To
My Dear Students,
Israel's
response to terror has often been criticized as
"disproportionate," meaning more than
it should be.
I
agree that Israel's response to terror has been
disproportionate.
Yes,
her response to the terror of the Haitian earthquake
has indeed been "disproportionate."
Gilles,
a 59-year-old administrative director of the Haitian
tax authority, spent 120 hours buried under the
rubble of what was once his office. Local
workers' attempts at rescue were to no avail and
they left to tend to others. But several
of the more than 200 Israeli engineers, medical
personnel, and rescuers, that had arrived from
halfway around the world, came back to the building
after receiving information that someone was still
alive in its wreckage.
"We
started looking around, using dogs and listening
devices and then we found him," said Major
Zohar Moshe. An Israeli military doctor
climbed into the rubble to insert an intravenous
liquid tube into Gilles' arms. Others cut
through the debris that blocked the entrance.
"We tried to talk with him, to keep him awake,"
said Captain Nir Hazut. "I told him,
'Do you know where we are from? We are from
Israel.'"
It
took more than seven hours of careful digging,
but by day's end, Gilles was out. His first
words were: "I can't believe it.
You came all the way from Israel to save me?"
Then this husband and father asked for a cell
phone to call someone in Israel and say "thank
you."
As
Gilles was taken out on a stretcher to the ambulance,
the crowd waiting outside broke into cheers, shouting
"We love Israel; we love Israel."
"It's
not about that, it's about saving lives,"
said Major Moshe, covered in dirt and sweat after
the rescue mission was over, "but it does
make us very proud."
Israel
was the first country to set up a field hospital
in Haiti. There, Gilles seemed exhausted,
but the doctors said he would be just fine.
Israel's
disproportionate response to the terror that has
gripped Haiti, a country that routinely votes
against Israel in the U.S., is the Jewish state
at its finest. It is one more of the myriad
reasons why we are so proud to bear the exalted
title "Zionist."
Shabbat
Shalom,
Your
Rabbi
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