Posted on 04/26/2002 9:35:29 AM PDT by SJackson
Friday afternoon, Soheila Hoshi, 47, a mother of four children ages nine to eighteen, completed her weekly shopping at Jerusalem’s colorful outdoor market known as Machane Yehuda. She was a regular at the market, picking up last minute fruits, vegetables and goodies for the family meal.
As Soheila waited for the bus, a young Palestinian who fancied herself a martyr positioned her body deep in the throng of people walking and waiting on the sidewalk and detonated a belt of explosives strapped to her waist. In blowing herself up and unleashing a combination of nails, screws and explosives that get more sophisticated with each passing attack, she also permanently tore apart six innocent shoppers and injured scores more. Soheila, who was standing close to the bomber, was so disfigured that the forensic specialists could not make a positive identification of her body until after the Jewish Sabbath, which ended at sundown the following day, using blood samples from family members.
Soheila is my husband’s first cousin. She left Iran as a young woman for Israel to fulfill a dream of living as a Jew in Israel. She immigrated alone, leaving behind parents who to this day, amazingly, still live in Iran. Soheila went on to marry and have four children. At some point after meeting my husband, I first heard her name in connection with another horror: cancer. This woman, then in her early 40s, was very sick and no one knew if she would live. Miraculously, though, she managed to lick that enemy into remission. This always-cheerful religious woman was not so lucky on Friday.
In a way, though, the details are not so important. For if she had woken up 20 minutes earlier on Friday morning or lingered at one more fruit stand in the market, this woman may well have been spared and another blown to bits in her place. Soheila was just one of tens, hundreds, thousands, who have been murdered over the past 19 months, and before that over the past nine years, and before that in 1973, 1967 and 1947 when war-loving neighbors on all sides attacked Israel. Before that, just 60 years ago, there were six million Soheilas murdered in Europe – the same ‘civilized’ place whose people were the first and thus far the most efficient in condemning Israel over the past few weeks.
Make no mistake about it, since September 28, 2000, over 450 innocent men, women, children and unborn babies (the population equivalent of some 23,000 or so Americans) have been killed by bombers and shooters for one reason: Because they were Jewish (Although, not all of the victims have been Jewish or Israeli. Friday’s bombing in Jerusalem took the life of two Chinese workers who were likely in Israel to earn some money to send to their families at home). Arafat and his henchman are not looking only to end what they call the occupation or to drive the Israeli Defense Forces out of the areas that they controlled autonomously following agreements known by names like Oslo. This isn’t about Muslims wanting to live in a neighborhood where Jews live. No, that would be too simple. This is not an uprising or a simple intifada as the news networks so neatly categorize it. Behind the violence against Israelis is a desire, one that has not been hidden or even blurred, to rid the Middle East and the country known as Israel – a name that to my knowledge is not even acknowledged or uttered in the streets of Jenin or Ramallah or Tulkarem – of its Jewish presence. In Nazi times it was known as “Judenrein,” or free from Jews; today, it’s called “jihad” or “holy war,” and it just isn’t any different.
Why should any American care about any of this, especially if they didn’t know Soheila, or if they’re not Jewish or if they don’t consider themselves a supporter of Israel? Because the moment Americans hesitate before going to a mall or their children’s birthday parties or the local pizza place, the moment these hideous excuses for “freedom fighters” infiltrate nice, free, quiet lives and blow themselves up on Main Street, USA – and they will - the moment Americans see the wreckage of body parts, groceries that will never make it to the table and abandoned cell phones that ring incessantly because their owners were just blown apart at our bus stops and meeting places, then this will become something that we will want to destroy and eradicate without nuance and without delay. Maybe then we will thank the Israelis for doing much of the world’s dirty work, the job that not one other nation in the world – including the United States – has yet dared to undertake. Maybe then, and only then, we will pay honor and respect to the memory of Soheila and all the others in the only way befitting these innocent souls who are no more.
Right. And Rosie O'Donnell really IS talented,and Bob Dillion really does have a excellent singing voice.
If the Israelis had hate, they would have demolished the "refugee" camps from the air.
They did shoot rockets into the refugee camps from the air.
Or sent nuclear weapons into the capitals of some aggressive, hate-filled Arab neighbors.
Right. And I suppose the fact that Israel would have immediately been whiped off the face of the Earth had nothing to do with them not using nukes? Make no mistake about it,if Israel were to use their nukes in a first-strike method,they would lose ALL their support. Not even the poweful Jewish lobby in the US could help them.
Or sent bomb-wielding children into Arab pizza parlors, markets, and formal dinners.
There is no reason for the Israeli's to do this. Unlike some people who will remain nameless (not to mention nationless),Israel has a professional army and air force to do their explosives work for them.
