’Neutralize’ a Terrorist? Just Say a Bullet to the Head - Opinion -
The trial of Elor Azaria is teaching us the meaning of ’neutralized.’
Avigdor Feldman Aug 30, 2016 4:24 AM
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On Sunday, without warning, the washers in the enormous laundry room beneath our feet suddenly stopped. Suddenly, instead of the susurrus of the machines, the rush of the water and the shriek of steam, silence reigned. It took some time to process, to realize what had happened to the white noise that has been part of our lives for many years.
A moment before we adjusted to the quiet, the confident voice of the security officer of Hebron’s Jewish community, Eliyahu Liebman, said, “A shot in the head is a means to neutralize [a terrorist].” Then additional voices murmured, as if Jaffa’s exotic military court were haunted: “The terrorist was neutralized,” “the girl was neutralized,” “the woman holding a kitchen knife was neutralized,” “the boy who fled the scene was neutralized.”
It’s so simple. Why didn’t you say before “a bullet to the head, “a bullet to the head,” “a bullet to the head”? “A bullet to the head” — so clear, manly, resolute, Israeli. Elor Azaria, everyone’s son, was meant for a historic role in Israeli society: to rip off the fig leaf covering its nakedness, to stop the historical “word laundering.”
It fits, like a finger to a trigger, to Efrat Lechter’s interview with The Shadow (rapper Yoav Eliasi) on Channel 2 on Friday. The language of wimps like Benny Begin, Benjamin Netanyahu, Tzachi Hanegbi and everyone Eliasi quoted in his lisping voice is being replaced by the language of rappers — a raised palm moving up and down, index finger miming the trigger of a pistol being pulled as the rapper screams “Bullet to the head, bullet to the head” at full volume. The audience mirrors his movements in unison, roaring, “Bullet to the head, bullet to the head, bullet to the head,” as though gangsta-rap group N.W.A. (Niggaz Wit Attitudes), writers of “Fuck tha Police,” were on stage, straight out of Compton, California.
