Israelis were still reeling from two terrorist attacks last week when yet another bomb ripped through a commuter bus in Jerusalem Sunday morning, bringing the week’s death count to at least 48. But the dead weren’t the only victims: 11 suicide attacks in the past two years have touched thousands of Israelis in deeply personal ways. Some friends and family of the victims want revenge; some try harder to end the bloodshed. Others accuse activists of exploiting their private pain. Last week, after Shimon Peres met with a pro-peace group of relatives, right-wingers seethed. Arye Bachrach, whose son was killed by Palestinians last year, charged the prime minister with turning a “national tragedy into political gain.”
Peres did ride a wave of sympathy into office last November when Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by a Jewish fanatic. But he called for national unity and waited three months before scheduling new elections in May. Early last week, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu took a similar tack, asking Likud bloc members to refrain from demonstrations for two days. Polls showed a sharp rightward shift: Netanyahu closed a 10-point gap to pull nearly even with Peres.
For relatives of the dead, the calculus isn’t so simple. Dina and Nissim Ben-Haim are still shaken by the death of their daughter, Ricki, in a bus-bomb last August. Nissim, a music producer, was planning a performance to promote Arab-Jewish understanding that day. But he canceled the show, and has given up trying to use music for peace. Nissim now believes that perhaps the Palestinians “only understand force.” “He cries at night,” his wife said last week. Just then, one of her children announced that another attack had occurred. Dina’s head sank into her hands. Then she frantically demanded to know if her other children were safe.
The Ben-Haims sometimes feel harassed. Journalists tried to persuade Nissim to stage another “peace show” for TV. Hawks tried to enlist Dina for demonstrations. Last week right-wing activists offered her money to attend a meeting with Peres–if she’d say what they wanted her to say. “They turn my private grief into a commodity,” she says. “They don’t have to live with it every day.”
Grief tends to be sectarian. But occasionally, Jews and Arabs do try to bridge the divide. When Rabin was assassinated, Widad Jabari, a Palestinian mother of 13, wrote to his widow, saying that her husband had also been murdered by a Jewish fanatic, in the Hebron massacre two years ago. “I told her that we have to be patient and peace will come,” said Jabari, though her own faith is tested daily. Her house overlooks Kiryat Arba, where the gunman is buried. From her window, she sees people placing flowers on the grave of the killer they consider a hero.
Hofit Ayash’s mother, Ruth, also refuses to succumb to hate. She and her husband own a bike shop, and do business with Palestinians. One sent a telegram last week saying, simply, “condolences.” “I don’t blame all the Arabs,” Ruth says. She voted for the Labor Party in the past, but isn’t sure how she’ll vote in May. For now, she doesn’t want to talk about politics. She wants to remember the daughter she’ll never see again.
