Voices: Dear Writer Of The Leaflet That Fell From The Sky,

The ground is littered with the pieces of paper you dropped warning us to leave. Each sheet says that if we stay we are complicate with Hezbollah, and we will be punished accordingly. They tell us that it is in our best interest to flee, move away, leave. But I want to ask, where are we to go? How does one pack up a life and move it someplace else. These towns you destroy from up high in your American made jets, are our homes. We have built these communities with our blood and sweat for years. We are not living in a traveling circus tent that can be pulled down within minutes and moved to the next venue. Our children go to school here, we have our farms and businesses here; we spend our time with our neighbors and families here. How can we simply pack these things into the trunk of a car and move them. What of our sick, our elderly, our children? Shall we go to Beirut? Syria? Where will we be safe from your rage and arrogance? What kind of person drops warnings telling people to abandon their homes and then destroys the very roads and bridges they are to use for escape. We have heard you are bombing all trucks on the roads. How are we to move? There are few cars. Gasoline is in short supply. Shall we simply walk away into the wilderness? Is that what you are asking your people to do? If you are afraid of Hezbollah rockets, why not move the people of Haifa to other places? If it is so easy to simply leave, why do you not heed your own advice?

Tell us where is it safe for us to go? We hear their governments are evacuating thousands of foreigners. Who will come save us from your terror? Where is our cruise ship sitting in the harbor? Are we to simply crawl away from our lives and leave our homes to be destroyed? Are our lives not worth as much as American, French, or British citizens.

Can you see us in your jet fighters? Or are you too high up? Can you se us on your televisions sets? Or are you too far removed? The headlines call this a “crisis,” but this is more than that; we are the victims of a massacre. The world has abandoned us. Our Arab neighbors under the thumb of the Americans ignore us as we perish in our own homes. Where is Egypt? Jordan? Syria? We have learned the hard way that there is no international community. There is Israeli and America. We tell our children to be strong. There is no help coming; we are alone.

Please remember that no leaflet telling us to move will make us disappear. Please do not play the gentle giant. If you are going to murder innocent people admit to it. Do not sit in the safety of your government rooms and pretend to worry about the victims of your bombs. If you want us dead, let the bombs drop, the world obviously does not care, but do not patronize us with your humanity. We see in the eyes of our children and the blood that runs in our streets that you have none.