Thank you Julie. I’m in week 4 of a visit to Israel from Melbourne, to volunteer here as a doctor, and so much of what you say resonates with me. I love this crazy passionate country that exists against the odds. In equal measure I also feel constraint and sometimes maddened by it, by its contrasts, juxtapositions, contradictions and bureaucracy. By those who seem to be trying to destroy it from within, whilst at the same time being in awe of some of the soldiers and people I meet and what they have given for the freedom we enjoy.
I feel afraid for the future of the Jews in the diaspora as well as the Jews and people of Israel. We are indeed living through unprecedented times. Unprecedented to us, but strangely familiar to anyone with a grasp of history. And the knowledge that time and time again, the Jews have been catapulted from what seems like a secure existence into the jaws of death and destruction. We are indeed the canary in the coal mine!
A government that includes far-Right Messianic racists? Theocratic Jerusalem? I don't think so. This kind of maudlin journalism which includes such nasty and ignorant clips bothers me no end. Israel is in the middle of a war that it will have to wage until victory. That is the one thing the maudlin West will not help and that is the one thing Israel needs. Journalists should focus on that if they want to do their job.
This is why I don't give a shit about anyone in gaza and their alleged suffering, including the children who are nothing more than future jihadists. In fact, I feel a sense of vengeance and delight over Israeli bombs destroying gaza, hamas and everyone else in that enclave.
"But as it is, the account of the two little boys in their underwear — covered in the blood of their slain father, one of them blinded in one eye, begging to be dead himself as a terrorist walks into their home and casually snatches a Coke from the fridge — as it is these two little boys stalk my waking hours. Did I really need to watch October 7th the movie? When I am likely to be living October 7th forever"?
This writer started by quoting the English banner upon her arrival in Israel but failed to emphasize the Hebrew just before it, “Our hearts are captive in Gaza.” I’m not Jewish but have spent many days and weeks in Israel and while the English “…Now” is very Western and USA in nature the Hebrew is a netter reflection of the minds of Israelis. What’s in our hearts, these captives and those who were murdered, is far stronger than a demand. It is what makes people who they are and not just someone passing through.
Overall I was a bit disappointed in the article. Why? It rambled from emotion and shock to what seemed to me a confusion about the war and the politics of Israel. Especially calling the Religious people in the way she did was not just disrespectful, but a demonstration of her lack of understanding and compassion for the politics of the Land.
At the end of the article I am left with a nagging sense the author’s relatively liberal perspective of life and worldview has been shaken by the truth of humanity. I just never connected with her journey in Israel, and had trouble staying engaged to the end.
Just my thoughts and I know others will see things differently.
My family arrived to Israel 2 years after yours left to Australia, in March 1960. Most of them stayed, the previous generations are buried there, between Holon and North Tel Aviv cemeteries, including my grandparents and parents.
Coincidentally, the Bat-Yam psychiatric hospital where your father worked has become famous, named after Abrabanel. My neighbourhood bordered on it, and my mates and I played basketball with the safer patients, as they had a basketball court, while the fence was mostly non-existent. It was stimulating fun, interacting with these creative, unique and somewhat unhinged individuals. It had quite a few Holocaust survivors, some more scary than others, usually in secure blocks.
Many of your emotions described in your essay are clear to me, as I left Israel after 22 never to return for good. Studied and worked as academic in the US, Canada, Australia, Singapore, and Kazakhstan. In Australia, I lived in Carlton, VIC, 1997-2001, as professor at Melbourne Business School; and in 2009 on a project in Melbourne. I still love Melbourne as a city and a society, and many of my MBA students still reside there. More recently I lived and worked in Parramatta, also very pleasant existence, 2010-2015.
