They exchanged text messages and emojis. Brief status updates with words of encouragement. A picture of the beloved family dog “Tutsi.”

Until no more messages came.

And then, Cindy Flash, an American, and her Israeli husband Igal vanished into the violence, presumed kidnapped by Hamas.

Four days after Hamas attacked Israel, more than 100 Israelis and potentially dozens of foreign nationals are thought to be held captive in the Gaza Strip. At least 14 U.S. citizens have been killed and an unknown number are still unaccounted for.

Flash, 67, originally from St. Paul, Minnesota, is one of them. She lives in Kfar Aza, a kibbutz in southern Israel near Gaza, where some of the most harrowing and grisly stories have been emerging during the last few days.

“They are breaking down the safe room door,” Flash said in one of her final messages to her daughter Keren, 34. “We need someone to come by the house right now.” She had been communicating with her parents from a few houses away.

Keren described her mother, who worked as an administrator in a local college, as someone who had the “sweetest biggest heart,” who everyone knew and loved, and who had spent a lifetime advocating for the rights of Palestinians, including those who live in Gaza where she may now be held.

  • Lucent@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    “It wasn’t a settlement at all.”

    Your entire country is a settlement.

    There are Palestinians that are older than your “state”.

    • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Every country is a settlement, you’re really not making a point.

      Look into the chain of events that caused Israeli/Palestinian enmity, then what caused those events, and so forth. You’ll find the only innocent side here are the civilians.

    • Tavarin@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Palestine became a state at the same time. there was never a Palestine before that.

            • Tavarin@lemmy.ca
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              1 year ago

              Because it was still basically part of Britain, not independent. Like Canada wasn’t it’s own country until 1867 when we were made independent from British control.

              • jack55555@lemmy.ml
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                1 year ago

                A state doesn’t need to be independent. Texas isn’t independent. Chechnya isn’t independent.

                • Tavarin@lemmy.ca
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                  1 year ago

                  We are currently using the word state for it’s sovereign meaning given the context of this conversation, not for it’s meaning as a part of a country. In the context of this conversation state is equivalent to country.

                  • jack55555@lemmy.ml
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                    1 year ago

                    No we are not. All you said was that they are of the same age. Age of a state has nothing to do whether it is sovereign or not.

        • Cleverdawny@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Yeah the area has always been a provincial administrative division but I’m pretty sure the last time there was a sovereign state controlling that general area, it was a Crusader kingdom. Before then, it was Judea before the Roman conquest. Relying on historical sovereignty isn’t a very good argument since the area wasn’t sovereign before 1948, and it was divided by UN mandate in 1948.