the fighting will start up again, and that his chances of surviving to the end of the war are fairly slight.
Now we are all dreaming. After the war ... peace ...
"Anyone who has seen war with his own eyes and is not a pacifist is mentally ill" said Shalom. "Or a sadist" added Yaakov.
"First we have to return to civilian life" I say.
Long, deep silence. Everyone is imagining what that is like - to sit in a narrow, dusty office, to work eight hours in a factory, routine, day after day.
"You know what," says Yaakov, "it won’t be easy for me, going back to all that."
* * *
We know what he means. We all feel the same. We have got used to a life of tension, life at the front. Our life is based on a few simple and unshakable principles: friendship until death; the mutual respect of soldiers who have been through umpteen battles; the sense of honor of people who don’t want to die, but who regularly volunteer for highly dangerous missions. How will we be able to change our lifestyle for one completely different and alien to us?
"I spent two days in Tel Aviv. The life they lead there makes me sick. Schemes, patronage, sloth ... I don’t know, I really feel that I won’t be able to get used to that kind of life. If I say that I am at the front, they laugh at me and think I’m an idiot. If I went back there tomorrow, they would be making a fool of me at work and every-where else..."
"If only the comradeship that grew up here could continue ..." I dream.
"I don’t believe it could," said Shalom. "It developed at the front, and after half a year of peaceful life it would be gone."
"I would love to travel the world. To see everything ..."
"You can’t just run away from it," I start preaching. "We will have to make sure that the ideals we fought for become reality." But the idea is tempting. To travel, to hang around somewhere with no responsibilities. "I don’t have the money for that," says Yaakov. "And I wouldn’t take any from my father."
"Who needs money?" asks Shalom. He used to be in the British Navy and has seen a lot of the world. "You work on a ship, arrive in some harbor, Rome for example, and stay there until your money