It is another of those unimaginably tragic events that scar our memory and can never be expunged: the assassination of JFK, the murder of Yitzhak Rabin, and the multiple attacks of 9/11. And now, the horrendous Simchat Torah terror attack.
Proportionally, the number of victims of this outrage – still rising as I write these painful words – is already more than three times that of those killed at the Twin Towers and the Pentagon in 2001. The chilling, desperate whispers of Israelis trapped in their homes and hunted by the terrorists directly parallel the last calls of passengers on the fated planes – recorded for posterity at the 9/11 Museum in New York City – pleading for help and sending tearful last words of love to their families.
As the enormity of this crime begins to set in, we, as a nation, ask the obvious questions: How could we be so unprepared for what has happened? Where was our vaunted intelligence when we needed it most? How could we have underestimated the temerity and ability of Hamas to wreak such havoc? How did we dare, so cavalierly, to continually dismiss the bloodthirsty villains at our door as a “non-existential” threat?
The seeds of this disaster were planted the moment Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – curiously heralded as “Mr. Security” – capitulated to media pressure and freed more than 1,000 murderers in the Gilad Schalit fiasco. At that moment, Hamas understood that taking Jewish hostages was the surest way to wrest concessions from Israel and continue their murderous way. And so, they set about planning a mass kidnapping, in order to free all their fellow terrorists in Israeli jails and accelerate their genocidal plans.
The virtue of revenge
It has become politically incorrect to speak of revenge as a desirable or moral reaction. But Judaism absolutely upholds the virtue of revenge, when it is called for. Psalm 94, recited every Wednesday in our morning prayers, places nekama (revenge), between two names of God, giving it Divine validation. And the Torah records numerous wars of revenge that we carried out against our most despicable adversaries, such as the battle vs Midian (Numbers 27).
If we are to regain the trust of our government and armed forces, we must punish the terrorists of Gaza and their equally evil countrymen by delivering a mighty blow that will bring them to their knees and from which they will not soon recover. That means widespread, indiscriminate destruction of their cities and their society, akin to the fire-bombing of Dresden and the attacks upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki that crippled Germany and Japan.
Today, our family is commemorating the anniversary of our eldest son Ari’s death; he fell in battle against Hamas in 2002. He was a member of the elite anti-terror, General Staff Reconnaissance Unit of the Nahal Brigade, whose commander, Jonathan Steinberg, was killed in fighting on Saturday.
“The blood of our brothers cries out from the ground,” and must be avenged if our nation and its defenders are to resume their role as the proud protectors of Israel. History will record whether this day marks a surrender to terror, or a determination to expunge it from our midst.
The writer is director of the Ra’anana Jewish Outreach Center – jocmtv@netvision.net.il. His son, Sgt. Ari Weiss, fell in battle in Nablus on this date in 2002.