We, the farmers in the Gaza periphery, are helpless. It pains my heart to see a field on fire after we worked day and night to sow it. People who aren't farmers might not understand, but when you grow wheat, you only have a certain time frame, so we don't mind spending a white night on the Gaza border, even though it's very dangerous.
We invest a lot of money and effort in fertilizing the soil and irrigating the wheat, so in a situation in which we see everything going up in flames, I see crops burning before they can be harvested, and my heart burns along with them.
I can't keep a tractor on standby every day and wait until we see kites in the air so we can start putting out fires when they land. I'm not a firefighter, I'm a farmer.
It's truly a terrible feeling, and I have no magic solutions. My plot was burned up and the army is standing there, not doing anything. What can it do? By the time they called in a fire truck, the field burned.
If the army doesn't have any solutions, what are we farmers to do? The fire spread to the jojoba we planted five years ago and have been waiting to see bear fruit. Now a lot of my plants are gone, and I don't have the words to describe what I feel. Everything is burned. How much more do we have to take? It's not even over yet.
We suffered from the Hamas terror tunnels and when we realized there was a solution to them, we were filled with optimism. But it's always something else: tunnels, bombs, snipers, and now the terrorists are using kites. We have to tell the truth: The Palestinians don't want us in this country and don't recognize our existence. They don't care that they are sacrificing people, but we care about them.
