Unpacking My Suitcase And The Resiliency of Israel | Jewish Diaspora Report

The first day when we landed in Israel, unfortunately, we didn't get to spend too much time in the center of Israel.

We went right up north because as many of my listeners probably are well aware, especially if you listen to this podcast, you know that the north was hit pretty hard during this war.

The people of the North were evacuated for years, living in hotels, living all over the country without school, without access to their homes.

And it was very challenging for many of them.

So it was very important for us to go and listen to their stories and also see what's been going on in the North now that it's a little bit safer.

From a hilltop overlooking the city of Metula, the most northern town of Israel, we saw the rebuilding of that city, which was no doubt devastated by the Iranian-backed Hezbollah group in southern Lebanon.

Many of my listeners are well aware of the fact that in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah has been raining down rockets, tank shells, and drones on the homes of Metula, a city that is, without exaggeration, feet from the border with Lebanon.

When looking across the border, which is simply just a fence, you can see the mountainous region of southern Lebanon.

And to think about how easy and how close it would be to use this mountainous region in order to hide anti-tank missiles, rockets, and even drone bases with the ability within feet and seconds to hit the people of Metula.

The damage caused by the Hezbollah terrorists against the city of Matula is estimated to be somewhere around 3.5 to 4 billion shekels in economic damage.

This would be roughly 1.2 billion US dollars, which is a massive amount of money for one town.

According to current reports, it seems that roughly about 50% of the people who lived in Metula before the war have returned to go back to their homes to repair, to rebuild.

But unfortunately, that's only 50%.

And it's understandable why.

Not only are homes damaged and destroyed and need to be rebuilt, but also you can understand how this community has been really traumatized by the attacks of Hezbollah against their community.

And the fear of if Israel removes themselves from southern Lebanon, which is the only thing keeping them safe right now, what happens to them? Is there going to be another attack by Hezbollah, just like after the 2006 war, when Israel removed themselves from the area in order to allow the UN to move in? And then we get October 7th.

And one of the most important things that people don't often speak about is the fact that the October 7th attack that happened in Gaza... was actually supposed to happen in Metula as well.

The plan was, according to all reports, that Hamas jumped the gun, that they went too early, because Hezbollah was planning the exact same thing on cities like Metula.

So you can understand why the people of Metula might be hesitant to go back if there's not a better way to live in safety with your community being literally feet from the border.

We talk about this a lot on the podcast, about the perception and the way the world pushes certain things onto Israel.

And they don't really care or realize how it affects regular people.

Standing over top of Metula from a hilltop, realizing how close that border is and how the people of Metula could literally see Hezbollah terrorists on the other side on motorcycles and Jeeps before October 7th.

makes you realize when the world says, hey, Israel, let's sign a ceasefire deal with Hezbollah or with Lebanon, and let's just move you out of there, and they say they're not going to attack you anymore.

That has real world consequences for the people who live in Israel.

It sounds lovely for the United States or Canada or Australia or the United Nations to say that, don't worry, they've signed a peace deal, or we're going to put the UNIFIL people in that region.