In the annals of the documentaries of cinema, a place of honor is reserved for a small, modest, simple – but exceptionally brilliant movie. It focuses on the face of a young boy over 10 minutes, during which he is watching a puppet show. The 3-year-old boy is frightened and calms down gets sad and laughs, is bored and captivated: we don't know what exactly causes this, but we get a glimpse into his soul while he is riding an emotional roller coaster and will eventually grow up within 10 minutes.
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The 100th day of the war is not a landmark requiring a strategic assessment of the situation or a discussion on directions that we must take on the day after. One hundred is a nice and round number, and nothing more. Any ritual, apparently, is unnecessary. You can move on. But it is customary to scatter milestones to mark distances along the length of main roads. The war appears to be one such long road. And since we do not know how far the destination is, we can at least remind ourselves, from time to time, how far we are from the starting point. It is an anchor.
This is perhaps the most documented, photographed, and exposed war we have ever experienced, and still everything in it is shrouded in the fog of battle, in intelligence camouflage, in psychological warfare. Everything within it remains in military code. It emerged from the thick of the earth, from the depths of our haunted memories, from the slopes of our stories as a people. It initiated riddles, traumas, nightmares – which we did not fully solve. We look into the eyes of the hostages who have returned from the branching network of tunnels below the surface of the earth as if they have ascended from the underworld after meeting Satan himself. What do they know we don't? What are they telling us?
It seems that we knew everything there was to know about our enemies' religious fanaticism – about incitement, about preaching hatred, about an organized and systematic ideology that seeks to exterminate us. Didn't we read the Hamas charter? But we didn't believe, we couldn't believe, that this culture of hatred was just waiting for an opportunity to fulfill its sick desires in such a sickening and horrible cult of sadistic violence, of a chilling delight in mass suffering, and blood, and screams. Now we know.
Apparently, we also knew everything there was to know about the collapse of values in the West, about the "progressive troll" that reigned in wild moral confusion. We mocked the theories that conquered social sciences and the humanities and scoffed at agendas that took over film and art festivals. But we did not believe, we did not want to believe, that this troll would reach a state where intellectuals, authors, students, and people of culture would be able to look at pictures of a horrific massacre – and then go out and demonstrate against the victim. Now we know.
We knew that international institutions are rotten, that the world of diplomacy is steeped in double standards, that "the whole world is against us", and that hypocrisy is applauded. Did we not see who is running the circus of human rights at the United Nations, who is bowing to Iran, and how Ukraine was abandoned to face a war on its own? But we did not believe, we did not want to believe, that even in the face of clear, blatant, and obvious crime – stupidity and hypocrisy would stand up showing their most primal expression in the courtroom of The Hague, in a despicable show of insulting intelligence and a criminal desecration of humanism itself.
We thought we knew our soldiers. We thought that they were the most patriotic, boldest, bravest, and most loving army imaginable, even when in the world – and in Israel itself – some worked hard to convince us that they were, in fact, war criminals, low-life fighters, abusers of other humans. But we did not know, we could not know, to what extent our soldiers would revive the IDF's vitality. To what extent are our combat fights made of the stuff from which heroes are made? How determined are they to win, how willing are they to sacrifice, how devoted are they to their mission, what legends are they? Who knew it would be like this? Now we know.
And we knew we had a great country. Or at least it was. We knew that we used to be a beautiful and honest nation of caring, loving, and amiable people. They sang "this nation that is divided all year round, how does it arise when it smells danger". But we did not believe, we could not believe, that even in our generation we would rise in such a way from the dust of internal clashes to such an enormous group hug. And we awaken those beautiful songs, and the beautiful people, and the volunteering, and the packages for the soldiers, and we wave the flag, also towards each other in peace. We thought that the Israeli spirit, the spirit of the generation of founders and the generation of our parents, would no longer arise anymore. Now we know even better.
After 100 days, we know. Like that 3-year-old boy, who grew up within 10 minutes in Herz Frank's short movie from 1978. we know. Forget the screens for a moment and look at our faces. How much have they changed in the last 100 days; fluctuating between panic and calm, between sadness and laughter, between curiosity and escapism, and most importantly – between repression and knowledge? Look how much we have grown in 100 days.
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