by JPost editorial
For many, there is a shared sense that this moment demands endurance. If Iran can be dealt with as it needs to be, then in the long term, we will all be better for it. That is Israeli resilience.
 |
On Friday, as sirens continued to sound across the country, Tel Aviv did what Tel Aviv does best. The cafés had laden tables outside, and the parks were filled with youngsters sitting in the sunshine.
A visiting guest commented while watching, turning and saying with a mix of admiration and disbelief, “You Israelis are so resilient.”
It is a word often used about this country, sometimes too easily. But the truth is, it is much more than that. It is a habit ingrained in us from an early age.
“We’ve been doing this for 80 years,” one Israeli replied to the visitor.
That answer is the history of Israel.
Israeli resilence on display amid war with Iran
From the earliest days of the state, when Arab armies crossed the border the day after independence was declared – through wars, intifadas, waves of rockets from Gaza and Lebanon, and now a second war with Iran – Israelis have lived with the understanding that normal life and national emergency are connected. The distance between the two can diminish in a matter of seconds, with only the wail of a siren.
And yet, when that siren sounds, something remarkable happens. People move quickly into shelters. Doors close and phones come out as people check on their loved ones elsewhere. It is Israeli resilience.
There is a kind of national muscle memory at work.
One should not misread that as levity at the situation. Many feel real fear for their lives, many run holding their children in their arms, and flights and plans are disrupted, especially nearing Passover.
Postpone celebrations, acts of determination
One Jerusalem Post staff member recently postponed a wedding because close relatives could not enter the country. When their family eventually made it to Israel, the couple went ahead and held a smaller ceremony under the constraints of Home Front Command guidelines.
It was not the celebration they had imagined or planned, but an act of determination and a refusal to let circumstances dictate the terms of their lives.
For many of our readers abroad, particularly in Western countries, this reality is difficult to fully grasp. That is not a criticism but simply the result of different experiences.
Few societies in the West have lived with sustained, existential threats overhead. War, where it exists, is often distant, seen only through social media apps or the news. The idea of daily life continuing under the possibility of incoming missiles is, understandably, foreign.
In Israel, it is familiar. That is Israeli resilience.
For decades, Israel has invested in the systems that keep its people alive. Through reinforced safe rooms in homes, public shelters in every neighborhood, a layered missile defense network, intelligence capabilities that reach far beyond its borders, and an air force trained for precisely these scenarios, Israel does its best to keep its citizens safe.
The Mossad, the IDF, and the entire security establishment have operated with a long-term understanding that moments like this come.
Compare that to Hamas or Hezbollah, which, despite billions of dollars in international funding, spent 20 years building up an arsenal of deadly weapons or underground tunnels, rather than the bomb shelters necessary for their people.
But infrastructure alone does not explain why Tel Aviv was thriving, nor why Israelis try to go about their day as normally as possible.
There is also a societal component. Israelis can disagree with each other, often loudly, about almost everything. Yet when faced with an external threat, a coming together is hard to miss.
Support for the operation runs deep, cutting across many of the usual lines. For many, there is a shared sense that this moment demands endurance. If Iran can be dealt with as it needs to be, then in the long term, we will all be better for it. That is Israeli resilience.
Patience, too, plays a role. To go to work when possible or to open shops; to be understanding when our children enter their fourth week of school without seeing their classmates; to hold weddings, even if the guest list is halved and the music is cut short by another trip to the shelter.
The visiting guest was right. Israelis are resilient. And on one Friday in Tel Aviv, as life continued under the blaring of sirens, it was visible in the most ordinary of ways.
JPost editorial
Source: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-890718
No comments:
Post a Comment