Blood, Fire and Pillars of Smoke

Nurit Greenger

In the Book of Joel, Chapter 2, Verse 3-5 the Jewish prophet prophecy states: "…will display wonders in the sky and earth, blood fire and columns [pillars] of smoke. The sun will turn to darkness and the moon into blood; before the terrible and great day of the almighty God; and all who will call the name of God, the Lord shall flee; because in Mt - Zion and Jerusalem they will find refuge and be saved, as God said, and the remains that God calls."

Is it only me who is sensing that each day passes the world is more confused, is a more dangerous place to love, and there is more fire and blood spilt? Yesterday, evil woke up Norway, the small Parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with King Harald V of Norway, as its head of state, and Jens Stoltenberg as its prime minוster. About 4.9 million Norwegians, living on the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, with an extensive coastline that is facing the North Atlantic Ocean and the Barents Sea, the home of the picturesque fjords, were rattled to their core.

The enlightened, Nobel Prize rendering country, a founding member of NATO ,joined the band of terror victims' states.

At this point, it is not important the cause of the terror attack; what is important is that now, the Norwegians know what is the meaning of innocent civilians killed, due to some person's ideology and belief, he or she expresses by an act of horrific terror.

The scene of damaged government headquarters' buildings, the terrorist blew up in Oslo, reminded many Americans of the terror job Timothy James McVeigh pulled off on April 19, 1995, when he detonating a truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrha Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people and injuring 450. The property damage in Oslo may be as extensive as the one in Oklahoma, but the fatalities were lighter, by comparison.

The lengthy shooting spree, the terrorist also carried out on youth camp attendees, on the small Utoya Island near Oslo, is unprecedented. However, it may remind many of the Beslan school siege, or Beslan massacre, in Russia, of early September 2004. It began when a group of armed Chechen Islamic militants took more than 1,100 people, including 777 children, hostage, on 1 September, at School Number One (SNO) in the town of Belsen, North Ossetia, in the North Caucasus region of the Russian Federation. Ultimately, at least 334 hostages were killed, including 186 children, hundreds more were injured and many were reported missing.

Like in every terror attack, there was fire, smoke, debris and bleeding people everywhere in Oslo and Utoya Island.

For few days Norway will be the focal point of the news. And then, when the coverage of the terror attack will arrive at some satisfactory conclusion, the reporters and their cameras will move on, to another location, where fire, smoke, debris and bleeding people will be everywhere.

Terrorizing civilians began years ago and the precautions the civilized world has taken against this phenomenon have evolved, as terror occurred. The fall of the Twin Towers, in New York, on 9/11, was a major turning point; to add to it were several other frightening terror attacks on civilians, in the USA, Spain, England, Indian and Pakistan, to mention a few, and also too many to count unsuccessful terror attempts, all have put the entire free world into a mode of living in fear.

In Israel, where a possible terror attack is the norm, you are watched and checked on every turn. You want to enter a mall, a movie house, the opera, a theatre, a supermarket, a shop, a restaurant, a building, an airport or airplane, etc., you are checked to make sure you are not a terrorist in the making. Other countries, slowly, are adopting the Israeli security mechanism. Norway, that until yesterday considered itself invulnerable to terror, will have to change its entire way of thinking. Now it is vulnerable and the countries it shares a border with, to the east, Sweden, to the north, Finland, and in its south Norway borders the Skagerrak Strait, across which Denmark is situated, are now on edge too.

In general we can blame Islam jihad for what is taking place in our world today. When a terror attack occurs, we expect Moslems to be involved. However, as we have just seen in the Norway terror case, it is not always the case. But terror attack is a terror attack, and when it takes place innocent people die or get hurt. And terror installs fear and demoralizes people. It shakes the core or freedom and safety in humanity.

We live in world of no certitude. There are wars, fire, smoke, and blood everywhere. A wave of rage is spreading and growing out of control throughout the world.

The biblical Prophet Joel was correct when he said that there will be blood, fire and pillars of smoke all over.