Under Fire, part 18

I can't sleep: I wake at 3:00 and can't fall back to sleep. Convoys of helicopters pass over Karmiel on their way to and from the front in Lebanon.

Growing up in the US during the Vietnam era, "the front" was some impossibly distant location on the other side of the world. Young Americans were sent there to fight a war that many didn't understand or support.

Here, I am less than ten miles from the border with Lebanon. The site of yesterday's bitter fighting is probably closer to my house than your office is to yours. In a sense, the entire north of Israel, with one million residents living within range of daily rocket fire, is the front. One million. Over 17% of our population. For us, this is a war we understand.

A Hizbullah spokesman indicates "surprise" at the strength of our reaction. The message is clear: We thought we could cross your border, kidnap your soldiers, fire rockets on your cities, and you would just shake your finger at us. We didn't expect you to fight back!


I find it morbidly fascinating that the international media so little values our lives that the coverage is 90% on the damage we inflict in Lebanon. What about our smashed houses and bloodied residents? Look at this house in Karmiel. This is what is happening to my city. And this is what has been going on for years in S'derot and Ashkelon, cities within our internationally-recognized borders; residents there have been targets of kassam rockets fired from Gaza.

Sleep-deprived, I make a number of stupid errors while trying to post this. I can't even imagine what it must be like for our soldiers, awake for 36 hours on end. Perhaps their strength and courage comes from understanding so clearly why we are fighting.

But I still can't sleep.