by Yossi Achimeir, journalist and former politician, translated by Hillel Fendel.
The trauma
of Oct. 7th is not over, the war continues – and Israel lives on.
It's now been
nearly 15 months that Israel has been living in the shadow of the trauma of
Oct. 7th. The horrendous calamity that fell with a frightful thud
that morning of Simchat Torah has swollen into a multi-front war, unprecedented
since our War of Independence. The matches lit on the Gaza envelope have set
raging fires in the northern border and Judea and Samaria as well, ignited by
the pyromaniacs sitting in Tehran.
The flames,
of course, have not yet gone out. Even though two of our greatest enemies –
Hamas in the south and Hizbullah in the north - have been soundly defeated, the
Ayatollahs in Iran have not given up their dream to destroy the Jewish State,
and are actively employing their third proxy - the Houthis in Yemen – to this
end.
Just like
the Yom Kippur War 51 years ago, the current war also took Israel by surprise –
and both were grave blunders that endangered our very existence. Both of them might
have been avoided were it not for complacency on our side.
But our
national will was strong. Though we abruptly found ourselves nearly overwhelmed
both times, the IDF was able not only to recover, but also to repel the
enemies, strike them cripplingly in their own territories, and thwart their
plans. However, both times we paid a very steep price in the blood of our
soldiers and citizens.
The main
difference between the two is that the Yom Kippur War lasted three weeks, while
the current war has not yet reached its absolute conclusion. Most Israelis
continue to live the good life, while its best sons, in the standing army and
in the reserves, continue to meet the challenges both north and south, far from
their families and jobs. The Israel Air Force has successfully sent its long
arms thousands of kilometers away, both to Iran and to Yemen – and with all
this, the work is far from completed.
We
sometimes believe that we will finally be able to breathe easily as soon as we totally
obliterate Iran's nuclear and other military capabilities. Is this true?
Though we
are the only country in the world under constant threat from all directions,
Israel has a strong military capacity that seems to reveal itself most
impressively when we are under attack – and often, after terrible internal fiascos
that seem to have invited the enemy upon us. In the current case, the enemy
appears to have identified the weaknesses eating away at us from within, issues
that bring us too close for comfort to civil war. And yet, over the past year, we
were able to climb up from the depths of defeat almost to the pinnacle of
victory and national pride. The Middle East geopolitical map has been turned
upside down, with the long-time attackers and war-mongerers having brought upon
themselves death, destruction and suffering that will require many years of
recovery.
But really
this war is simply the last in a chain of hostilities that have been forced
upon Israel throughout its 76 years. Basically, it's been one long, 76-year
war. It would be a mistake to think that Oct. 7th is behind us, and
that we have well learned the lessons it presented us. Just consider last
week's terrorist murder of Holocaust survivor Ludmila Lipovsky, 83 years old, on
Holocaust Martyrs St. in Herzliya. That was her own private Oct. 7th
– parallel to the national Oct. 7th that cruelly snuffed out the
lives of 1200 Israelis in their homes and at an outdoors festival.
We must
internalize that the extremist Muslims' uncontrolled hatred for us, wherever
they are, is far from extinguished. They will continue to seek to murder and
maim us – Israelis and other Jews alike. Even when our security forces manage,
without fanfare or recognition, to thwart hundreds of attacks a year, there
could still be one lone attack that could pass under the radar and bring death
and tragedy upon us. We are at perpetual war with fanatic, implacable enemies
who, as it looks now, will never accept our existence.
Dangers
also face us from the "quiet" Jordanian border. The Hashemite
Kingdom, with which we have a peace agreement, is facing the threat of
destabilization by Iranian elements. We also have a treaty with Egypt, which for
some reason has begun arming itself to the teeth. And even in crumbling Syria,
the dreaded Assad regime is in the process of being replaced by an unknown
quantity – i.e., not only the rebels, but partially also Erdogan's threatening
Turkish forces.
What we
can do is the following: We must not ever give our enemies reason to believe
that we are crumbling from within, busy with our own disputes and arguments
while ignoring the threats from without. And 15 months after Oct. 7th,
the IDF needs a new leadership, ready to spring like a lion, aware and ready
for all scenarios
I read recently of a small, little-known country named the Kingdom of Bhutan. It is barely 1.5 times the size of Israel, with less than 1/12 of our population. Despite its precarious location between superpowers China in the north and India in the south, this "Land of Happiness," as it is known, manages to live in peace and serenity, away from major headlines. Israel is far from being Bhutan or Switzerland, but it is still the "Jewish Kingdom of Happiness" – even if in the coming years we will continue having to live on our sword.