Dear readers,
After days and seeming weeks of paralysis in early October Sam and I grew more certain of our role in this horrific extended moment of Hamas terror and its consequences.
We came to realize what is perhaps obvious. There’s nothing we can do about the world situation but there’s something we can do here on the ground: Communicate.
Communication sounds easy but as anyone knows who has struggled with interpersonal, familial, and all kinds of situations communicating is sometimes anything but easy. We quickly learned that communication was vital, whether with family, close friends, or a larger audience and just as important as communicating among “ourselves” there was a struggle to communicate outside the bounds of our small community. To try somehow to make sense of the Israel “situation” with people of good will….and I like to think most of us are…who are unfortunately, unwittingly starved of real information. Our western media just doesn’t tell the whole story, barely tells a sliver of the story, as I learned from my eyewitness experiences in israel just last month.
I’ve learned to speak boldly and honestly about my beliefs. Sam has told me he’s in awe of my public speaking powers and….well…I’m willing to take the credit ?. One thing I do is ask anyone I’ve spoken with to pass on my message. Because too few of us are brave enough to stand up for the truth. The drumbeat of hatred disguised in a thousand costumes of love, liberation, and self determination too often overshadows our voices.
So I just want to post a couple of recent and not-so-recent items. They are from Jewish sources and they reflect a Jewish standpoint. But for me, there is such obvious truth that I wonder. If I ask you to be the judge will you please get back to me or Sam and tell us what you think?
The first piece is from today’s Jerusalem Post. It’s just a news item so I think you can find it anywhere, Al Jazeera or anywhere. Read it, analyze it, and let me know. What does it tell you?
My second entry might shed light on the first. I hope you can find time to listen all the way through its fifteen minutes. It was sent to Sam by a friend he met in India. Yehuda, who was born in Persia (later Iran) emigrated to Israel in the 1970s and later settled in London. He is in his 80s and has many elderly and disabled relatives in Israel, most of them close to the Gaza border, who were severely impacted by the Hamas invasion. Perhaps more than Sam and me, Yehuda was in a paralyzing spiral of sadness in the early days of October. He found this recording of a British rabbi and sent it to Sam, who gained more than
succor from it. It shaped our thoughts andactions in the ensuing weeks and months, and it continues to shine its light as we struggle forward.
What to do when darkness declares you its enemy?
Please hear out the words of Rabbi Rowe and let us know your response.
We want to communicate. We want you to be the judge.
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