My Son Who Has Gone Made Me the Father that I Am
Yitzhak Frankenthal
I lost my son for one simple reason - the absence of peace.
Arik was a 19.5 year-old lad when he took a hike to his death. The car that stopped to pick him up had 3 Hamas terrorists in it, and within 3 minutes he was attacked. In the struggle that ensued the driver was shot in his foot and Arik got 3 bullets through his head.
As I sat "Shiva" at our house in Gimzo, friends came and with great sorrow asked me whether at long last the realization that we have no one to make peace with has finally dawned. Did I, at long last, wake up from the illusion that peace with the Palestinian bastards was impossible? After all, they killed my Arik! My answer was that Arik was not killed because of who he is but because there is no peace. It was then and there that I resolved to do everything in my power to support the peace process and so that other parents will not experience bereavement and loss. I must try and help bring the peace, and that is exactly what I began doing.
I met scores of people, from the right, the left, Israeli Arabs, Palestinians, the Popular Front and the Hamas. I sat down with them trying to find any common ground that will form the foundation of peace between Israelis and Palestinians. During these meetings I came across bereaved Palestinian parents and tried to understand whether they too suffer as much as we do at the loss of a child. Could it be that Palestinian parents regard the loss as a decree from heaven and as part of the price in the struggle against the conqueror? Do they continue living with no particular pain? Soon enough I realized that they share the same pain as we Israeli parents do. There is certain vitality in the deep void. It is true that the pain of losing a child to sickness or accident is different than the pain of losing a child in the army in battle against an enemy? One needs to understand the meaning of the difference in pain. I can say that I love an apple, I love my family, my wife and my house. Does the word "love" have the same meaning as love for an apple, my children or my wife? No. The same can be said about pain. Yes, Palestinian parents' pain is exactly the same as that suffered by Israeli parents. There is, however, a difference in the attitude towards living with the void. Bereaved Palestinian parents that I met gave me the distinct feeling they understood that the loss of their child was due to the lack of peace. The obvious conclusion from this pain was that we need to support the peace process. Moreover, bereaved parents, Israelis and Palestinians have lost the sense of fear, respect, insult and disappointment. What is more terrifying than standing on your child's grave? What is more insulting to one's ego that a child one brought into this world died because there is no peace? I have failed as a father. Is there anything more insulting to one's ego? What is more frustrating than the sense of having lost a child to the absence of peace, when one knows this absence will not last forever. There was no peace with Egypt. We fought for years and yet today we have established peace. What, then, is more frustrating than losing a child for no reason at all?
I heard this rationale from Palestinians too. Yes, there is a fundamental difference between them and us. We are the conquerors - they are the conquered. They encounter a daily struggle to make a decent living - we live in relative comfort. We have a state - they do not. They need permits to move around - we don’t. But we also have a great deal in common. They regard our soldiers as terrorists who killed their children - we regard the Hamas and Fatah as terrorists who killed our children. The question is should each one of us dig into his own trench and view peace from a distance or should we try and resolve the problems between us so that we come to face the realities of peace and avoid further bloodshed on both sides?
I recall one meeting I had in Gaza in preparation for a visit to Israel by a large group of bereaved Palestinian parents (we were all invited by the President to his house). One participant, who had lost 4 brothers in the Arab-Israeli conflict, told me "Yitzhak, I greatly appreciate your coming to us to try and help the peace process, I, as a human being, am very sorry that you lost your son, but I want you to know that on the other hand I am glad you lost your son who was a soldier and our enemy". How painful it was for me to hear these words. My reply was "I very much appreciate your honesty and integrity by telling me the truth to my face, and as a father I feel anger, pain and frustration at your harsh words, but I do what I do to avoid similar pain from others".
