The buzzer has sounded. A strange aura hovers over us. We, Diaspora Jews, are sad and hurt. We feel betrayed, sickened, helpless, and angry. It is the end.

For a week we’ve watched thousands of family members dragged from their homes and herded onto busses for the longest-short journey ever.

But, they the family members, they remain strong, and proud. They are determined, driven, and firm. It is the beginning.

They don’t put up their hands in weak surrender to the inevitable. They abide but they don’t surrender. They don’t take their eyes off that piece of land. Home. That piece of land is Home. The home the creator of the world granted them. They, the family members, they see it as it is. It is the beginning.

Storms have passed before; some storms threatened but failed to strike. Some left ruins in their wakes. But always, always the end was another beginning.

They, the evacuated Jews from Gaza, do not want to start again. They have been re-starting from time immemorial. They started from square one and they built many thousands of squares, and they have arrived. They have arrived at square one. They don’t want to start there, but they will. They didn’t ask for it but it was given to them. It is the beginning.

It is the end and it is the beginning, for a beginning is what every end is.

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E-mail the author at: shlabraham@hotmail.com