M12-Conflict and Compassion(Denise Arnault) Lieutenant Yuri Bransky was in his quarters at Ramat David Air Base in northern Israel, having just finished debriefing from the most recent bombing run of IDF Squadron 117 over Gaza. He was tired. He had been up for 16 hours readying the flight, flying the jet, and talking about the mission afterward. The days and weeks were all blending together in a fog of weariness. He just wanted to close his eyes and get some rest.

'You are a brave member of your country's military defense.' The comment, whispered in his ear, seemed more a thought of his own, than a quiet statement from someone else. Yuri rolled onto his side, considering the weeks prior and the work he and his fellow pilots, all of the IDF in fact, were doing to rid the world of the Hamas terrorists. His eyes twitched as recent memories of the October 7th attack against his people by the thugs from Hamas played out upon his closed lids.

"You are a soldier, doing your duty to your family and country," the whisper, louder now, tried to intrude in his thoughts, but it was hard to break the train of memories. The pictures that he had seen of slaughtered girls and boys at a music festival, mothers and children in their homes or automobiles, they were all vivid and horrible. He did not like to dwell on them and how they made him feel, but they kept coming back when he closed his eyes.

"Vengeance is Mine, sayeth the Lord!" the unseen voice continued, even louder this time.

Yuri opened his eyes, rubbing the right one with the back of his hand, as he glanced around his semi-darkened quarters in search of the source of the words. The glowing figure of a man was not hard to find. Sitting in the chair at the small desk across the room was a figure clad in the traditional garb of a Hasidic Jew, a long black coat, with the flat brimmed hat perched on his head with the long-braided knots of hair dangling before each ear. It would be odd enough for such a man to have invaded his room in a guarded military barracks, but to make things a little odder, he seemed to be glowing from within and somehow not quite solid.

"What?!?" Yuri mumbled, sitting up and still trying to get the sleep from his eyes. "What are you doing in my quarters?"

"Do not be concerned," the man responded. "I mean you no harm." The man appeared to be about 50 and unarmed, so Yuri did not think he would be much of a threat, but you never knew these days.

"I am here to talk about your life," the glowing man continued in a calm, resonate voice.

"My life?" Yuri asked as he sat up, his bare feet feeling the cold of the linoleum floor. He was fully awake now, but the strangeness of his visitor still did not make any sense. His military training and the recent terrorist events had his mind on edge and racing.

"Yes. You are murdering innocent people. Why?" the stranger asked.

Yuri looked at the clock beside his bed. He had slept all the way through the night, and it was almost time to get up for the next day's mission.

"Nothing to say?" the stranger prodded.

"I have murdered no one!" Yuri declared forcefully. "What makes you say such a thing? How did you get into my quarters?"

"You bombed a building in Rafah yesterday," the stranger stated, not asked.

"Yes, it was a secret Hamas storeroom, but I should not be discussing this with you," Yuri said. "You never answered my questions about who you were or how you got here."

"I am Messenger Aharon," the glowing figure replied. "I am not really of your world. Your walls and guards do not hinder my movement. We Messengers are ethereal beings, who spend our time helping you humans."

Although this was a lot to take in, it did not seem unlikely to Yuri for some reason. The sincere look on the glowing man's face and his voice, not to mention the light that seemed to emanate from him, all combined to make the illogical seem quite logical somehow.

“So you are here to help ME?” Yuri queried, obviously trying to understand what was happening.

“Yes. You tell yourself that you are a good man and value God, but your actions do not validate that,” Messenger Aharon accused.

It was surreal to be having this argument with someone that he was still not sure was actually there or who might be just a figment of his overtired imagination, but his love of debate betrayed him. He could not ignore the bait.

“How so?” Yuri asked to draw out more of the argument from his visitor.

Smiling as he recognized the ploy, the Messenger continued, “You decry the brutality of October 7th, and yet you inflict destruction and death over wide swaths of Gaza.”

“You would deny us vengeance for what was done?” Yuri shot back heatedly, realizing but not caring that emotions do not win arguments.

Messenger Aharon looked at Yuri for a moment, giving him a chance to recover himself. “I do not,” he finally replied. “Although, as I said earlier, another has reserved that right. What I want to point out to you is that the ones that you call terrorists, who perpetrated those acts were called hero’s and patriots by their own people, just as your friends and family name you for your violence.”

“You are a Jew. How can you defend that filth.” Yuri raged.

