Leaving Israel

First, I will give you this disclaimer: I have read and seen the facts about the current issues in Israel. Everything else is opinion.

So I came back last Thursday from our tour of Israel. We hit the ground...and then heard that rockets were being launched at places we'd been the week before. That is a disconserting feeling. We also knew for a fact that a family from our tour stayed on and was now in a place that was being rocketed. They sunsequently arrived home safely (thank Gd).

When I went back to work, everyone was "we were concerned about you, we're glad you're backsafely," which I appreciated. It was nice of them to say things like that. The things that stuck under my skin were a couple emails I got that were to the effect of "You were in Israel? Are you NUTS?" or "You must be really glad to be home." The answers to both, of course, were "No." What people don't get are a) things were relatively peaceful a couple weeks ago and b)why would you be glad to leave a long anticipated vacation?

I understand that now, things are bad. But one of the things I got the feel for on this trip was the fact that Israel is a real place with real people and they think of everyone as family. It's not New York, where you look out for yourself and that's it. Israelis look out for each other because there are so few of them and they fight so hard everyday to exist.

So no, I'm not glad to be home...or I wasn't when I stepped off the plane. I felt sad when I left the airport like I lost something. And as far as being nuts to visit Israel, people could make the same case for visiting New York, since the day the world changed.