Skip to main content

Children bear traumatic costs of Israeli-Palestinian gambits

Both Israeli and Palestinian children are paying a high price in lifelong trauma for politicians' violent and careless promises.

Palestinian children look out through a bus window as they wait with their family to cross into Egypt through the Rafah border crossing after it was opened by Egyptian authorities for humanitarian cases, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip August 27, 2017. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa - RC1E970E29C0
Palestinian children look out through a bus window as they wait with their family to cross into Egypt through the Rafah border crossing after it was opened by Egyptian authorities for humanitarian cases, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, Aug. 27, 2017. — REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa

The papers reported that two rockets fired from Gaza on Dec. 18 had landed in the Israeli border town of Sderot and in a community south of the coastal city of Ashkelon, “causing damage but no casualties.” The next item read that Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said while touring the Gaza border region the following day that the government had known there would be a cost for US President Donald Trump’s Dec. 6 recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. “Such things appear to have a price that’s worth paying,” the minister said, not forgetting to praise the “optimism and high spirits” of area residents.

The same day, Liberman declared his “full backing” for the soldiers who displayed restraint when a 16-year-old Palestinian girl, Ahed Tamimi, slapped them recently in what some quarters claim was an effort to provoke a response. The soldiers proved that the Israel Defense Forces are “an ethical army guided by moral values,” he said.

Related Topics

Subscribe for unlimited access

All news, events, memos, reports, and analysis, and access all 10 of our newsletters. Learn more

$14 monthly or $100 annually ($8.33/month)
OR

Continue reading this article for free

All news, events, memos, reports, and analysis, and access all 10 of our newsletters. Learn more.

By signing up, you agree to Al-Monitor’s Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy. Already have an account? Log in