Would You Be Happier…

A couple of weeks ago, I posted in a social media group about a common bit of dialogue on TV. A teenager/adolescent gets into a fight and the adults are angry at that teen. We, the viewers, get to see that the teen didn’t start the fight and we hear the teen whining that “they started it” and we hear the adults continue being angry. I’m still wondering how those adults would react if the teen said “would you be happier or less angry if I had just let them beat me up?” 

I realized that this is a perfect mashal (parable) for what’s going on today regarding Eretz Yisrael. Too many people have forgotten what happened on October 7th and what Hamas and their cronies did to start this war. They’re angry at Eretz Yisrael for going into Gaza, for creating wartime casualties, for going into Rafah, etc. They’re not calling for the release of the hostages. They’re not crying out in anger over our women who were raped. They’re not crying foul over the continued rocket barrage into Eretz Yisrael. 

Instead of the line of “they started it,” I suggest some different lines.

Would you be happier or less angry if we just left our women (Naama, Agam, Liri, Karina, Daniella, Doron, Noa, Romi, Carmel, and the others) to be raped and tortured?

Would you be happier if we just left Ariel and Kfir to be starved and undeveloped? 

Would you be happier if we just left Shiri and Yarden to be tortured and terrified?

Would you be happier if we left Hersh to just let his severed arm heal itself with no medical care? 

Would you be happier if we left Omer with a choice of starving or gluten issues?

Would you be happier if we left Shlomo reliving his experience with the Farhud?

Would you be happier if we allowed Hamas to get away with the rapes and murders and kidnappings of October 7th? 

Or would you be happier if they came to the US and other Western countries and did the same things? And not just to Jews but to anyone whom they consider unworthy? 

Would you be happier if they came after your daughters and put them into that Gehenna of rape and torture? Would you be happier if they blew off your sons’ arms and gave them no medical care? Would you be happier if they took your infants and toddlers and gave you no reliable or valid information on where they are or how they are?

Would you be happier if more of those rockets fired into Eretz Yisrael got past Iron Dome and succeeded in killing hundreds or thousands of people? 

I never thought it was entirely right for even TV teens to get yelled at for defending themselves. Here, I know that I’m only getting angrier that our hostages are still not returned and that we have to fight for them. So if the answer to any of the above questions is no (and I sure hope it is), then the only thing anyone should be yelling is for Hamas to let our people go.