The Peace Now movement came knocking at my door this morning. Not literally, of course, but there they were, trampling the new flowers that my settlement had just planted on the road, positioning themselves proudly before the sign that pronounced us as "Sha'arei Tikvah," the Gates of Hope. They were demanding that further building be frozen, but since they held signs in English, the Arab workers ignored them as they passed by to enter and continue building.

Although I confess to being unable to comprehend what the protesters thought they would accomplish, the media event and television cameras were a dead give-away as to their motives and interests. These people came not to understand but to condemn; they came not to find a road to peace, but rather to impose their idea of peace on the people they think most likely to become victims of that precarious process. They wanted to be seen -- all ten or fifteen of them.

Surely if they would risk life and limb to cross the short, one kilometer distance from the army checkpoint to their rallying point, they wanted media attention. Though I don't consider the road dangerous and have walked the distance that is bordered by a few Arab homes and vegetable stands, perhaps they had heard of the stoning of the Oranit school bus just a few weeks ago and thus asked that the police come to protect them.

Maybe they thought they were delivering the message that we should freeze building in the territories, perhaps they wanted to make us believe that our homes are somehow less a part of Israel than theirs, or that we are the obstacles to peace rather than the terrorist bombers and those who call for violence and jihad. Whatever missive they thought they came to impart in their 30 minutes of flower-trampling was lost on the people who passed them by on their way to work. And yet, after talking with friends and neighbors I found that indeed a message had been clearly received after all.

By targeting our yishuv - just one kilometer from the archaic borders of 1948 -- Peace Now has announced that we are all settlers -- whether we live in Hebron or Sha'arei Tikvah, Jerusalem or Efrat. It does not matter to them if we are thousands living just a few kilometers away, or a few hundred living on a barren hilltop surrounded by Arabs. It is irrelevant that from our front porches we can see their homes, their boats and their existence. Jewish history, our land and our future are unimportant to their political agenda and easily dismissed.

Peace Now wants us to give up our homes and our lives in the misguided belief that if they feed the terrorist monster a sacrificial lamb, they will be safe in their homes in Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan. But as we sit here among our now-dead flowers, we know the monster who seeks to destroy is not satisfied with a little morsel. Yesterday we gave it Hebron, today Peace Now wants to feed it Sha'arei Tikvah and tomorrow, tomorrow the monster will be hungry again.
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