At the Border's Gate

ISRAEL 44 At the border’s gate From Israel’s Valley of Tears monument in the Golan Heights, a Syrian town is visible. Photo credit: Hillel Kuttler. By HILLEL KUTTLER has killed a half-million Syrians and made Here was as gorgeous a spring day as one refugees of a million more. Syrian Presi- could wish for: lush greenery everywhere, dent Bashar Assad has dropped chemical flowers blooming, the sun out. A few hun- JUF News’ Israel correspondent Hillel weapons on his own people multiple times. dred yards off, past the stone monument Kuttler made visits in April to two places A few weeks earlier, I’d visited Tel Saki, and the two abandoned tanks, down the along Israel’s border. June’s dispatch was further south in the Golan and site of an- hill and across a field, I saw Israel’s border from Metulla, overlooking Lebanon. This other memorial to a key Israeli tank-battle fence with Syria. Clearly visible beyond it month’s report is from the northeastern Go- victory in 1973. From Tel Saki’s ridge, I saw were Ufaniya, Khan Arnabeh and, further lan Heights. a vast white tent below, about a mile away: south to my right, Kuneitra. In those Syr- a field hospital that Israel opened years ian towns I made out houses, apartment earlier to treat Syrian civilians wounded in buildings, water towers, dirt paths, utility MY GIRLFRIEND, MARCELLE, and I the war and those with illnesses and con- poles, and a mosque. No people, though. were out for a walk, due east from her ditions needing attention. For all I knew, life there could’ve been brother’s house on Kibbutz El Rom in the Tel Saki was utterly quiet on my visit, proceeding normally just then, a serene Golan Heights. The blue sky enchanted as but the Valley of Tears was decidedly not. spot in a shattered country. Maybe, the we passed fruit orchards and cows grazing I grew up in New York, and as an adult blasts struck somewhere else. It could be in meadows. Aside from two cars driving lived in Washington and Baltimore—all that thousands of such war-free vistas ex- along the dirt road, no humans appeared. cities with far too much violent crime. Yet, ist throughout the land. We turned left toward a historical site. never did I hear gunfire there. But what if, as I stared their towns’ way, Boom! Boom! Boom! went the sky, one Nothing about the sounds of Syria could the people were then crowding into bomb thump every half-minute or so, as if her- be easily discerned. There were neither shelters; furiously prying open locks to alding a thunderstorm. fire nor clouds of smoke to reveal where an basement doors to escape, like in The A realization struck. air bombing or missile strike might have Wizard of Oz, as the tornado struck; giv- “It’s the Syrian civil war,” I told Marcelle. landed. I couldn’t see a fighter plane to in- ing first aid to wounded neighbors; as- We had just reached the Valley of Tears dicate the booms’ source, nor be sure from sessing holes in their cars and roofs; pray- monument to a pivotal battle in Israel’s de- which directions the blasts came. ing for their lives? fense against Syria’s invasion in the Yom As to what they were? War, of course. The devastation Syria continues to en- Kippur War. At the ridge’s edge, a Syrian For a second, I recalled then-Prime dure at its own hands remains unfath- tank, facing uphill, remained where an Is- Minister Menachem Begin’s reported omable. raeli tank had halted its progress 44 years quip, early in the Iran-Iraq War, that he For the foreseeable future, the war will earlier. An opened hatch revealed soda cans wished both sides success. I caught my- continue, with bombs falling and Syrians’ and candy wrappers of more recent vintage. self. Yes, let the bad guys of all parties in lives ending. Israel will continue helping The Syrian front has been quiet for de- Syria knock each other off—but leave the the hurting civilians of a so-called enemy. cades—during peace negotiations I cov- civilians alone, for goodness sake. I didn’t As we left, the booms reigned. Their ef- ered in the mid-1990s, Israeli delegates know any Syrians, and I certainly didn’t fect grew fainter with each step. n trumpeted Syria’s keeping it the calmest of wish civilians harm. all Israel’s borders—but the country’s been Being on the Israeli side, so close to dan- Hillel Kuttler is a freelance writer living at war with itself since 2011. The fighting ger that it rang in my ears, was unnerving. in Israel. 44 July 2018, JUF News.

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