Poised For The Fight

Shai Shachar, in foreground with rifle and camera, at a roadside grill on the Gaza border. Joshua Mitnick

Shai Shachar, in foreground with rifle and camera, at a roadside grill on the Gaza border. Joshua Mitnick

by Joshua Mitnick
Israel Correspondent

Kibbutz Kfar Azza, On The Gaza Border — With a camera slung over his shoulder alongside his M-16, Shai Shachar looked more the part of an army photographer than one of the thousands of combat reservists called up to help with Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

As the freelance photographer gathered with Golani infantry buddies Tuesday at a roadside meat grill within view of the Gaza border for dinner and to watch the news of the invasion, he said the initial anxiety over the call-up had eased somewhat. The relatively low casualty count — six soldiers killed since the invasion began, as of Wednesday — was also a reassurance.

“The number of injured isn’t high,” said the 40-year-old reservist and father of one. “Once

the war started, I thought there would be many more.”

A week and a half since getting a phone call in the middle of the night informing him of the emergency call-up, Shachar’s intelligence unit has been watching from the Israeli side of the border, assisting field commanders inside Gaza by directing them to targets. But with each day Israel’s army advances into Gaza, the chances rise of his unit getting sent into the Gaza Strip.

The camera will go into battle, Shachar said, just as in 2006, when his unit was called up for service in the Lebanon war against Hezbollah. Might the camera be a safety blanket? Possibly, he said.

“Ever since I studied photography, the camera comes with me,” Shachar said.

And yet, when the reservist goes off to fight, he goes off with a different kind of baggage: Shachar’s father was killed in the 1973 Yom Kippur war. His main anxiety now is ensuring his daughter doesn’t suffer the same fate of growing up without a father.

Ignoring the nearby posting of the army home front command’s order prohibiting crowds in public places within a three-mile range of the Gaza border, Shachar and his unit were among hundreds of soldiers streaming through the “Shmerling Meat Bar” restaurant to devour Sloppy Joe sandwiches.

Although the reports of the funerals of four soldiers killed in a friendly-fire incident dominated the news, the reservists seemed calm and relaxed. “Now we’re fighting,” said Ofer Shmerling, the restaurant owner and a former paratrooper. “There will be time to cry later.”

The reservists agreed that the battle in Gaza against Hamas is different than their 2006 experience in Lebanon. Hamas has fewer weapons than Hezbollah, and the Israel Defense Forces is better prepared than two years ago, they said.

Though many in 2006 criticized Israel for not being ready for combat against Hezbollah, Shachar said the unit had trained on several occasions for the fight in Gaza. The fighting is being directed with more focus, said one of the unit members.

In Lebanon, “every second there was a shift in targets,” said Omri Dan, a 24-year-old university student. “They didn’t know what they wanted to go after,” he said of his commanders.

Another switch from 2006 is that the army is taking away soldiers’ cell phones, stirring worry among soldiers’ families about their fathers and sons being out of touch for days.

So far the main danger to the soldiers has been snipers and mortar fire. Israel’s media has also reported attacks from Hamas operatives with explosive belts.

Dan said that in Lebanon the army tried to advance too fast to conquer Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon. Now the progress seems deliberate but careful, he said.

Despite that assessment, as they watched TV footage of the fighting, some joked that the armored divisions would conquer most of Gaza before they would get the chance to be deployed to the front of the fighting.

“If I go into Gaza, I hope to find an oud,” said Barak Ben Yedidya, a professional musician who referred to a Middle Eastern guitar. “We want there to be peace so we could go to Gaza and hear music, not explosions. But sometimes we give up on this dream.”

As reports began trickling into Israel about the shelling of a United Nations school in the Jabalyia refugee camp, Ben Yedidya said it was important to show reports from the other side of the conflict, not only the Israeli side.

“Our media is co-opted” by the government, he said. “They don’t want to lower the morale behind the war.” (Israel claims Hamas fighters were firing from inside or near the UN school.)

Reports of increasing international pressure for a cease-fire did spur hope for an early end to the fighting, Shachar said. If Israel withdraws prematurely from Gaza, all of the work would be for naught.

The goal, he said, was to make Hamas understand that “its not worth it for them” to fire missiles on southern Israel, a pattern that has gone on for some eight years.

“A cease-fire won’t help if we don’t finish the job,” he said. “The situation will go back to the way it used to be — when Hamas decided when it wants to fire. ... I have no idea what will be tomorrow,” Shachar said, “and where this will all end.”

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