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Grandpa’s despair

Government spitting in face of those who built country

GUSH KATIF - I only have one question: Why? Why doesn’t the army do anything?

 

They want to kick us out of our homes; they close us off in a ghetto, degrade us at every checkpoint and let the Arabs kill us.

 

Why don’t they go into Gaza and impose some order, instead of using 15,000 soldiers to make sure no one gets into Gaza?

 

 

They would be better off coming into Gaza to ensure no one comes into Israel. I feel the army has forgotten what its job is. Who is the enemy here, us or the Arabs?

 

After Dov and Rachel Cole were killed last night on the Kissufim road, the Palestinians fired additional mortars at us. You might think they could let us have a little bit of quiet for our last month here…

 

How low have we sunk when the country abandons its citizens like this? (Oh yeah - we still are citizens of this country, just like those of you in Tel Aviv).

 

'I'm kind of fed up'

 

The Coles were innocent people who came to see their family here in Gush Katif. They needed special permits to visit, and then were forced to degrade themselves by having to provide proof they were allowed to visit. And then to get murdered? What was their sin? Why doesn’t anyone do anything about it? Where is Prime Minister (Ariel Sharon) in all of this?

 

Our country has simply lost its mind. It started last week, when I marched through the fields of Kfar Maimon to attend the demonstration.

 

Helicopters in the air, soldiers all over, people under siege, water machines, gravel machines, even machines to make ear-splitting noises (they don’t even use these things against the Arabs, but I guess it’s alright to use them against us).

 

The truth is that I’m kind of fed up with everything that happened at Kfar Maimon. We waited so long, and after all, the rabbis said soldiers should not refuse orders, the Yesha Council decided not to break through the roadblocks - so what’s left for us to do?

 

When I saw that nothing was going to move at Kfar Maimon, we decided to go back to Kissufim, to do what we’ve been doing for the past week: Talk to soldiers and cops in an attempt to show them what really goes on here.

 

'Stop harassing innocent people'

 

We arrived at the Beeri Junction and waited to hitch a ride. All of a sudden, a car went past with a blue ribbon, and someone yelled out, “Go home, you retards,” and other moronic curses.

 

The truth is, I would have gone home, if only they would have let me. A second later, a bus stopped and 6-7 cops got off, surrounded us and demanded our ID cards. We refused. We were about 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) from Gush Katif, and well within our right to move freely around our own country without being arrested.

 

At the end of the day, we figured out they wouldn’t budge, and we were in a hurry to get home, so we showed our IDs.

 

Meanwhile, I spoke to one of the officers, telling him, “It’s embarrassing that this is our police department; that instead of catching criminals and ensuring public security, we are harassing innocent people.”

 

He responded by saying, “Kid, if you continue to speak like this, you know where you’ll find yourself,” pointing to the bus he’d just gotten off.

 

'Having a brit away from home'

 

He even took my freedom of speech away, the one thing I thought should never be taken away. But in a dictatorship, anything is possible; everyone dances to the tune of Ariel Sharon.

 

And where is he in all this? Sitting at home down at Shikmim, entertaining shiksas (non-Jewish women) like (U.S. Secretary of State) Condoleezza Rice.

 

Let him come out and meet the people. Let him see what he’s doing to his country.

 

The next day we had a brit in our family, for my sister’s little boy. Initially it was clear the brit would be held in Ganei Tal, but eventually we decided to hold it in Ashkelon.

 

The whole thing was strange to me, until my grandfather got up to speak. He’s the one who asked my father not to hold the ceremony in Gush Katif.

 

In 1946, after six months in Israel as a Holocaust refugee, they asked him to help build a settlement in the Negev desert, and he went willingly.

 

'Settler blood is cheap'

 

My grandfather built this country so that no one would ever be able to expel future generations of Jews.

 

Now, the state is spitting in his face. To visit his son, grandchildren and great grandchildren, he has to degrade himself, request permission, and show a permit at the border - all this to move about in his own country, a country he built with his own two hands. He just couldn’t do it…

 

I expected that the people administrating the disengagement program would be sensitive toward us. After all, they are trying to kick us out of our homes, out of our communities, take away everything we know.

 

But they can’t even do this small gesture.

 

I hope I’ll be able to write another column, but at this rate, who knows what will happen the next time I go out of my house, or dare to travel along the Gush Katif roads.

 

Apparently, the blood of Gush Katif Jews really is cheap….

 

Renana Marmelstein, 18, is a resident of Ganei Tal in Gush Katif in Gaza. She is writing a personal diary of her reactions to the disengagement for Ynetnews and Ynet

פרסום ראשון: 07.24.05, 18:33
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