Too Close for Comfort

By now you've all heard about the maniac who steamrolled his way through Jerusalem with the sole purposes of murdering Jews. My friend Jameel was on it, both literally, and then on his blog, almost as soon as it happened. I was oblivious to the events until I got a panicked call from Mazi. She said, "Baila, something happened here and people are running. People are taking out their guns." Then she said, "There's a tractor here, and people are saying it crushed cars and flipped over a bus." In the background I heard sirens and general chaos.

She had been on her way to Modiin to meet us, and then we were going to drive together to a water park. She had called me a bit earlier to tell me she was running late, and then again to tell me how annoyed she was that she missed the bus to the Tachana Merkazit (Central Bus Station).

Now as she was on the phone and I was turning to the computer and TV to find out what was going on, it became clear to me that there was a reason she and her nieces were late this morning.

Needless to say, we did not make it to the water park. It took her two hours to get out of Jerusalem. She finally made it to Tel-Aviv, where I picked her and the girls up. We spent a couple of hours at the beach, but our thoughts kept returning to the pigua (terrorist attack).

Three dead, scores injured. And one friend and her two young nieces thankfully late for their day of fun in the sun.