I carry less guilt in comparison to you and yours, as I did serve in IDF, felt 100% integral part of the nation and the people, travelled throughout its geography hitchhiking and on foot, including Sinai and the Golan, while avoiding most geographies I considered foreign, NOT mine; being a 3rd generation atheist, the Green Line defined the boundary for me. I never visited Gaza, Beit Lehem, Hebron, Sh’hem, Jenin, and similar, but my son was born in Upper Galilee (Safed). I toured Jordanian ruins of the Roman Empore (Um-Kai’s, Jarash) plus Petra, and more. Sinai’s Gulf of Aqaba-Eilat beaches were favourite escapes from civilisation location, especially Nu’eiba and Dahab. Skied in the Herman too. Military service took me to bootcamp and squad commander school in Samaria and Golan Heights and regular service to Sinai and all over the whole geography again. I was fortunate not to harm anybody and not to be harmed in return, as a soldier, although I had been ready and willing for either on several occasions between 1969-1974.
Zionism is NOT a “thing” for me and my family, we just felt that Israel became home, all the way to my grandparents (3 survived the Holocaust, very unusual for Polish-Soviet Jews). Of course, digging into this apolitical (unprincipled?) attitude, we implicitly accepted Jewish history in this geography, and father being a Holocaust survivor as a teenager, while losing his mother and only sibling, Oskar-Joshua, the rest didn’t matter. We never discussed this theme in any meaningful way, but we all accepted without any theological justifications that we should be in Israel, period. We did believe that humanity matters most, but as Jews we had no other viable locations on the Planet to call home.
As my neighbourhood mates dubbed it — Israel was NOT the “Holy Land,” it was the “Only Land.”
It still is the one state, national entity and its geography that I feel viscerally connected to, even if I don’t expect to return there, except in spirit and on my elaborate “memory lane journeys.” I reside in Thailand with my Thai family, and there is a place for me at a Buddhist Temple’s cremation ritual in our neighbourhood.
Would be nice to compare “notes” with you, as I might have snippets of history and culture you might be interested to hear, as a journalist.
I so often find the comments as fascinating as the essays. Yes, you ramble a bit, but so artistically. As your reader, I found a few opportunities to learn and many impressions to digest slowly. As in encounters with any work of art, my appreciation only scratches the surface and I hope to absorb more on subsequent readings. Thank you, Julie, for this exquisite piece of writing. It was a bonus that I saw no typos or grammatical goofs. Kudos to you or whoever did your proofreading.
Regarding your content:
1) Not one of us is the same Jew since October 7th. We have been individually changed. Our Jewish institutions have changed. Our unity as a People has been threatened. Jews will always be a spectrum. Like you, this Jew has shifted on it, but you rightly celebrate the things that make Israel so special, so important.
2) Regarding your observation about the Druze having a cultural creed including loyalty to one’s host country, the same is true of Jews in the Diaspora. It is also part of our religion and part of our practice to be supportive of and loyal to our host country. Not always an easy part these days. The countries who made us feel welcome in the past benefited hugely from our presence. History is a great teacher, but its pedagogy has been no match for social media and journalistic media.
3) I applaud your ability to sit through the video. In order to protect my sanity and ability to sleep, I have avoided every form of explicit imagery since October 7th, including your paragragh that begins with mention of the two little boys in their underwear. Forgive my wimpy instinct to avoid the worst, but I passed that one by, unread.
I do, however, look forward to reading more of your impressions. Brava!
Thank you Julie; you have crafted a very poignant, provocative, work. I find it very moving indeed, but am also fascinated by the way it is, and will be, received by others - such as Professor Hauptman above.
Unlike him, and so many others, I do believe very strongly in the G-d of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I see the evidence for Him virtually everywhere, but acknowledge the reality that others see none, anywhere they look. This gulf in perceptions is, to me, a fascinating, and exceedingly portentous, mystery that becomes more and more clearly apparent in the times we are living through. It’s as if our lived realities are driving us to take a stand on one side or the other of the question of G-d’s existence. And, if He exists, what are His attributes, how can we know Him, why did He create the world and allow it to be as it is, why does He allow ‘bad things to happen to good people’, what are His plans for the future, or how are we to relate to Him?
