By Guest Contributor: Binjamin (Ben) Casey

A few weeks ago, I decided to join the Bear Witness Tour, a group that was organized in Katzrin for those who wanted to visit some of the war ravaged communities in the South of Israel. I admit that I had serious doubts about going after I read an article about how some of the residents of the communities on the Gaza envelope were feeling that their privacy was being invaded. I certainly had no goulish desires having seen more than enough death throughout my many years working in Africa. What finally convinced me to go was that already a short three months after the atrocities of October 7, people were denying it had taken place even with the huge amount of video, audio and personal testimonies given by those who witnessed, were affected and the perpetrators themselves.

People who had vociferously campaigned for peace and a “Two State solution” such as 74-year-old Vivian Silver from Be’eri who was brutally slain alongside those who have now realized that peace cannot happen until the ridiculous refugee saga is finally put to rest and the Arabs are absorbed into their own cultures and countries.

I realized finally that I needed to see and to feel the atmosphere of the towns and villages and hear from those who have been involved. I wanted to understand the financial as well as the tragic human aspects.

During the three years I have been in Israel, I have noticed the remains of rockets that have been fired into Israel over the years. My curiosity led me to consider the monetary cost above and beyond the cost of human lives. On October 7th around 8,500 rockets were fired at Israel. At an average cost of $600 a piece, this comes to approximately $5,100,000 (USD). Around 10% of these rockets either failed, landed in the sea or fell inside of Gaza. That means that roughly 7,650 made it into Israel. If the Iron Dome fired at 90% of the rockets, then we have a figure of 6,885 interceptions by that means. Each interception costs around 60,000 USD, we come to a cost of $413,000,000. Adding that together with the cost of the Hamas rockets ($5,100,000) and you get a cost of roughly $418,100,000. The difference between the cost of the rockets and the cost of the interceptions by the iron dome is 413 million dollars.

According to Fresh Books, the cost of a 50-bed hospital averages from 25 to 75 million USD. Considering that the cost of the rockets and interceptions comes to 418,100,000, if we now take the cost of the hospital divided into the cost of rockets using the high-end cost we could have built five and a half, fifty bed hospitals in one day!

The above figures allow for only one iron dome to intercept one rocket. What brought these figures to mind was that on every stop of our tour to the Gaza envelope there were rocket parts scattered everywhere.

The terrorist groups have consistently fired rockets into Israel–murdering, maiming, and disrupting our lives. These attacks create a feeling of hopelessness among many Israelis. I have to admit that our trip made me angry but why was I angry? What was the anger about?

I guess one of the big points is why. Why are we spending millions upon millions of dollars on developing, manufacturing, maintaining, and ultimately, using these defense systems? Why does the EU the USA and other so-called developed countries continue to aid and abet these terror organizations so that we have to counter their murderous plans?

Oil was obviously a huge incentive to get the Arabs incentivized back in the forties and fifties but apart from having the Black Gold, what else have the Arab nations contributed to the world? Where are their great leaders? Writers? Inventors? Nobel laureates? They don’t exist–not because the Arab is unintelligent but because instead of using the vast wealth they’ve gained to educate and move their people forward they’ve developed a system that is medieval in it’s concept. Surfdom. The Arab people are taught by their rulers that their low level of existence is because of Zionist aggression, oppression, and imperialism. But who is really guilty of these things? Their own rulers live in gilded palaces, leading sumptuous lifestyles instead of sharing the wealth and educating their people.

If the common people could see this they would soon realize that their misery comes not from the Zionist regime but from their own overlords and rulers.

Our tour started on a cold and rainy morning. However as we descended down from the Golan heights into the widest part of the Jordan valley to the sea of Galilee the rain stopped and lasted that way until after we left Ashkelon that evening. Traveling down route 6 we passed Tulkarm in Judea and Samaria, a veritable hotbed of the Palestinian terror groups, who after October 7th have begun to flex their muscles and try to enter into the struggle begun by Hamas and the Gazan Arabs. There is a very high protective fence along this section of route 6 which was built to stop terrorists from firing on to the highway. Of course Tulkarm and Qalqilya both on route 6 are in area a of the Oslo accords and are therefore under the direct control of the so-called Palestinian authority. The fact that Israel had to erect the security fence speaks volumes in itself.

