More Needs to Be Done. But What?

Aryeh Shchupak (Jewish Press)

It’s been a while but it happed again. There was a terrorist attack in Jerusalem today According to the Jewish Press 2 bombs exploded at 2 separate bus stop locations. There was one casualty: a 16 year old Yeshiva student by the name of Aryeh Shchupak. 31 people were injured.

To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time in years there was a terrorist attack of this magnitude outside of the West Bank. 

The good news is that Israel’s security measures had prevented attacks like this from happening for many years. The bad news is obvious. Those security measures were not enough. 

Can they be improved upon? I’m sure they can. There is lttle in this world that cannot use improvement. But at the same time I do not fault Israel’s security establishment for this attack. Nothing is fool proof. I’m absolutely sure that Israel had done the most it could that is humanly possible. But as human beings, they are not infallible. 

I don’t know how many times I made comments like the following in the past. Too many times to be sure. But it is as true now as it was each time I made them. 

I truly cannot imagine the pain of Aryeh Shchupak’s parents at the sudden loss of their son in such a horrible way. One moment he is a happy and healthy Yeshiva student going about his business, perhaps thinking about how he will spend the rest of his day. And in an instant, he is gone. No longer of this world. 

His parents had surely taken for granted that he would be home soon. But suddenly and shockingly they come to the realization that they will never see their son again. All the hopes and dreams they had about their beloved son - suddenly up in smoke!  Now they are making funeral arrangements?! What is going on in their minds  is unimaginable to me.

It is also unknown at this time how seriously injured those 31 people are. Or if they will even  survive those injuries.  And even of they do, how many of those injuries will be permanent. Pain that may be carried with them for the rest of their lives. Pain that is either physical... or mental...  or both

It is at times like this when my emotions take over and I start thinking about Meir Kahane. 

Please do not misunderstand. I do not in any way approve of his vile rhetoric about Arabs or his ‘solutions’ to the Arab-Israeli conflict. But still at a deep emotional level I just want to destroy the enemy that hates us so much. 

Then I start thinking about what can be done to end this madness. To be honest all the efforts being made to placate world opinion about how we deal with  Palestinian terrorists hasn’t stopped them from doing the kind of thing that happened today. 

Israel has wisely chosen not to do anything to upset world opinion too much on this matter. They have not done anything drastic. But maybe it’s time to do more. Maybe security measures that take into account world sensibilities too much - has been a mistake all along.

True – Palestinians suffer a lot of indignities via Israel’s security measures. Which Israel requires in order to prevent terrorist attacks. There were a lot more of those before those security measures were put in place. After all the lives saved surely outweigh any indignities Palestinians may suffer. Bearing that in mind, maybe it’s time to do more, regardless of how much additional indignity Palestinians will suffer as a result. And to heck with what the rest of the world thinks,

Maybe Ben-Gvir is right. He has suggested that Israel resume targeted killings - and let the chips fall where they may. However, as appealing as that may be - it may end up hutting Israel more than it helps - if world criticism increases enough. Especially if Israel’s closest and strongest ally - the US - is part of that criticism. On the other hand I am sick and tired of seeing innocent Jewish blood being shed. Treading lightly in order to avoid world criticism has clearly not been enough to fully prevent Jewish blood from being shed. 

World criticism centers around Palestinian suffering for which the Israeli ‘occupation’ is blamed. Completely ignoring Israel’s security needs as the real reason. 

Thatbeing said, it’s hard for people who suffer at the hands of a nation they see as illegally occupying their land, to not blame the occupiers themselves. That is what they see and experience every single day – while seeing Jewish Israelies going about their day without suffering any indignities. 

This is indeed a sad consequences for them.  They cant really be blamed for feeling that way. But a fair assessment of the realities would produce the real reason they suffer. Which is sourced in the terrorism against Israelis committed by their own people. But at the same time I understand why they don’t see it that way. They look at the here and now that they suffer at the hands of their Israeli occupiers. 

Who are we going to protect - and how are we going to do it? Cleary what Israel has done till now has not been enough. They need to take harsher measures to assure its citizens safety. If Palestinians suffer even more because of that, too bad.  Let them look inward for solution.

But is this the really way to look at it? Is it really either us or them?  At the end of the day, is making life harder on Palestinians really the answer?  Will that end terrorism or will it increase it? That has always been my bottom line question. The plain hard fact is that the Arabs do not think we belong there. They see us as occupiers of their land. and the more we do that,  the more upset they get and the more they are incited towards violence and terror.

The counter argument I often hear is that Arabs don’t need a reason to kill us. So why hold back? 

The answer to that is as follows. While that might be true in many cases, that does not mean we just ignore it and incite them further.  That would be like going up to do someone pointing a gun at us and daring him to shoot us. NOT a very smart thing to do.

To the best of my knowledge no one has taken credit for the attack in Jerusalem today. But only a fool would not realize that this attack was carried out by Palestinians terrorist or their sympathizers. Hamas has applauded it. They see killing innocent Jews as a legitimate tactic towards their goal of ending the occupation of their land – which includes all of Israel.  The more we do to incite them the more they are motivated to act in ways that result in terrorist attacks like the ones that happened today. 

So I am right back where I started. and have no clue how Israel should move forward.  what I do know is that enough Jewish blood has been spilled without ‘daring them to shoot us’. Additionally alienating our strongest and most important ally - the US - is never a good idea. 

So... should Israel increase its security measures in order to save more Jewish lives - even though it will result in increased hardship for Palestinians? That will surely result in world outrage. Probably even from the US. It’s kind of like we are damned of we do and damned if we don’t 

There has to be a way to solve this conundrum. Just don’t know what it is.