Eilon, July 20, 2006
Hello friends
One of my recent dispatches appears as an op-ed column in the Morning Call, Lehigh Valley's daily [Allentown, Bethlehem, Easton, Pennsylvania.]
Last Updated: July 20, 2006
Rockets and gunfire interrupt sleep, work in the kibbutz
Eilon, July 19 | -- After yesterday's huge barrage which occurred around 5 in the afternoon, when according to local sources more than 80 rockets fell within Israel, we still managed to sleep fitfully. Gilad came by and took the dog for the night. It saved my evening stroll with Zed. As usual, sporadic artillery fire continued throughout the night. In the east, a jet may have cast an occasional rocket into the gloom that must be overtaking southern Lebanon. From bed it sounded like a medium-sized stone plummeting into a broad and ever deepening cistern. When you peer into its depths, everything is just as obscure as before.
Some of those rockets were classic Katyushas, the ones we often witnessed from Adamit exploding in the gorge. Rumors began to circulate where some of the latest cluster may have dropped. A neighbor said Avdon, but there was even a reported unconfirmed sighting of one rocket making a big splash in the Hamdan reservoir across the road. Wherever they did fall, coupled with the ferocity of the exchange, it sufficiently motivated Moshe, our security chief, to stress the need to use the shelters.
Starting work at 5:30 a.m. has advantages in July. Clods of ashen cumulus clouds that inevitably wither in the summer heat crowd a brightening sky. It is still dark enough for me to drive up to our trailer where the irrigation computer is situated with head-lights, reminding me of winter and the wet emerald leaves of our Ardit avocado trees. A solitary eastern howitzer commenced firing at 4:45 a.m., joined by a choral cannonade of big guns ranged around the region, and automatic heavy machine gun fire beyond the ridge of Sulam Tsur.
Zohar and I reach the Bayit Lavan orchard, where a lone jackal espying our presence is forced to quit the field, after a night of ravaging pipe lines. We discovered a newly dug hole beneath the fence, exactly where Ibrahim had stitched a breach, and was forced to leave it at that, when this whole new trouble began. The jackal's night shift was done. In the west, an artillery round snapped the air and there was more automatic gun fire.
The gunfire here appears to have its own phonetics and own variable audio sequences. There are different timbres of shot, popping and plummeting, reverberating beyond the massif that separates us from the Adamit plateau and the hilly Lebanese terrain beyond. The earth shudders; the air dilates and flaps haughtily in our faces. The audible deviation of one gun to another depends on location, the grandeur of the terrain and the type of ordnance expended in its deadly rondo. Its arrangement is left to chance, like the Dadaist's chance instrumentation of a symphony. An errant violin is coupled to the tympani, the bassoon bound to the bass; the trumpet in tatters.
The nearby gas station is closed. There has been no mail delivery for more than a week. The local grocery remains open, but the proprietor, Nissim, has stipulated that he won't take customers if they bring their children. Outside, I hear the garbage truck making its usual collection. As the truck clawed and compressed its contents within its maws, the shooting escalated. We heard that rockets had dispersed harmlessly in open fields in western Galilee, but the first alerts also sounded as far south as Haifa.
United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan spoke of the possibility of dispatching a military stabilizing force to the region while his envoys met with Israeli officials. In Israel, there are few expectations that such a force could succeed. One should not forget that the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon, UNIFIL, is still deployed, but has played no substantial role in the current conflict. In fact, Hezbollah has often exploited UNIFIL positions to launch attacks. These missions are much like an official at a soccer match. They issue colored cards for violations of ceasefire agreements.
And, it should not be forgotten that Hezbollah's public debut occurred when there was a multi-national force in Beirut in late 1982. When the American and French marine barracks were attacked, the four participating nations abandoned their mission.
Barry Steinberg is a New York native whose family moved to the Lehigh Valley. He has lived on a kibbutz in Eilon in northern Galilee since the 1970s.
Copyright © 2006, The Morning Call