Violence in Israel

Those who are familiar with my messages know that I don't just paint a
rosy picture of Israel. Certainly Israel has more than enough
detractors, and in my opinion in the political sphere Israel is much more
sinned against than sinning. But, while life in Israel in general is
fine, nevertheless there are certain violent events that bear recording.
Many of you will have heard about the shooting at the gay youth center in
Tel Aviv two nights ago. A masked man walked into the center (where was
the guard?) and started shooting, then he left and walked away. He
killed two people, a youth director aged 26 and a girl aged 17, and
injured 10, two of them seriously. The police are searching for him. He
was not dressed in any distinctive way and there are no obvious clues to
his identity. The most popular explanation is that he is a homophobe,
but that is speculation. Generally Tel Aviv has a very tolerant, liberal
atmosphere where gays have been widely accepted. This killing has cast a
pall over this prevalent attitude. The PM has condemned the killing in
the Cabinet and said that the killer "will be prosecuted to the full
extent of the law."
Meanwhile the rioting of haredi men in Jerusalem on shabbat continues
over the opening of the Carta garage to accomodate visitors. Many
orthodox and haredim view this rioting on the sabbath as sacrilegious,
but nevertheless, without specific orders to stop from their rabbis, they
continue. The police keep arresting them to keep the garage open, but
they think they are doing God's work.
Another group of protestors are the Palestinian Arabs who protest each
weekend at the security wall in Bi'ilin near Jerusalem, and they are
joined by an unholy alliance of leftist Israelis and foreign visitors.
This event has become popular with the chic left set, and it has become
de rigeur for young people to include it on their tourist itineraries.
Within Israel, there was a bombing in Petach Tikva that turned out to be
a feud over sales of marble slabs (for kitchens) in the city! Ther are
also cases of child abuse and non-violent crimes that would take another
page to discuss.
Perhaps all this proves that Zionism has been successful, we have become
a "normal" country like all others.