The Day After the Attack on Eilat

January 30, 2007 - 2:24 PM by Allison

Yesterday, I wrote:

Eilat is a vacation getaway, with glitzy hotels, crowded restaurants, and shopping centers lining the Red Sea, amusement parks, an IMAX theater and a dolphin park. It’s Israel’s answer to Miami Beach.

Floating off an Eilat beach in the crystal water, the Jordanian resort town of Aqaba is clear on one side, the dramatic mountains of the Egyptian Sinai on the other. Despite the high hotel prices that Israelis grumble about, they bring their families back for vacation year after year, particularly since security warnings have discouraged them from visiting more affordable beach getaways like the Sinai and the Turkish Mediterranean coast.

Though part of Israel, and so visibly close to Arab neighbors, Eilat has always felt like something of an oasis from the Middle East conflict, somehow immune from it. Much of the reason – no suicide bombing had ever taken place in this city of sun and fun.

That all changed today, as glass shattered across the blood-stained bread trays of a downtown bakery.

That was yesterday? What of today? Today, the hardworking population will wake up, bury and mourn the victims of the attack, then dust themselves off, and get back to business, shaken but determined. Hopefully, we will all get busy booking our next vacations in Eilat. I know I will. (pretty cool — to get to relax at a fabulous beach hotel and feel like you are making a noble statement at the same time…)

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