(Canadian Jewish News) Gil Troy - The ugly terrorist onslaught of the last three years has imposed a new geography of anguish on Israel. The Israeli compulsion to rebuild, balanced by the Jewish commitment to remember, has yielded an urban landscape pockmarked by mini-monuments mourning the sites of Palestinian mass murder. Outside the Dolphinarium, the disco where a killer later glorified by Arafat slaughtered 21 teenagers and wounded 120, a simple monument promises defiantly: "Lo Nafseek Lirkod," We Won't Stop Dancing. Despite the toll of Arafat's war, Israelis remain unbowed. The Israel debate often appears Orwellian. After September 2000, when Arafat led the Palestinians away from negotiation toward terror, too many Israelis, too many Jews, asked, "What's wrong with us?" By contrast, after Sept. 11, 2001, most Americans asked about the terrorists, "What's wrong with them?" The writer is Professor of History at McGill University and the author of Why I Am A Zionist: Jewish Identity and the Challenges of Today.
2004-01-23 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive