There are so many things people argue about. Some are unimportant, and some are a matter of life and death. One of those things is the issue of Gilad Shalit. Even though this is a controversial subject, I think that there is one thing we all must do – show our support to his family.
The student council of my school organized a campaign and on February 24 we went to collect signatures for a petition in our city. The petition called to release Gilad Shalit at all cost (meaning to surrender many terrorists and murderers in exchange for his life), a thing which not everyone agrees with. The opinions between my classmates were divided, but we all worked together to show Gilad’s family that we supported them.
Holon is a big city, so we were divided to areas in it. I was in charge of one group, which was sent to collect signatures at the Holon Municipality. Other groups were sent to the mall, the library, etc. We were wearing T-shirts and bracelets with pictures of Gilad and the sentence “Gilad is still alive” on them, and also handed out bracelets to people.
We got to the municipality around 09:00 AM. We were ten teenagers, determined to perform our mission successfully. For the next four hours we were talking with each man, woman or kid we saw, telling them how important it was to show their support. In most cases we convinced them easily to sign the petition, but some didn’t agree. They said they didn’t want to release Gilad at all cost, or that the petition wouldn’t help.
The truth is I am not sure that the release of Gilad at all cost will benefit us, and I don’t know if this is the best thing to do. But I do know that when his family saw all those signatures, and understood how hard we all worked that day, it made them smile. If they felt peaceful even for a moment, I feel I did a good thing. I did the right thing.
My team with a Gilad Shalit is Still Alive sign
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