Facing up at the sky

Second day of milluim. Unlike Jack's posting of what I probably do in the IDF, my milluim doesn't waste time.

We were simulating combat with tactical paintball rifles, and we rotated being unit commander.

I was told to advance and find the terrorist.

Slowly moving forward, I heard the noise to the left. Turning around, the person watching my back...wasn't.

Whoosh.

Splat.

Soldier down.

me.

Shot by a paintball, the rules state that I had to stay out till the next round (about 10 minutes)...and I had to lie on the ground.

With my paintball face mask still on, I heard my own heavy breathing as I looked up the slightly fogged sky through my mask.

Yellow paintball streaks continued to whoosh through the air over me, and they loudly banged into the metals walls around me. Yells and confusion as soldiers looked for paintball terrorists.

The sky was peaceful, the tall trees offering solace as I lay on the cold, wet ground, wondering if this was what the end is like.

Subconsciously, "life flashing through my head" -- flashed through my head.

The night before I had to run to my older kids' school with no time to change out of uniform, for a parent-teacher-student get-together, and as I was leaving and walking away from the school, I heard one the remnants of a conversation as a student excitedly told his father about a cool rifle that a soldier was carrying (me). The father told his son, "there's no way you're going to be a combat solider...no reason for you to be a frier...the government just released 450 Palestinian terrorists today...why bother being a combat solider...don't be a frier...don't die for nothing..."

Do soldiers really end up lying on their backs, looking up at the sky, wondering if it's worth it?

The yells of "Sof Targil, Sof Targil" (end of the exercise) brought me out of my daydream, and the terrorist who shot me extended his hand to help me up.

He said the other guy should have watched my back...but he took advantage of it to nail me.

Brushing the dirt off my uniform, I took a picture of the spot I was killed, and where I spent 10 minutes looking up at the sky.

But our trainers had more in store for us.

We did about 10 more simulations, and the last one was the most difficult.

Little did I know, but the explicit mission of 1 of the 2 terrorists was to "kill Jameel...don't worry about anyone else...just kill Jameel"

(Our IDF trainers really like me).

I won't go into details of the simulation, but the terrorist didn't succeed.

Chanuka Sameach.

Oh, and wish me luck; I may have an unbelievable post coming up next week, which will surpass almost every posting ever seen on this blog.

Shabbat Shalom,

Jameel.

Wherever I am, my blog turns towards Eretz Yisrael