9th Thought

The article I will be discussing, from the Jerusalem Post:
Here

Two Israeli Arabs were sentenced to four and a half years in prison for torching a yeshiva. The article doesn't mention if anyone was hurt; I hope that means everyone was okay. The punishment carries with it a monetary compensation (presumably to help rebuild the yeshiva, which was damaged by the Molotov cocktail). Another resident was charged with being an accomplice and sentenced to community service. These are pretty fair punishments, considering. I hope the prison term has a rehabilitation program, and that the compensation doesn't put undue stress on their families.

The article stated that the three were arrested claiming "that they attempted to burn the yeshiva down for nationalistic reasons". I couldn't think of how burning down a religious school would possibly serve any nationalist desires. It seemed an act of violence, period.

And it is, which I condemn. But a brief bit of research about Acre brought up the fact that "schools for Arab citizens have been underfunded, and by 2000 there was only one Arab elementary school in the area." This is really depressing; I hope things have changed for the better in the last nine years. It doesn't at all excuse their actions, but I think it provides a possible motivation. They have only one school in the entire city; therefore a school is a logical thing to attack. It saddens me that we've failed to provide a proper education, in both schools and in moral action, that could lead to such a brutal attack.

I pray for a swift recovery of the yeshiva and the safety of its students. I also pray for new schools and crayons and security for the Arab Israeli population, so that no one has to suffer this kind of violence again.

Nationalism. What a terrible reason to burn down a place of learning. "The world only exists because of the breath of children learning Torah in school" - Bavli Shabbat 119b