henever terrorists commit an atrocity, there's a tendency to call them
‘animals.’ Of course, technically all humans are animals; the
only difference is that sometimes they find ways of rising above it and
sometimes, as was plainly demonstrated last week, they don't.
For ten years I lived in a rural area full of actual animals. I discovered there is only one way to keep them out: by creating a barrier that makes it physically impossible for them to enter.
A groundhog, for instance, will dig tunnels and take up residence under your deck. Yes, you can shoot it, but another one will soon take its place. The only solution is a metal fence that extends far enough underground to make digging a tunnel impossible.
Woodpeckers will see your house as a gigantic tree and drill nesting holes in it. Deer see your bushes as a fancy buffet. In either case, repellants have no effect; the only solution is to physically deny them access by putting a net or metal fence around it.
They will try to push down your fence, dig underneath it, or chew holes in it. They do it because they think they have something to gain. The point is that if the fence isn't strong enough, or if it's not monitored, it forces you to do things you don't want to do.
The local humans were no different. If you left something in a shed, they would cut off the padlock with bolt cutters and steal it. If you had a conventional hardware-store deadbolt on your door, they would kick it in, damaging the frame. The only solution was to fortify door frames with heavy plate steel and solid oak, install unpickable locks, and reinforce windows with polycarbonate. It cost us a fortune, but no humans ever broke in afterward.
Years ago, when Palestinians were walking into Israel and murdering dozens of innocents every year, I asked my Israeli friends why they never put up a fence. They only shrugged. Israel finally stopped shrugging and built one. The Europeans castigated them for it, but the murders dropped to a handful.
It sounds like the fence may have led to predator naiveté, where isolation from danger leads to reduction of anti-predator vigilance. The cost of building an insufficient barrier has now increased. They may have no choice but to seek a secondary strategy.
Americans always assumed that Israeli citizens were all armed. We were shocked to discover that, just as they didn't build a “fence” until forced to do so, they will not arm their citizens unless forced to.
The US can give the Israelis moral support, sympathy, and military protection. But in the final analysis, in a world filled with wild humans an individual is responsible for his or her own survival. It is unethical to deny them the tools they need to ensure it.
Israel deserves our unqualified support as it seeks to eliminate Hamas and re-structure Gaza using whatever tools it feels are necessary. But ultimately they will have to build a stronger fence. As difficult as it will be, Israel must also record and preserve the records of the massacre, including the decapitated babies and children and the other murdered civilians, as well as records of the celebrations held by antisemitic groups on college campuses so that no one can deny what happened.
oct 10 2023, 6:44 am. updated oct 11 2023, 3:57 am
