Shalit, Goldwasser, and Regev: Men Who All Deserve More Than We Are Willing To Give Them

In my home we have a custom: every Friday night before we recite kiddush we say the prayer for our captured soldiers who don’t have Shabbat with their families and friends as we are privileged to.

It’s really the least we can do, but I like to think that it elicits a conscience among our guests and us.

These poor men. These poor bastards who are suffering GD knows what on a daily basis.

One of my friends actually hopes that they are dead so that they don’t have to suffer the tortuous indignities that Arabs are known to inflict upon our people.

Another person I know believes that we should play it smart and try to negotiate with their captures for their freedom.

I am of the opinion that actions speak louder than words. I am of the opinion that negotiating with these foul monsters is degrading to our very essence as human beings and Jews—the survivors of Babylon, Greece, Rome, Stalin, and Hitler.

I say we go after our men and retrieve them wherever they may be held. I say we kill the bastards who took them and ship their body parts home in pigskin.

I say we go for them as we did for Nachson Wachsman.

“Wachsman” you say??? “Wasn’t he killed in rescue attempt? Wasn’t it pointless?”

Would be captures of Israeli soldiers must learn that every time an Israeli soldier is captured that we will be coming, that we will come with force and that we will execute the men who take our boys with brutal distinction.

What our men need to know is that wherever they are taken, wherever they may be we will come for them. That no matter what conditions prevail we will be there for them. They must know that they do not defend the Moledet at their own peril, and that the defenders of our country are not expendable, that every one of them will be retrieved.

I like to think that poor Nachson Wachsman, in his final moments, knew that Israel was coming for him. I like to believe that in his final moments he heard voices speaking Hebrew coming for him and that he was not alone. He was not left to die.


Shalit, Goldwasser, Regev and every other Israeli captive are alone. There are no voices speaking their language coming to save them. Their country has abandoned them. Their military and political orders do not care enough to punish those who took them. Rather they taunt them, childishly, they play diplomatic games of cat and mouse with them that do not inspire fear.

Those who would take our boys must know that we will be there every time. And so must our boys be able to count on the same.