Day 139 Of The War: Feeling Sorry For Ourselves

I never thought that on February 22nd, we would mark the 139th day of the war, still having hostages in Gaza, and Israeli citizens from the north and the south still being refugees in our country with no end in sight. In difficult times like these, it is important to have leadership that we can look up to rely on, and derive hope from. Unfortunately, in the island of the Lord of the Flies, which is where we are right now,  our government spreads chaos: a convicted terrorist and a group of bullies are making decisions and leading us to hell without hesitation. I don’t want to feel sorry for myself, but the situation in Israel right now is unreal. Not unlike the hostages who were kidnapped by Hamas to Gaza, a group of homegrown lunatics took the entire country hostage against its will

A cousin who is visiting from the States lamented on the fact that everywhere in Israel there are posters and reminders of the hostages, and that in the outside world, no one knows or cares about it. It is true, but unfortunately they also don’t know that we are a nation under constant attack by psychological terror from the outside and inside. The leaders whose job is to take care of us are doing everything they can to drive us crazy:  they incite, lie, and spread conspiratorial theories through television, radio, and social media. A whole nation is out of its mind with worry, and there is nowhere to turn.

As our leadership continues to falter, something hopeful is emerging in the realm of alternative media. Some time after the beginning of the war, a new liberal streaming app called ‘Relevant’ came into being. While it must be a very challenging time to go on the air, it presents a refreshing approach to news, markedly different from conventional channels. The program that is currently most interesting to me is the daily “Ein Gvoul” (Without Borders, or as a part of the Hebrew expression, there is no limit or no end) program featuring journalists Emmanuelle Elbaz Phelps and Daniel Zilberstein. They bring international news that we truly miss and conduct interviews with experts. Emmanuelle and Daniel not only interview experts in their fields, but  ask intelligent questions, and demonstrate an ability to listen (something quite rare in Israeli media) and they are overall delightful. Every evening, I look forward to  hearing their perspective on the day’s events and to learn about what is happening outside of Israel. I sincerely hope that this new initiative will succeed because all of us who are disenchanted with conventional Israeli news media deserve something better. Relevant is indeed a very good start.