Contrary to hate,
Kain't ya just FEEEELLLL the love,brothers and sisters?
they have turned down an opportunity to kill many, many terrorists holed up in a church (a church that, I believe, means little or nothing to the Jewish people),
The church itself may not mean much to the Israeli's,but you can bet your bippy that the continued good will of the fundie Christians in the US means a great deal to them. This group is a bigger supporter of Israel than most of the Jews in this country.
because of their compassion for the innocents in the church and because of what the church means to so many Christians.
"Compassion" my ass. They were afraid of alienating fundie Christians.Otherwise they would have rolled a tank right through it.
Of course. Doesn't the official version of that equation read:
"Jews=ALWAYS right and good
Non-Jews=AWAYS wrong and evil."?
The Jews,too?
Or there could be an agenda underneath the feigned inability to see the obvious.
"Most people understand this.",what? It's obvious even you don't understand what you wrote. You are implying that since the Islamic fundies are clearly our enemies,this means the Israeli's are clearly our friends. The Arabs ain't our friends,and neither are the Israeli's.
Or there could be an agenda underneath the feigned inability to see the obvious.
I think so too,and it seems to me your agenda is as I have stated earlier,"Israeli/Jews=ALWAYS good and right,non-Jews/Israeli's=ALWAYS evil and wrong.
We're talking about what's going on in the world today. The Palestinians and a good deal of the Muslim world wants to kill Americans. They've been doing this and telling us they want to do this. Israel as a country is not doing this and their people never voice such opinions, yet to you they are both our enemies.
Please demonstrate what you assert with facts, else you have no argument.
Please point out where I have EVER said the Israeli's were our enemies. I have only stated the nation of Israel is NOT our friend. This does not automatically equate them with a actual enemy. This is not a "either/or" world we live in.
Israel sat still for Iraq's bombing of their citizens because the U.S. asked them to under Pappa Bush.
I guess if someone took a bullet to help your family they wouldn't be a friend either.
HorseHillary! The only ones Israel was doing a favor then was Israel. They had us and a bunch of other nations going after Iraq FOR them,so why would they bother? Looks like they and the "Israel-first" lobby in the US is trying to get the US to attack Iraq for them again.
BTW,WHO was Israel "taking a bullet for" during the USS Liberty incident? Seems to me Israel has OFFICIALLY taken more US lives than the PLO has. And "No,this does NOT mean the PLO are our pals,either.
This lays in stark contrast to the thousands of Americans that have been killed by the other side.
You might be the only person left on the planet that doesn't understand that Al Qaeda and the PLO (Hamas, etc.) are all part of the same organization. All of them are dedicated to your death. It's not like they hide it from you. They explicitly say it.
Let me know if you can find any similar viewpoints about America that emanate from Israel.
The Koran also specifically states that the taking of innocent life is always wrong and the taking of your own life is always wrong. Because some "followers" of Islam do not conform to the actual teaching of their religion does not change the value of that religion. (See the Catholic priests and their young boys.) Many here on FR are seeing this problem with a great personal bias. Have you read anything lately about the Islam religion written from an unbiased perspective? Try reading the book, "The Religions of Man" by Huston Smith when he was Professor of Philosophy at MIT.
That may be, but it also may be that after trying that and getting decimated, they realized it would only get them killed because they were hopelessly less equipped to fight a conventional war. The only victory against a U.S. supported military campaign was Vietnam where similiar tactics were employed. It is understandable that those tactics are being used again where there seems to be no alternative.
"Axe to grind"? I guess this is supposed to mean the murders of those US sailors is supposed to be overlooked and excused,or whoever mentions it ends up being called "anti-Semitic" or accused of "having a axe to grind".
The reason you folks do that is because it's the only thing you guys hang your hats on.
Oh,well. What the hell. It was only a Naval ship flying the US flag in international waters in broad daylight,so why not go ahead and ignore such a little thing. Never mind that it was a OFFICIAL state act of terrorism with a US Navy vessell and US sailors as targets. This lays in stark contrast to the thousands of Americans that have been killed by the other side.
Is it somehow possible you really ARE delusional enough to think the Palestinians ordered the Saudi's to fly into the WTC towers? I don't remember any Palestinian terror attacks against the US,do you?
I'm not so sure that's true. I think it is a combination of VERY bad "leadership" that NEEDS to keep the pot stirred to stay in power,and the fact that the Jordanians don't want them any more than the Israeli's do.
>If they want a 'state', let their Arab brothers give them land. They have far more of it than Israel.
Doesn't matter. Ain't gonna happen.
Did you even see them dancing in the streets when the WTC fell? You don't read what they themselves say in their newspapers?
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