Beginning Wednesday afternoon, people greet each other with “Shabbat shalom,” anticipating Shabbat. For the vast majority of Israelis, Shabbat is just the weekend. For many, even secular Israelis, it may include a Shabbat dinner…but in truth, it’s just the opportunity to get together for a family dinner when everyone is available.
For us, today (Friday) and tomorrow, our pace changes…but not the emotions.
Today, I offer three separate – but interrelated – thoughts.
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We woke up late. We did a group “debrief,” had some free time, and then headed over to Modi’in, a modern community of over 100,000 people. Modi’in has the sad statistic that more soldiers (of 561) who have died in the fighting on or since October 7 have come from Modi’in. We visited with one of the Reform rabbis who has officiated at three of those military funerals. The remarkable piece of the story is that a Reform rabbi conducted the funeral with the permission and cooperation of the military rabbinate. He told us about each of the soldiers: Yanai, Ido, and Yam…each barely past their 2nd decade of life. Yam was an “overseer,” a soldier who was tasked with keeping an eye on the Gaza border from a base near a kibbutz. She died on October 7 but – due to the horrific acts committed by Hamas – her body was not identified for almost a month. Then,we went to the cemetery to pay respect to Yam’s memory. There we mourned. There we remembered. It was a sobering moment to see physical remembrances of the outpouring of love for this young soldier who gave her life defending her/our country.
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I want to share some other statistics I was reminded of today. I am neither tone-deaf to the pain felt by so many Palestinians in so many ways. (See tomorrow’s post for more on this) But sometimes…sometimes…statistics can help put our stories into perspective.
The number of Israelis who were murdered on October 7: 1200. Of those, 274 were soldiers.
The number who were murdered on 9/11: 2,966.
The number of people killed in Gaza, since the beginning of the war: approximately 27,000, according to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Agency.
The number of those who are estimated to have been Hamas fighters: 10,000. The number of civilians: 17,000.
In the Afghanistan war that the U.S. waged (2001-2021), about 176,000 died: 69,000 Allied military; 53,000 opposition fighters; 47,000 civilians.
The Syrian civil war, from 2011 continuing until today has resulted in some 600,000 people killed, with over 300,000 being civilians.
The number of Japanese who died in the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki: 129,00-226,000. Of those 7,000-20,000 were soldiers.
What do these statistics tell us?
First, war is devastating to civilian populations. Innocent people are killed. Each life is precious, to be sure. And…it is the sad cost of waging war.
Second, in each of the conflicts mentioned above, each of the attacked felt compelled to attack “back,” in order to punish, prevent another attack, or both.
Third, (and to the best of my knowledge) no other group – other than the IDF (Israel’s army) – gave warnings to civilians and combatants as to where they would attack…as a way to minimize civilian casualties.
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I want to believe that there are many innocent Palestinians, whose only crime has been to live in a place governed by ruthless terrorists.
And we know – it has been irrefutably shown – that Palestinian children have been raised on a diet of antisemitic rhetoric. Quoting the Jerusalem Post, “ a report by IMPACT-se last year found that Palestinian textbooks contained a large amount of antisemitism and anti-Israel material. According to the report, the books portrayed Jews as impure and encouraged the children to sacrifice themselves and kill Israelis. The books also erased Israel’s existence and legitimacy, referring to the entire country as Palestine.”
Does this justify their being killed? No. But it does indicate that the educational and governing systems that are in Gaza and the West Bank today are not conducive to creating an atmosphere of trust, cooperation, and peace.
And I ask: Would Yam – a wonderful young 20-year-old woman, whose entire life was ahead of her – be alive today if Hamas (and UNRWA [United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East] and the PA [Palestinian Authority]) had not been in place in Gaza for the last 20-30 years?
Hamas is a terrorist organization. Hamas is dedicated to eradicating Israel and (by definition) a safe home in which Jews (and others) might live in a democratic society. And it has done all it can to turn a civilian population against its neighbors. It chose intentionally to embed its military in the midst of and below the civilian population, whether forcibly or with cooperation. Many dozens – if not hundreds – of homes were filled with caches of arms and entrances to tunnels. This is not what innocence looks like.
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As Shabbat begins, I will recite Kaddish (the prayer of remembrance for the dead) for Yam, and for Ido, and for Yanai. I honor their lives. I mourn our loss.
The State of Art 