It had been a crazy week and John and I had decided to sleep in last Saturday. If it was sunny, we’d have a leisurely breakfast on the large rooftop balcony. We’d take in the view, read over and discuss the week’s Torah portion, and just relax.

Around 8am I was getting all sorts of red alerts on my phone. The siren goes off and a banner tells what type of attack is in progress… missile Shlomi; hostile aircraft intrusion Tel Hai; terrorist infiltration Margalit; missiles Meron;… we then heard the sirens blaring outdoors, locally. Time to hop out of bed (John was still asleep), get our things together (I have 2 packed bags. I take my phone and power cord and the two bags and purse. John gets his phone, wallet, the iPad and the dog) and we head to the safe room downstairs. 18 seconds. Hostile aircraft intrusion (explosive-laden drone). We failed miserably. It took us almost 90 seconds. “Was that a siren??? Is it here? Where are my sweatpants?? My slippers?? What’s going on? Did you hear anything? Can you hear anything outside? Was that a boom? Do you have the iPad? Did I just hear an all clear signal? Do we go downstairs? I have to pee first. No time. No time!!! Can you get downstairs?” Oy! Were we in trouble!

The Wednesday previous to that, 4 January, Salah al Arouri, the second in command of Hamas was killed after a meeting with top Hamas, Hizbulla and IRGC heads in Beirut, Lebanon. He was one of the 7 October masterminds. Israel was the first to be blamed for the hit. Then US/CIA/Mossad. Some suggested it was an inside job. There are many Lebanese who do not want to see another war spread to their country.

Hizbulla has taken over much of Southern Lebanon. They are deeply embedded in homes and facilities and also have an extensive tunnel system between villages. Iran has supplied Hizbulla with over 150,000 missiles: many area precision guided, far ranging missiles. That’s almost 10 times greater than the arsenal Hamas had in Gaza. Iran has kept Hizbulla well funded, equiand trained. They supposedly have IRGC troops embedded in Lebanon and in Syria. It is a definite threat to Israel׳s existence to have another Iranian proxy army at our throats.

Since 7 October, Hizbulla has been engaged in a rather small (considering) game of tit-for-tat shelling along the Israeli border communities, which have all been evacuated. Every morning and afternoon there is shelling- some antitank missiles and mortar fire. Occasionally they will launch a small rocket barrage or a UAV comes across the border. The IDF answers with precision guided missiles aimed at their launch pads, their surveillance towers, bases, storage units and other military installations.

After the assassination of alArouri, the threat level has become higher. Nazralla, head of Hizbulla, warned “if Israel wants war, we will fight without restraints, rules, limits or restrictions. We will avenge alArouri’s blood.”

62 rockets and drones were launched into Israel Saturday morning, sending people- Jews, Arabs,Druze, Muslims, Christians- from 90 communities into shelters regardless of ethnicity. Two (confirmed) Israeli satellite dishes were taken out on Mt Meron on Saturday by Hizbulla. There is a heavy military radar and information center at the top of the mountain.

Since then, things are becoming more interesting here. We go to bed with the sound of drones and of jets strafing the sky overhead. I wake up in the early morning to the cooing of a turtle dove outside my window. The low booms of shelling sound in the background and the thrum of helicopters whir to the East. It’s quite the weird juxtaposition.

Our IAF, F-16s, F-35s, Apache Helicopters, have upped the game in Southern Lebanon. They are taking an offensive stance at this point, making precision strikes against the enemy strongholds. The IDF has finally started using their surveillance blimp. We saw it in the sky last weekend.

During the first days of the war, Israel floated the idea of a full attack on Hizbulla. Eliminate the Iranian-backed terrorists once and for all. The US was very alarmed and objected heavily, with President Biden calling Netanyahu up to three times a day to dissuade Israel from expanding the war to multiple fronts.

To prevent the escalation of fighting between Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel, an envoy from the Biden administration, Amos Hochstein arrived in Israel last week. Last Wednesday Hochstein met with Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib and said the US has “a diplomatic effort underway to help resolve some of the tension” without providing further details. A senior Biden Administration stated that Lebanon doesn’t want war with Israel. “I think from everything that we can tell, there is no clear desire from Hezbollah to go to war with Israel, and vice versa,” he said. We’ve learned to take everything from the White House with a grain of salt or to believe the exact opposite.

After another week-long trip to the Middle East, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Lebanon this morning. France and the US are insisting that Hizbulla remove their forces to North of the Litani River in Southern Lebanon as per UN Resolution 1701. This was drafted in 2006, but was never fully enforced and Hizbulla troops and military installations crept right up to the border fence with Israel over the past 17 years.

Israel has continually explained that it cannot have the residents and businesses of 27 border villages evacuated long term. It cannot incur the regular daily fire of armaments into its territory. Infrastructure and residences have been destroyed and there have been numerous casualties including innocent civilians. “Israel will not return to the pre-war status quo in which Hizbulla poses a direct and immediate military threat to the security of the Israeli-Lebanese border,” stated Gen Herzi Halevi, head of IDF forces.

The Biden administration is currently exerting even more pressure on Israel to completely back down from Lebanon. Yesterday, a report, usually kept top secret confidential was “accidentally leaked out to the press” by the United Stated Defense Intelligence Agency. The head of defense, Lloyd Austin has been mysteriously absent for days while undergoing critical medical treatment. The report said that “… it will be difficult for Israel’s army to succeed because it’s military as sand resources would be spread too thin [sic] given the conflict in Gaza.” The story made major headlines from Iran to England with banners reading “Hizbulla Will Easily Defeat Israel.”

In Iran this week, there were two major explosions at the grave of Solemani, a lead terrorist who was killed in a targeted trike by the US four years ago. There were conflicting casualty reports – at first there were over 200 bodies recovered and over 200 injured. It was later scaled down to under 50 total casualties. Surprisingly there were no dignitaries, imams, politicians or military leaders present at such an important event. Initially, there was talk of it being an inside job. Then ISIS claimed responsibility. Soon afterIsrael was to blame for coercing ISIS to carry out the atta. You can’t make this up! Within a day, 8 IRGC warships were blown up mysteriously at an Iranian port. No one has claimed responsibility.

Monday, 8 January, the IDF eliminated Wissam alTawil, a senior commander in the elite Radwan Unit of Hizbulla. He was killed by a guided missile to his car as he traveled along the Lebanese/Israeli border. There are expectations of things really flaring up now.

The IDF has been preparing for war on all fronts since 2006. Relying on the United States at this point is futile, since they claim to be sealing de-escalation and ceasefire, yet send billions of dollars in aid to all our enemies. Their foreign relations envoys visiting the region never fail in stirring up the boiling cauldron in the countries surrounding us.

So we try to go about our lives and be of service to one another as much as possible despite the jets overhead. Despite the sounds of war 16 miles to the North. Despite the advancing threat of escalating. Each day we have more UAV incursions into Israel. More missile barrages to the immediate north. We pray a lot. We attend weddings and funerals. We make food for soldiers and for families whose dads have been called up to the front. Our son, Max has been called back to reserve duty after 2 months of hiatus. I hope it’s just for training, but we have no way of telling.