Our Amazing Trip To Nahal Oz Last Night! (Part 1)

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16 Cheshvan 5779

25 October 2018

Quote of the Day:

“Hamas determines the level of violence on the border. Most of the resources entering the Gaza Strip go to digging tunnels or making rockets.”

Brig. Gen. Yehuda Fuchs, departing commander of the IDF’s Gaza Division

This is an amazing and refreshing statement coming from someone in the IDF General Command because it contradicts everything we are currently being fed by the government and that Command.

Let’s repeat what he said in different words:

Hamas are the bad guys. Most of the humanitarian resources entering Gaza go to digging tunnels or making rockets.

Whatever the departing Fuchs has in mind for his future, the IDF must not be a part of it.

The News On The Israeli Street

Palestinian terror in the last 24 hours . . .

The main target last night was the area around Urim.

**At 11:17 pm last night, incoming missile sirens were heard in the Eshkol and Merhavim regional councils in the north central Negev (Zone 256) in response to at least one Palestinian missile fired from Gaza. Israel’s vaunted Iron Dome system fired an interceptor that missed, and the Palestinian missile hit in an “open space.”

Ominously, this is the third consecutive failure of the Iron Dome following its inability to intercept the missiles fired at Bat Yam and Beersheva last week.

In response to the missile fire last night, the IDF spokesman claimed that the IAF hit eight terrorist targets including a Hamas training facility (read “empty sand dunes”), and munition and storage sites (read “empty buildings”). As usual, no terrorists were killed or wounded.  

**Meanwhile, 8 more fires were started by Palestinian terrorists launching incendiary devices into Israel in places such as Nahal Shikma which your humble servant passed through yesterday on his way to and from Nahal Oz.

In what has become the new normal, more incendiary devices landed in southern and central Israel: one exploded in Ashkelon, one on the beach in Rishon LeZion, and another at the Bilu shopping center outside of Rehovot.

Pardon your humble servant’s cynicism, but it is amazing that the IDF spokesman did not declare these to be “false balloons.”

**None of the above terrorism has had any affect on our pathetic government falling all over itself to provide “humanitarian” supplies to the terrorists–an effort which increased yesterday. 

Ten minutes after the missile hit last night, one wag commented on social media:

“Defense Minister Lieberman responded: ‘Ten minutes have passed since the Qassam, and there has been no more shooting. The crossings to Gaza will open, and we will give Hamas candy.'”

How true.

Just how pathetic is our government? . . .

Yesterday, we were treated to a rash of government ministers and military officials rushing to microphones to claim that Hamas was not responsible for the missile fire on Beersheva and Bat Yam last week.

What did they claim?

In unison, they declared that “poor Hamas” was not to blame because the missiles were fired as a result of a lightning strike on a Hamas automatic missile launcher. 

If you recall, dear reader, the preposterous lightning strike canard was first used by Hamas itself. Shortly afterwards, Hamas dropped that claim and said the missiles were fired by PLO elements in Gaza; shortly after that, it claimed that the missiles were fired by Israel.

And now, our government, reaching for straws, has adopted the initial Hamas line.

That is now pathetic our governing and IDF general command has become.

Another farcical “crime” committed by Israel . . .

Israeli police carefully and gently removing Egyptian Coptic monk Macarius Orshalemy from in front the Sultan Monastery in Jerusalem two days ago.

Yesterday, the PLO accused Israel of violating the status quo at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and committing an act “of aggression against the peoples of Egypt and Palestine.”

Actually, what happened took place at the Sultan Monastery in the Old City and is just the latest chapter in a centuries-long dispute between the Ethiopian Orthodox Church which has inhabited the Monastery for almost 200 years and the Egyptian Coptic Church which claims that the Church belongs to them.

In this case, the Ethiopians have wanted to make renovations to the Monastery which is in serious disrepair. Recently, the Ethiopians replaced the front doors without telling the Egyptians–and the battle has ensued with Egyptian Coptic demonstrations outside the Monastery. In those demonstrations, one monk had to be removed so that workers could enter the Monastery (see the picture above).

Another place where the Ethiopians and Egyptians battle it out is on the roof of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre where both sides have been allotted a space. Back in 2002, the two sides had a mini-brawl there because an Egyptian Coptic monk moved his plastic chair to get out of the sunshine and thereby encroached on Ethiopian space. Again, the Israel police had to be called in to separate the “warring” monks who were throwing plastic chairs at each other.

TODAY’S BLOG:

Our Amazing Trip To Nahal Oz Last Night! (Part 1)

Last night, your humble servant and his wife were honored to visit Kibbutz Nahal Oz on the Gaza border. When I say on the Gaza border, I mean on the Gaza Border–directly across the fence from the Shujayiah neighborhood in Gaza. Nahal Oz is the closest Israeli community to Gaza.

Look very closely at this picture taken from Nahal Oz. In the foreground is Israel; in the background is Gaza. In between, just beyond the group of IDF soldiers, you can see a part of the “Gaza Border fence.”

During the 2014 war, the population of the Kibbutz dropped dramatically as around 30 families pulled up stakes and moved further north to escape the continuous mortar and missile fire as well as the threat from tunnels.

Note the distance from Gaza to Nahal Oz–450 meters, and that Gaza attack tunnels ran right into the Nahal Oz community.

Today the population numbers about 390 people with another 40 teenagers from all over Israel who live in two-year shifts at the Kibbutz.

We have been at Nahal Oz many times in the past to show visitors its proximity to Gaza, but never in the Kibbutz itself.

Last night we were there because of a very special organization, My Brother’s Keeper International (MBKI) and an incredibly amazing man– MBKI’s president, Dov Ben Zion. 

To quote from MBKI’s website: “My Brother’s Keeper International’s mission is to restore hope and create educational solutions for children and families living in poverty and conflict zones in Israel. MBKI has been on the cutting edge of community and school-based program development and delivery since 2005.”

The event last night was part of MBKI’s “Operation Southern Solidarity.” The goals of Operation Southern Solidarity are:

1. Delivering Basic Life Saving (BSL) Mobile Trauma Kits to civilian medical first responders working in several Gaza Strip border communities.

2. Providing provide financial grants to Gaza border communities for children and teen activities in the protected areas and bomb shelters. Activities to include games, toys and funds to help cover potential evacuation.

3. Providing practical support for the City of Sderot’s fire department and other municipal and county emergency services.

When we arrived last night, we didn’t know what to expect, but we were astonished at what we found!

From right to left: Dov Ben Zion of MBKI, Eyal–security chief of Nahal Oz, and your hunble servant upon our arrival at Nahal Oz yesterday evening..

I will describe what we found tomorrow.

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