It was a Saturday morning and also the holiday of Simchat Torah. I was late for synagogue anyway so I started the morning with a cup of coffee. There were booms in the distance but I live in the West Bank, so it is just background noise to me. A few minutes later I would make the connection.

While I was getting dressed I heard my phone vibrate. And again. And again. Not all of my friends and family are religious but they know I am. It was unusual enough that I decided to look. I see a WhatsApp group being very active for so early in the morning. I open it up and see everyone asking a friend if there is terrorists near his house. So I opened the news and it came like a flood. One day I will go back to the news from that day but I think the first thing I remember is pictures of terrorists on trucks in Sderot. I immediately understood the booms were Iron Dome.

I did not understand how bad things were. I thought the army would take care of everything. So did the innocent people who were massacred in their homes near the Gaza border. Some people immediately understood, took whatever weapon they find and drove towards Gaza. Some of them came back and some did not. I was still too naive. The idea didn't even enter my head as an option.
By the end of the day things became more clear. The massacre at the music festival, in the bus shelters, the dumpster, the burning of the towns. The rape of women in front of their children. The death of people I know. Some in combat, others were just massacred.

Whatever naive thoughts I had that morning were gone by the end of the day. I will never forget the sounds of people celebrating in the Arab villages around me. Beeping cars, fireworks, yelling. It became a holiday for them. And all the innocent civilians who came from Gaza to steal stuff from dead Jews. There was more of them then terrorists. Regular people, coming to celebrate the death of their neighbors by taking a TV...