Reprinted via The Algemeiner: Not the Typical IDF Soldier’s Mom: Muslim Arab Mother Whose Son Serves in the IDF Speaks Out

 

H/T: The Algemeiner

 

Anet Haskia is not the typical mom of a soldier serving in the Israel Defense Forces. A Muslim Arab, who grew up in a mixed Arab-Jewish city in the north, Haskia is breathing a little easier this week.
For Haskia, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision not to enter the Gaza Strip last week was “brave and right.”

The mother of three children, with a 20-year-old IDF combat soldier, Haskia told Tazpit News Agency, that “many Israeli soldiers’ lives were saved thanks to that decision.”

“Going into Gaza would have yielded success for the Hamas terrorists. Israel did what it had to do for the time being to stop the rocket attacks and played it smart.”

Haskia who was born and raised in Acre (Akko), a mixed Arab-Jewish city in the Western Galilee in northern Israel, is openly vocal about her support for the Jewish state of Israel.

A Day in the Muslim Quarter

I recently had an opportunity to take a walk in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. Before going there, I’d always been a little apprehensive about showing up—especially with my kippa and tzitzit (the traditional Jewish garb). It took some courage and the friendly smile of a close friend who made Aliya about a year ago to persuade me to venture out of my familiar comfort zone into a hereto unknown reality.

We entered the Old City, a place holy to the world’s three great faiths, perhaps the most hotly contested area in the world through the Yaffo Gate. I asked my friend if she was up for some coffee (the cold weather was beginning to be felt in Jerusalem). She gladly accepted my offer.

As we sat there watching passerby’s, we noticed people of a variety of backgrounds that’s difficult to spot just about anywhere else. Both of us are Russian-speakers, so I pointed out a group of Russian tourists taking in the beauty of the Old City. They spoke in the traditional jargon that I simply couldn’t resist ignoring them. It was like being back in Moscow again. Some kind of dejavu…

War in Gaza...Again

Jerusalem 11/16/12: My friend who lives in the small rural town of Kiryat Malachi where I visited her a week ago, called me some time in the afternoon yesterday. I instantly noticed something was wrong. She sounded hysterical as she recounted what she’d just witnessed.

What happened in Kiryat Malachi yesterday has been taking place in Israel since the establishment of the Jewish national homeland. Three people were killed and a four members of the same family were injured as a Kassam rocket scored a direct hit on an apartment building where a Chabad family was staying.  News of the tragedy spread like wildfire as people scrambled to leave the south for places that would themselves soon become threatened by Hamas rocket fire. We were getting closer to war. Again.

What’s changed since Israel’s government pulled out of Gaza in the summer of 2005? Most Israelis agree that the situation has steadily declined and that offering Gaza to Hamas terrorists was perhaps the gravest mistake any Israeli government has ever committed.