Scenes From a Ceasefire
The Third Lebanon War is on pause.
Day 419 of the October 7th War. All quiet on the Northern Front. The guns fell silent, the drones stopped buzzing. I still hear warplanes high overhead, but they’re fewer and further between.
A ceasefire with Lebanon’s Hezbollah—the world’s most heavily armed non-state military— went into effect at 04:00 hours (IST/EET), November 27, 2024.
Lebanon’s Army— no, the other one—is to take positions on their country’s southern border for the first time in, like, maybe ever. They’re not there to fight Israel—although who knows what the future holds— they’re there to [LOL] stop Hezbollah reconstituting itself [LOL, wink wink]. I wish them and us the best of luck.
In the meantime, The Third Lebanon War is on pause. 14 months of war, and now a 2- month bathroom break. If all stays quiet the army will start withdrawing across the border at the end of 60 days.
It’s not a victory so there’s no elation.
It’s not a defeat so there’s no devastation.
It’s not a draw either—we took their heads, eyes, fingers, hips, and groins.
Every senior Hezbollah leader and his replacement’s replacement—either dead or maimed.
It’s a ‘Cessation of Hostilities’, aka Ceasefire. People are not sure what to feel. Relief, I guess? Fatigue? Definitely. After 14 months of war, sirens, rockets, funerals, and constant worry, feelings are at once easy to describe—terror, panic, loathing, rage, vanquished, vanquisher, hopeful, hopeless, it’s all hopeless—but also hard to pin down because they move around so much.
It’s clear that a misery has made itself at home deep inside our DNA, where previous horrors politely shuffle aside to let the new guy in. There’s room enough for every generation’s horror in Jewish cells!
Oct 7 wiped the smile off our faces, maybe forever. Sure, we’ll smile again, just like we’ll dance again —our lips will form smiles and our limbs will move to the beat—but we’re never going to get that smile back again. That smile appears when you feel deeply that life is fundamentally good, that the future looks doable. It’s the smile that people have when they don’t know better.
At least 60,000 internally displaced Israelis aren’t smiling. They’ve been told not to go back to their homes for the next 60 days, just in case the ceasefire starts again. Some might never go back; why live next to those people ever again? How did that work out for the Kibbutzim in Southern Israel? Going back would be like the Trojans going back to what was left of Troy, and then letting in another big wooden horse through the gates. Troy will never fall again!
Maybe Israelis will get that smile back in 40-50 years, when our grandchildren start going to music festivals near the borders again. When our innocent angels won’t know any better.
But enough dwelling on this ceasefire, we have a war to draw in Gaza!
[[ends]]