The attack in Israel was shocking on so many levels, I have found it very hard to speak about openly. Mainly because people I spoke to held the most shocking views I had ever heard. Comments that hurt to the core of my very being. As an asylum seeker in hiding from threats to kill me by a number of males having given evidence in a High Court case about sex offending still serving police officer and his associates in England I felt really vulnerable myself at the time of the attacks.
The morning I heard about the terror attacks I was curled up in bed. The radio was on, I was drinking a cup of tea and the newsreader announced in clippped English a terror attack in Israel.
This is a headline I have heard many times in my 51 years. Yet this time the numbers were huge, hostages taken and the use of horrific sexual violence by terrorists and torture. This was something I just could not even comprehend. The men were filming the attack on a livestream and calling mothers to boast about how many Jews they had killed. This unbelievable horror. the worst terrorist attack since 9/11 and the largest slaughter of Jews since the holocaust. This all unfolded on a kibbutz. A place I am familiar with as my mums brother lived on one when I was a child. A rite of passage like military service. At the time there was no indication to me that this was anything unusual. Although none of my friends in childhoods had famillies living in Israel.
There was something about this attack that was different and over these months I have discovered why and only now am I able to eloquently express this from a place of having any knowledge and the feelings that these horrors raised in me of rage, disbelief and then a dull numbness at the street parties that followed.
What I knew before this attack was that area that everyone in the West calls Gaza is actually Israel and is a region. Not unlike Hampshire in England. It is small in size and had previously been a British colony. They unlike the Rothschilds ( who paid for large parts of the land of Israel to bring together a state whereby the holocaust could never happen again.) had not paid for the land. It was however prosperous. After the holocaust this land was handed to the Israeli state that had been set up with the land the Rothschild’s had purchased. Of course at that time there were Jews living in Israel.
Here it gets.a bit fuzzy for me as I was not there or party to those negotiations. However the Israeli state grew exponentially, enterprising and creative people built. It seems that they did this not to be a Jewish supremacist power state, but because after holocaust they knew that there was huge murderous hatred for Jews and they had suffered throughout history. The holocaust was the systematic ethnic cleansing on an entire continent, with unspeakable torture and treatment of Jews. The democracy grew and flourished and areas of Israel attracted poorer people from Egypt, Syria and others parts of the Arab world. Attracted no doubt by the thriving economy being created and opportunities for development. However many Arabic states want to gain influence in the West to build thriving communities that have historically had dark links to murderous terrorists, who align themselves with religion, not unlike the IRA. These terrorists have very clear aims and in the Middle East this includes murdering Jews. Although historically Anglicans were also target of attacks, 9/11, 7/7 I could go on.
All terror attacks are horrific and the loss of innocent life is devastating. Growing up I saw regularly terrorism against Israel. It was so usual and included, taking entire aircraft’s hostage, demanding large sums of cash in return for the hostages lives. The television often had news stories of terrorist attacks within Israel. Car bombings, shootings and later suicide bombings. This was during the time of the IRA in England. I recognised this terrorism. I often glanced under the car just in case, or worried what happened if they blew up a building when I was on a regular stay in London. During one terror attack my daughter was in London as machete wielding men stabbed and murdered their way through an area of revellers.
I was also very aware that across areas of the world where terrorists operated or state coups, that rape of women was a very common and horrific occurrence. I also found out that state rape was also authorised ( unlike Israel and most western democracies ) by England. Having been subject to this treatment myself I was all too aware of this. Yet the horrors in Israel were like a mirror into familial violence I have heard and seen about all my life in England. 200 women are murdered by men in England every year. Children are also murdered regularly. Sexual violence is so commonplace against women and children that it is almost no longer illegal in many respects. Raping your wife is legal and threats to kill women are so usual I cannot count the number of times a man has threatened to kill me in my 51 years.
Yet to see seven years of familial violence ( in UK stats ) committed in just a few hours on camera on a kibbutz in Israel was the ultimate horror. That the area of Gaza had been segregated a few years ago. This is like the neighbours breaking into your home and committing seven years of familial violence towards famillies, children, babies and young people having a huge party.
Every victim was Jewish, the largest number of Jews murdered since the holocaust and it was in their own homeland. I was so numb I haven’t cried yet. over 100 people were taken hostage, I say people but this included babies children elderly and others. Driven into the area of Israel occupied and run by terrorists. These innocent people were apparently held in tunnels, a network that was dug of some 650 miles. More that the British subway system in England. Used to store weapons under the makeshift school, churches, and the burnt out buildings. These once positive Arabs who sought a better future settling in Israel, now the pawns of terrorists from outside of Israel using them as human shields to condemn Israel, who over years have had to cross the border or try and stop the terror attacks.
Israel paused after the attacks, as did I, long enough to pack a bag and leave England. I watched the hate marches on the television, I heard the shouts of infatada, holy war, calls for Genocide of Jews in Israel. I watched some of the live feed that was released by Israel, yet the images so horrific I could not breathe without a feeling of anger inside me so strong that it was almost a physical pain. I could not describe…
I knew very small amount of history of Israel, except I know a lot about terrorism and how it can be so difficult to stop terror attacks from happening.
I placed my blogging and release of my first book on hold. I have spent some time learning about Israels history and my own mothers heritage. Yet this attack for me raised too many questions about the antisemitism that followed. The hatred the lies the denial of particularly the sexual violence was sickening. Even with a live stream of murder and torture, still people throughout the west called Jews liars and white supremacists ( except that many Jews are not actually cascasian. I still haven’t cried properly, it has resolved me to visit Israel as soon as possible and I turned over this blog about gender violence to the Jewish nations horrific targeting and campaigned on social media to release hostages.
I still hear the antisemitism but in truth the war that Israeli is undertaking is a war between light and Dark and where there is darkness light always wins out ! Because we have made torches and technology to make sure that it does!!
Bring Them Home now, Never again is now, I stand with Israel forever ….
