OPINION:
Knowing something of the Israeli people’s pain and longing for peace, my heart yearns to comfort, but also to confront, with truth, the plethora of falsehoods and fabrications Israelis are forced to endure.
I was writing another article aimed at debunking anti-Israel and antisemitic slurs crowding the social media platforms. I counterattacked with all the objectivity I could muster against the arrogance of those who posture out of their ignorance and misguided sense of justice.
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And yet, while putting the final touches on that article, I realized my factual rebuttal had a fundamental flaw…Facts don’t persuade; feelings do.
And so, contrary to my nature, I appeal here to the reader’s emotions by exploring the feelings of the peace-loving Israeli people in the hope that how they feel might persuade at least a few hardened hearts where the facts have failed. Consider with me, then…
How does it feel…when your countrymen are massacred and your nation is widely denounced for a precision military response that is only trying to protect you and your fellow citizens from further harm?
How does it feel…when after momentary sympathy for the mass slaughter of your people, world leaders pivot to condemnation for going “over the top” in defending yourself by (finally) removing a terror threat that no nation on earth would tolerate on its border for 19 years?
How does it feel…when one minute you’re waiting tables in Jerusalem and the next you’re plunged into urban warfare against an ISIS-like enemy that hides behind the women and children you’ll be blamed for harming if you make one mistake?
How does it feel…when as a kid you grew up learning songs to mitigate the trauma of running to the bomb shelter because of incoming missiles from your Hamas neighbors?
How does it feel…that as a girl you survived the Nazis, and now as an old woman you wonder if you’ll survive the rockets and tunneling incursions by Hamas and Hezbollah?
How does it feel…to be a Jewish kid growing up to learn that there is a social hatred so endemic that it warrants its own technical term, antisemitism, and it’s all about your existence?
How does it feel…to be labeled a white, colonizing oppressor when you are a brown, indigenous citizen of a law-based, justice-seeking, rights-defending sovereignty that in no way is an “apartheid state?”
How does it feel…that your 4,000-year-old homeland, biblical Judea and Samaria, was renamed the “West Bank” by an illegal occupier, Jordan, and yet the misnomer is used in every media broadcast and every academic lecture hall?
How does it feel…when you hear the name “Palestine” you are reminded of the Romans who spitefully re-named the Land of Israel after your ancient archenemy, the Philistines, in derision of your Jewish ancestors, and your God?
How does it feel …to live in a peaceful and productive Israeli community on land “from the river to the sea” that elitist activists worldwide call “Palestine” and assert “will be free,” and you know that is actually a libelous call for your deportation?
How does it feel…as a young wife to suddenly be a widow as your husband becomes one of the hundreds of IDF soldiers who have made the ultimate sacrifice?
How does it feel…as an 18-year-old soldier, to bear the rigors of war, bodily wounds, mental scars, privations, fears of ambush, and the dark terrors of clearing those endless tunnels?
How does it feel…when you know the way things work in the Middle East — that the Islamist jihad only respects overwhelming force and will exploit any weakness shown through compromise and negotiation, the very thing world leaders demand that you do?
How does it feel…as a military commander to have presidents and pundits across the globe involving themselves in your tactical planning as though they know better how to conduct urban warfare while taking extraordinary measures to protect civilians?
How does it feel…that in every “unfiltered” video compilation of Oct. 7, there are still certain atrocities that no one can bear to include, nor even speak about?
How does it feel…when in 2023 your country’s rating dropped from fourth to fifth happiest in the world?
What…? With all this, Israelis could feel happy? Oh yes, despite war, and despite being the most misunderstood, maligned, and delegitimized people on the planet, Israelis consistently rank among the happiest people in the world.
Why…? Maybe because they have a God-given sense of their purpose not only to survive, but to live.
Indeed, as the most-aired song of this present conflict eternally declares… Am Yisrael chai…the people of Israel live!
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Bill Adams serves as a Chaplain on the CCM/Medi-Share Spiritual Development team, helping to strengthen employees in their faith through rich biblical teaching and compassionate care. A graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, Bill served as an officer in the United States Army before going on to earn a Doctor of Divinity and Master of Arts in Judeo-Christian Synergism from Master’s International University of Divinity and a Master of Divinity from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary.
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