Each morning when I come to do a final proofread on this piece another bombshell has altered reality. Yesterday it was literal.
You have all read the news of the targeted killing of Hamas Politburo Chief, Ismail Haniyeh, who was in Tehran celebrating the inauguration of the recently elected “reformist” Iranian President. Although Israel has not taken responsibility publicly for this precision assassination speculation abounds. As it does regarding the killing of senior commander Fuad Shukr, Hezballah’s #2 man in Lebanon.
Shukr is said to have been the brains behind the bomb that fell on a soccer pitch in Majdal Shams on Saturday, killing 12 children and wounding dozens more. It is also believed that Shukr has directed the daily attacks on Israel from Lebanon since October 7th, as well as having been a key player in organizing and executing the 1983 bombing of the US Marines barracks in Beirut in 1983. More than 200 servicemen and women were murdered in that attack.
Today in Beirut, Hizballah leader, Hassan Nusrallah, echoed the pledge made yesterday in Tehran by the Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, to avenge Israel’s actions with “harsh” punishment. The media is reporting on significant military movement in the region. There is a strong expectation that the western allies will band together to defend Israel should there be another mega-attack by Iran as we experienced on April 13-14. That night we witnessed the most extraordinary alliance in the air and at sea when multiple countries scrambled to intercept 99% of the hundreds of missiles launched from Iran and targeting Israel. This time experts are anticipating something larger, more sustained and multi-front, engaging Iran and its proxies in the region; the Houthis, Hezballah and Hamas.
In Israel, every thing and every one is on highest alert.
Several major airlines have cancelled all commercial flights to and from Israel, including Delta, United and British Airways.
Many people have written to me asking what will happen. Like everyone else, I have no idea. But I do have provisions should we lose power and contact with the outside world.
This really is a war of Evil vs. Good. Freedom vs. Tyranny. Theo-fascism vs. Tolerance. It has been building for decades and we are out of time in the west to counter this very real and immediate threat to liberal democratic values and societies.
Now. I will quickly finalize my various thoughts on certain recent events, before night falls and I awaken tomorrow morning to yet another fresh reality.
Let’s start with something a little lighter.
On Tuesday morning I attended the English Club on Kibbutz Ruchama, which was a fascinating cultural immersion.
My new neighbors were curious to meet me. It was mutual. Under the patient tutelage of a native English speaking kibbutz member, they gather each week and discuss a pre-selected topic. This week it was less structured, with each person sharing a bit of their past, and present.
What struck me most about this group of twelve women, meeting in the kibbutz clubhouse, was how disrupted so many lives have become. Not just because of October 7th. But because we are all wandering, rootless Jews.
Many of the women present were born on the kibbutz. Some left for a few years and returned to raise families. All are well-educated and represent the broadest range of professional accomplishment imaginable. Their families, children and grandchildren are scattered, globally. Canada. Europe. United States. Australia. Some among the younger generation living abroad speak Hebrew. Many do not. Some have cut themselves off entirely from family and Israel. What comes out among a group that is overly familiar with one another - when someone new arrives - is always fascinating. The familiar flow and equilibrium is thrown off a touch. People want you, the newcomer, to know some things, and not others.
What I took away was that I have a welcoming place in which to hang out, chat, nosh, get some great quilting and embroidery tips – about which I am very excited – and begin to experience the surface of this extraordinary way of life that, I must say, is very seductive so far.
We also discussed the horrific events shown on the news in Israel and around the world on Monday night, when dozens of ultra-nationalist Jewish men who stormed two military bases where nine IDF reserve soldiers who had been detained earlier that day had been taken. The bases housed a military court and other functions related to the military justice system. The nine men were brought in based on allegations of having sexually and physically abused Hamas Nukhba terrorists held in Israeli security prisons since October 7. Apparently, the investigation has been ongoing for several months.
