2) Slight of Coin…Slight of Name

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A few months later in November the kibbutz was shelled by Russian missiles fired from across the Lebanese border.

They missed.

The orchards, where we picked apples, were also shelled.

They also missed.

But each time Israel responded with missiles that did not miss.

Jets tore through the skies in angry response. People living on the Lebanese side of the border were killed in retaliation.

Ordinary people picking apples on the Lebanese side of the border were killed in their orchards.

These deaths still haunt me.

Perhaps it was the folly of youth but I was not particularly worried by the sounds of machine gun fire, the orange dropping flares and rare missile attacks falling with such planned inaccuracy on my side of the border. On an intuitive level it was like children throwing stones at an adult they did not wish to hit. They were just trying to make a point is all.

But what did chill and frighten me was Israel’s hot blooded blind response. Their desire to obliterate. Their desire to kill. And their accusation that it was the perpetrators fault that they had suffered deaths.

That the stone throwers were responsible for their own annihilation.

I hear this same harsh word spin today. That the gruesome death count in Gaza is the fault of Hamas. That the brutal annihilation that is occurring in Gaza is happening not because Israel is raining bombs and explosives upon a starving people but because Hamas are still finding the strength to throw a few misaimed punches from their bolt holes towards their oppressor.

Tragically Israel with its economic success still can not find a way to speak and fails to think about building bridges with those who are slight of coin.

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