Not quite the envisaged visit
Social workers are overloaded by the number of cases in the wake of the Second Lebanon War and the Gaza pullout.
Photo: Ariel Jerozolimski [file]
The Sabbath day is dawning here. I cannot sleep because of the loud airplane movements in the skies over this area. I am writing from Haifa, Israel, where I have been for the past two weeks, since July 7. I have had the dubious privilege of experiencing the newest war against Israel. I am sitting (in bomb shelters) in the city that has been in the eye of the storm of rocket attacks by the Hizbullah terrorists. I will still stay through a third week, returning to Cincinnati on July 28, as we say here 'God willing.'
I had planned all year to take my vacation this month in Haifa, my home city, to help my parents' transition to an assisted living apartment on Mount Carmel. Obviously this move is postponed because all offices and institutions are closed because of the war. Also while I am here, Rachel, my mother-in-law who lives alone, had to undergo a series of operations. Now she is being moved from hospital to hospital as beds and staff are needed as the war wounded arrive.
My original vision for this Haifa visit was that I would balance my responsibilities as a daughter with some reflection and meditation time by taking frequent walks on the beach of the sparkling Mediterranean Sea, see a few concerts and drink coffee in outdoor cafes. Obviously, the Hizbullah rockets and resulting war conditions have changed everything.
When the Internet connection went down in my father's apartment, we were unable to repair it. Only food, pharmacy and emergency places are open. Stores and business and everything else are closed or canceled.
I am not in the best shape for communication, nor for much else. I have not yet found the words or feelings to describe the now tedious and nerve-racking air raid sirens and scramble into bomb shelters. How can you imagine the constant hustling of my blind mother and elderly father into our bomb shelter facilities, waiting for the rockets to crash with loud booms?
Yesterday a rocket fell within four blocks of the hospital where Rachel is, and the whole area was blocked. I was turned away, only to sit a good part of the afternoon with my own folks in our bomb shelter. We are under voluntary 'house arrest,' since we are given full instructions when not to venture out.
There is a ghost town around us because many people, particularly those with children, have left. I am not frightened, though the situation is frightening and very, very serious. Many friends and acquaintances call and offer to open their homes to us, even when they have other families of their own crowding in.
I spoke on the phone with a Holocaust survivor who lives in Cincinnati and is here in Haifa visiting her sister. She spoke about how we cannot shake off the feelings of being hated and hunted down wherever we seek refuge, and the dreaded sounds of the air raid sirens. We shared our deep-seated anxiety about how to describe the conditions here when we return to Cincinnati because - in spite of the awful feeling of helplessness and violation and profound fear - we feel that the government here is protecting us, looking out for each and every one of us, and that is an achievement, a victory, a true sense of security.
Racelle R. Weiman
Haifa (Cincinnati)
Staying put
The in-home 'security room' might well be termed a fool's paradise. With walls of reinforced poured concrete, it is reputed safe for all but a direct hit, and what are the odds of that, anyway? As we say around here, at any given time on the coastal road north of Nahariya, it's more likely you'll get killed or maimed in a highway accident than by a Katyusha. Perhaps the equation's shifted nowadays, with traffic sparse after so many local residents departed beyond the rockets' recently extended range.
As for us, we've chosen to stay put, declining the kind invitations of colleagues, friends and total strangers who offer home hospitality. All sorts of considerations went into this, too numerous and personal to detail here, and we repeatedly reconsider our options and the logistics involved. The other safe place, an underground shelter, isn't deemed preferable by most of our neighbors, many with far more experience than we've accrued in our two decades here. In essence, we're a security room community.
A description of the accommodations may prove enlightening to the uninitiated. Our younger daughter's bedroom, outfitted with a bunk bed/trundle set-up sleeping three, now resembles a jail cell for nonviolent offenders in a holding pattern awaiting trial while hoping that the movers and shakers will somehow arrange their release. Just a few paces away, for those with the urge and nerve, are the other rooms that contain all the amenities of home: better lighting, air conditioning, Internet connection, cold drinks, hot food, clean clothing, a selection of books and CDs (though no video: we're a TV-free family) and, of course, lavatory facilities. All of the above are only available at your own risk, though, as overt warnings are approximate and usually absent.
You'd think we'd be experts at identifying these by now, but with the peculiar acoustics of the humid Medi-terranean air it's hard to distinguish between outgoing fire and incoming, except for the whistling of the nearest ones and the dreaded, sharp crack of detonation. The more distant sounds evoke a sickly sense of guilty relief, knowing that everything overflying us will inevitably come down somewhere else. What is usually suppressed is the knowledge that it could just as easily be us next time - or the next.
To be honest, uppermost in my day-to-day awareness are hopes that the electricity won't fail because so much of my sense of well-being depends on the appliances' functioning. Past midnight or just before dawn, when for a few minutes I venture outside to walk the dog, I cherish the cool air and feel grateful for the scraps of normalcy we manage to preserve in the interim. So says a humble resident of the 'confrontation line' writing from the confines of her homely domain, yearning for a safe, sane future ASAP.
