Fire & Flame!!

The Sights and Sorrows of Israel on Fire & the Measure of our Loss ....

   

(If you click on the individual images you should be able to access a larger version, if you so desire ~ they are brutal images!) 

It is difficult to blog this tragedy,  it is Eretz Israel & close to my heart.   Along with 9/11 it is the most difficult blog I've attempted.  42 people died, another 5 are critically injured, hundreds have lost homes & possessions and 15,000 were evacuated.  Those directly affected carry vivid, unsettling memories,  and all who lost their loved ones are hurt & heartbroken in a way that cannot be seen on the outside.  Israel is a tiny country & it's society has been touched.   I wasn't there,  I didn't experience the sights or sounds or smells or terror of the encroaching flames.  I thought & thought about how best to tell this tale without intruding, to honour the fallen & express Sympathy & Solidarity.   It came to me how best to do that ..... in the words & pictures of those who were there!

On Thursday last, a bus filled with Prison Service Cadets burned completely, killing 36 of its passengers, after a fallen tree blocked the road it was travelling on, trapping it in flames.

 "The fire began rolling down. The fire trucks tried to form a blocking line, but the flames leaped over the road. At that point we were still looking and taking pictures," Oren added, saying that suddenly "we noticed that there was a bus in the fire ~ about 400 metres as the crow flies from where we were."

"I hardly managed to aim the camera and take a few pictures, and then a wall of fire just covered the entire area. We no longer saw the bus. It was almost as if it vanished, and we saw only fire. Flames as high as 30 or 40 metres," Oren added.

  

 

 

 The Car following the bus carried Haifa Police Chief, Ahuva Tomer, who was pulled from the carnage alive, but critically burned.  She succumbed to her injuries & died last night.  May she be blessed in Memory!

 Thirty-six of the fallen were prison service officer course cadets that were on the way to Damon jail to evacuate its prisoners from the path of the flames. Two of the fallen were northern region police officers, and one was 16-year-old volunteer firefighter, Eldad Rivan, who rushed towards the flames to assist.  May he be beloved in Memory!

All were on that dangerous road with one mission in mind  ~  to save the lives of  'palestinian' prisoners  in the path of the fire.  Without intervention these Arabs would die or suffer injury in their cells.  All volunteered without thought for their own safety ... the prisoners welfare being paramount.  Unfortunately, as you can see from the disgusting image below,  the reaction of the prisoners was far from thankful.  They clapped & cheered joyously on hearing of our Jewish dead.  There was dancing in the streets of Southern Haifa .... Jewish residences in the north of the city & whole Northern neighbourhoods being in danger of being swept away in the conflagaration at that time.  Fireworks in Arab villages were filmed for Youtube alongside some of the most graphic & gruesome images of death I've ever seen,  all amid arab celebration.  May their Attitude be Avenged!!!

 There is an old Jewish proverb I'm fond of quoting "Those who are Remembered do not Die",  so for the remainder of this week I shall blog on those lost individually so we may share in their loss & grieve with Israel for her heroic children.  Am Israel Chai! 

The fire has destroyed more than 50,000 dunam (12,300 acres) of land and damaged three communities ~  74 buildings burned down in Kibbutz Beit Oren, Ein Hod, and the Yamon-Ord boarding school, and 173 buildings were partially burned.  You can help   Rebuild Eretz Israel and  those in emergency need   in the Haifa region in particular.

Over 5 million trees, some hundreds of years old are reduced to ash & rubble.  Please help in the reafforestation of Israel .....  Plant a tree in Carmel Forest!!