Elders of Zion, MD

Last Monday, I went to a little event at the house of one my parent's Israeli American friends. My parent's friend is a very successful artist with a huge house with walls clad with art. The event was organized by Friends of the IDF which provides IDF soldiers, especially those who came to Israel from the Diaspora, with support in helping them live in Israel and serve in the IDF (apartments, spending money, food baskets, people to care for them, etc.). Everybody there was Israeli and spoke almost entirely in Hebrew. There were about 30 people there and many are IDF veterans such as my dad.

An IDF officer was there to talk about the conflicts the IDF faces when in war - such as fighting in heavily populated areas where the enemy hides among civilians. He talked about the recent Lebanon war and had short video about a daring IDF operation in Lebanon '06. He had another short video about how Hamas uses civilians and abuses childrens to do there bidding. Some of the guest asked why aren't they showing these pictures in the media - we are the Elders of Zion, aren't we?

Another guest said that when he was an officer in the IDF, he was frustrated because the upper echelon of the army didn't have their best interest at heart - they weren't letting them finish the job.

The night was exciting for me because I haven't been around so many Israelis in the US ever. My parents knew about half the people there. One of the guests was an old army buddy of my dad.