The old adage, ‘Ignorance is bliss’ is indeed true - but only to a certain extent. Beyond a given point, which varies with the specific issue or matter in question, ‘Ignorance bites’ becomes an ever-increasingly heavy fact of life. And then, at some point, another time-worn adage comes into play; ‘The truth hurts.’
But (Behold the Underlying Truth), there are times when it is necessary to endure great pain; great hurt, in order to be healed. And I believe we are all living through such a time today.
Individually, there may be some who suffer more outrageous evils and misfortunes than ‘the Chosen People’. But, there has never been, or ever will be, any people group forced to endure the focused, irrational, evil and outrageous malignity that has been the lot of the Jewish people.
I can completely sympathize with Tevye's request, but I know, in the depths of my heart, that the G-d of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will - one day - be vindicated in all things, including the travails of the Jewish nation across time.
Until then:
Habakkuk 2:2-4
2 Then the LORD answered me and said:
“Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.
3 For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it;
Because it will surely come, it will not tarry.
4 “Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith.
Daniel 12:7-10
7 Then I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left hand to heaven, and swore by Him who lives forever, that it shall be for a time, times, and half a time; and when the power of the holy people has been completely shattered, all these things shall be finished.
8 Although I heard, I did not understand. Then I said, “My lord, what shall be the end of these things?” 9 And he said, “Go your way, Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. 10 Many shall be purified, made white, and refined, but the wicked shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.
Jeremiah 29:11-13
11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. 12 Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.
Now, may the Lord bless, keep, protect, strengthen, guide, and save Israel, give her leaders wisdom, her warriors courage and might, and all Israel a love for the truth, a love for her G-d, and discernment to escape from the deceptive snares and traps laid for her people. May she have victory over all her enemies, and may she be brought into the fullness of the love, desires, and the promises of her God - for His glory, and the glory of His Kingdom, forevermore.
Thank you Julie. I’m in week 4 of a visit to Israel from Melbourne, to volunteer here as a doctor, and so much of what you say resonates with me. I love this crazy passionate country that exists against the odds. In equal measure I also feel constraint and sometimes maddened by it, by its contrasts, juxtapositions, contradictions and bureaucracy. By those who seem to be trying to destroy it from within, whilst at the same time being in awe of some of the soldiers and people I meet and what they have given for the freedom we enjoy.
I feel afraid for the future of the Jews in the diaspora as well as the Jews and people of Israel. We are indeed living through unprecedented times. Unprecedented to us, but strangely familiar to anyone with a grasp of history. And the knowledge that time and time again, the Jews have been catapulted from what seems like a secure existence into the jaws of death and destruction. We are indeed the canary in the coal mine!
A government that includes far-Right Messianic racists? Theocratic Jerusalem? I don't think so. This kind of maudlin journalism which includes such nasty and ignorant clips bothers me no end. Israel is in the middle of a war that it will have to wage until victory. That is the one thing the maudlin West will not help and that is the one thing Israel needs. Journalists should focus on that if they want to do their job.
This is why I don't give a shit about anyone in gaza and their alleged suffering, including the children who are nothing more than future jihadists. In fact, I feel a sense of vengeance and delight over Israeli bombs destroying gaza, hamas and everyone else in that enclave.
................................................................................................................................................................................................................
"But as it is, the account of the two little boys in their underwear — covered in the blood of their slain father, one of them blinded in one eye, begging to be dead himself as a terrorist walks into their home and casually snatches a Coke from the fridge — as it is these two little boys stalk my waking hours. Did I really need to watch October 7th the movie? When I am likely to be living October 7th forever"?
This writer started by quoting the English banner upon her arrival in Israel but failed to emphasize the Hebrew just before it, “Our hearts are captive in Gaza.” I’m not Jewish but have spent many days and weeks in Israel and while the English “…Now” is very Western and USA in nature the Hebrew is a netter reflection of the minds of Israelis. What’s in our hearts, these captives and those who were murdered, is far stronger than a demand. It is what makes people who they are and not just someone passing through.