We eventually arrived in Ashkelon where we picked up Eliyahu McClean, our guide. We then continued South until we reached the Erez crossing into Gaza itself. As we passed by the army base we noticed the approximately 6 meter high concrete wall. This wall is now pot-marked with bullet holes. The army base watchtowers also bear witness with bullet holes still visible in the glass windows. The crossing itself is very similar in looks and function to Ben Gurion airport and this is not surprising as it was designed and built by the same company. Even with all of its high-tech tools, the crossing was easily overcome by the terrorists. Before the war, around 6,000 Gazans traveled through the crossing daily to work in Israel, now it is known that a majority of these workers were actively involved in spying on the communities they were working in. They looked for information such as who owned guns and how many people lived in each house. What were the ages and did they have dogs. All of this intelligence helped to make the job of the terrorists easier. There were a number of vehicles at the crossing that had been destroyed in the attack. Riddled with bullet holes and half burned out, these vehicles are a stark reminder of how those who tried to escape the murderous rampage were gunned down or blown up in their vehicles. To me, these vehicles were a very sobering start to what would prove to be a very moving day.

As we were leaving the crossing we made a small detour to see what remained of the village station and railroad bridge at Deir Sneed. Although not directly involved with our tour, Deir Sneed was an Arab village located on the ancient Via Maris. It is mentioned in Exodus 13 as the road to the land of the Philistines. In one regard this stop was very significant as the so-called Palestinians claim this village as one of the starting points for the Nakba or catastrophe.

Many claim that the name Palestine comes from the word Philistine but archaeological evidence has shown this to be dubious. The Philistines or sea peoples originated in the Aegean sea and were very possibly Minoan in origin. The term Palestinian was very likely used to blot out the memory of Judea in the second century CE and as such, the British name in their “Palestine Mandate” almost succeeded.

The railway bridge station and village are hidden in the midst of a Grove of Sabra cacti, a bit difficult to get to.

From Deir Sneed we traveled south to the town of Sderot. Sderot was founded in 1951 as a refuge city for 80 families from Kurdistan and Iran. Interestingly, the first Arab refugee camp was opened in Gaza in 1948. It’s noteworthy that Sderot grew and became recognized as an Israeli city in 1996 with a thriving economy and diverse citizenships including immigrants from North Africa the former Soviet Union and Ethiopia. By comparison, the Al Shabti camp in Gaza is still considered a refugee camp and receives huge funding from the UN, USA and the European commission.

Al Shabti, one of eight refugee camps in Gaza is home to some 90,000 Arabs while Sderot has grown from the original 80 families into a thriving commercial city of 30,000, and has inaugurated 15 factories in the past few years. Most of this work was done with Israeli government funds. Al Shabti on the other hand is home to the AlQuds, the “holy” University and many miles of terror tunnels. Many of its residents worked in Israel, many of whom, according to reports were complicit in gathering information about the surrounding Jewish communities outside of the camp. The average Gazan Arab earned in Israel up to 10 times what he could earn in Gaza.

According to Wiki between September 2000 through March 2013 nearly 9,000 rockets and 5,000 mortar shells were fired at Sderot alone. Yet even in this trying period Sderot continued to grow.
As we were driving towards Sderot along the same route as the railway it was pointed out that the banks and trees between Gaza and the road / railroad were erected as a screen to help protect vehicles from RPG attacks. The bus shelters are bomb proof with safe rooms inside them. We saw the actual bomb shelter where the British Israeli hero Aner Shapiro ZTL managed to throw back seven grenades before the 8th blew up in his hand killing him. These bomb shelter type bus stops are a common sight throughout Israel but what is unique to Sderot is the train station. It boasts the only bomb-proof roof in the world. Also unique to Sderot are the playgrounds. They boast giant concrete play equipment in the form of caterpillars or “snakes’ ‘ designed as bomb proof shelters for the children playing there.

