As the world sees footage of Hamas kidnappings and rockets firing into Israel from Gaza, many Israelis are confined to their homes or shelters. One of them is Yaniv Moshe, who has been unable to leave his home since the air raid sirens first sounded Saturday morning.
“You have to run to a safe place,” Moshe said of the protocol when the sirens blare.
For the 17-year old and his family, that was his parents’ bedroom.
After the sirens, you have about 90 seconds to get to shelter, where you have to stay for 10 minutes – until the siren sounds again. Over 3000 rockets were launched from Gaza on Saturday alone, with 1500 more in the days since. More than 1000 Israelis have died, and Hamas is holding dozens of captives, including children and seniors.
Moshe witnessed a nearby building engulfed in flames from a missile strike. He saw only the aftermath because he was in his parents’ room when the building was struck.
Despite being near the front line, Moshe was seeing much of the same footage the rest of the world was.
Two stood out as particularly jarring. In one, a dead Israeli soldier is being stomped on. In another, a girl finds her friend’s burnt dead body.
“They crossed a line that should have never been crossed,” Moshe said. “Kidnapping and murdering children, kids, babies, mothers, grandmas, grandpas. There’s no stop to it. If they caught you, they killed you. It doesn’t matter who you are or what age.”
Moshe, who lived in the United States for three years before returning to Israel, fears there’s no good outcome to this conflict.
“Even if we win this war, we don’t win,” he said. “There is no winning when you lose more than 1000 people that have been tortured and murdered.”
The best case scenario, he said, is that he and his fellow Israelis can proceed with “no more losses and no more families crying over dead members.”
Moshe’s view of the international response was favourable.
“Most people support us instead of believing lies on the Internet,” he said, aware that not all do. “There’s still a lot of people hating us and somehow justifying what has happened, but that’s not new.”
While there are people throughout the world supporting Palestinians, as seen with rallies held across Canada, Moshe remains unbothered, saying “I know we are in the right.”
He reflects on years of experiencing judgment and prejudice due to his identity as an Israeli and a Jew. Moshe says he can recall various situations where he avoided telling people that he was from Israel, “because people will start judging me, saying that I’m a dirty Jew.”
Throughout Moshe’s life, he’s rarely seen anyone support Israel when they were at war. “I’m used to being in the situation where Israel and the Jews are alone.”
