I have friends in Israel

and it is a country I would like to visit but never will. It would be good to see those places I was told about in Sunday School and, later, in high school.

But, it isn't safe. I am not going to put myself at risk and perhaps put others at risk because I cannot do an Olympic dash from trouble. It is not a safe country. It has never been a safe country.

The events of the last two days have left me feeling more than merely "anxious". I am deeply concerned for my friends there. I have not heard from them and they are people who would send out group messages telling people, "We are safe." There have been no such messages. 

I don't know what the answer is to the tragedy which is Palestine-Israel. What I do know is that many ordinary people on both sides of the conflict simply want to get on with their daily lives without having to constantly be on guard. They don't want their children involved in the conflict. They have their own ideas about how the situation should be resolved but know that others will not allow that to happen. As mothers they try to teach their children that violence will get you nowhere and know that their teenage children will get called to do military service on one side or trained to fight on the other. 

The two families I am thinking of have been friends for many years. One of them has a profoundly disabled son, now an adult. He needs constant care and attention. He is not unintelligent but he is not able to speak and uses a communication board. I helped to set it up many years ago. It was at another time when the conflict was severe. Even being seen talking to one another was dangerous then. The speech pathologist who took the risk of helping is a brave woman. She was heavily criticised at the time. Now retired she has remained in touch with her "other family". To her they are simply a family in need of help. 

It would be so good to think that friendships like that could stop the bloodshed. They won't. There are very powerful voices fuelling the violence. The violence is being driven by beliefs that cannot be shifted. It is being passed on from one generation to the next. How do you stop that? 

I just hope my friends are safe.