There is a high terror alert in Jerusalem, and I am sitting here in my apartment listening to the helicopters fly overhead. They say that a specific person is planning a suicide bombing, and he might have succeeded in getting into Jerusalem already.
And then Tuesday afternoon:
Your sense of outrage is restored when the bombing is in your neighborhood. The current toll from the #32 bus bombing is 19 killed and 50 wounded, many of them kids and teenagers on their way to school. The Pat Junction where the bombing took place is about a 5 minute drive from where I live - I used to pass by there everyday until I found a better route to take T. to work.
This AM I didn't check the news (I was busy with a technician who was trying to install Cable Modem service). When I left for work and turned on the radio, I could tell that something happened, but the coverage had already left the scene of the bombing and switched into "introspective" mode - so it wasn't immediately clear what had happened. T. then called me and told me that there had been 18 people killed just a few minutes away. The #32 bus had been going towards downtown - so it hadn't yet passed through neighborhoods where T. and I know people.
The bomber boarded at Beit Tzafafa - an Arab village in southern Jerusalem. One teenager saw him and backed away a few moments before the blast and escaped with minor injuries.
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