We are elated. We are exhausted. While we have dreamt of this fantastic outcome for years, the reality of smashing the head of the snake that has funded the vilest terror groups in the world and whose declared intention is to wipe the Jewish State off the map, is quite another matter.

While my own home is in a little town with nothing of interest to the Mullahs, and too far away from Lebanon for Hezbollah rockets, my children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa, are quite another story.

When I WhatsApp’ed the family on Saturday night after four days of not a single siren, I was shocked when my granddaughter in Jerusalem said they’d been sent to their bomb shelters seven times over Shabbat! My daughter near Tel Aviv said it was eight times for her, as did my son in Modi’in. They were “absolutely exhausted.”

There is no question that the current missile and drone barrage keeping Israelis up all night and all day, has been carefully coordinated between Iran and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah, to wear Israeli civilians down and ensure we will not have a moment of peace. It’s one thing for adults, but quite another for parents who have to not only wake up their toddlers and babies but haul them to shelters, all the while trying not to traumatize them. My grandson-in-law Jacob has cleverly arranged a corner in his public shelter with toys and books. So now when the alarm goes off, his two-year old and one year-old smile, happy to know they’ll be going to their playroom to meet their friends. But I wonder how long parents can keep this up without sleep?

It comforts us to know, however, as we sit sleepless, yet protected in our shelters, that the terrorists of Iran and Hezbollah aren’t sleeping either. And while their drones and rockets are being shot down, causing us no casualties but a night’s sleep, our planes are destroying their infrastructures and killing hundreds of bloodthirsty terrorists. We can catch up on our sleep. But their entire base of operations, Air Force, Navy, underground bunkers, oil reserves, banks, weapons caches, missiles, launchers, drones are in total ruins that will take billions and years to replace. What joy to see decades of terrorist investment in hate go up in smoke before our amazed eyes!

Unlike the unprecedented unity Israelis are displaying towards this just war, it has been suggested that the ferocious, relentless Israeli/American onslaught is opening cracks in the Iranian beast. A few days ago, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian apologized for attacking neighboring Arab states, and promised Iranian forces would no longer do so, only to be contradicted hours later by the head of Iran’s ruling council of Islamic clerics, and National Security Council chief Ali Larijani, who said Pezeshkian’s remarks had been a mistake, and attacks on Arab neighbors would continue. Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Qalibaf further humiliated the President of Iran tweeting: “Iran’s defense policy is based on the directives of the Supreme Leader, the martyr, and it remains unchanged. As long as there are American bases on the lands of neighboring countries, they will not enjoy peace and tranquility.”

Yesterday (Saturday) during a broad wave of strikes, the Israeli Air Force struck Iranian terror regime military compounds and regime F14 fighter jets at Isfahan airport, as well as detection systems and air defense systems that posed a threat to the Israeli/American Air Forces.

On Friday, MK Smotrich asked Israelis to go to the synagogue and pray for the well-being of American soldiers who are fighting with us “shoulder to shoulder.” He even posted the words of the prayer! I bless our wonderful American allies. May God watch over them and their families and their country. 

What we in our shelters are depending on and hoping for is that the pilots of the best Air Forces in the world, our own and America’s, will finish taking out the missile launchers and completely destroy the stockpile of missiles and drones that kept in underground bunkers. Many of these bunkers have already been bombed, leaving the IRGC no access to them, even if they haven’t completely gone up in smoke.

Israeli newscasters are projecting that 80 percent of missile launchers have been destroyed, and 60 percent of missiles. That still leaves them plenty of weapons. But the destruction of missile factories will make it hard for them to replace these weapons. In the last two days our forces have bombed 400 sites in Iran containing ballistic missile launchers and weapon-producing facilities. There is also talk of a commando raid to extract enriched uranium so it can be whisked out of the country. What a heroic deed that would be! That it is even being considered is remarkable.

Israel also massively bombed Iran’s Mehrabad Airport, which was used by the Quds Force of the IRGC as a central hub for arming and funding the regime’s terrorist proxies in the Middle East. Aircraft loaded with weapons and cash took off from the airport numerous times and landed across the region for the use Iranian proxies. In the strike, 16 such planes were destroyed on the ground. Unlike Israel, who is being supplied by America, no one can resupply Iran, unless they too want to get massively bombed. Also targeted were several Iranian fighter jets. Hopefully we will soon see Hezbollah back to throwing stones, if not waving white flags. 

In the meantime, our granddaughter’s boyfriend is in uniform with his unit, poised on the border of Lebanon, waiting for orders to go in. She too is in uniform. Our hearts break for what our children and grandchildren are being forced to endure through no fault of their own, simply by virtue of being post-Holocaust Jews with the ability to defend themselves.

At such times, I try to remember my research on what happened during the Holocaust, when children and grandchildren were rounded up, stripped, starved, shot, or gassed all over Europe with no chance of fighting back or protecting themselves. Thank God those days are over. But the causeless hatred still exists. But now, when they endanger us, they too are endangered. 

A cloud of dark grey smoke hangs over Iran this morning, as bombed oil depots continue to burn and send up acrid smoke. I have no doubt at all that the evil IRGC regime of the Iranian Muslim fanatics will be bombed into oblivion. I pray that all Israel’s soldiers, all her children, will get through this proud, but dangerous moment in our history, and create a better, safer world for the next generation of Jews and all those who cherish human freedom and dignity.

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