Grains of Sand

The Fall of Neve Dekalim

 By Shira Shomron

Mazo Publishers, Jerusalem. Soft Cover. 185 pages. US $16.95

Reviewed by Adele Rubin

The writer of Grains of Sand: the Fall of Neve Dekalim was born in the USA and lived in Neve Dekalim from 1992 – 2005. She describes how as a teenager life continued  ‘normally’ in spite of terror attacks and the loss of life of settlers and soldiers during the second Intifada. Shifra is a recipient of the “Letter of Academic Excellence” from the Ministry of Education in Israel. Her previous literary work Fronds in the Breeze won first place runner-up in a youth contest.

Says Shifra about her book: “I began writing Grains of Sand: The Fall of Neve Dekalim (in English) as a senior in the Neve Dekalim girls’ high school and completed it a year later as a nineteen year old. My book is based on my personal experiences as a former Neve Dekalim – Gush Katif resident and expellee. It depicts the life of an Israeli family living in Gush Katif from pre-intifada II until disengagement.”

“Gush Katif now exists only in the memories of its banished residents, and those memories mustn’t be forgotten. Gush Katif no longer belongs only to those of us who lived there – it has become part of the legacy of the entire Jewish world. My novel, Grains of Sand: The Fall of Neve Dekalim is the story of blossoming communities that, after thriving for thirty years, were reduced to gray piles of rubble”.