Sderot which is Hebrew for boulevard, is a small but pretty city sitting off of Highway 34 a third of the way between Ashkelon and Beer Sheva. It was named by Israel’s first prime minister David ben Gurion for the Eucalyptus trees that line its main avenue. The major employer in Sderot is the Osem plant according to Wiki. Osem is a food processing plant that produces items such as Bamba, Bisli instant noodles and rice dishes. The Menorah candle factory which produces Hanukkah candles that are shipped all over the world is also located here.
Besides its industries, Sderot, despite it’s s proximity to Gaza and the constant barrage of rockets, is a growing town with a young community. Many musicians and poets have come from Sderot and boast that they practiced their music in bomb shelters! Many of the traffic circles are decorated with poetical and musical themes.

On October 7th the town was invaded by some 200 Gazan terrorists according to the Jerusalem Post. There were some 50 civilians massacred in the city streets and police officers in the police station. The attack on Sderot began at 6:30 a.m. with a barrage of rockets exactly 50 years to the day of the Yom Kippur war. The barrage was followed by an infiltration by Gazan terrorists.

When we entered the town we passed the place where a minibus carrying a group of elderly tourists were gunned down after the bus got stranded with a flat tire.

We viewed the remains of the Sderot police station where the terrorist gained control and murdered some 20 police officers. After a fierce fight the IDF and police regained control using bulldozers and tanks. The building is now completely demolished and a memorial Hanukkia has been placed on the site. The basic message of the sign is: “By Hashem’s Grace we are able to stand together.” People from different countries have left flags and other memorials at the site. A beautiful painting adorns the wall of the adjacent building—a depiction of the flag of Israel, the police force and the IDF. A tank is shown firing at the station with a Torah scroll above it and several Hebrew letters flying Heavenward, presumably representing the holy souls of those murdered there.
The town, although still very quiet, is slowly coming back to life with stores beginning to reopen for business.

We drove around the town, past the Chabad house and the caterpillar bomb shelters to the Hesder yeshiva. The yeshiva according to wiki is the largest Hesder or Talmudic military yeshiva in Israel. It boasts some 800 students who returned to their studies on January the 8th despite the ongoing conflict in nearby Gaza city. The yeshiva is also built as a bomb-proof structure. On the roof of the yeshiva, where one can see  a beautiful view of the city, we came across two stark reminders of the ongoing attacks against Israel since the start of the second intifada in 2000. The first was a magnificent Hanukkah Menorah whose candle holders are made from the spent casings of 8 Qassam rockets. Also on the roof is a tree of life, which has its roots made from the casings of rockets. This menorah depicts the trails the rockets leave in the sky as they fly from Gaza to Israel.

From the yeshiva we drove to the Givati Kobi overlook. From here we could view from the Erez crossing down through Jabalia into Gaza City proper. While we were there we witnessed an explosion–possibly a terrorist tunnel being eradicated which put a huge plume of smoke into the sky. I felt no sympathy for the destruction in Gaza. Having watched numerous videos of toddlers being trained to grow into terrorists I find it very difficult to have sympathy for a group of people who train their children from birth to kill Jews and especially after October 7th when the same civilians followed behind their Hamas overlords and actively took part in the slaughter rape and looting along the Gaza border. These same barbarians did nothing to stop the violent kidnappings of the hostages but used sticks to beat them as they were driven through the city right into the area I was looking at. Sympathy should be reserved for the victims not the perpetrators.

From there, we traveled further south to Kfar Alumim with a first stop at at the original site of Saad, Maoz mul Aza (Stronghold opposite Gaza).

As soon as we turned off the main road at Saad we began to see signs from the October 7th incursion. All along the road the asphalt was either scarred or burned from the vehicles that had been shot up or blown up by RPGs. The grass and bushes at the side of the road were still black from the fires caused by the burning vehicles. It was a vivid picture of how people had tried to escape the mayhem at the Nova festival and the carnage inside the kibbutzim and moshavim.

Although we did not enter Kfar Aza where some 50 people had been brutally murdered, we did see the remains of the original village at Ma’oz Mul- Azar just next door to the kibbutz: Ma’oz Mul-Aza (Stronghold Opposite Gaza). The only building left of the kibbutz is the stronghold fortress which stands some four stories high and gives excellent views towards Gaza from its roof. Bullet holes—some at least 15 cm in diameter, pockmark the concrete. Seeing what the bullets did to the concrete gave a vivid picture of the grotesque damage they did to human flesh and bone. Unfortunately, the museum was closed but we did see the remains of a rest area for visitors that had pictorial images of what the original kibbutz looked like. The structure had received an almost direct hit from a Qasam rocket and now it is barely standing.

