Ballistic Missiles, Apples and Honey
The New Year brings PTSD and gratitude
Update: Iran launched 181 ballistic missles at Israel on October 1, and miraculously no Israelis were killed.
This isn’t the Erev Rosh Hashanah email I thought I would write. I want to write about the holy day and its spiritual potential to change our lives and our future. I wanted to write about my TikTok channel and how it can be used to educate and inspire. I wanted to write about Teshuva, Tefilah, and Tzedakah, the main themes of this time of year.
But Iran is launching missiles at Israel now.
So, I refer you to some Rosh Hashanah ideas I have written about: Rosh Hashanah and solar energy, believing in your potential, or using food to inspire spiritual growth.
Ballistic missiles kill lots of people indiscriminately, and they disturb me intensely.
When I was a student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1990, the US invaded Iraq, and Saddam Hussein and the US were at war. They canceled classes.
All the other Hebrew University overseas students left Israel except for me and another student. I love Israel and didn't want to abandon it. I have family in Tel Aviv, Afula, and Jerusalem. My brother was on a gap year program at Kibbutz Urim in the south, and they needed help in the fields. So, I decided to stay with him and help however I could. The thought that staying in Israel was putting me in harm’s way wasn’t even a calculation.
On January 18, 1991, Hussein began firing SCUD missiles at Israel.
The Soviets first deployed these SCUD missiles in the mid-1960s. The rocket was initially designed to carry a 100-kiloton nuclear warhead or a 2,000-pound conventional warhead, and Its principal threat was its potential to hold chemical or biological agents.
We were all instructed in the use of gas masks because Hussein threatened to send deadly chemical weapons inside the SCUDs. We created sealed rooms and stayed in them for hours as the SCUDs were being launched. The gas masks were hot and uncomfortable. I felt awful for the children and babies in their masks and sealed cribs.
The SCUDs were mass terrorism designed to frighten all of us. And it worked. Sitting in the sealed rooms was terrifying. We had a radio that would give out occasional updates and warnings. There was no internet. There were no smartphones. There was nothing to watch on TV.
Communications were so different that it’s hard to remember. There were phones and radio and TV. The next day, you read the newspaper to discover what happened the previous day.
Even when the war started, I didn't realize it. I was in the Kibbutz clubhouse playing pool that night, and when I got back to my room, my brother had taped a note on the door saying that the war had started and that I should hurry to the sealed room.
Eventually, after many trips to the sealed rooms, it seemed that Hussein wasn't sending chemical agents, which would have likely provoked an Israel nuclear response. So, after a few weeks, I didn't run to sealed rooms when the sirens went off.
The SCUD could take out a whole block. Miraculously, before the advent of Israel’s current missile defense array, no one was killed by the SCUDs directly. The Patriot missile batteries supplied by the US were able to destroy most of the incoming SCUDs.
PTSD
But there was damage to my psyche.
Years later, I looked back at my response and actions and realized I was traumatized by the entire episode. I never returned to classes at Hebrew University. I spent much more time on the kibbutz and then went on a trip to work with Jewish students in Istanbul, Budapest, and Poland.
Every time Israel is threatened with ballistic missiles, it triggers a PTSD response in me. I didn’t know how to handle the existential threat of weapons of mass destruction at age twenty-one. Who did?
I remember back on the kibbutz being initially very afraid of what might happen to my family in Tel Aviv, to thousands and thousands of innocent Jews being targeted by a madman lashing out against Israel for its war with the US. And I buried that fear deep down and acted as if everything was OK.
I remember going out for beers with my close friend in Jerusalem one night in the middle of the war. When the radio blared “Nachash Shefa”—the code for missiles being launched at Israel—we kept drinking beer.
The bartender ran out, leaving us alone in the bar. We sang and helped ourselves to another beer. I no longer ran for the shelters but looked into the sky to see if I could spot the Patriot missiles taking out the SCUDS.
Iran says they will attack Israel very soon again. Iran has many ballistic missiles in its arsenal, and its most deadly is the Khorramshahr-4 missile, which has a 1,500 kg payload.
According to Google, “Ballistic missiles can create explosive damage radii that can range from 1.06 km for a short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) to 1.99 km for an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM). In an urban area, these explosions can cause up to 77,600 casualties for an SRBM and up to 132,510 casualties for an IRBM.”
Prayer and Gratitude
Please pray for Israel.
We are blessed and fortunate that the US has stationed its aircraft carriers and troops nearby to help knock out these missiles.
I am so grateful that Israel has an array of antiballistic missile capabilities to protect all its citizens from G-d willing Iran’s deadly arsenal.
May God protect Israel! May Iran’s terror regime cease to exist speedily in our days!
May all the children of Abraham live in a world at peace.
May the world see that our common humanity and future are intrinsically tied to how we treat one another and our environment.
May you be written for a sweet and healthy year in the Book of Good Life.
Shana Tova!