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MAYAN'S STORY

by Mayan Yadai

I must admit that it was not very easy for me to agree to leave my husband, Eyal, and my two young children, Avia, two years old, and Yoavi, nine months old.

I feel honored and appreciative that the Young Israel Organization enabled me to come and I feel especially thankful to Rabbi Pesach Lerner for his encouragement as to the importance of sharing with you wonderful caring community leaders, my own personal story.

Although I am only 27 years old, my life story includes episodes of war, loneliness, rebirth, and faith that led me from Croatia to Gush Katif; from Catholicism to Judaism; from destruction to rebuilding; from loneliness to a world of Kol Yisrael Areivim zeh Lazeh (our Jewish mutual support base).

Today we live in a most beautiful blossoming and flourishing place. A place that I pray sincerely will be our home for many years to come.

I am living in Gush Katif only one year but already I can feel that my roots are very deep here, like the acacia trees that the JNF planted all over Gush Katif to prevent sand storms. Like the roots of the endless varieties of vegetables and houseplants that are exported daily from Gush Katif to all over the world. When you work the land, you gradually become part of the land, and you love it even more. The children of Gush Katif who work the land are among the best soldiers in the Israeli army because their love for Eretz Yisrael is even stronger.

It is difficult for me to believe what the old-timers in Gush Katif tell me, that only 30 years ago when they were encouraged to move here by the Yitzhak Rabin government, this now flourishing area was bald empty sand dunes with no birds, insects or even weeds. Even the amount of rain then was very minimum compared to today's rainfall measurements.

It is difficult for me to believe that this obviously now blessed area is the very same area that our Moslem neighbors called the "cursed land" of El G'erara. They have told me that nobody lived in this area from the time that the last Jews left because there was not enough rain, and nothing could grow properly. They were happy when the Jews returned because the rain started again, and the land began to produce.

Yet it so easy for me to believe and feel from deep within, that this is, in fact, the very same "Gerar" where your and my forefathers, Avraham and Yitzchak, lived. The very same claim of Shevet Yehuda that Yehoshua conquered and where Jews have lived throughout the generations of our history.

My story begins in Croatia, where I was born into a comfortable life with a wealthy, warm and supportive Catholic family. These were times, only 27 years ago, when Yugoslavia was a calm and peaceful country. Perhaps my lifestyle then was similar to that of your own children. I recall clearly our many fun ski trips and summer boating vacations. I remember a life of endless opportunities.

When I was ten years old, my father passed away. Exactly two years later war broke out in Yugoslavia! This war turned me, suddenly, into a "Croatian", the evil enemy of my best friends, who I now discovered were "Serbians."

The Yugoslavian peace collapsed and tore the area to pieces! The fictitious unity had no real national or religious bonding. The so called Yugoslavian people had no base of "Areivim Zeh LaZeh".

Yet we the Croatians tried to make a minimal commitment to each other to stand united and strong against this cruel Serbian enemy. This commitment did not hold out, as each Croatian group worried only about themselves.

My family and a few acquaintances found ourselves deserted and within days we became hostages in a now Serbian-ruled area. We somehow survived only thanks to our hopes that we would be saved by our Croatian leaders. Our belief in Croatian unity and nationalism was a nice pipedream -- we were abandoned and betrayed. We experienced hunger, cold, and death. I saw many of my friends dying in front of my eyes.

My mother, my younger sister, then 15 years old, and myself, now 17 managed through endless very hard work to save enough money to buy passports to escape to the now-Croatian side of the border after five years of being hostages in a Serbian-occupied area. However, when we finally reached our "promised land," nobody there could believe that we had survived under the circumstances, and worse yet, they did not care; there was no support and no help for us.

My sister and I found ourselves in an orphanage, broken by the struggle, the uprooting and the relocation. During a war many families are destroyed when they are taken from their homes and their lands.

Amazingly, even after seven years, these divisive Croatians didn't give up on any of their "promised land", the land that they themselves had developed and built up for the future of their people.

Everything in my life was unreliable and false. I felt a strong yearning to find something that would be reliable and truthful! I had no one to turn to.

I felt a compulsion that I must start my life all over again from the very beginning!

I am so grateful to Hashem for giving me, at this point, my own personal Bereishit, a new beginning.

I found myself working as a cocktail waitress on a luxury cruise ship. Perhaps you, my fellow Jews, even vacationed on this cruise and we met? What is certain is that on this cruise I met my husband, Eyal, the Israeli security officer of the ship.

Soon we were to reach dry land with dreams for our future together. Eyal, however, revealed that he would only wed a Jew. I gladly began to learn the details of this new way of life that I had yearned for, the life of a nation where all really care about each other with devotion.

Several months later as I became close to becoming a true Jew, I revealed to Eyal that I would now only wed a man who would live with me as a true Jew. So Eyal began studying Judaism as well.

We decided to start our family in Eretz Yisrael, and the perfect place for our home and education of our children is Gush Katif. The day that we moved to Gush Katif was the day that the immoral plan for disengagement was announced.

