Children Crying: Under Iraq's Siege

By Anastasia Toufexis

When the air-raid sirens wail, Tali Rubin, 9, dashes to the "sealed room" in her home in the middle-class Jerusalem neighborhood of French Hill, quickly dons her gas mask and, along with her mother, brother and two sisters, waits nervously for the missiles to roar overhead. Her first experience with wearing the protective device was distressing. "It was hard to breathe," recalls Tali. "The mask was too tight. I just wanted to take it off." As the attacks on Israel intensified last week, misery turned to anger. "I'm mad at Saddam Hussein," she declares. "He has no right to attack us. He's just a bad man."

Just a 10-minute walk from Tali's home lies the Palestinian village of Issawiye, home to Shirin Abu-Humos and her family. Psychologically, it is another planet. When the sirens sound, Shirin, who is just 5, remains serenely unconcerned, though the missiles could as easily fall on her home as on Tali's. She huddles with her parents and three siblings in a sealed-off room, but no one reaches for a gas mask. "I'm not afraid," brags the young girl. "It means that Saddam is throwing something at the Israelis. That's good."

For the 1 million Jewish children living in Israel and the 500,000 Palestinian children under Israeli occupation, the gulf war has added a new twist to the ongoing cycle of violence in the Holy Land. Youngsters of both communities face injury or death from Iraqi missiles, or even bombs dropped from planes, but the reactions have been vastly different. The Scud attacks, which so far have primarily hit the Tel Aviv area but pose a threat to the whole country, have left Israeli children feeling fearful, frustrated and helpless. Palestinian youngsters, by contrast, appear relaxed and resigned. Sometimes they are even proud that an Arab -- Saddam Hussein -- has been able to strike at Israel.

The responses reflect personal history as much as political philosophy. Most Israeli youngsters have remained relatively sheltered from war. The 1973 and 1982 conflicts were fought far from Israel's civilian population. When the Israel Defense Forces began to distribute gas masks to citizens last October, few parents expected they would ever need to be used, a view they conveyed to their offspring. Now, with air raids sounding almost nightly and schools closed as a safety measure, many children feel a sense of betrayal. "You told me we would never have to go into the sealed room," said an 11-year-old in Jerusalem to her father. "And here we are in the sealed room. You said we'd never have to wear the gas masks, and now we're trying them on. Why should I believe anything you tell me from now on?"

Many children have trouble sleeping. Others say they hear sirens all the time. Little ones are afraid to lose sight of their parents. And there are complaints about the foul-smelling, claustrophobic gas masks, which have caused children to vomit. Families are haunted by the fact that a toddler suffocated to death in her mask. Talma Rosen, a Tel Aviv mother, faces a torrent of questions from her sons Jonathan, 6, and Daniel, 10, who ask about weapons systems and moving to a safer place. "I have told them that the chances statistically of us getting hurt are very small," she says. "As for military questions, I refer them to their father."

Most Palestinian children, on the other hand, have been inured to violence through Israel's occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and the three- year-old intifadeh. Arab youngsters have been in the vanguard of the uprising, burning tires, hurling stones -- and dying violently. They see little to fear from the Scud attacks. If they are hit, it will be by accident. And whether they die by Israeli guns or Saddam's missiles, they will still be martyrs to the Palestinian cause. Says Zobaida Abu-Humos, Shirin's older cousin: "I've seen so many Palestinians die. It doesn't make any difference to me."

Not all Arab children are so impassive at the prospect of death. One Palestinian mother from Beit Sahur in the West Bank acknowledges that "when my children hear the siren, their whole bodies start shaking." Says Ziad Ahmed, who with his six children lives in a refugee camp near Bethlehem: "My children have picked up my fear, and there's no way now to calm them down." Because of strict U.N. curfews, Palestinian youngsters in the occupied territories are cooped up at home most of the day. Another source of outrage and anxiety: a shortage of gas masks. Israeli authorities initially refused to issue the masks to Palestinians to ensure that they would have no protection against tear gas used to quell demonstrations. The Supreme Court has overruled this policy, but mask distribution is lagging.

Arab families faced with terrified youngsters have been left to muddle through on their own. The curfews have made it hard for welfare agencies or the mosques to offer communal assistance. In contrast, Israelis are making a major effort to help ease rising anxiety among their young. Newspaper columns % are offering helpful hints to parents. On the Israeli edition of Sesame Street, a porcupine named Kippi admits that he is frightened of missiles. A new hot line started by the Ministry of Education handles about 1,500 phone calls a day. Some youngsters simply seek a friendly ear in which to confide their fears. Others, however, want practical advice. Can I chew gum while wearing a gas mask? asked one. Answer: yes.

Slowly, children are learning to handle the pressure. Some have decorated their gas masks with feathers or flowers. Daphna Glazer, a four-year-old from Jerusalem, asked her father to make a mask for her teddy bear. Elihai Radzinski, 15, has volunteered to stay up most of the night listening to the radio so he can quickly alert his family of government warnings. Others take a stoic view. "I'm not frightened anymore. Once I get the mask on, I spend the rest of the time in our sealed room playing Nintendo," says Yoni Radzinski, 10, of Herzliya, a town just northeast of Tel Aviv. "By and large, Israeli kids are coping very well," says psychologist Robert Asch of the Ministry of Education. He predicts that tensions and boredom, a growing problem, will ease still further once children begin returning to school. But a residue of fear and bad dreams is likely to remain even after the gulf war ends.

With reporting by Robert Slater/Jerusalem