Here on Island Israel, Bewilderment and Tough Questions It’s been a rough week and it’s not over yet. P. David Hornik
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It was reported Thursday evening that Israel’s Transportation Minister Miri Regev, Economy Minister Nir Barkat, and heads of Israeli airlines were holding an emergency meeting on what to do about thousands of Israelis who have been stranded abroad since Sunday—the day a Houthi ballistic missile from Yemen penetrated both Israeli and American air defenses and hit the perimeter of the main terminal of Ben Gurion Airport, injuring six people.
Those Israelis have now been stranded all that time because the Houthi airstrike prompted almost all foreign airlines to immediately cancel flights to Israel. Many of them now say their flights to Israel will be suspended until at least mid-May; for British Airways, at this point, it’s until June 14.
The two Israeli ministers and the airline chiefs were discussing ways to help the far-flung, stranded Israelis get home; the option of the local carriers, for the time being, reducing ticket prices; and “emergency plans in case of another wave of cancellations.”
Since October 7, 2023, the feeling of being isolated on Island Israel is not new to Israelis; many of the international airlines had suspended flights to Israel since that day and only resumed them in March or April this year.
Indeed, there was something almost bizarre about what happened on Sunday. Since March 18, when Israel resumed fighting in Gaza, the Houthis had launched 26 ballistic missiles and several drones at Israel, and all had crashed into the sea before getting here or been shot down.
Yet Sunday’s missile, aimed at the airport, managed to evade both Israel’s Arrow defense system and the US THAAD defense system, deployed to Israel amid heightening tensions with Iran.
One of the Hebrew Bible’s more resonant lines states, in the King James rendition: “The people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations.” Israeli aloneness existed well before October 7, but since then it’s been stronger and multifaceted. It involves, among other things, being subjected to a horrific attack, then being blamed and penalized as the attacker; suffering a toll of dead, injured, abducted, and traumatized not suffered by any other democracy on the planet; and becoming a stigmatized people whose National Security Council warns us to hide signs of our identity abroad.
And now, along with being back on Island Israel after the situation with foreign airlines seemed to have improved, we face questions, such as: What did President Trump mean by touting some sort of verbal nonaggression pact with the Houthis that seemed to exclude Israel? Why did US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabeeꟷlong considered a pro-Israel stalwartꟷmean when he said to an Israeli TV interviewer:
“Here’s what I can tell you, because I had a conversation with both the president and the vice president last night…. There’s 700,000 [actually closer to 200,000] Americans living in Israel. If the Houthis want to continue doing things to Israel and they hurt an American, then it becomes our business.”
Asked by Channel 12 to clarify whether he meant that the US would only intervene to fight the rebel group if a US citizen was hurt by a Houthi missile, the ambassador said, “It’s a matter of what becomes our immediate business.”
The plain meaning seemed to be: For the Houthis, it’s open season on all other Israelis.
We are no doubt at a difficult juncture, and the biggest question is how much Trump and his subordinates are trying to put an end to Iran’s nuclear program and how much they’re trying to reach a flawed “deal” with the hope of locking Israel out of military action.
And meanwhile there’s more “mundane” business to tend toꟷlike trying to figure out how to get those marooned Israelis home to Island Israel.
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