Stinging the Frog

There is a story where a scorpion asks a frog to give it a ride across the Suez canal. The frog says I'm not crazy you'll sting me and I'll die. The scorpion says to the frog I promise I won't sting you. I'll sign a peace agreement that I won't sting you. Besides if I sting you in the middle of the Suez canal we will both drown. The frog agrees and swims across with the scorpion on his back. Half way across the canal the scorpion stings the frog. The dying frog asks the scorpion "How could you do this? You signed an agreement. Now we will both drown. The drowning scorpion answers, "This is the Middle East".

A recent example of this occured on December 30 when Arabs ambushed an ambulance carrying Arabs to the hospital. The story follows.

A Jewish ambulance driver was attacked on Sunday by a mob of Arab stone-throwers when he was on his way to - and from - a serious accident involving several Arab cars. The driver, Chezky Betzalel of Talmon, told Arutz-7 that the Arab witnesses to the crash chose to call Israeli ambulance services and not Palestinian, as is their habit, and that on his way to the crash he clearly saw an Arab lookout at the Calandia refugee camp alerting and directing the stone-throwers towards the ambulance. Betzalel said that the attack, which occurred in an area under total Israeli control, was unprecedented in its fury and intensity. "On the way back," Betzalel said, "after treating and taking with us one of those who were seriously wounded, we saw the entire refugee camp waiting for us. We doubled back to the nearby Border Guard checkpoint, where we arranged for two jeeps to escort us. Despite this, we were again attacked from all directions, and the ambulance was unable to continue. Another ambulance soon came to replace it... They definitely knew that we were taking Arab victims, and yet they still attacked us. This is not unusual, and it happens about once a week."

Arutz Sheva News Service Tuesday, December 30, 1997 / Rosh Chodesh Tevet, 5758