Overall I was a bit disappointed in the article. Why? It rambled from emotion and shock to what seemed to me a confusion about the war and the politics of Israel. Especially calling the Religious people in the way she did was not just disrespectful, but a demonstration of her lack of understanding and compassion for the politics of the Land.
At the end of the article I am left with a nagging sense the author’s relatively liberal perspective of life and worldview has been shaken by the truth of humanity. I just never connected with her journey in Israel, and had trouble staying engaged to the end.
Just my thoughts and I know others will see things differently.
Thank you Julie for sharing!
My family arrived to Israel 2 years after yours left to Australia, in March 1960. Most of them stayed, the previous generations are buried there, between Holon and North Tel Aviv cemeteries, including my grandparents and parents.
Coincidentally, the Bat-Yam psychiatric hospital where your father worked has become famous, named after Abrabanel. My neighbourhood bordered on it, and my mates and I played basketball with the safer patients, as they had a basketball court, while the fence was mostly non-existent. It was stimulating fun, interacting with these creative, unique and somewhat unhinged individuals. It had quite a few Holocaust survivors, some more scary than others, usually in secure blocks.
Many of your emotions described in your essay are clear to me, as I left Israel after 22 never to return for good. Studied and worked as academic in the US, Canada, Australia, Singapore, and Kazakhstan. In Australia, I lived in Carlton, VIC, 1997-2001, as professor at Melbourne Business School; and in 2009 on a project in Melbourne. I still love Melbourne as a city and a society, and many of my MBA students still reside there. More recently I lived and worked in Parramatta, also very pleasant existence, 2010-2015.
I carry less guilt in comparison to you and yours, as I did serve in IDF, felt 100% integral part of the nation and the people, travelled throughout its geography hitchhiking and on foot, including Sinai and the Golan, while avoiding most geographies I considered foreign, NOT mine; being a 3rd generation atheist, the Green Line defined the boundary for me. I never visited Gaza, Beit Lehem, Hebron, Sh’hem, Jenin, and similar, but my son was born in Upper Galilee (Safed). I toured Jordanian ruins of the Roman Empore (Um-Kai’s, Jarash) plus Petra, and more. Sinai’s Gulf of Aqaba-Eilat beaches were favourite escapes from civilisation location, especially Nu’eiba and Dahab. Skied in the Herman too. Military service took me to bootcamp and squad commander school in Samaria and Golan Heights and regular service to Sinai and all over the whole geography again. I was fortunate not to harm anybody and not to be harmed in return, as a soldier, although I had been ready and willing for either on several occasions between 1969-1974.
Zionism is NOT a “thing” for me and my family, we just felt that Israel became home, all the way to my grandparents (3 survived the Holocaust, very unusual for Polish-Soviet Jews). Of course, digging into this apolitical (unprincipled?) attitude, we implicitly accepted Jewish history in this geography, and father being a Holocaust survivor as a teenager, while losing his mother and only sibling, Oskar-Joshua, the rest didn’t matter. We never discussed this theme in any meaningful way, but we all accepted without any theological justifications that we should be in Israel, period. We did believe that humanity matters most, but as Jews we had no other viable locations on the Planet to call home.
As my neighbourhood mates dubbed it — Israel was NOT the “Holy Land,” it was the “Only Land.”
It still is the one state, national entity and its geography that I feel viscerally connected to, even if I don’t expect to return there, except in spirit and on my elaborate “memory lane journeys.” I reside in Thailand with my Thai family, and there is a place for me at a Buddhist Temple’s cremation ritual in our neighbourhood.
Would be nice to compare “notes” with you, as I might have snippets of history and culture you might be interested to hear, as a journalist.
Be well, be safe!
Oscar Hauptman, PhD MIT
On LinkedIn
Thank you for this incredibly moving piece. It brought me to tears! The world has gone mad. My prayers are for you all! 🙏
I so often find the comments as fascinating as the essays. Yes, you ramble a bit, but so artistically. As your reader, I found a few opportunities to learn and many impressions to digest slowly. As in encounters with any work of art, my appreciation only scratches the surface and I hope to absorb more on subsequent readings. Thank you, Julie, for this exquisite piece of writing. It was a bonus that I saw no typos or grammatical goofs. Kudos to you or whoever did your proofreading.
