We went yesterday to Itamar, the West Bank settlement where Udi and Ruth Fogel, and their children--Yoav, age 11, Elad, age 4, and Hadas, their 3-month-old daughter--were murdered. A detail that wasn't widely reported, or reported anywhere that I've seen, is that their newborn baby was decapitated. . .Sadly, I think she is right. One can't have a conversation with savages who decapitate your babies when they get a chance and then celebrate in the streets. Israel is increasingly isolated and increasingly dependent on its army alone for its survival. We pray that no major crisis/war occurs until this anti-Israel president has been removed from office by the democratic process.
One very quick point I'll make is that this was clearly not a family above all of "settlers"--some alien species that exists primarily as a political bargaining point--but of human beings. In the home next door to the one that was invaded, kids' clothing was hanging on the line next to a child's bicycle. You simply cannot look at that and think, "This story is above all about land and politics." This story is above all about murder. They were children and they were murdered. Two more children were orphaned. The children were targeted deliberately. This was a premeditated murder--not a crime of passion or self-defense--and it was a psychotically savage crime. Anyone who in any way tries to rationalize or minimize this or to suggest that this is a fitting punishment for anything needs to go out and look at a three-month-old baby and ask himself what it would take to climb over a fence, climb in a window, and cut off that child's head. If that act seems an "understandable" reaction to a political grievance to him, I don't think we can have much of a conversation."
Mark Steyn has a reflection on this tragedy bitterly entitled: "Dead Jews is No News." He writes:
The Western media has covered itself with shame once again. Its selective moral outrage grows less believable with every incident like this. The real motivations behind the de-legitimization of Israel are every bit as ugly as this atrocity. In fact, they are identical.On Friday night, twelve-year old Tamar Fogel came home to find both her parents, Ruth and Udi Fogel, two brothers Yoav (11) and Elad (four), and her three-month old sister Hadas murdered in their beds. They had had their throats cut and been stabbed through the heart.
That’s not shocking: There is no shortage of young Muslim men who would enjoy slitting the throat of a three-month old baby, and then head home dreaming of the town square or soccer tournament to be named in their honor.
Back in Gaza, the citizenry celebrated the news by cheering and passing out sweets.
That’s not shocking, either: In the broader Palestinian death cult, there are untold legions who, while disinclined to murder Jews themselves, are content to revel in the glorious victory of others.
And out in the wider world there was a marked reluctance to cover the story.
No comments:
Post a Comment