Last week I watched as a one-day-old baby was pulled from the rubble that had been his/her home in Gaza. Is this tiny one-day-old baby acceptable collateral damage?
What Hamas did on Oct. 7 was horrific. The majority of American elected officials agree that Israel has a right to defend itself and a cease-fire is not needed — yet. What did a one-day-old baby do, who wasn’t even alive on Oct. 7, to deserve to die in the rubble in Gaza?
My heart is breaking and my soul is in grave despair as I see the Israeli war on Gaza unfold. Close to 4,000 children have died in almost four weeks, ranging in age from a day-old baby to teenagers. Not one will become a teacher, a doctor, a farmer, a nurse, a wife, a mother or an elder. These children may have saved lives, if they had lived. What are we doing?
What have we become as people, as a country, as a world? Can we bear witness to the deaths, wounding or burial in rubble of children without changing as people?
The Israeli war in Gaza is being paid for with our taxes. How can any of us stand so silently by as innocent children die? How can we watch the sorrow of these children’s families without changing? Some children who lived now have no family. I can only ask again, what have we become?
Elenara Joubert
Montpelier
