Shooting and Sobbing
Hold your breath. This in not a joke, this is not a satire. It is real almost as much as it is pathetic. Israeli Ynet just reported that the images of captured Israeli commandos published in Turkish papers opened “...old wounds among those Israeli commandos involved in similar circumstances. Thus far, at least four combat soldiers have reported worsening of their (mental) condition”
While the rest of the world is caught shocked and angry by the images of Israeli navy seals executing peace activists in cold blood, the Israelis seem to moan over their new emerging phantasmic trauma.
Ynet reports, “the difficult images of Israeli commandos tied up and bloody on the deck of the Marmara have had significant effects on soldiers who have been away from the battlefield for more than a year.” Apparently the new sufferers are soldiers who didn’t even take part in the event.
First, let me offer the Israeli traumatised commando ‘victims’ a light remedy. In the following picture they can see that the Turkish medical team was actually treating the lightly wounded Israeli soldiers on the lower deck at the time their friends were executing peace activists on the upper decks.
I want to believe that once Israelis grasp that there is compassion out of their Hebraic Ghetto, they may even start to develop some empathic feelings themselves. But I may be over optimistic here.
Ynet learned that at least four “Navy combat soldiers have recently contacted the Defence Ministry to report that the media images of the injured soldiers have instigated a worsening in their mental and psychiatric conditions.” No wonder why Israel needs so many atomic bombs. If this is the way its toughest combatants react to images of light injuries, Israel may as well use its ultimate weapon against the next humanitarian flotilla to Gaza.
One of the ‘suffering commandos’ who was enlisted last year and didn’t participate in the cold blooded murder on the Mavi Marmara reported that he “did not receive any training on how to deal with such situations and their repercussions”, one of which is that he has a hard time falling asleep at night. The kosher warrior cannot close his eyes. Not too bad, I guess, in comparison with the nine peace activists who won’t see daylight.
Interestingly enough, Ynet is yet to report about Israeli commandos who are traumatised by the massacre they committed executing peace activists in international waters. Ynet is also yet to report on any Hasbara officer who committed a suicide after being exposed for forging and staging footage of violence on the Mavi Marmara. Maybe the Israelis are not that fragile after all.
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Gilad Atzmon was born in Israel in 1963 and had his musical training at the Rubin Academy of Music, Jerusalem (Composition and Jazz). As a multi-instrumentalist he plays Soprano, Alto, Tenor and Baritone Saxes, Clarinet and Flutes. His album Exile was the BBC jazz album of the year in 2003. He has been described by John Lewis on the Guardian as the “hardest-gigging man in British jazz". His albums, of which he has recorded nine to date, often explore political themes and the music of the Middle East.
Until 1994 he was a producer-arranger for various Israeli Dance & Rock Projects, performing in Europe and the USA playing ethnic music as well as R&R and Jazz.
Coming to the UK in 1994, Atzmon recovered an interest in playing the music of the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe that had been in the back of his mind for years. In 2000 he founded the Orient House Ensemble in London and started re-defining his own roots in the light of his emerging political awareness. Since then the Orient House Ensemble has toured all over the world. The Ensemble includes Eddie Hick on Drums, Yaron Stavi on Bass and Frank Harrison on piano & electronics.
Also, being a prolific writer, Atzmon's essays are widely published. His novels 'Guide to the perplexed' and 'My One And Only Love' have been translated into 24 languages.
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Source: http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/shooting-and-sobbing-by-gilad-atzmon.html
