It was supposed to be just another normal preparation day for Shabbat in Jerusalem, Israel. We were cleaning up our dorm and preparing for a quiet evening. Some were in the showers, some brushing teeth, some preparing dinner. A weeks’ worth of digging had left us worn out and ready for the weekend.
Suddenly, an amplified wail began to sound from outside our building. The wail increased in pitch until it became a howling screech. We gathered outside to hear what it was—it sounded much like the tornado sirens we would hear in Oklahoma. But it heralded the approach of no tornado. It wasn’t long before we realized that this was an air raid siren.
That fateful Friday—Nov. 16, 2012—marked the first time ever that the air raid sirens in Jerusalem had been used. We were two days into Operation Pillar of Defense—an Israeli campaign against Gaza in retaliation to the incessant, belligerent rocket attacks by the Hamas-governed strip. Three Israelis had just been killed in a rocket attack on Kiryat Malachi the day that the operation began, and dean of students Stephen Flurry and junior Jessie Hester had traveled to the scene of the incident that night to report on it in a Trumpet Daily episode. The towns close to Gaza were under constant threat of rocket attack—but as yet, no one really expected anything to come near Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. We were proven wrong.
All of us at the men’s dorm (affectionately named “Bethel” after the location of one of the ancient Israelite colleges) gathered outside, intrigued and excited by this new situation we found ourselves in. We immediately rushed down the street to where we knew there was an elevated bridge overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem and the Arab neighborhood of Silwan. People were going to and fro along the street, disorientated by the sirens, unprepared, not sure of where to go or how to get there. As we made our way down the street, we heard two distinct, heavy thuds in the distance. We later found out that there were two missiles that had struck open areas just outside Jerusalem, fortunately causing no casualties.
But it was enough to get our hearts racing. Excitement was high as we made it to the bridge lookout. Here we were, literally living in a sort of war zone with air raid sirens wailing and missiles flying in! We looked out across the valleys of Jerusalem and heard what sounded like fireworks and gunfire as, appallingly, Arab residents celebrated the attack. We stayed on the bridge a while before turning back in for the night.
The days passed, and Operation Pillar of Defense (named after the pillar cloud that led the Israelites in the wilderness) continued. Things were quiet once again in Jerusalem. One particular day the next week, Mr. Flurry requested that Jessie and I return home early from the excavation so that we could help him with taping a couple of Trumpet Daily episodes. We put in a half-day’s work on the dig site and returned to the women’s apartment (which we called “Mizpeh” after another of the ancient Israelite college locations). We were excited to head out filming, especially considering the continuing battle between Israel and Gaza. Several of our fellow Israeli friends on the dig had been called up by the Israeli Defense Force (idf) and were standing by on the Gaza border, ready in case a land invasion would be ordered into Gaza. Climbing into the rental vehicle with Mr. Flurry, we asked him where we would be filming today. “I think we will head on out to the Gaza border,” he replied.
Our jaws dropped! Jessie and I were rocked by the excitement of becoming wartime cameramen! We made our way toward the border. As we got nearer, we saw tanks parked on top of giant trailers alongside the road. I hung my head out of the car window with one of our two field cameras as several Israeli F-16 fighter jets flew in low over our heads, fully loaded with ordnance, trying to capture some secondary “B-roll” footage to use in our programs. After we stopped at a gas station where we asked for directions in broken Hebrew, we finally made our way into the small border town of Sderot.
On the western edge of Sderot, a highway cuts through a number of small hills and valleys. Reporters were stationed to the east side of this highway. Huge cameras were set up and pointed toward Gaza, their crews trussed up in bulletproof vests. It seemed as though they had been positioned there all day, just waiting for the perfect shot of the rockets coming out of Gaza. West of this highway were a couple of small hills that tapered off onto a long, flat plain stretching all the way to the city of Gaza. The media on the east side of the highway had a good vantage point from where they stood. But for us to tape our program right next to the other camera crews would have been somewhat awkward and difficult. We figured that we could get closer to Gaza—to an even better vantage point. And so we set off again in the car.
We took to the road and turned off onto a perfect looking outcrop of hills to the west of the highway—closer to Gaza and in front of all the major media cameras. To think, an unprofessional film team—donned in loose shirts minus the bulletproof vests—was out in front of the major film teams, telling the real story from the Gaza border!
We set up the camera and began filming an episode. Already, we had seen a number of rockets fired out of the distant city of Gaza, along with the loud boom! of a nearby Israeli Iron Dome missile interceptor shooting down Hamas rockets that were flying toward urban areas. We were hoping and praying to get some good footage of rocket fire in the background of the Trumpet Daily program. Jessie was manning the camera trained on Mr. Flurry, and I was on the lookout with the other one for any interesting B-roll footage (of rocket fire, tanks, fighter planes, etc.).
Jessie poked me suddenly, and I whirled around. He pointed off in the distance at a plume of smoke rising from within the city of Gaza. A rocket had just struck, while we were filming (see 6:07 in the above link)!
It took a while for the sound of the explosion to travel across the miles of terrain, but as soon as we could, we cut the tape and rewound it to have a look at the footage. Here we were, having just arrived at this prime location, and at just the right moment, we had a perfectly framed shot of an incoming rocket for the Trumpet Daily episode! Surely the professional camera crews across the road, who seemed to have been set up all day, wouldn’t have come close to having such a perfectly framed shot! We counted it as one of the many miracles we experienced that day. We set the camera rolling again and finished the episode in jubilant spirits.
While Mr. Flurry took a breather before filming the next episode, Jessie and I walked through the valleys that tapered toward the plain leading out to the city of Gaza, looking for an even better filming location. We were talking excitedly and taking pictures together, never having dreamed of being so close to the Gaza border during a military operation! We found a closer location that we thought might work, but upon returning, Mr. Flurry decided that we would use the same place that we had before. As we began setting up for the second clip, an Israeli police car made its way up the dirt road toward us. Several armed men got out and told us that we had to pack up—we couldn’t continue to film at that location anymore, but would have to go to the other side of the highway where the other camera crews were. That was fine by us—we already had our stellar footage! We did take another video on the other side of the road (but it turned out that episode was unusable because of the fading light). Afterwards we packed up our equipment, stopped by the local Sderot shawarma shop, and headed home to the accented punches of the Iron Dome interceptor firing off missiles into the night.
It was an eye-opening experience, traveling to the border town of Sderot. The people there live under the constant reality of rockets raining down on them from Gaza. And during Operation Pillar of Defense, residents in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv were waking up to a similar reality, that the terrorist Hamas organization now had rockets that could reach them too. Living under constant fire is a way of life for them. Still, the people go on with their lives. We in more privileged, Westernized countries often don’t realize how good we have it. That is what makes it so much easier for the Israel-bashers to sit behind their computer screens and produce smear campaigns against a country that is just trying to defend its inhabitants from foreign attack. But that kind of reality—and much, much worse—is coming to America and the other Israelite nations; it will be a stern wake up call.
It is the job of all of us, young and old, to help sound the alarm of what is about to befall all of the nations of Israel. And you never know where you might end up doing that job! When I applied to Herbert W. Armstrong College, I never imagined it would take me to the Gaza border during a military operation! God does work in mysterious ways with every one of us. We just have to follow His lead and walk through the doors that He opens for us.
The fighter jets. The tanks. The troops. The rockets, missiles, bulletproof vests. Never before had Jessie or I ever dreamed of being wartime cameramen. But there we were, having completed our first military assignment. And now we were on to our next assignment: an Epistles of Paul paper due in class the next day!