Gangs – and I choose that word intentionally – of supporters of extreme right-wing cabinet ministers, Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, stormed the bases violently. Army personnel either were not capable of restraining them or did not particularly care to. I share with you a rather sharp analysis of the event posted on “X” by Ya’akov Katz, my regular Sunday co-host on the State of Tel Aviv podcast:
“Why are far-right activists and MKs breaking into IDF bases and rioting? They claim it is to protest the detention of IDF soldiers who are suspected of abusing a Palestinian detainee. At one of the bases, the protestors were seen being led by a government minister as well as two MKs, including one from @netanyahu ‘s Likud party. Supporting the soldiers is what these politicians are using to rally their supporters, but this is not their true intention. What is really happening is that members of the Israeli government are actively trying to sow discord in the military and undermine its chain of command. They are doing this to deflect criticism from themselves over the failures that led dto the disaster of Oct. 7. Rioting in bases serves this cause because it diverts the conversation and makes it about the military’s alleged broken system of values and lost morals. Just listen to what these far-right lawless activists claim: ‘If the IDF had fought on Oct. 7 the way it is fighting against its own soldiers (the ones detained) then maybe Hamas would not have succeeded in its attack.’ This is just one example of a talking point you can hear in the far-right and pro-Netanyahu media. The truth is that these people couldn’t care less about the soldiers who are being investigated over serious suspicions. As is usually the case, these people care about one thing – retaining control. There is a simple way to describe these politicians and their supporters – they are criminals. They are breaking into military bases to disrupt a legal process. They need to face the full force of the Israeli criminal justice system.
The spectacle of that mob and all that it represents was shocking, even to this shell-shocked nation. As one woman in the English Club remarked, “They are criminals and they are raised to be criminals and we have their leaders sitting in cabinet.”
It is a searing indictment that grieves many in Israel, which seems to be decaying before our eyes. Such a wild mob scene on an army base would have been unthinkable in the country in which so many of us thought we live.
Two weeks ago, on Tuesday, July 16, I attended a press conference at the Hostage Family Forum in central Tel Aviv. Since October 7th, when the embryo of the Forum was formed late in the evening – it has been the epicenter of almost all outreach and other efforts supporting the hostages and their family members.
The building that is used as their HQ was donated by a private company. Every single person working there is a civilian volunteer. Financing is raised privately. The government of Israel has not contributed to this effort or other grassroots operations that provide a “floor” and a home for all manner of traumatized Israelis: survivors of the Nova music festival, first responders, returning soldiers, family members, Israelis displaced from their homes in the north and south of the country. It is a long and growing list. But the Forum, as it is known locally, exists primarily to support and service hostage families and those who have returned.
The night of July 16 was extraordinary. This ongoing hostage horror is a tragedy of biblical scope; and feels like it is a metaphor for what is happening in the State of Israel. Many – particularly Jewish people living in the Diaspora – often prefer not to see this truth. Those of us living here wish with every fiber of our being that it was not so. But if the Jewish people have learned one thing it should be that pretending carries a very high price. And many of us refuse to pretend.
It feels like we are unraveling; that we have misplaced our soul.
Israelis have, for so long, promoted and tried to live up to an impossible legend; that we are some form of super-hero. “Resilient.” It is perhaps the most overused cliché to describe the Israeli character and mindset. No. We are drained. Depleted. And despairing. And we discuss that privately. But publicly, our government promotes the myth, as the nation withers, physically and psychologically.
Exhibit A. The mothers of the five young female soldiers who were captured by Hamas from their base at Nahal Oz on October 7.
At 7 pm on July 16, along with other family members, the mothers (all but one) sat at a long table, an enormous screen behind them showing photographs of their daughters, bloodied, terrified, imprisoned. The girls sit on floor mats in an otherwise bare room and look up at a camera, which captures their sorrow, bewilderment and fear.
Mothers, fathers, siblings spoke to the room on July 16 which was packed with Israeli media and a smattering of foreign outlets as well. The following week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu planned to travel to the United States to speak before Congress. A big deal, for sure. He has the distinction of being the only political leader of a foreign country to have ever addressed Congress four times.
But, in this room, nothing mattered more than bringing home those five young women. Liri Albag. Daniela Gilboa. Naama Levy. Karina Ariev. Agam Berger.
Each parent spoke, as did one sibling. After their initial remarks the microphone was passed to whoever wished to add something. This is the club that no one wants to belong to but in which membership is for life. They remind me, frankly, of my father and his friends. They were all Holocaust survivors and they stuck together. They understood what they had seen, experienced and struggled each day to overcome. As with these families, only they can relate to this surreal life they find themselves living. They do not have to explain themselves to one another.
The torment of each is palpable. Being in that room was important, to get their message out. It was also devastating. Not just to see them in their agony. But to be there. To see what we have become, as a nation. To not have the option of looking away.
The parents are the unsparing mirror reflecting back to us all things we would prefer not to see.
Now almost ten months from October 7, as these families find themselves pleading with the Prime Minister. What does that say about who we are?
I have chosen to reproduce here short transcripts of the comments of Orly Gilboa, mother of 20-year-old Daniela, and Shira Albag, mother of 19-year-old-Liri.
I interviewed each of them privately, after the formal press conference. The comments made by Orly, however, are taken from the main press conference. Shira’s words are from the one-on-one conversation we had.
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