The antisemites marching on campuses and in major Western cities demand the genocide of the Jewish people in Israel, between “the river and the sea.” They also have been demanding an intifada against Jews in general. Having gone through the Second Intifada, I wanted to record what it was like. Part I is available here.
After I was wheeled out of the pediatric ICU (PICU), I simply burst into tears. I had seen the first CT scans. A piece of shrapnel had entered the back of our son’s head, passed fully through his right brain and lodged itself in the front cranial bone. We made PICU our home for the next month. We always had someone there. My wife would go from 9 in the morning until later afternoon, when I would replace her. A young woman studying at the school where my wife had studied would replace me at 10 pm and stay all night, with the rabbi who ran the school covering from 7 until 9 in the morning. He canceled his family vacation to stay with us. We read and told stories all day long to keep our son occupied. The bed next to his had a very sick boy by the name of Osama. He died shortly after we arrived. The beds at the time were half Jewish, half Arab, including the son of a terrorist that Israel had tried to eliminate.
To get through the challenges we faced, we needed and had a huge support network of family, friends, and old college roommates. Essentially, every person asked himself or herself: how can I help them? My business partner’s wife organized the neighbors so that every day a hot meal was brought to our house around noon, before the kids came home from “gan” (kindergarten). On one occasion, no food arrived. I was embarrassed: nobody owes me a thing, but we had not been shopping and I had nothing ready. I made a phone call, and a woman who lives in the neighborhood came with hot food and apologized. I told her that I was ashamed to have to ask for food. She said to me, “There are times in life to give, and there are times in life when you have to receive. I was in bed for one of my pregnancies for months, and these same neighbors made food for my family. You’ll have your opportunity to give.” When we finally got back on our feet, I asked that the meals be stopped. My friend’s wife asked if we could take food for another two weeks. I asked why. “They have already made the food for you, put it in the freezer, and really want to give it to your family.”
I was out of the hospital after a week. Skin grafts from my leg cover the spot where two screws had gone through my arm. Our son moved to a pediatric hospital after a month. A few days after his arrival, he started to see. Initially, it was not great vision, but he could see. Later, his left side—weak as it was—came back on line. We spent months on different types of physical therapy: swimming, horseback riding, biofeedback, exercise, and more. In June, the shrapnel—the head of a Philips screw—was removed from his head. The body of the screw had come out in the laundry, when the blood-drenched clothes were returned from the hospital and washed. When I testified in federal court in Manhattan in 2015 in our case against the PLO and Palestinian Authority, I put the two pieces of the screw together in front of the jury and said, “By the grace of G-d, the screw broke in the first milliseconds of the explosion and the rough portion of the screw did not pass into our son’s head or body.”
Over the years, there have been challenges, big and small. For quite some time, I was in charge of closing the left sleeve button. Our son, with great determination, received both Nevada and Israeli driver’s licenses, where in both countries issues were raised about his visual field and ability to drive. He is an excellent driver and also took a couple of flying lessons to boot.
My arm works, for which I am very grateful. The scars are still there. Last month, I saw my doctor and after a few minutes, she remembered the events of 2002 and brought a camera to get follow-up pictures of her work. We are still involved in litigation against the Palestinian Authority and PLO, though we won a landmark $655 million judgment in 2015, after which Tony Blinken filed a legal brief on behalf of the terrorists and against the 11 US family plaintiffs.
When I hear the pampered students screaming for “intifada revolution” I am reminded of what we went through. No two people or families harmed in attacks have the same experiences. One of the first challenges I had was in the ward where I was recovering. Across from me was a soldier who had been wounded in the head in a previous bombing and was a vegetable: I had to force myself to build a wall between his head injury and the one our son experienced and not try to learn from one case to the other. I cannot praise enough the medical staff and doctor friends who availed themselves around the clock for any consultation or assistance.
As the Western elite bash Israel, I will relate only one of many experiences we had. Our son was taken for CT scans regularly to monitor fluid pressure on the brain. On one such trip, sitting across from us while we were waiting was a fellow handcuffed to his wheelchair, with a border guard and an M-16 sitting next to him. My wife made inquiries and sure enough, here was a Palestinian terrorist who had been shot and was now receiving world-class medical care. It was suggested to push his wheelchair off of the roof of the building, but the soldier said that it was against his orders. He actually went into the CT before us.
Those protesting in the West want to get rid of three groups, in this order:
1. Israelis (“from the river to the sea)
2. Jews in general (“intifada everywhere”)
3. Western Christians (“revolution”)
When Muslims and leftists marched in major cities, they took upon themselves to deface landmarks like the London Cenotaph and the White House fence. They took down local flags and replaced them with those of the PLO. Putting a keffiyeh on Ben Franklin’s statue might seem silly or small potatoes, but they are giving you a preview: their religiously-driven goal is to rule the US and European countries according to the Koran. Today, leftist trans and LGBT folks march with them; tomorrow, they will join the pushed-off-the-roof Olympics.
So those who think that an intifada would be limited to Israeli territory are sadly mistaken. The huge number of Western unassimilated Muslim refugees with their fellow travelers on the Left want to make Israel, Jews, and Western governments go away. The time has come to act to prevent another intifada.
The West ought to make every effort for its own future to ensure the second intifada was the last intifada.
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