Heritage Florida Jewish News - Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice

In the summer of 2014, my 17-year-old daughter knocked on my bedroom door late one night shortly after my wife and I had gone to sleep. She asked us not to come downstairs, saying that she had just brought two guys home. This was not an announcement I ever expected, except she didn’t use the word “guys.” She said soldiers. Israel was embroiled in what became known as Operation Protective Edge which began a few weeks after the kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers, one of whom was our neighbors’ nephew.

The seven-week-long battle saw the Islamist terror organization Hamas fire thou...