Last weekend we escaped. Couldn’t stay in Tel Aviv a moment longer. Day in and day out, every channel on Israeli TV shows how Israel is suffering: Israeli’s fleeing their homes; shortages of food, towns, villages & cities hit by +2500 rockets, the economy is reeling, etc, etc.
And when you switch over to the international news you see the same, only worse in Lebanon.
The Home Front has advised Tel Aviv residents to prepare for an emergency. At the office we were asked if we could take in refugees from the north. My neighbour – who has seen war here three times since the 60s – advised me to stock up on supplies.
So we hired a car and went away. For the first time in two-and-a half years, I drove a car. And what fun I had. So good to be back on the road. Generally I was OK but on two separate occasions my girlfriend asked me “Russ, why are you driving on the left…?”
And I swerved hurriedly back into the right lane. I’m from South Africa and I made aliyah two years ago. We drive on the “other side” of the road.
First stop, Ashkelon, to visit my girlfriend’s aunt. Arriving at 10am we sat on the balcony and had brunch. In the distance you could hear soft rolling booms. It reminded me of the summer storms that wash Johannesburg late in the afternoon. “What’s that, I asked, wondering if kassam rockets were hitting Ashkelon again? We knew they had hit every other day that week.
“Oh, that’s just the army, shelling Gaza. It’s not kassam’s. Don’t worry. The kassams only start hitting Ashkelon at 3 o clock and continue into the night. Kol hazman (all the time). You’ll be on your way long before that.”
And we were. That afternoon we stopped at a monastery – Bet Jemal – built on a hill overlooking the town of Bet Shemesh. What a lovely locale. Calm. Serene. Peaceful. The monks and nuns come there to pray and make pottery and wine. We bought a bottle of the latter and a bottle of port and wondered around the monastery.
The nuns had an amazing energy. The air was thick with it, or so I felt. It was like warm water, everywhere.
What a lovely place, we said. Let’s camp overnight in the olive groves and at 4 in the morning we can continue our journey to En Gedi and the Dead Sea.
We made a simple meal on the gas cooker I just bought for the trip, pitched our tent and watched the stars come out. Unfamiliar constellations to those of us who live in the southern hemisphere. Then my neighbour called to tell us about the suicide bombers roaming Tel Aviv. “Don’t go out!” he begged.
“Too late,” I replied.
Later he called back to say that one – a woman – had been caught but the city was closed down as they were hunting for another. “You are MAD. You can’t camp out. THIS IS WAR and the Arabs cross into Israel around the wall through the West Bank. You never know what will happen to you!”
“Thanks for the warning and your concern, we’ll be fine,” I replied
We went to bed early. At midnight my girlfriend woke me up. “Can you feel it? Oh my God!” The shelling was continuing.
Israel is a small country and while we had driven for an hour away from Ashkelon, we could still hear the bombardment. We could feel it as well; the earth trembling beneath our sleeping bags. Booooom boooom baboooommmm … softly, over the hills and far away…
This carried on until 3am. Those poor Palestinians, we both thought. At this point my girlfriend was jumping at every noise outside, and I … well I just wanted to sleep.
Then the jets took off. You could hear them firing their afterburners… RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR and then take off rrrrrrrWOOOSHHH. This carried on for another hour as they flew over Gaza.
At 3h30am a rave party started somewhere in the forest… Doof Doof Doof.
At 4am we left. I’d had two hours sleep after having driven the entire day but it was too surreal to stick around any longer.
An hour later we entered Jerusalem. And promptly got lost – three times – trying to get on the correct road to the Dead Sea. It seems that Israeli roads are seldom numbered. Take Route One; come to an off-ramp where the entire highway diverges. None of the new routes are numbered and you get lost.
Which is not good because Jerusalem is surrounded by Arab towns. Not a problem for me, but for my girlfriend, who is obviously Israeli, it’s not a chance worth taking. We’d be safer if we were driving into a location sometime in the 80’s in South Africa.
And it’s those experiences I had growing up in South Africa that lead me to believe that not everyone is out to get you, just because they have all been tarred with the “enemy brush”. But here the mutual hatred, the animosity, seems to suggest otherwise and no-one wants to listen.
I think a great deal has changed in the 15 years that have passed since I first visited Israel. Years ago I met Israeli’s who were all to keen to make peace with “our cousins”, but I believe the suicide bombers changed all that. They ratcheted up the violence to a horrendous level and today both sides have seen too much of the abyss to be in the same room together, let alone talk of peace.
But what do I know?
Finding the road at last we sped off towards En Gedi to find our secret hideout before the sunrise. On the inhospitable, mosquito-infested, garbage-strewn shores of the Dead Sea there is a natural Jacuzzi bubbling out of the bowels of the earth. A fresh-water spring that feeds the sea, it’s filled with soft sand. Climbing in you quickly sink up to your waist, immersed in the earth, while warm water bubbles up all around you. In the past we have shared it with a bunch of hippies, and even a couple of yeshiva students.
When you feel like a change of pace you climb out and walk into the sea. The water is so warm, and with the high salt content, you can float easily away across to Jordan. There are public beaches, but we prefer our private little cove.
By midday we were exhausted and slept in the car. That afternoon we took a drive to the caves at Kumran. Having spent several hours at the site – we were photographing tourists: Japanese, Indians, Mexicans, English and Australians – we made our way back to Jerusalem. Passed some tank transporters, slowly grinding their way up north. Yes we got lost again.
That evening I went to the Western Wall to pray. For family, for friends, for peace… then we walked through the Arab Quarter, then to the promenade overlooking the city from the West to people-watch. At one point a white limo, flanked by revving motorbikes, sped by, followed by SUVs and Mercedes Benzes, with shabbier cars taking up the rear. A wedding convoy for two wealthy Arab families. Jews and Arabs applauded as they raced by.
We brewed coffee while sitting on a bench in the park and watched the sun set at last. The Sabbath Peace was over. Driving back, we listened to the news: three suicide bombers caught in Tel Aviv (bringing that to a total of FIVE for the week); while in Gaza, the Palestinians had declared a ceasefire. No more kassam rockets to be fired at Israel. Israel, for its part, would stop the targeted assassinations of known terrorists. Negotiations were underway to release the first kidnapped soldier. It wasn’t picked up by the international news.
Within 24 hours the truce was shattered by Islamic Jihad and their friends who declared “No deal with Israel.” They smell our blood now. And the kassam rockets began to fly again. In Ashkelon, tea and cake was served indoors, once more, from 3pm.
Come Sunday, we returned the car. What a pleasure it was to have had our own transport – makes a world of difference. I’m seriously considering getting one now. Well, maybe later this year – I would have to teach my girlfriend how to drive with gears first.
