Whose fault?

by Leah (Israel)

“We have to help the Lebanese rebuild their country after Hezbollah gets wiped out of there.” I told my husband while munching on my Saturday morning snack of pistachios and looking at the destruction of bridges that the IDF had done.

“Who has to help them? Let Iran and Syria finance it. It’s their fault after all.” was his reply.

It’s their fault. It’s our fault. It’s no one’s fault. It’s God’s fault. Who cares. It’s been doubly distressing for me this week because two of my nephews who live in Jerusalem, one recently married, got called up to the Lebanese front. I thought I could ignore this war, but I want it to end. And I don’t know how it could. I’m totally helpless in this craziness.

Before I even found out about it, I called my brother whose kids were called up. We don’t speak often and aren’t very close, but in a psychic moment I felt I had to call him, since his sons have all been in the IDF and I was feeling that something was happening.

After my brother told me the news and said that my nephew’s bride was sleepless and worried and crying all over the place, he said quite harshly to me “And those mother-fuckers should all get it.” Hoping he was just referring to Hizbollah, but knowing that he wasn’t, I interjected.

“Not all of them are to blame. You KNOW there are many innocent people in Lebanon.”

He changed the subject.

Even my own interfaith group of Moslems, Christians and Jews, is not meeting until the end of August, and the Sulha in Israel won’t be starting until August 22nd. Do I have to wait until then to find some like-minded people?

I got a though-provoking email from a leader of a macrobiotic diet group in Jerusalem.

“The news here at home is perilous, and we strongly identify with the people on both sides of this needless conflict. My macrobiotic understanding is this: there are times of peace and times of war, as we know from Ecclesiastes. This means that sometimes we try more yin approaches of getting along, such as peace conferences, negotiations, and joint activites. Sometimes we must use a yang approach, even war, if such an extreme imbalance exists. Extreme times create extreme expressions.

We see this complementary duality in our own daily actions. Sometimes we may warn our children in a soft, gentle way–”Watch out, darling, take care.” Sometimes a yang appraoch is appropriate, “Watch out! That stove is hot! Move away!” Even a shove or violent act may be needed sometimes. All of these are acts of love, some yin and some yang.

So if someone is coming at me or those I love with a gun, I shoot first. Then I must strongly reflect why I attracted such violence into my life. This is the macrobiotic approach–act appropiately and self reflect from a broader perspective. Michio used to talk about seeing everything from the eye of God. This is the highest level of understanding.”

And this e-mail saddened me. There are lots of excuses for violence. Like when I was Orthodox, I used to ask Rabbis why innocent people get hurt in conflicts. “Because it’s like surgery” I was told. “Sometimes you have to remove healthy tissues along with the diseased for the entire body to be cured.”

Isn’t there some kind of homeopathic self-cure in store soon?