The Middle Eastern War
Tatum Robertson Monday, November 13th
BOOM! CRASH! BANG! The war between the people of Israel and Palestine is a big topic in many countries all over the world.
This segment of the war started when Hamas attacked Israel in October. Although this is the first attack during this war, there have been many other wars between Israel and Palestine in 2006, 2008, 2012, 2014, and 2021. In the past, Israel has also gone to war with Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon, but after a while, signed peace treaties with both Egypt and Jordan. One of the largest disputes between the Palestinians and the Israelis is about who should have Jerusalem, which has places that are sacred to Christian, Muslims, and Jews alike. Israel says that Jerusalem will stay its capital and that Palestine could not have it.
Due to Israel there are over 5.6 million Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza.1 For quite a long time, Palestinians have been demanding that the Palestinian refugees be allowed to return, but Israel says that they would have to be outside of Israel’s borders if they wanted to return.
The death toll for Palestinians has gotten above 10,000, and the amount of Israelis dead is at about 1,400. Today News says that Israel will not have a ceasefire until the Israeli hostages captured by Hamas are returned. When Israel attacked Palestine, more than 1 million people had to leave their homes and go to the U.N. and various hospitals to seek shelter alongside many wounded Palestinians. Palestinians weren’t the only ones who had to leave their homes. There are also many people in Lebanon who had to move farther away from the border for fear they might get bombed. One example is Jeremaiah and Maria Carter, a couple of missionaries who lived in Tyre, but had to move two hours away to Broumenna (the suburbs of Beirut).
Life in war, or even close to it, is unpredictable. Jeremaiah Carter says, “Sometimes you wake up to the birds chirping...recently we’ve been waking up to the sound of bombs going off. Every day we feel trapped, because it's not about ‘Oh, hey I gotta go to work’, or ‘Hey, we’re gonna go to church’. The biggest priority is ‘Oh hey, let's check the news to see if we’re going to get bombed today.” It also can feel dangerous. Maria Carter says, “It makes me feel like I’m not secure. It also makes me appreciate every moment of life.”
War is never fun and we should all know this; there is no winner in war.