I’ve been gone from this page more than a month. I did a few readings. I visited friends in San Francisco. My family suffered a crisis. I feel a bit guilty even though I think few people read what I write here. Which forces me to admit I’m writing only to myself. Which is OK, perhaps even good. I’m paying attention to the idea that I feel guilty for not talking enough to myself.
It’s also hard to talk about poetry and art these days. Not only because of my unnamed family crisis but because of the revolutions occurring all around Israel, because Israel is as usual caught in the middle. There has never been an Arab revolution that’s been positive to for Israel. I’m desperately hoping that these, some of these, prove different.
Today, a bomb exploded at a Jerusalem bus stop, thirty one hurt, four seriously. Today, another eight mortar shells hit western Negev between two attacks on Be'er Sheva, and within hours of another strike on Ashdod; on Israeli lightly wounded, at least eight Palestinians killed just yesterday.
While Hamas may have pulled the triggers, it is likely Syria and Iran who planned and urged the attacks. Why now? Not that the attacks ever totally stopped, but why this hard now? Because their own people, Syrians and Iranians, are in the streets, protesting against their own governments. Because these same governments are killing their own people in order to retain power, and the only way they can possibly distract their own people from such killing fields, is by trying to turn their people’s anger on Israel. It’s an old story.
Syria and Iran want Israel to retaliate. So far, Israel has made small targeted reprisals. But even to these, Hamas responds by stating, "Israel is escalating against our people and the whole world should show their responsibility to stop this escalation." My husband says just drop one big bomb on Haniyeh’s house (the head of Hamas in Gaza), though I think he is just one of many heads. The heart lies in Tehran.
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