THANK G-D FOR ADVERBS!

  Who. What. When. Where. Why. How.

If I ever run into a student and show them the above list of 6 words, I will be very disappointed if they do not recognize the above six question words as the six questions that an adverb answers. Those words help to anchor, define, and/or specify the detail of a statement or question, be it spoken or written. 

Without the clear information they provide, there is a paucity of clarity, leaving a huge gap as to comprehension and transmission of necessary content. Hence, it is expected to find the terms, the words so necessary, particularly in a situation demanding those answers, those bits and pieces of information, and where and when necessary, the more details the better.

And so, we come upon today's conundrum. Over- night I have received several exuberant emails from various Jewish, Israeli, and news related websites practically shouting "They are coming home. All of them.” I almost ran to wake up fellow members of my household with that joyous piece of information, knowing immediately that this meant that all the hostages, alive or dead, whatever poor condition they are in, are coming home. To the arms of their family, their friends, their loved ones, to all who have been hoping and praying for this to finally take place - after over two years, 734 days of horror. Or to be accorded proper burial rites per   the beliefs of the returned hostage.   

However, ...

Upon closer, slower perusal of the various postings, there was a very obvious - and telling - paucity of details in answer to the definition and purposes of adverbs. 

Who - Those slaughtered on October 7th or during their horrendous years of captivity, but more definition of who these redeemed from Hell are, their lives before, who awaits them with tears of joy or tears of the unredeemable loss of life, of  what could and should have been, if not for the savagery of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and all those who either implicitly or complicitly enabled this awful situation.

What - According to Turmp, and all those who read his statement and those of others reporting on this event,

 “I am very proud to announce that Israel and Hamas have both signed off on the first phase of our peace plan,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

“This means that all of the hostages will be released very soon, and Israel will withdraw their troops to an agreed upon line as the first steps toward a strong, durable, and everlasting peace,” he continued."

Finally, the treaty, pact, agreement, promise that we have been waiting for, so terribly long a wait. Uh-oh went the warning bells in my head and my fingers ached for a red pen of correction/editing. What exactly was this statement, in actuality, transmitting to us? Treaty? Signed. sealed and delivered? Word of honor?  Detailed letter of agreement? Could we see it or are we to look aside from the possibility that in actuality there is nothing truly solid, concrete, real and assured to be so. Yet another blowhard situation, wherein false or wishful, imaginary thinking, akin to those presented to us as fact on that oxymoronically named self-serving site Truth Social? 

He has made this statement - “Blessed are the peacemakers!”  many, many times, always premature or, in fact, never to truly become fact and substance. Is the 'what' of it a very brief statement, an expression of a hope we all deeply desire, and soon after echoed by Netanyahu, with his own version of a longed-for actuality? “With God’s help, we will bring them all home”. 

Statements such as the above statements of both politicians, so practiced in the art of saying something actually amounting to nothing of reality or consequence, have been heard before. Too often.   Trump has, so modestly, deemed himself as the go-to "peacemaker", in situations where that peace never actualized, so desperate is he, even campaigning for it, the Nobel Peace Prize. He has contacted other leaders of the world, and the    Hostage Forum has contacted the Committee urging such a granting, despite the fact that we hear nothing concrete, etched in stone, as of yet. I, we all, so long for the return of our people and an end to these eternal wars, but the details? The adverb fulfillment? Where are they? 

These statements first put forth on that so aptly oxymoronically named Truth Social, remain as words of possible beauty and courage, whose realization will be a smooth process, smoothly, a  soft series of new realities it emerges, leaving room for further accepted and welcome positive change  release rather than with an abrupt painful bursting of all planned for, all dreams, all achievements. Frightening, noisy, yet another false moment by a man who has strong allergy to truths. I so hope that this time he will surprise me, the world will surprise itself, but ... 

The exact details necessary to fill in the void of where, when, and how are missing, glaringly so. Where will all this take place? Will it be a supposedly neutral area? Is one to be found there and it so, is certainly disguised well. Where will the people who are supervising this exchange to be found? If they can be found. The IRC has proven itself to be inefficient, and rather brutal actually in their treatment and regard to and for our hostages. There must be a place with no room for the awful displays, the staged performances meant to further delay releases of our tortured and tormented people.

How is where the details are sorely needed. How are the details to be filled in? With what information? How is all it to be actualized? Are those details and facts in writing, signed, sealed and delivered? The lopsided exchanges of swapping of innocents for those with blood on their hands cannot be left in vague terms, nor the who to be involved, for Hamas and ceasefires and exchanges have been sabotaged several times already. The word of Hamas is nothing to be trusted nor valued. So how do we ensure that so desired and smooth  exchange? We know it must be as peaceful, stressless and quick as possible, with all hostages alive and dead, returned before any permanent change takes place.

Why is it taking place now? These terms are nothing less than what has been spoken about before, bruited about on the airwaves, in the media, almost identical to what we have now. So why now? Why is Israel consenting to terms which chain their hands and feet? Why is there no wording re the exchange so that Hamas cannot stop it in midtrack? Why are we allowing for the release of those with the blood of thousands on their hands?    Why now as opposed to before when we refused  to do so with the very ones we are apparently agreeing to at present? How are we to prevent their return to bestiality? 

Finally, we have yet another why and how. Absolute security re the disarming of Hamas. Closets, cubbies, tunnels, hideaways and homes and cribs, hospitals and beds and schools - all emptied out of arms ad ammunition. During this ceasefire no chance to rearm and organize, to plant devices meant to take as many lives as cruelly as possible. They cannot be trusted, nor am I trustful of a force of Arab counties to patrol and neutralize.

How is the vetting to be done? Vetted to the day of birth! The antisemitism, the JewHatred, the Israel hate, suffusing the world these days makes this a certainty with great doubt of that force and its behavior for will there be true neutrality? How high is the risk of fighting should Israel be attacked or suffer yet another intifada, for the image of all Arab countries warring against Israel is abominable and unthinkable, yet there it is. Israel is attacked yet again, everyone standing there doing nothing as Isreal reacts. 

When they do take action, who judges its “appropriately” for if Isreal defends itself, it is almost 100% discouraged and disapproved by the nations of the world.  For Israel to defend itself seems to be an anathema.  Israel and then ... Will the world cry? Another multi-million people population are, in fact, having genocide once again perpetrated on them. The claim will be that Israel has done wrong, has ever does so in their eyes.

This whole situation is so fraught with uncertainty, so shaky are its foundations. Not necessarily so happening, nor coming to fruition with a positive finality.

 I hope I am wrong. I hope my mostly empty glass  fills up with good, clean soul restoring water and remains so. But until this happens, I cannot forget yesterdays and todays of horror and oppression, born of desire of the erasure of the entire Jewish nation and their heritage, their gifts to the world, and the tomorrows proposed to keep it that way.

 Would that it was not so. Unfortunately, it is. Who, when and where, why, and how - many questions, many details, many hopes, much distance between the wish for the imagined and the reality.

   We will have to wait and see. And pray.