Regarding your content:
1) Not one of us is the same Jew since October 7th. We have been individually changed. Our Jewish institutions have changed. Our unity as a People has been threatened. Jews will always be a spectrum. Like you, this Jew has shifted on it, but you rightly celebrate the things that make Israel so special, so important.
2) Regarding your observation about the Druze having a cultural creed including loyalty to one’s host country, the same is true of Jews in the Diaspora. It is also part of our religion and part of our practice to be supportive of and loyal to our host country. Not always an easy part these days. The countries who made us feel welcome in the past benefited hugely from our presence. History is a great teacher, but its pedagogy has been no match for social media and journalistic media.
3) I applaud your ability to sit through the video. In order to protect my sanity and ability to sleep, I have avoided every form of explicit imagery since October 7th, including your paragragh that begins with mention of the two little boys in their underwear. Forgive my wimpy instinct to avoid the worst, but I passed that one by, unread.
I do, however, look forward to reading more of your impressions. Brava!
Thank you Julie; you have crafted a very poignant, provocative, work. I find it very moving indeed, but am also fascinated by the way it is, and will be, received by others - such as Professor Hauptman above.
Unlike him, and so many others, I do believe very strongly in the G-d of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I see the evidence for Him virtually everywhere, but acknowledge the reality that others see none, anywhere they look. This gulf in perceptions is, to me, a fascinating, and exceedingly portentous, mystery that becomes more and more clearly apparent in the times we are living through. It’s as if our lived realities are driving us to take a stand on one side or the other of the question of G-d’s existence. And, if He exists, what are His attributes, how can we know Him, why did He create the world and allow it to be as it is, why does He allow ‘bad things to happen to good people’, what are His plans for the future, or how are we to relate to Him?
The old adage, ‘Ignorance is bliss’ is indeed true - but only to a certain extent. Beyond a given point, which varies with the specific issue or matter in question, ‘Ignorance bites’ becomes an ever-increasingly heavy fact of life. And then, at some point, another time-worn adage comes into play; ‘The truth hurts.’
But (Behold the Underlying Truth), there are times when it is necessary to endure great pain; great hurt, in order to be healed. And I believe we are all living through such a time today.
Individually, there may be some who suffer more outrageous evils and misfortunes than ‘the Chosen People’. But, there has never been, or ever will be, any people group forced to endure the focused, irrational, evil and outrageous malignity that has been the lot of the Jewish people.
I can completely sympathize with Tevye's request, but I know, in the depths of my heart, that the G-d of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will - one day - be vindicated in all things, including the travails of the Jewish nation across time.
Until then:
Habakkuk 2:2-4
2 Then the LORD answered me and said:
“Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.
3 For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it;
Because it will surely come, it will not tarry.
4 “Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith.
Daniel 12:7-10
7 Then I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left hand to heaven, and swore by Him who lives forever, that it shall be for a time, times, and half a time; and when the power of the holy people has been completely shattered, all these things shall be finished.
8 Although I heard, I did not understand. Then I said, “My lord, what shall be the end of these things?” 9 And he said, “Go your way, Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. 10 Many shall be purified, made white, and refined, but the wicked shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.
Jeremiah 29:11-13
11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. 12 Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.
Now, may the Lord bless, keep, protect, strengthen, guide, and save Israel, give her leaders wisdom, her warriors courage and might, and all Israel a love for the truth, a love for her G-d, and discernment to escape from the deceptive snares and traps laid for her people. May she have victory over all her enemies, and may she be brought into the fullness of the love, desires, and the promises of her God - for His glory, and the glory of His Kingdom, forevermore.
Great article, Julie. BTW you’re off by 10x - there are 150K Druze in Israel. Our best.