Allison Kaplan Sommer has a lovely description of a trip to the Golan. It sounds so nice. It would be a shame if Israel had to give it back - no soldier wants to take the same piece of ground twice - and there's no reason they should, although as Allison admits, if it were for a real, lasting peace...

I remember visiting the Golan a long time ago. If my memory serves me correctly, it's a steep drop on the Israeli side, and a gentle slope down toward Syria - horribly strategic from the Israeli point of view.

I recall that while our guide was speaking, we saw a plume of brown dirt and smoke sprout up and start to drift with the wind from somewhere down near the Syrian border. A few seconds later we heard a lound report. We kids were pretty excited and interrested, curious as to what had happened. An explosion? Near us?

Our guide just glanced over for a second and then back to us. Wanting to get back to his talk he just said, "OK, I no longer care what has gone on over there..." and went on as though nothing had happened. We went back to listening, and in a few minutes the incident was over, forgotten, and drifting off in the breeze with the dust from the explosion.

That ability to take note of what went on, but move on quickly to the business at hand definitely stuck with me.