I face next week with pain, fear, dismay and anger, yet with prayer, hope and love. Monday brings Yom HaZikaron, Israel’s Memorial Day for the Dead. Tuesday is Yom Ha’Atzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day. If only things were simpler; everything tears at the heart.

There’s pain. ‘It’s over twenty years since my son Noam was killed in Lebanon,’ my friend Aaron Barnea tells me, ‘Yet a hundred and fifty people still came for the anniversary.’ I think of Ilana Kaminka, her son killed defending his base, on October 7. My heart travels to the site of the Nova Festival, the trees planted for everyone killed, the photos and letters tied to them: ‘We miss you, love you, long for you.’

I hear the terrible cry of the Palestinian mother, trapped between Hamas and the IDF in Gaza’s misery. Her child has just been killed: ‘Before God I call to account…’

On Yom HaZikaron I’ll say the Prayer of the Grieving Mothers, written by Raba Tamar Elad-Applebaum and Sheikha Ibtisam Mahameed together:

God of Life, who heals the broken hearted…
Hear the prayer of mothers…
For you did not create us to kill each other…
But …to sanctify Your name of Life… [1]

I fear the hatred waiting to ambush the future. For decades, Hizbollah’s gunmen lie hiding beneath the houses of South Lebanon, foot-soldiers of Iran’s brutal, hate-filled leaders, dreaded and loathed by their own people.  

I feel shame and dismay at the racist haters among my own people. I saw the children’s books scattered across the broken floor of a Palestinian school bulldozed by a settler, after the villagers, intimidated and afraid, abandoned their homes. This isn’t what God meant by commanding us to be anshei kodesh, holy, heart-aware people, attuned to the sanctity of life.

Then there’s the chaos of the campuses, the bigotry, hatred and folly. Is this really for the good of Palestinian people, or another way in which their just needs are betrayed? I feel for the fear and loneliness of so many fellow Jews in this threatening, violent world.

But I can’t stop here. For we have prayer, hope and love to strengthen our hearts.
My prayer is ‘Veshavu banim legevulam – May the children, may all the hostages, be returned to their longing families. May this terrible fighting, this catastrophe, end, with a forward-looking plan for the security and dignity of all. Mindful of Nachmanides’ words that ‘where true tears are, God is too,’ I pray with all who weep.

For we mustn’t act as God tries to act after the golden calf. ‘They’re your people now,’ God tells Moses,’ You deal with them.’ God – albeit temporarily – wants nothing to do with them anymore. In contrast, I recall the woman in Israel’s far north who turned to me quietly: ‘People are saying, “My country, right or wrong.” I’m saying, “Wrong. But they’re still my people.”’

I struggle, like countless others. I think, ‘Right in this; wrong in that.’ But the Jewish people is my people and Israel is our only country. I pray for it to survive and thrive. I’m bound by ties of faithfulness and love. I don’t mean love for any racist and corrupt members of Israel’s leadership who disgrace Judaism. Many families of hostages are furious with them, wanting a deal, not yet more bloodshed.

But I care deeply for the innumerable Israelis, Jews and also Arabs, who work to heal wounds, in Israel’s hospitals, food banks, hesed (lovingkindness) NGOs, schools and arts.

I know so many who see beyond the bloodshed and anger, who reach across the grim wall between Israelis and Palestinians and say, ‘Enough tears, enough heartache; how can we build together?’ How can my heart not be with them? With them rest my prayers, love and hope.