ציטירנדיקער פּירוש אויף איכה 4:4

TO PUT US AND OUR CHILDREN AND OUR CATTLE TO DEATH WITH THIRST. In their complaint, they mentioned the cattle too, thus telling Moses that they need a lot of water and it is therefore necessary to take counsel on the whole matter. This is why it says at the second time [when the incident at the waters of Meribah is recorded], and water came forth abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their cattle.⁴¹⁴Ibid., 20:11. Now here it is not mentioned but it is self-understood that when the rock was turned into a pool of water, they drank and they watered their flocks (Ramban in Verse 5 further). In the instance of the waters of Meribah at Kadesh, it is mentioned on account of the mishap that resulted from the entire affair, as explained there; see also Ramban here in Verse 5 for another interpretation. And our Rabbis have said:⁴¹⁵Mechilta on the verse here. “They made their cattle equal in importance to themselves. They said: ‘A man’s beast is as his life. If a man travels on the road and his beast is not with him, he suffers.’”
Now the reason they mentioned us and our children and did not say generally: “to put us to death with thirst” or “to put to death this whole assembly,” [an expression] which would have included men, women and the little ones, as they said in other places,⁴¹⁶Such as above, 16:3, to put to death this whole assembly by famine. is that by mentioning the children to him, they emphasized their murmuring against him so that he should make haste in the matter, since the young ones could not suffer thirst at all and they would thus die before the eyes of their parents. This is something like the expression, The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst.⁴¹⁷Lamentations 4:4.

And the tongue of the dumb shall sing. A figurative expression for they will find water everywhere; it is the reverse of the tongue of the suckling cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst (Lam. 4:4)

פרוס Break. Comp. פרש אין להם no man breaketh it unto them (Lam. 4:4); פריסת is divided (Dan. 5:28). It means here to break a loaf of bread, in order to give a part of it to the poor.

Tzion spread her arms. As in, “and he will stretch out his hand in its midst,”⁵⁶Yeshayahuu 25:11. like a person who moves his hands back and forth [showing] his pain with them.⁵⁷Alternatively, ‘Tzion spread her arms in prayer, but to no avail.’ (Lechem Dimah) Another explanation: פֵּרְשָׂה צִיּוֹן is an expression of breaking, as in, “no one breaks פּוֹרֵשׂ bread for them,”⁵⁸Eichah 4:4. [and as in,] “they will not break [bread] for them in their bereavement to comfort them for the dead.”⁵⁹Yirmiyahu 16:7. So did Menachem classify it. And in the language of the Mishnah, “the broken piece of bread פְּרוּסָה is intact.”⁶⁰Maseches Berachos 37a. It means [that Tzion was] like a person in pain who clasps his hands and breaks them [from agony]. I found an addendum. Adonoy has commanded concerning Yaakov,