I had not heard the news and was confused when journalists began knocking at my door, demanding to know why my family was settling here. I responded that we wanted to live in Gush Katif because of the wonderful people in the community. The reporters could not believe this. They assumed we had moved to receive the money that the government would pay for the houses of anyone leaving this area. I told them that, as renters, we would receive no compensation. The reporters did not trust our sincerity and challenged me, "Don't you know that Kassam rockets are being shot at you every day?" I told them, "But the people here are wonderful; the community is wonderful. This is where I want to raise my family. I am used to Kassam rockets --I am from Croatia."

Today again my home is being threatened, as well as the homes of all of my 9000 friends in Gush Katif, including their cared for gardens, their playgrounds. This time they are homes of a world of Torah, a world of Jewish education on all levels, a world of Chesed, a world of 36 beautiful synagogues, probably similar to the one in which you, my friends, pray, that is threatened with destruction. An Eretz Hachaim (cemetary) of 46 graves that had been brought to everlasting rest, threatened with exhumation.

Most important it is a world of 1000 acres of greenhouses filled with insect free leafy vegetables according to the most stringent Halachic demands, filled with a vast variety of organic vegetables; cherry tomatoes, peppers of of all colors, eggplants, cucumbers, herbs etc. Fifteen percent of the agricultural export from Israel comes from Gush Katif. 60% of the organic vegetables exported from Israel come from Gush Katif, many of the herbs and 70% of the chives exported from Israel are grown in Gush Katif.

My town Netzer Hazani is one of the 21 towns that are Gush Katif. But in fact it isn't only my home that is being threatened, it is our dear Medina, our dear State of Israel. Hundreds of thousands of citizens in Israel realize this and every day more and more people are expressing their support and are acting on it with mesirut nefesh, with devotion. Just this week tens of new families are moving into temporary housing in the towns with only basic facilities just to be part of this Kiddush Hashem. They often come to give us strength but end up realizing that Gush Katif is in fact an overflowing source of faith and strength to them.

These last few years the people of Gush Katif have had the zchut, the privilege, of experiencing endless miracles. Many people were murdered by terrorists on the roads but so very many more were saved from the cruel Islamic enemy.

These last two years 6000 mortars and rockets have been shot onto the towns of Gush Katif which one would think is certainly a good enough reason for everyone to have fled for dear life. But yet everyone in Gush Katif has stayed on and thus, has proven their devotion to you, the people of Israel and to your dear Land of Israel. They have proven their devotion to Hashem!

Almost every family in Gush Katif has many personal heroic miracle stories to tell.

One is my own family's privilege to have felt God's personal Hashgacha, personal intervention.

Exactly one year ago Eyal, Avia and I, pregnant with Yoavi, were driving on the road out of Gush Katif. Suddenly we saw two men with rifles running towards us. Just before we passed them they shot out at us. I looked at their faces - they were young men who looked calm and peaceful. They knew that they would be killed, but they did not care. My husband somehow floored the gas pedal yet they kept running in our direction while continuously shooting. Five bullets penetrated our car. Each bullet was a personal miracle to each member of my family, missing each of us by millimeters.

We now know that these were not men but cruel Islamic animals because less that a second later they murdered the passengers in the vehicle behind us. They destroyed the entire Hatuel family, leaving only David Hatuel, home, waiting for his dear pregnant wife and daughters.

I, Mayan Yadai, know that all that I experienced in these twenty seven years has led me to be here at this Young Israel Dinner. I am here because I want you to feel in your hearts that truly kol yisrael areivim zeh lazeh. We are responsible for each other, and we need to take care of each other. We are not Americans or Israelis - we are Jews.

The cursed sand dunes that have become a flourishing oasis, the feeling that God listens and answers our prayers, the miracles in this tiny place that all the world watches so closely. This is our story, the story of the Jewish people, throughout generations. This is the realization of the vision of our prophets. It is the story of devotion, heroism, love of Hashem's Land. It is the love of our dear Torah.

I, Mayan Yadai, together with all my friends in Gush Katif want to know and feel that each and everyone of you really care. We want you to pray to Hashem to change this dangerous and immoral plan. HaShem blessed each of us with special purpose so please use your abilities to help Eretz Yisrael. We do not have another place to go. We need to keep each millimeter of our Land and not let our killers celebrate their victories in our homes and in our land.

I need to really feel your caring. It is what I really want to take home with me because this caring will give all of us the strength to continue.

And pray because HaShem listens to our prayers. If He heard the prayer of a young non-Jewish girl in a small Croatian town, then He will certainly listen to the prayers of His Chosen People.

Thanks are due Anita Tucker of Gush Katif for sending us this essay. Anita writes, "Mayan Yadai, of Netzer Hazani, Gush Katif, was invited as guest speaker at the Young Israel annual dinner in NYC, May 22, 2005. This is what she said. Her personal story is worth reading and very moving and as well tells the story of Gush Katif and that of the Jewish people. If you find it inspiring, pass it on to others."