“I AM a Jew, and I am NOT defending those people. They are guilty of their actions, but I am not addressing them right now. It is you that I am asking to consider your actions and decide what you believe is right and correct for you to do next.”

Before Yuri could respond to this declaration, a loud claxon started to sound, and he rose to his feet reflexively, slipping his feet into his shoes.

"I must go!" Yuri said urgently as he looked about his room to assure himself that he had all he needed and was ready to leave. "You must go."

"As you wish," Messenger Aharon replied. "We may talk some more on this subject later." With that, there was a brief bright flash of light, and he was no longer there.

The disappearance caused Yuri to pause for only a moment, then his training took over and he was moving once more. In the Ready Room, he discovered that ballistic missiles from Hezbollah bases in Lebanon had been discovered incoming. His squadron was being sent to intercept.

* * *

After the intercept mission, Yuri ate and crashed for the night on his bed, sleeping undisturbed throughout the evening. He was only mildly surprised the following morning to see that his visitor from the day before had returned, sitting calmly and waiting as before.

"I see that you are a man of your word, and have returned," he said to his glowing visitor. "What more have you to discuss with me?"

"When we ended our conversation yesterday, we were talking of perspective," Messenger Aharon replied. "I would like to continue to explore that topic, if you have the time."

"I'm listening," Yuri said.

"You claimed the right of vengeance for atrocities committed by your neighbors on October 7th. They claimed that they were exercising their right of vengeance for prior atrocities by your country against them," the Messenger continued.

"I have heard their claims before, but we must not allow such things to go unpunished!" Yuri said, once more becoming more upset by the direction that this conversation was taking.

"Must you not?" Messenger Aharon replied calmly. "How has that belief been serving you?"

Yuri was taken aback a moment by this question, but then continued, "We cannot just allow the terrorists to murder our people."

"You are correct, but let's get back to the concept of vengeance," the Messenger agreed. "You claim vengeance for an act for which they claim vengeance for a prior act, which you, in turn, claim was vengeance for yet another act, and so on. Where does all this end? What was the first terrible act that requires vengeance? Does it even matter?"

This line of reasoning stumped Yuri for a moment. He could not think of a suitable rejoinder.

Filling the conversational void, Messenger Aharon, continued, "Your Palestinian neighbors claim vengeance for the theft of their lands in 1947, resulting in their current journey in search of a homeland, and millions of deaths, when the state of Israel was formed."

"We cannot go back that far," Yuri protested. "We have to deal with the current atrocities!"

"Why so, my friend?" the Messenger queried. "Who is to say what act warrants vengeance more than another?"

"But…" Yuri tried to say.

"Maybe it is vengeance that is the problem that cannot be solved," Messenger Aharon continued. "Maybe vengeance should be left to God, as he suggests, and another method should be sought to solve the problem."

Yuri did not immediately have anything to say about this comment, but his alarm clock did. As it sounded, Yuri again told the Messenger that he would have to leave, because Yuri had duties to perform. Messenger Aharon again departed as requested with a promise to continue the conversation later.

* * *
His day was busy with mission briefings and other military matters, but throughout the day, Yuri continued to think intermittently about what the Messenger had said. His firm conviction about what was right and wrong was no longer so steady. He was confused now. After the evening meal, he returned to his quarters to prepare for the night mission that he had been assigned.

When the glow appeared to be coming from behind him as he was getting his flight gear ready, Yuri knew that his visitor had once again appeared. He turned and said, "Your words have been with me all day. You were going to say that there was another way. What did you mean?"

"I believe that everyone should devote their energy to solving the problem, rather than continuing the violence," the Messenger said.

"But, if a terrorist attacks us, we must defend ourselves," Yuri interjected.

"Yes," Messenger Aharon replied. "You must defend yourself from that terrorist, not the entire Palestinian people. That terrorist must be stopped."

"We have no quarrel with the Palestinian people," Yuri insisted. "I'll admit that there are times when someone is killed who is not a terrorist, but that is the fault of the terrorists for hiding behind them."

"Is it?" the Messenger asked in his infuriating way. "If it was your mother that the terrorist stood behind, would you feel the same?"

This question struck Yuri almost physically. He stepped back. "Of course I would not kill my own mother!"

"Then why the Palestinian?" Messenger Aharon asked calmly.

Yuri said immediately, "We have told the Palestinians to move out of the way."

"But are they able to do so?" the Messenger asked. "When they have nowhere to go that is safe in all of Gaza, which is where they are trapped and are not allowed to depart, can they step aside so as not to be in front of the terrorist?"