Next to the structure is a shed that had an intact fire kite inside. The kite was a crude affair of three sticks one and a half meters long tied together with string and a sail made from clear plastic stapled to it. At the tail were strips of newspaper to act as combustible material and on the stabilizer of the tail there was a wad of material presumably soaked in kerosene and lit before launch. Kites although crude are a very effective method of causing widespread arson and damage at a negligible cost to the terrorist.

In June of 2018, Times of Israel reported that some 6,200 acres or 25,000 dunnam of agricultural and recreational land had been destroyed causing tens of millions of shekels worth of damage. Balloons and kites conceptually are a brilliant weapon of terror. They are cheap and simple to build, difficult to spot until after launch, difficult to bring down once launched and can cause an immense amount of damage at a cost of a few dollars. For eight months of the year the prevailing wind is from the West at speeds between 5 to 8 mph. Gaza City is 4 miles away so it takes around an hour for the kites to cross that distance. Most of the kites were launched from areas a lot closer to the border meaning a shorter flight with less time to track and destroy them.

We drove from there to Kibbutz Alumim where we were met by two very alert guards carrying assault rifles who checked our reason for being there. We parked the mini bus and started walking towards the kibbutz synagogue as it was almost time for afternoon mincha prayers. On the way to the synagogue we came upon a shrine. The shrine was the remains of rusted and crumpled Qassam rockets alongside the gleaming remains of Iron Dome missiles which had helped to bring the Qassams down. The site was poignant showing the twisted iron remains of the Qassam rockets which to me represent the evil Hamas lying next to the surgically clean and gleaming remains of the Iron Dome. The fight against evil by good.

The synagogue in Alumim is a beautiful airy place with Windows all around. One of the miracles of Alumim was that not one of the windows in the building was broken during the attack. As we entered the sanctuary we were reminded of the fact that the kibbutz had been celebrating Simchat Torah the Celebration of the Joy of Torah which marks the ending of the annual cycle of the Torah reading. Holiday siddurim and children’s pictures and flags were where they were left as people ran for shelter. After mincha we headed across to the kibbutz community meeting hall. Outside is a huge banyan tree and pathways lined with flowers and bushes. A pair of peacocks strutted away from our rude intrusion into their new found privacy. In the meeting hall we met with one of the defenders of that horrible day. He told us how some 60 terrorists had infiltrated the kibbutz through the rear gate. He told us that the kibbutz’ automatic weapons were kept in an armory for “security’ ‘ and how they had to fight their way to the armory to get them using hand guns. He told how the terrorists knew this because some of them had worked at the kibbutz and were familiar with security arrangements.

He told how the Thai and Nepalese workers were gunned down in cold blood as they held up their passports screaming that they were not Israeli. He told how the Slotky Brothers Yishai and Noam ZTL perished near Alumim trying to keep the Invaders at bay. We left the meeting hall and went to see the living quarters of the foreign nationals. This was a scene of utter devastation. Everything inside the dormitory was completely burned. The twisted remains of the bunk beds showed no sign of ever having had a mattress or a blanket on them. The heat had been so intense that virtually nothing remained. The floor was covered in a thick layer of ash and the roof was buckled and collapsed in places from the intense heat. Here and there lay personal items that had somehow survived intact. A boot, a coffee mug, a beer bottle and everywhere an overwhelming stench of burned and charred fabric and wood. We left the living quarters and made our way to what had been the silos and equipment sheds. The remains of the sheds stood precariously with the roofs collapsing in and the steel I-beam wall supports bent outwards from the force of an explosion as if they were made of plastic and not steel.

From Alumim we drove to the site of the Nova festival massacre. The area of the festival was muddy from the recent rains. A coach that was stuck was being pulled out of a deep mud hole by a huge wrecker.

