Finally, by Tuesday evening, the smoldering embers of the fires which began on Sunday in the Jerusalem hills began to burn out. The smell of charred forests was so strong that Jerusalemites waking up 20 kilometers away could easily smell it. (Some joked that if someone couldn’t smell it he should do a coronavirus test – no joke in a country which had over 8,000 new cases on Tuesday, the most in nearly a year.) Exhausted firefighters, some of whom had fought the fires for 30 consecutive hours, could return to their families. (Defense Minister Benny Gantz thanked Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas for sending his firefighting crews and equipment to assist the Israeli crews.)
Firefighters assessing the damage noted that the fires had destroyed 25,000 dunams of natural forest, 1000 dunams more than the Carmel fire which blazed in the winter of 2010, making it one of the largest fires in Israeli history. Fortunately there were no human casualties in the current fire, but the damage both to flora and fauna and to the ten communities nestling in the hills southwest of Jerusalem was horrendous. One resident of Ramat Raziel, Yaron Ginsburg (50) described seeing a “15-meter high sheet of fire” on returning from work Sunday. “I immediately entered the community and started evacuating people. Our house was near one of the two epicenters of the fire. At this point the fire engines hadn’t yet arrived We helped evacuate everyone and used hosepipes to douse out what we coul, until the firefighters arrived and helped us.” He described the scene after the fire as “like Hiroshima. We are used to living in a green place and now everything is black. It’s really tough.”
Ginsburg was lucky, since the fire only singed the front and back of his house, but others were less fortunate. The Marcus family in Givat Yearim found their house gutted after they escaped the raging flames. A valuable heirloom from Mrs. Marcus’s grandmother, who survived Auschwitz, was also ruined in the flames.
Orna Van Aldrink had left Holland with her Dutch husband and children after 20 years living there and moved to Israel “in order not to assimilate”. She opened a business selling musical gardens and instruments, which operated out of her Givat Yearim back yard. The entire yard with all the instruments was destroyed.
The Metzudah winery, run by Eli Bash, a chareidi vintner, was totally destroyed in the fire. However the grapes are in a separate location and, since it is harvesting time, 15 other wineries offered Bash the opportunity to make his unique blend of wine on their premises. “This is encouraging. We are harvesting and will produce our wine at another winery. Nothing will break us, we are continuing on full speed. The winery will return to activity. We have harsh feelings but our spirit is strong and we will not be broken,” Bash stresses.
