When my oldest sister got engaged, my grandmother -- God rest her soul -- insisted that the engagement be no longer than six months. "A long engagement signifies doubt," she always said, "and a ring means nothing without the paperwork. If you engage, you can just as easily disengage, but a marriage is forever." And my sister did as she said, as we always did, because we knew she was right and that experience had taught her a thing or two about life and the power of perception. As I write these words, the fight over the Amona outpost is in full swing, each side claiming ownership, and people lodged in the middle of a vicious custody fight. If the High Court's decision to evacuate the 40 families and 200 children from Amona stands, the residents will have to leave their homes by Dec. 25 and see what they've built be demolished. This will tear families and friends apart, but also the fabric of the country, as the soldiers given the order to help evict Amona find themselves fighting fellow Jews, and may themselves be on both sides of the issue, depending on the order of the day. Wherever one might come down on Amona and the issues and specific history of that outpost, there is a larger problem at hand. And unless we address it, we will find ourselves in many more heartbreaking scenes of disengagement and loss. The Israeli government is failing to decide whether or not to fully commit to Judea and Samaria, and instead judging each case individually, wavering in will and policy. It's like the longest engagement, where the couple breaks up and gets back together after each fight, thus never allowing the relationship to grow but always shivering with the uncertainty and doubt that comes with lack of commitment. A new president is about to enter the White House, and in the coming months we will know how he will relate to Israel and the issues close to its heart. We can either allow the new administration to influence how we relate to our land, or we can commit to a strategy that the administration is forced to relate to, neither wavering nor allowing the pressure to build. My grandmother was married for 70 years, and she always called herself and my grandfather a team. She spoke in "we" and always took his side in public, regardless of whether she felt he was wrong or right. They were protected because they were a unit, and no quarrel or outside influence could move them because they knew where they stood. That is the magic of marriage: It protects the people in it and the products of it and it does not break with a single fight or leave room for second guesses. An engagement means nothing until the marriage contract is signed, and the time has come to take the leap and stop playing the political field. Either we break up or we get married and commit to Judea and Samaria, creating permanent facts on the ground. Until we do, there will be too many more scenes like Gaza and Amona, too many soldiers put in an impossible situation against their fellow Jews and too many families forced to live in gut-wrenching uncertainty. I have stood in that heartland many times, looking out over our country's narrow waist, and seen the many dedicated people who make the country bloom and the nation prosper. They deserve much more than to be pawns in a political fight or symbols of a struggle, as it dehumanizes their experiences and their lives. They are entitled to a commitment, be it a breakup or a bond, because they are risking their lives and livelihoods as they are waiting for a decision to be made. The waiting game is tearing Israel apart, and in the long run, it is detrimental to its foreign relationships. An engagement sends the signals that the union can be influenced or even torn apart, but a marriage is forever -- that is an old and tested truth. It is time to decide if we own it or not, if we love it or will leave it, if we want to commit and finally let the ink dry. Annika Hernroth-Rothstein is a political adviser and writer on the Middle East, religious affairs and global anti-Semitism. Twitter @truthandfiction.
A long engagement
מערכת היום
מערכת "היום“ מפיקה ומעדכנת תכנים חדשותיים, מבזקים ופרשנויות לאורך כל שעות היממה. התוכן נערך בקפדנות, נבדק עובדתית ומוגש לציבור מתוך האמונה שהקוראים ראויים לעיתונות טובה יותר - אמינה, אובייקטיבית ועניינית.
