What Makes People Tick?

  Last weekend, on Saturday the 7th of October, a great number of people got together to cross a border. Some flew over using gliders. Others toppled a fence in a lot of places. Through the breaches in the fence came people. Men. In cars. On motorcycles. They didn't come through that fence to find freedom, or to flee from persecution. They didn't cross the border hoping for a better life, for the fulfilment of a dream. The men who crossed the border, they came to kill, to murder. To shoot people in their homes. To kill babies and children in their beds. To go into communities full of people, civilians, and indiscriminately shoot everyone and everything. To go to a festival where people were dancing, enjoying themselves, and to shoot, kill, rape those people. The stories of the survivors are horrifying. Stories of people rushing for their cars, driving, being shot at. Stories of people running, being shot in the back. Stories of people hiding, being found, finding new places to ...

In 2014, when Hamas attacked innocent Israelis with numerous rockets day in day out, the world was mostly silent. Or I should say: The world quietly applauded the so-called Palestinian 'freedom fighters' and their despicable terrorist acts, calling them heroes and courageous people.  What is courageous about terror and hatred? What is courageous about killing innocents? What is courageous about sending rocket after rocket at men, women and children simply trying to live their lives? What is courageous about terror tunnels meant to attack non-combatants? What is courageous about hating Jews because an old book tells you that you should? Yet when Israel fought back, when the Jewish people responded by protecting their own instead of waiting to be slaughtered the way the world seems to think they should, the world reacted. The world shouted about the 'evil Jews' and the supposedly horrible acts they committed. The world shouted about 'concentration camps' in Gaza...

The words "Free Gaza From Hamas" seem to be popping up everywhere on social media. I hope this means that the world is starting to wake up, just a bit, to the reality of Hamas. It is a terrorist group intent on the destruction of a nation and the extermination of a people. I understand that in 'the West' we see images of what is happening in Gaza and sympathise with the plight of the people who are effectively stuck in Gaza. We should sympathise with them because they are suffering and they deserve a better life than they have now. However we need to consider, very carefully, what the money or goods we are sending to Gaza are being spent on. Are they being spent on making the lives of people in Gaza better, or are they being spent on making the lives of people in Israel worse? Construction materials meant for Palestinians routinely enter Gaza from Israel. To be exact, 4,680 trucks carrying 181 thousand tons of gravel, iron, cement, wood and other supplies have ...