As we drove into the area we saw how the poppies were blooming after the rain storm eerily reminding me of the World War I battlefields of France and of John Mcrae’s famous ode “In Flanders Fields the Poppies Blow.” Suddenly we came upon a site which impressed all of us very deeply–the main area of the festival, where some three hundred and fifty 20 to 40 year old youngsters were mercilessly gunned down, raped and mutilated and some 40 others kidnapped and hauled off to Gaza. There was a sea of memorial photos. Each picture was of a young person at the start of their adult lives who had been defiled in ways that no words can convey. Seeing the pictures bought the full horror of the body cam footage of one of the police officers who got to the scene shortly after the atrocity occurred. These people had come to party and listen to their music and generally have a good time but had their dreams dashed, their bodies cruelly broken and their lives cut short by merciless savages who screamed the name of their sick god in their faces as they carried out their nefarious scheme. Each picture represented a life. A life destroyed because of some supposed nationalistic inequity. And as I stood in this forest of pictures, I realized again that there are sick and depraved morons who claim that it never happened or that those who suffered did so because they were occupiers and oppressors in some mythical kingdom that had never existed. And all of this is aided and abetted by the criminal United Nations organization.

The bodies have been removed and buried and a garden of flowers has been planted, one for each of the victims, but their blood screams out from the ground for justice to account for the agony of the relatives and friends who suffer nightmares that should not even be portrayed by Hollywood. Do the pictures and flowers and trees placate us or do they move us to support the fight against the pure evil that is Hamas, Palestinian jihad, Hezbollah and all the other obnoxious radical Muslim groups? Not one of these youngsters was given any way out. There was no quarter given and indeed written orders were found on some of the terrorists explicitly telling the perpetrators to kill, rape, behead, burn and mutilate as many as possible. Sound recordings of sick individuals calling their parents on WhatsApp to brag about the number of Jews they had just killed and their parents glorying in their accomplishments. The visage comes to mind of children running alongside a pickup truck with the semi nude beheaded corpse of a young woman spitting on her and beating her broken body with sticks. And now, a world gone insane screams at the knights who avenge them for being the protagonists of murderers.

The final stop on our tour was to the car graveyard. We drove up to the field outside of Netivot as the sun was beginning to set. We were told there were some 3,000 vehicles of both Israeli victims and Hamas terrorists. It was a surreal ending to a heart wrenching day. There was razor wire around the field to keep out souvenir hunters. With the sun dipping below the Gaza horizon and the quiet of the yard itself, I realized that many of these vehicles had and still contain blood, ashes and body parts that the incredible ZAKA volunteers could either not find or could not clean out of the burnt and bullet riddled hulks that had at one time been someone’s prized possession. The vehicles piled up in rows and in the twilight of the dusk appeared eerily reminiscent of a neat peaceful cemetery giving no hint to the confusion, noise and terror that had marked their final moments.

According to the Jerusalem Post, because of the impossibility of extracting all of the human remains the vehicles will be crushed or shredded and buried in special plots around the country. It’s hard for a rational person to look at this monument of human suffering caused by a hatred that has no logical basis. It’s difficult to imagine the stark terror and suffering that happened as young people were gunned down, blown up by RPGs and burnt to death inside their vehicles as they tried to escape from the carnage that was going on around them.

I’m sure many of us offered silent prayers for these murdered victims and also for those still among the kidnapped and the family members who lost loved ones on that awful day or whose loved ones were violently kidnapped into the subterranean rat holes of Gaza. I think of the medical teams and first responders and the ZAKA volunteers who had the sickening task of removing and identifying the almost unrecognizable human remains.

We remember the families, not only in the Gaza envelope but in the northern border villages and towns who cannot return to their homes or communities due to the ongoing rocket fire from the terrorist regimes that are not only maintaining but trying to escalate the monstrosity that is being perpetrated on the people of Israel.

May Hashem bless the names of those who perished that day. May Hashem bless the memory of those who work tirelessly and endlessly to resolve who the body parts belong to and our soldiers who look for the hostages. And be with those who are left and suffer from awful nightmares of what happened that day.

May Hashem bless the memory of all the soldiers who have perished since this awful war began and may he bring peace back to Israel and let us please say “amen”.