Another Day, Another Funeral

Another Day, Another Funeral

May 10, 2001

Yesterday, at 7:06 in the morning my beeper started buzzing. The words on the screen were chilling: “Two boys from Tekoa were found dead in a cave in the Judean Desert. There are signs of mutilation on their bodies.”

The 2 boys, Kobi Mandell and Yosef Ishran, both 14 years old, were so badly mutilated that they were unrecognizable. The two bodies had to be pathologically examined in order to positively identify them. The killers pelted them with huge rocks and then hacked at them.  They then buried them in a cave underneath a mound of rocks, leaving only their feet visible. The murderers then wrote slogans on the walls of the cave with their victim’s blood.

At the funeral the killers were called beasts. This is an inaccurate description, as it degrades animals. There is no word in the human language to describe the species of creature that murdered these two boys.

At the funeral it also was said that the cause of the killing was continued incitement, broadcast on palestinian television and radio. This too, is not accurate. Arabs murdered and mutilated Jews long before the television was invented.

For example, Hebron in 1929. Sixty seven Jews were brutally murdered and almost 70 others were wounded. What types of injuries? Fingers and hands were cut off  others were axed in the head. Women and young girls were raped, others were tortured. One man, the baker, was thrown into the oven by his Arab employee. Others were broiled by kerosene burners. Some lived and some died.

Those who insist that 1929 is ancient history - several months ago two Israeli soldiers were butchered in Ramallah. After being slaughtered their bodies were dropped from windows and dragged through the streets. Their deaths were perpetrated by creatures dressed up in uniforms, adorned by the insignia of the palestinian ‘police’. 

What was accurately expressed at the funeral is, that in the eyes of the Arabs, only a dead Jew is a good Jew.

It is time to grasp simple facts:

1.         The Arabs are our enemy. They are not a ‘peace partner.’

2.         Yassir Arafat is the leader of the largest terrorist organization in the world, hiding behind the name ‘the Palestinian Authority.’

3.         The only way to fight fire is with fire.

Not too long ago, when discussing options available to the Israel Defense Forces, and particularly the retaking of land transferred to Arafat, we were told by a senior government official, “There are rules to combat which must not be violated.”

This is utter nonsense. War is war. Arafat understands this. He will do anything and everything to achieve victory. It makes no difference to him how many people die, whether they are Arab or Jew, whether they are 10 months old, 14 years old or 83 years old. His aim is to win and the ends justify the means.

Israel has yet to learn this. There cannot be rules of war. The Nazis knew no rules of war 60 years ago when they annihilated six to seven million Jews. Arafat is continuing where Hitler left off. His goal is the eradication of the State of Israel, to be achieved via terror, world pressure (cloaked behind euphemistic ‘diplomacy’) and the ‘right of return’ of millions of ‘palestinian refugees into “Israel proper”.

Yesterday, following news of the murder, Labor MK Haim Ramon described on Israeli radio his proposal to renew negotiations with the devil. His idea revolves around implementation of a third, 10 to 15 percent Israeli withdrawal from Yesha. This, in return for a cessation of hostilities and a return to the negotiating table.

How dense can even a politician be? Ten to fifteen percent of Yesha is ten to fifteen Tel-Avivs. Israel is supposed to reward Arafat for 7 months of war and almost 80 dead? Israel is expected to grant a prize to Arafat for sponsoring the horrific slaying of Shalhevet Pass, Kobi Mandell and Yosef Ishran? 

So, what is Ariel Sharon waiting for? Yesterday, at the funeral, Education Minister Limur Livnat, seeing the two murdered boys stretched out in front of her, looking as shocked as all of us, said, “we (the government) have made changes in our policies but we haven’t done enough.”

When will they ‘do enough?” Arafat’s forces now have ground to air missiles which can knock airplanes out of the sky. (Sports minister Matan Vilnai said two days ago that the Strella anti-aircraft missiles that the Palestinians have "do not endanger people - just aircraft".) So what is Sharon waiting for: a passenger plane with 400 people aboard to get hit by an Arafat-signed missile? Only then will he officially ‘declare war’ on Arafat?

This past Monday night, Arabs killed 48 year old Aryeh Arnaldo Agronyoni, from Ma'aleh Yisrael, near Ariel. Last Tuesday Arabs murdered 30 year old Assaf Hershkowitz from Ofra, three months after murdering his father, Aryeh. On April 28 Sgt. Shlomo Elmakias, 20, of Netanya, was killed in a drive-by terrorist shooting attack on the Wadi Ara highway in the Galilee. On Sunday April 22 Dr. Mario Goldin, 53, of Beit Levenstein Rehabilitation Center, was killed, the result of a suicide bombing in Kfar Saba. Yesterday, Kobi Mandell and Yosef Ishran from Tekoa. Today, two Romanian workers on the Gazza-Kisufim border.

I have pasted on my wall in the office a full page advertisement from the Jerusalem Post . It shows a picture of six year old Na’ama Didovsky, daughter of murdered teacher Rina Didovsky, crying at her mother’s funeral. The page is titled, “Another Day, Another Orphan.”

A new full page ad must be printed, headlined:

"Another Day, Another Funeral."