One of my favorite aspects of living in Israel is the feeling of solidarity between Israelis during the tough times. And since the times are by definition always tough due to the fact that a not insignificant portion of the world would like us wiped off the planet (manifested by terrorism or support for terrorism), there is plenty of solidarity to go around.
Why do I mention this? Well, it has been a year since IDF soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev were kidnapped by Hizbullah terrorists. As a show of solidarity, many of the top Israeli websites, such as the Jerusalem Post, Walla!, nrg, ynet, msn, Army Radio, Israel Radio, keshet, reshet, nana,and tapuz ceased all their online activity for five minutes, starting from 9:05AM. For instance, when I went over to the JPost website at this time, this is what I was greeted with:
As the Post explains:
Instead of the JPost.com site, a unique page titled “The soldiers cannot be found”, which is a play on the words, “Page cannot be found,” the message which sometimes appears when an inactive website is loaded.
Yeah, I got it.
In any event, may you all be so lucky to merit living in a country such as this.
Update: Speaking of solidarity, please keep in your prayers also the family of 21-year-old Staff-Sergeant Arbel Reich, who was killed this morning during an IDF operation in Gaza.
[His high school teacher].. said that he stood out among his classmates. “When they coined the phrase ‘salt of the earth,’ it was for people like him. He was decent, sensitive and always willing to help.”
Hagit Baruch, Arbel’s high-school literature teacher said: “Arbel loved life and loved his friends. School did not really interest him. He only decided to take the bagrut (matriculation) exams towards the end of his senior year.”
Update: Mobius has managed to capture screenshots from many (if not all) the sites this morning.
