Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: it too shall past

Per chi è abituato a leggere le isterie di Moni Ovadia pensando di
entrare nell'anima ebraica, può essere utile cercare di capire cosa
pensano gli israeliani. Yair Lapid è il più popolare editorialista
del più diffuso quotidiano israeliano, Yediot Acharonot.
Ecco cosa scrive oggi.
Stop for a minute and think. How are you going to remember this
'Operation'? Because that is how you'll refer to in two years
time, 'The Operation'. If there is one thing Israelis have gleamed
from the Arab world, it's the inclination to exaggerate.
Ten years ago exactly, almost 1,000 rockets were fired on Israel during
'Operation Grapes of Wrath ' 24 civilians and 31 IDF soldiers were
killed. How, if at all, do we remember 'Grapes of Wrath'?
Three years ago we awaited the delivery of chemical tipped scud
missiles courtesy of Saddam Hussein. Today it seems a bit funny how we
were absolutely sure that would be his final act of desperation. How do
you remember it now?
A year ago exactly we were telling one another with trepidation that
the country was on the verge of a civil war. We thought it was just a
question f time before the first Jewish settler fired a gun at IDF
troops, or that thousands would refuse the army's orders to evacuate
the settlements. The country was going to collapse from within.
Remember? Maybe we've repressed it a little because it is unpleasant
to admit that we scare so easily.
Nowadays 'Ammunition Hill'
When did we become so hysterical? 800 Israelis were killed in the
Six-Day war: 776 of them were soldiers and more than 3,000 were
wounded. Only six days of the most precise, the best planned, most
valiant and premeditated offensive and we still lost 800 people.
How easy it is to imagine how the media would cover the battles on
'Ammunition Hill'.
7 AM and the 'Special News Bulletin' logo would flash across the
screen. The energetic reporter in a flak jacket would say: "37
paratroopers were killed overnight during a four and a half hour fierce
battle in the canals of Ammunition Hill." All the facts about our
losses would be accurate but the report would have been inaccurate
because that it not what happened there.
Freedom of expression? Give me a break
Three hours after the katyusha attack on Kibbutz Kfar Giladi and I am
glued to the television like everyone else. The Channel 10 TV news
report explains without batting an eyelash that it was the platoon
commander's fault. I am not usually known for talking back to the TV
screen but now I am yelling at him.
"What's so urgent?" I beseech him. "Why now?"
Don't you dare start preaching to me about freedom of expression and
the public's right to know. I am in this business for 25 years
already. I have covered two wars and an 'Operation'. I can assure
you that there is no journalistic directive that says you are permitted
to conjecture before there's a military inquiry; before the bodies
have even gotten cold; before the wounded have left the operating
rooms; before the most miserable commander in the Israeli army has been
given a chance to explain.
Middle East hurricanes
What happened is the Middle East. That is the way this region is. Once
every few years something happens. Sometimes it's horrible, sometimes
just bad but this is our version of hurricanes. You never know when
they are going to begin fermenting in the middle of the ocean or how
they will attack.
You don't ask who wins when a hurricane hits. You don't argue that
the hurricanes have to be destroyed. You don't deal with the question
of what the hurricane talks about with his friends the tsunamis.
When the smoke settles there will still be on one side of the border a
country with a GNP larger than Portugal, a culture more vibrant than
Greece and with better restaurants than London. On the other side of
the border will still be a terror organization of a few thousand poor
people, disenfranchised and forgotten who will celebrate on the ruins
of their destroyed country. This is the only real victory, all the rest
are emotional disorders.
"What are the objectives?" our learned commentators ask repeatedly.
What are the objectives all the time? That as few of us as possible
will die, that we'll gain a few years of quiet, that we'll continue
to be aligned with the correct side of the globe.
Israel's wars were never fought to resolve conflict. There is no
resolution. The best one can hope for is to improve one's position
before the next outbreak of violence begins.
Hysteria and reality
Hysterical people always vacillate between depression and insanity. No,
we can't go into Lebanon and annihilate them and 'we don't care
what the rest of the world thinks.'
It just doesn't work that way. It's not in us to kill 100,000
Lebanese civilians. In any case, the planes we use to bomb them are
made in the USA; 82 percent of the fuel that powers our tanks comes
from the former Soviet Union (and the rest from Egypt, from western
Africa and from Norway); because the factories now closed because of
the situation exported USD 15 billion worth of goods to Europe last
year.
Without this, our economy which finances, among other things, the
security establishment would collapse.
On the other hand, wipe your tears. Not every local screw-up means
total failure, not every operational postponement becomes 'the
subject of an investigative committee'. And you don't have to
continue replacing officers every time they err in judgment.
The self appointed geniuses now speak about how the expanded ground
offensive should have begun sooner. Let's say they are right. So what
does that mean? The war isn't perfect? Life isn't perfect? IDF
Chief of Staff General Dan Halutz is not perfect? So, there have been
mistakes, and there always will be but be grateful that there is
something bizarre in our need to fall in love with them.
I know that 'our deterrence abilities have been hit,' because I met
Rina G at the home of friends. She told me. Rina is a math teacher in
an elementary school so she must know. Without hurting her feelings, we
didn't have much deterrence before the hostilities began. There is no
deterrence for crazies who think that Allah whispers to them at night.
It too shall pass
The US has all the weaponry in the world and it hasn't stopped Bin
Laden from attacking American targets. The only deterrence that is
important is directed at states like Syria who is dying to attack us
but knows that if it tries it would be obliterated. The only damage
they have caused us is the dancing on their roofs. I saw the pictures;
our soccer players are better dancers.
There is no, nor could ever be, consolation for the grandmother and
grandson who are killed by a katyusha rocket as they drink tea on their
balcony. We will try not to forget but as the prophet Isaiah said,
it's God's job to wipe the tears, not ours.
Eventually it will all fade away. It will be the Palestinians or
traffic accidents or the fight for more drugs in the basket of
subsidized medicines or some other scary thing that we don't yet know
about (just like up to a month ago when we weren't so concerned about
Hizbullah ). In the end it's one of those weird distortions of life
in Israel. It's painful, it's terrifying but it too shall pass.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3290883,00.html

 
-- 
Diario di guerra
www.tonibaruch.blogspot.com

 ha scritto nel messaggio 
news:1155544124....@75g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
Per chi č abituato a leggere le isterie di Moni Ovadia pensando di
entrare nell'anima ebraica, puň essere utile cercare di capire cosa
pensano gli israeliani. Yair Lapid č il piů popolare editorialista
del piů diffuso quotidiano israeliano, Yediot Acharonot.
Ecco cosa scrive oggi.
Stop for a minute and think. How are you going to remember this
'Operation'? Because that is how you'll refer to in two years
time,
Gianpipetto la tragedia č che non lo scrive in Italiano Moni Ovadia invece 
lo fa
-- 
            Saluti & Salute
                Pomero
 

 Gianpipetto la tragedia è che non lo scrive in Italiano
effettivamente è davvero una tragedia: un sito israeliano che non
riporta la traduzione italiana. Per fortuna che ci sono le tue risposte
a sollevare il morale.