When it’s ALL bad in Israel, you can only do this

Another stabbing today (Thursday), this time in Ramle, a small city smack dab in the middle of this crazy country, where Jewish Israelis and Palestinian-Israelis buy strawberries together in the shuk, shop for clothes at Castro and body lotion at Laline, drink coffee on Herzl, and bitch about the line in the pharmacy.

(This is a shock to the system because Ramle has been quiet throughout all of this.)

The other day, there was a horrific shooting and a stabbing by Damascus Gate — again.

(It happens a lot there, sometimes three in rapid-fire succession, sometimes, a week of sullen calm will pass before the next one. )

A week ago, in front of a grocery store.

TWO weeks ago, INSIDE a woman’s home — if the killer had come just 15 minutes earlier the house would have been filled with kindergarten students.

And then last month, Tel Aviv — in a bar on Dizengoff on New Year’s Day. No one drinking their beer and smoking their cigarettes saw THAT one coming.

A few weeks before that, a stabbing in Raanana.
(Ra’anana? Who the fuck goes to Raanana?)

And before that, an attack in Beer Sheba.

And before that, Afula.

And before that in… do you see my point?

Everywhere is a target.

There is no one specific place to avoid because… seriously, if it can happen in Raanana of all places, then it can happen ANYWHERE.

That’s just how it is right now — until our leaders do better by us and start talking.

Everywhere is a target. So is everyone.

(Ask the Nepalese worker who was stabbed outside Damascus Gate two months ago if only Jews are targeted.)

It could be at the Central Bus Station in Jerusalem tomorrow. It could also be in the sleepy convenience store down the dirt road from where I live.

It could be on a soccer field, or on the train. It could be at a check point, or outside a pub in that golden hour before sunset.

Everywhere. Is. A. Target.

So this gives us a choice:

We can avoid… well… EVERYTHING.

We can stay home. And lock our doors. And wait for the next @TOIAlert on Twitter with more bad news.

But even with Netflix and chill, that’s a bullshit way to live.

Or… we take a deep breath and go outside and buy our milk and our coffee and our bourekas, and take the bus to wherever we want to go, because, hell, it’s ALL bad right now.

Still: Chances are we’ll be just fine.

We have to be.

Although this place is so damn small that inevitably we know someone maimed or worse in an attack. Which means, by the way, that we MUST leave our homes — we MUST go outside — because there are people to visit in hospitals and shiva calls to make.

And then…when another season rolls around, there are weddings, and there are babies, and we must show up.

Israel is a country of near misses and miracles.

And right now, everywhere is a potential target, which means there really is one choice.

Go where you want. Do what you want.

And make it all good.