. Together, along with Yesh Atid, these two men may very well end up forming the next Israeli government. 

In short, politically speaking, there is the extreme right, the more moderate right and the center. For now, the left is not gaining any traction, so blaming them for a higher price being exacted by bloodthirsty terrorists is either ignorant or a deliberate smear, but definitely inaccurate.

Secular Israelis, who make up the majority of the country’s population, are far from leftists who believe in a two-state solution and promote ill-advised notions such as coexistence with haters of Jews. And if they did once exist, October 7th has put an end to those fantasies.

At the moment, we are just one frustrated, heartbroken and exasperated people who can no longer imagine the torment of what it’s like to spend one year of your life in the pit of hell, emerging from it weighing only 36 kilos (76 lbs.) as was discovered of Eden Yerushalmi, one of the six whose emaciated frame made it clear that none of them were being fed. The picture conjures up the horrors of Auschwitz and the piles of bones that were found once the death camp was liberated.

And this is what’s happening. We are literally watching a 21st-century Holocaust take place, in real time, right before our eyes – something that is unfathomable and to which we vowed we would never again allow – certainly not a few kilometers away from us. But it is, and we have been helpless to put an end to it for nearly one year!

Israel is being tortured each and every day by the fact that our hostages remain in the underground dungeons, wasting away and coming one day closer to their deaths. It is the reason that we have no choice but to put an end to this painful, ongoing saga, because not to do so will be too much to bear. The memory is still too fresh of the profound suffering which was endured by our people, just for the crime of being born Jewish.

The same murderous spirit of the 1930s is spitting distance from our border, and they possess the exact depth of evil that has been all too familiar to us for centuries. So why is anyone surprised that they have raised the price to hand over the hostages? And why does anyone feel the need to lay that burden of guilt upon anyone who felt so moved by the cold-blooded murder of six of our hostages, right in the middle of a negotiating process, to the extent that they broke down and took to the streets to be part of the “We’ve got to do something now” crowd?

It is outrageous that anyone would not understand that kind of inner struggle and turmoil that is being felt by anyone with a heart and a conscience. But we cannot sit by and continue to wait for the U.S. to intervene or for a terror organization to finally green light a deal whose terms keep getting changed.

We must do something, and that desire does not make us globalist progressive left-wingers. It makes us human beings who have deep empathy for the suffering of our people! So, if you’re one of those who has received that very disturbing libel, which does nothing to bring us together at the worst time in recent history, then just delete it, because it serves no purpose except to further separate us and tear us apart.

We must be united in our effort to eliminate our enemy, before they eliminate us. Can we put politics aside until then?

A former Jerusalem elementary and middle-school principal and the granddaughter of European Jews who arrived in the US before the Holocaust. Making Aliyah in 1993, she became a member of Kibbutz Reim but now lives in the center of the country with her husband.

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