Michael Douglas visits Kibbutz Be’eri: ‘How do you recover from something like this?’
Douglas later met with President Herzog where he was presented with the yellow ribbon pin, and dog-tag necklace worn in support of the hostages and their families.
American film star Michael Douglas visited Kibbutz Be’eri on Sunday where over 100 people were slaughtered on October 7.
“I met people here who believed in peace, who hosted their Palestinian neighbors in their homes. Now I ask, how do you recover from something like this? How do you conquer the urge for revenge? It will take generations, if at all,” Douglas said during his visit to the Kibbutz.
Douglas later met with President Isaac Herzog and First Lady Michal Herzog at the president’s residence in Jerusalem where he was presented with the yellow ribbon pin, and dog-tag necklace worn in support of the hostages and their families.
“This war was waged against us in the most brutal way possible, burning, abducting, raping, taking people – by the way – people who always believed in peace and coexistence. And the tragedy goes on and on. And the agony that you see,” Herzog said.
I’m shocked by a lot of hypocrisy that I have seen, by academia that does not understand the difference between good and bad. Israel does so much good in the world in so many fields. People are simply mistaken, they don’t know the real story, what the raison d’etre of what this nation is. They have no clue that in this nation, we have twenty percent Muslims and Christians who live together and are equal citizens. Some of them were butchered and killed on October 7th, or in battle. And they have no clue about our democracy about the rule of law or the fact that we are offering our hand in peace, but we cannot accept terror under any circumstances. This is the real story. You saw it for yourself,” Herzog added.
Douglas said he met with families of the hostages and also visited the Nova memorial exhibition in honour of the more than 360 people who were slaughter at the festival.
“It’s a very difficult time. The deep shock of this whole experience. We’re just happy to be here in support of Israel, and to share with you the fact that America is definitely your ally as our President has shared with you. I just hope that the latest negotiations will be reached, and the hostages will be back soon,” Douglas said.
First Lady Michal Herzog said: “For Israeli women, this was our first experience of having sexual violence used as a tool of war in the conflict here. And it is very shocking. And we feel – especially Israeli women and women around the world – that we have to raise our voices for those women who cannot anymore.”
Mr. Douglas added: “I think the big shock, besides this attack for both Israel and the United States was this Palestinian student movement, which was a shock to everybody. What kind of brainwashing is this, the students involved in because, you try to talk to many of them, there is no education, there’s no knowledge.”
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