Friday, September 18, 2015

A 10-minute walk home should not be a ‎statement

...My heart was beating through my chest when I got to the promenade, and ‎while I may have gotten home unharmed, the damage was done long ‎before I got there. A man died this week, as others have before him, at ‎the hands of terrorism and complacency. Because terrorism ‎isn't merely the attack; it's the aftermath, leading to a slippery slope from ‎normalcy to adaptation. Giving up on normalcy is giving up on life, and ‎compromising freedom to avoid a war means you're already in one, ‎playing an endless game of catch-up to save your life. ‎

Annika Hernroth-Rothstein..
Israel Hayom..
17 September '15..

It's a beautiful evening on the eve of the holiday, and I am walking back from dinner ‎through Jerusalem, where the dust has barely settled. I would have ‎stopped to admire the view from the hill, but I was making my way from ‎my friends' house in Nof Zion to my apartment in Abu Tur, which means ‎crossing the village of Jabel Mukaber‎. I'm walking briskly in spite of the ‎steep incline, attempting to look relaxed and self-assured, but my heart is ‎racing as I realize this may not have been the best idea. Cars pass, ‎someone throws a can in my general direction, yelling something I fail to ‎understand. The people I pass speak to me but I stay silent, keeping my ‎pace as I race for the Haas Promenade. ‎

Over the holiday of Rosh Hashanah, there have been repeated clashes ‎between Israeli police and Palestinians on the Temple Mount. Palestinians have been stockpiling rocks and firecrackers to throw at ‎non-Muslims visiting the holy site. This is after months of escalating ‎intimidation, with radical Islamic groups flocking to the Temple ‎Mount to harass and even physically attack non-Muslims at the site. ‎Since just before Rosh Hashanah, the State of Israel has been, finally, ‎cracking down on these highly illegal tactics, attempting to protect ‎everyone's freedom of religion, and as a result, the Muslim extremists ‎have been stepping up their game. ‎

Upon entering Al-Aqsa mosque, where rioters were barricading ‎themselves, Israeli police found not only rocks, firecrackers and ‎concrete, but also pipe bombs designed to blow up the entrance to the ‎Temple Mount should non-Muslims try to enter. ‎

But the violence is not contained to, or solely focused on, the Temple Mount. On ‎Monday evening, a family traveling back from a holiday dinner was ‎attacked by rock throwers in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Talpiot. The ‎assailants, believed to be Palestinian residents of the nearby Sur Baher‎ neighborhood, reportedly hurled rocks at the moving car, causing ‎it to crash into a pole. The driver, 64-year-old Alexander Levlovich, later ‎died as a result of the terrorist attack, while the two passengers riding ‎with him sustained minor injuries. ‎

My friends told me not to walk through Jabel Mukaber alone, but I did ‎anyway. Not to be cocky, not to act a fool, but because I couldn't accept ‎that I needed a bodyguard just to walk back from dinner. The precautions ‎taken by me and by us, the Jews walking the streets of Jerusalem, are ‎already too many and too accepted, gradually turning into normalcy when they ‎should be anything but. While many countries and many cities have ‎areas where one does not necessarily want to go, Jerusalem is unique ‎in that we have areas where Jews cannot go without risking their lives, ‎whereas our attackers are not beholden to such limitations. What is ‎theirs is theirs, and what is ours is theirs, as well. ‎


Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday, during a visit to the site of the ‎recent terrorist attack in Jerusalem, that he intended to "declare war" on rock throwers, increasing minimum sentences for such attacks as well ‎as giving greater leeway to police and the military to intervene. However, ‎during the same impromptu press conference, Netanyahu reiterated ‎Israel's commitment to the status quo on the Temple Mount, which allows ‎Jews to visit but not pray there. ‎

The problem with addressing one, while ignoring the other, is that the ‎signal of strength Netanyahu is attempting to send comes off as little more than ‎an empty gesture. Either he and his administration are committed to ‎keeping the Jews of Jerusalem safe or they are not. The stones thrown ‎on the mount are connected to those thrown in the streets, and by ‎ignoring the first, the government is exasperating the second, ‎cherry-picking on issues of life and death. ‎

Before I left my Abu Tur apartment that night, my friend insisted that I ‎shouldn't walk alone. You are walking from one Arab village to another, ‎she said, and making a point just isn't worth the risk. As sad as it is, she ‎was right, and as angry as it makes me, it was probably the last time I ‎make that particular journey. A 10-minute walk should not be a ‎statement, just as praying on the Temple Mount should not be activism. But they ‎are, and we allow them to be, forgetting that human rights apply to Jews ‎and that coexistence means being met halfway rather than fruitlessly ‎going the distance. ‎

My heart was beating through my chest when I got to the promenade, and ‎while I may have gotten home unharmed, the damage was done long ‎before I got there. A man died this week, as others have before him, at ‎the hands of terrorism and complacency. Because terrorism ‎isn't merely the attack; it's the aftermath, leading to a slippery slope from ‎normalcy to adaptation. Giving up on normalcy is giving up on life, and ‎compromising freedom to avoid a war means you're already in one, ‎playing an endless game of catch-up to save your life. ‎

Link: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=13757

Annika Hernroth-Rothstein is a political adviser, activist and writer on the Middle East, religious affairs ‎and global anti-Semitism.‎ Follow her on Twitter @truthandfiction.

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