It wasn’t until a
little later - when I obliviously crossed through the common room and saw dozens
of kids huddled around the tv, watching the latest coverage - that I began to
realize the full magnitude of what had happened that day.
In some ways, my
experience on Saturday, October 7th reminded me of my morning on 9/11. I picked
up my phone to check the weather forecast. (I had tickets to the Orioles
play-off game at 1, so I was crossing my fingers that the rain would hold off.)
Someone had posted a map of Israel on Instagram along with some text, but I
hadn’t had my coffee yet, and I was in a rush to get up and make breakfast for
my kids, so I didn’t give the post much of a look.
Only when my parents called
and asked me if I had heard the news about Israel that it began to dawn on me
that something truly terrible was happening.
The Palestinian militant group
Hamas launched a series of coordinated attacks from the Gaza Strip into
bordering territories in Israel. In a single day, more than 1200 Israelis were
murdered. The attack was deliberately carried out on a day of two Jewish
holidays: Shabbat, the Day of Rest, and Simchat Torah, an ordinarily joyous
celebration of Jewish holy scripture. Many, including President Joe Biden,
observed that October 7th was the bloodiest day in Israel’s history and the
deadliest for Jews since the Holocaust.
If you aren’t Jewish, or if you don’t
have any type of relationship with the State of Israel, I understand that
Saturday, October 7th may have been the same as any other day. You may not have
given the situation a second thought. I get that. After all, terrible things
happen every day, in every country in the world.
But for most observant Jews,
like myself, the news was absolutely devastating. As I learned the details of
what had happened, I began to feel something like what I felt twenty-two years
ago on September 11th. Let me try to explain why:
When I was about six or seven
years old, I started attending Hebrew School, and I would continue to do so for
the next decade, until well after my Bar Mitzvah. In Hebrew School, my
classmates and I learned how to read Hebrew, we learned bible stories, we
learned prayers, and customs. And we learned about the land of Israel, Eretz
Yisrael, a tiny nation in the Middle East, roughly the size of my home state of
New Jersey, that was the Jewish homeland. Constantly, our teachers “hyped up”
Israel to us. We learned about its beautiful scenery and its historic cities. We
sang its national anthem, “Hatikvah,” every day.
And as I grew older, I was
increasingly exhilarated by the idea of a country governed and populated by
Jews. I grew up in a suburban town that was overwhelmingly white and Christian
(both Catholic and Protestant). At school, I was always one of just a handful of
Jewish kids in my grade. Even though I liked many of my peers, I always felt
vaguely like an outsider. Not many of my peers knew anything about the customs
or the culture that made me who I was. But somewhere, half a world away, there
was a wonderful country full of people just like me. And it was just waiting for
me to visit some day.
When I was six years old, our Hebrew school teachers took
us on a mock trip to Israel. Over many days, we prepared for the trip, crafting
passports out of construction paper and cameras out of cardboard. The teachers
transformed each school room into a different destination in Israel: Jerusalem,
Tel Aviv, the Dead Sea. On the day of our trip, they arranged chairs into two
straight lines so we could pretend we were sitting on an airplane. I still
remember how excited I was just to pretend to travel to Israel: to me, it might
as well have been the Land of Oz.
When I was eighteen years old, I was lucky
enough to travel to Israel for real - via the BirthRight Program, which for
years has been offering free trips to Israel to young Americans. With a
contingent of other college students, I toured many of the country’s major
sights, from the Golan Heights in the north down to the Dead Sea, the world’s
lowest lying point, which makes up part of Israel’s eastern border with Jordan.
Instantly, I felt a sort of bond with everyone I met in Israel. Everyone was
Jewish - from the guy at the pita and falafel place to the bus drivers to the
soldiers to the beggar who approached me to ask for spare change so he could buy
a challah for Shabbat. This was the special place I had heard about since I was
a child.
I’ll admit that I still have a hard time looking at Israel objectively.
When I hear it criticized, it’s hard for me not to react emotionally. It has
taken me time to see Israel not as some sort of magical utopia but as a country,
like any other country, subject to questionable leadership and objectionable
policies. It has taken me time to realize that one can be critical of a nation’s
leadership and policies, and still feel deep love for that nation. After all,
that’s how I feel about the USA: over the years, I’ve often questioned the
choices we have made as a nation, and sometimes I’ve despaired for our future.
And yet, despite my misgivings, I always come back to a deep and abiding feeling
of patriotism.
I don’t agree with all of its decisions and I don’t support all
of its leaders, but I love the USA and I want to see it thrive. I feel the same
way about Israel.
Love for a country, just like love for another person, doesn’t
mean blind acceptance of its every flaw: it means steadfast support through
difficult times, and the undying hope that it can someday become the best
version of itself.
In order to feel heartbroken on 9/11, I didn’t have to agree
with America’s every policy. Nor do I have to endorse Israel’s every move to
feel devastated by the events of October 7th.
But right now, I’m just not in the
mood to debate, or to talk about anything as abstract as political policy. Right
now, I’m too busy grieving for the thousands of Israeli men, women, and children
- as well as thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians - who have lost their
lives over the last few weeks.
Every day for the past three weeks, friends and
relatives of mine have posted the pictures of Israelis who recently lost their
lives. They look so normal, so happy, and full of energy. Some of them remind me
of the Israeli counselors who worked at the Jewish summer camp I used to attend.
Every time I see one of their pictures, it stops me in my tracks and I think all
over again about the senseless loss of human life.
Since October 7th, several of
my non-Jewish friends have reached out to extend their sympathies and ask how
I’m feeling. I appreciate their thoughts. And every time I hear from one of
them, I am reminded of the connection I feel to Israel.
One of the lines from
Hatikvah, the Jewish National Anthem, is “od lo avda tikvateinu,” which
translates to “our hope is not yet lost.” In spite of years of conflict, my hope
is not yet lost that the land I love can one day be a Land of Peace.
