ארכיון דון קישוט:

החלטתי לכתוב ברכה באנגלית לשנה החדשה. הקוראים הוותיקים יודעים שאני כותב פוסט כזה פעם בשנה, ובדרך כלל מגביל את עצמי לעברית. מי שמתעקש לקרוא יש תרגום (לא מדויק במאה אחוז) למטה.

Every year, at the waning days of the month of December, I sit at my computer station and try to conjure up something to congratulate my readers with.

Most of the times, it's not a problem. For some unknown reason, the fall and the winter have always been low points in Israel's history, and it is always easy to wish my readers that the impediments plaguing Israel at that point will be removed.

Two years ago, missiles fell in the south. In fact, some of them hit very near my place of residence. I remember waking up at the crack of dawn, after cramming for my last year of college, and immediately cowering away in my pyjamas in the only place safe enough from them. I can still recall the chilling cold of the walls penetrating my back, right to my spine, as I was trying to hold down my mother who was too old to bend properly into that corner. You can imagine that at that particular year, I had no problems finding something to congratulate Israel with.

This year, following the terrible blaze in the Carmel, a blaze that was both harrowing and humbling, and cost us our very best – both in equity and lives , I thought I finally found something new to wish my readers.

Much to my dismay, following some political trickery on the part of Prime minister Netanyahu's, and the new government's budget for the next two years, I cannot even realistically wish for that terrible catastrophe to not reoccur.

Therefore, I've been racking my brains trying to wish something better. Again, fate came to the rescue, and I saw our former President Katsav convicted on two counts of rape and one count of sexual harassment.

One might think this makes my task easier. Here stands something horrible enough to warrant at least a new year's resolution. But this event left me empty, because the ground-braking court decision left such a gaping hole in the Israeli's psyche, that long after we stop patting ourselves on the back, and congratulating ourselves for our ability to convict the number one citizen in criminal activity – a feat which even the mighty United States could not match, we will still be left reeling from the entire process in some sort of a collective PTSD.

It is easy enough to convict someone in a one day's verdict, but truth be told, the process in its entirety is much much longer. Here it took 3 years, but it could have taken more. In those years when a case meanders its way through the bureaucracy, how would the accused support himself, providing he does not enjoy the copious salaries of a retiring president? Wouldn't that process, by the sole virtue of its length, force the accused to unwillingly confess or face famine? Imagine a world where an overzealous prosecution intentionally prolongs the proceedings purely on those grounds,

On the other hand, much has been said about the president's pension. Many voices were heard in favour of cancelling his pension in the case of conviction. This makes the move financially worthwhile since pensions, even for the poorest of the poor amount into hundreds of thousands... possibly millions. Therefore, the act of denying a pension on the grounds of a criminal conviction which sexual harassment and rape are, could be very rewarding to the employer under whom the act has occurred, and who should share some of the blame. This employer might unduly promote groundless complaints on that count fuelling a witch-hunt .

The truth is that Israel is facing too many uncertainty factors for me to wish her anything for the future. My wishes could fill scrolls, to fit all scenarios which is not the intention of this post. Therefore, my only wish is for the Israelites who underwent so much, to find their way quickly enough and for them to know what they want for themselves.