“Because a young child was wounded the police worked hard to catch the criminals, and by 2 a.m. the next morning four teenagers, aged 15 to 17, were under arrest,” wrote Seth Frantzman in his Terra Incognita column in yesterday’s Jerusalem Post.
I like Seth Frantzman. I don’t always agree with him, but he always makes me think. I prefer that to having my own views regurgitated back at me at regular intervals. Reading his work also helps distract me from my own writing work at Kars for Kids.
Here Frantzman refers to the stoning by Arabs of a Jewish car in a Jerusalem neighborhood, in which a 2 year-old baby sustained a head wound. The above cause and effect statement caught me up short. Is there an inverse theory to the idea expressed therein? Do the police expend less effort in catching those who attempt to murder Jews when no one gets hurt, or when an adult is injured? Is the effort only made when the attack occurs within the Green Line?
Does the type of injury count? Is a head wound worse than say, an ugly facial scar, or the loss of a finger? Excuse me for being graphic here, but that sentence really set me wondering. It made me think about the priorities of my government, who it is willing to protect, and how.
Brian of London made the point that had the police only gone vigorously after the Arab wannabe lynchers who “accidentally” attacked the Palestinian couple who looked too Jewish, Avigail Ben Zion would not now be lying in a hospital bed. I concur. Because when criminals are pursued and prosecuted with the full vigor of the law, it serves as a deterrent factor and drives down crime.
Note that crime in Judea and Samaria is up 120%. I live in Judea and have for the past 28 years which is why I don’t need statements from senior IDF commanders to tell me that crime is way up in my area. I have personally attended some of the rallies and protests related to the recent surge of nationalistic crimes by Arabs against Jewish drivers in Yesha (Judea and Samaria).
It doesn’t help that settlers have their hands tied. God forbid that we should shoot the people who threaten us on the road. If we do, we are arrested, while the police just don’t work too hard to find those who would kill us with stones, Molotov cocktails, bombs, knives, or guns.
And when we get arrested, it is reported that we merely “claim” we shot in self-defense, thus giving lie to the idea that rocks are thrown to kill. Rock-throwing is not a hobby, as much as Jodi Rudoren of the NY Times would wish us to believe. Rock-throwing is attempted murder. Every time it happens.
Similarly, it doesn’t help when the government releases Jew-murderers from prison. What will stop these released killers from going out to murder more Jews when they know that with the slightest nudge from Abbas and Kerry, they can get out of jail free? The murderers win and the victims and would be victims, God forbid, lose.
And then, of course, we confront a dishonest and persistent narrative by the world media that is a study in opposites. The settler, who builds a home and lives in his historic heartland, is demonized as the evil perpetrator, an “occupier,” while those who attempt to murder him and dream of a Judenrein state are portrayed as victims and “freedom fighters.”
I don’t want to moan and groan about this state of affairs any longer. I want my country to adequately protect me and my children. We know what’s going on here: our government fears to upset the international community so it doesn’t defend its citizens and doesn’t allow its citizens to defend themselves. If the police arrest Arab boys for rock-throwing, the world is going to scream to the heavens, call it Apartheid, and talk about little boys at “play” being treated like the criminals they are by the IDF or the Israeli police.
But ah, when a little girl is hurt in the head, then the government feels it has a little leeway to act against the perpetrators. Then the police will work hard to catch those terrorists no matter their nationality or age.
It’s time for the Israeli government and its police force to get their priorities straight. The number one priority should be ensuring the safety of Israelis and Jews. Because we already know that the world will not. Witness the Geneva agreement.
Don’t encourage the violence by looking the other way when it happens over the green line, or because the injured is an adult. And for heaven’s sake, don’t release terrorists from prison.
We can only count on ourselves.