I remember, immediately following Arik's death, I wanted to meet the parents of his murderer. I wanted to understand how he was brought up. Did they teach him to hate Jews? To hate the conqueror? And then I saw his mother during the trial giving an interview to the press. She said her son was never in jail, has never had any criminal convictions and the killing in which he participated was a token of his identification with the suffering of his brother Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli conqueror. Now I had the answer to the question that taunted me. Now I had no need to meet the killer's parents. I recall with great pain my meetings with bereaved Palestinian parents who have lost a 6 month-old baby or a 2-year old daughter from Israeli fire. Were these children killers? Were these children terrorists? Did these children pose any threat to the Israeli soldiers? Would those Israeli soldiers, my children and brothers, have murdered intentionally? Not at all; every Israeli soldier has a soul, every Israeli soldier (although there may be exceptions) is here to defend his country, its citizens, and a soldier that kills a small child, even unintentionally, is still my brother and of my own flesh. On the other hand, I can understand the fact that every Palestinian soldier who fights for his country and people does so out of love for his country and out of longing for its independence. Indeed, there are exceptions even amongst Palestinians. There are those who are capable of killing women, children and elderly helpless people, - but most of them are motivated not by the hatred for Jews but out of hatred for the conqueror. At the same time, I reiterate that even amongst the Etzel, Lechi and Hagana there were those who committed atrocities against mankind, killed women, children and the elderly and Jews too were killed in violent actions aimed mainly against the British conqueror in Palestine - The Land of Israel. Are they my brethren? Yes, they are! There are many whose eyes are blinded and many not willing to face reality. There are many who see only one side of the coin - their side. It would have been so easy for me to come out against the Palestinians, to react with hatred and vengeance, but where would it have led me? Would my hatred and vengeance avoid more bloodshed? Had I called out to set up another settlement in the West Bank in memory of Arik would it avoid further bloodshed? I have no doubt that it would bring more and more bloodshed. I know that there are those who think me wrong, there are people who do not speak to me, or think I have lost my mind, but I do not bend down to them. The only time I bend down is when I weed out wild grass from my son's grave. The only fear I have is when I stand on my son's grave. I yearn to caress him, to hug and kiss him, to smell his scent, to see his face. I am not afraid of saying the truth even if this is hurtful and annoys.
The big question is what can I, as a human being, do for peace? Am I to be Don Quixote or Sancho Pancho the fools or can I contribute, little as it may be, to peace. Am I not placing myself in a situation where I make a fool out of myself? I have given the matter much thought. It is a known fact that bereaved parents have a special status. Everyone, including friends and the general public, expresses sympathy and empathy with their pain, especially so a parent of a soldier how has served his country and died in battle with terrorist. And here I am, faced with a situation where as bereaved father I struggle with a hostile society, with friends who excommunicate me because, in their eyes, I am a traitor, a traitor who has abandoned the dreams of the Land of Israel. I have faced difficult and painful moments, even physical force was used against, me. There were moments when I could have felt humiliated, especially by those closest to me, friends who have worked with me for two score years; but there is no pain as deep as a loss of a child in vain. No words can describe the loss of vitality and the joy of life, life with the terrible void. I have lost all my joy of life. I have lost the ability to enjoy situations where a normal person would have reacted with joy and excitement.
I met the President of the United States, and felt no elation. I have met the US Vice President, I have met Prime Ministers of Israel scores of times, ministers, dignitaries in Europe and the US, the Presidents of Egypt, Palestine, and many others, yet I have no joy in my heart, nor exhilaration. This loss, the fulfillment of the void, the lack of joy of living, lack of joy of creation, it all shrinks when I am faced with the terrible loss of a son. As a religious man, when told the bitter news that my son has gone, I stood up and said "Baruch Dayan Emet". I justified God's action, I gave thanks to God of the ill that has befallen on me just as I thanked him for the blessings he has bestowed on me. I worship God - not the other way around. I, as a religious Jew, know how pivotal peace is in Judaism, and being religious I know how far one can go in compromising over The Land of Israel for the sake of peace. I know how less important is Jerusalem over human life in Israel, I know that respect for mankind and humanity are important in Judaism, I as a religious man know how we yearn for peace as Jews. I know as a religious man how wrong and misleading were great men headed by Rabbi Akiva with their messianic dreams and how many losses the People of Israel have suffered as a result of these wrong convictions. No, I will not be taught what Judaism is as far as peace is concerned. I know, as a religious man how many "villains in the name of the bible" who have misused the Jewish religion against peace, exactly as there are villain Ayatullahs who use Islamic sources against peace. Nothing is new under the sun. And perhaps because I know all this, I work for peace out of Judaism. And the question is asked again, what can we do for peace? I have resolved, that as a bereaved father I must, I can and will have to try and change things around, change the public's concept both in Israeli and the Palestinian societies that we need peace. Bark and Arafat cannot establish peace without their people's support. I think the only possible way is to try and sell to the society in Israel the values of peace and democracy derived out of Judaism and to the Palestinian society the values of peace and democracy.
I have set up a group of bereaved Israeli parents who work for peace, not as "Arab lovers" but as "Israel lovers". At the same time we have set up a group of bereaved Palestinian parent who work for peace not out of "Love for Israel" but out of love for the Palestinians. Neither they nor us seek revenge. We all want to contribute in a constructively towards peace. We do not offer solutions on how to make peace, this is for the Israeli, Palestinian and Syrian governments to decide. We try and spread the values of peace so that each side will know that it is possible, necessary and essential to make peace. There is price to be paid for peace.
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