"But they know the terrorists are there. They can report them. They can refuse to allow them to operate," Yuri tried to protest.

"Can they? How do unarmed people who have very little already do that?" The Messenger asked.

"We have to do something. We must defend ourselves," Yuri asserted.

"Yes. We agree on that," Messenger Aharon said. "It is the 'what' and the 'how' that we have been discussing this entire time."

Yuri looked at his glowing visitor a moment, then asked, "And what do you suggest?"

Messenger Aharon smiled, clearly pleased with the direction that the debate had turned. "You say that you cannot prevent killing others while targeting the terrorists. Perhaps that is because you have prevented innocents from being elsewhere."

Yuri said nothing, waiting for the Messenger to continue.

"Your country spends millions of dollars of your wealth, and the wealth of your allies, on military equipment and explosives killing terrorists and others," the Messenger said.

"True," Yuri said, agreeing with this statement.

"What if your country spent some of that wealth creating a place for the Palestinians." Messenger Aharon said.

"That was supposed to be Gaza!" Yuri countered.

"Yes, but it would have to be different, on both sides," the Messenger added. "The Palestinians would have to be allowed to self-govern a country of their own with full international rights as they once had. They would have to accept a UN force to inspect that no terrorist activity was being allowed. The Israelis would have to keep their people a set distance from the Palestinians, both in Gaza and the West Bank where settlers are constantly assaulting and even killing Palestinians. Israeli settlers cannot be allowed to steal and live on Palestinian land. This buffer would ensure that terrorists could not come out and murder before being detected. This neutral zone would have to be monitored. Terrorists would have to be killed, not innocents."

"That seems pretty close to what we have that's not working," Yuri said sourly.

"Yes, but it would have to be enforced fairly. Israel has shown that it cannot be trusted to do so. The Palestinians have shown that they cannot be trusted. Both have shown that they will not stop their citizens from violating the rights of others. It would have to be monitored by an international group which would have the authority to enforce compliance. The international community would also have to enforce blockade of arms being provided to both parties."

The claxon sounded again announcing the time for the night mission. Yuri just looked at the Messenger and he winked out of the room.

* * *

Yuri was level at 20,000 feet going Mach 2.2 on his way to his target when Messenger Aharon appeared, somehow floating easily in front of the speeding jet, just outside the cockpit cover. In spite of the rush of wind and the roar of the jet engine, Yuri could clearly hear him.

Messenger Aharon saw the ethereal Infidel riding in the cockpit with the pilot. Infidels are ethereal agents of chaos who try to disrupt and destroy everything. The Messenger flashed his essence to dispel it and it was gone.

"Your target tonight is in a populated neighborhood," the Messenger said.

"Yes," Yuri replied. “I know.”

"There will be innocent lives lost," the Messenger continued.

"I am doing my duty," Yuri said.

"You do not have to," Messenger Aharon insisted.

"Yes I do," Yuri said. As he slid his thumb over the bomb release button, he hesitated, his eyes becoming wet with tears, seeing a indistinct vision of a woman sitting against the wall, shielding young children with her arms and body, as an elderly couple in turn shielded her. He did not see or feel the invisible hand of the Infidel that had been hiding between his feet inside the cockpit reach up between his legs and press his thumb down on the button.

Intelligence later reported that the bomb that fell that night killed two grandparents, a mother, 3 children, 1 Hamas terrorist, and created 14 more future terrorists, who vowed to avenge their loss.

Yuri Bransky resigned his commission as a pilot in the IDF the next morning and devoted his life to changing the way Israel defended itself. He would no longer drops bombs on innocent non-combatants. He did not know if he could achieve his goals, but he could no longer ignore what the Messenger had shared with him. The killing must be stopped, or it would never stop. We do not yet know how effective his attempts will be.


Author's Note: This story is part of my new Historical Messengers series. Yuri Bransky and the events in the story are fictitious of themselves but reflect events that have happened.

The states of Israel and Palestine were formed at the same time in 1947 by international decree, an agreement that the Israelis accepted but the Palestinians did not. A war immediately ensued which Israel won quickly. The two parties have been in conflict ever since. Outside governments have backed both sides for their own political ends at the expense of those who live there.

You can use the following links to find out more details of the history of the events covered in this story.

The Wikipedia web site gives a short history where many facts were drawn for this story.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Israel

Reading the following article on Reuters will be interesting.
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-palestinian-dispute-hinges-statehood-land-jerusalem-refugees-2023-10-10/

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