War and Peace; Israel at the Crossroads

 

12^th June 2026

27^th Sivan 5786

 

Shabbat Shalom! I hope this missive finds you well. Today I don’t want to write about events but rather about what the vast majority of Israelis feel after the Haredi riots against conscription and the extremist settlers who claim Biblical lands as an excuse to be vile bullies.

 

There are moments when I struggle to recognise the Judaism I love. This week, Haredi rioters shouted that it is better to die than serve in the army and defend Israel. Better to die? Ours is a religion that celebrates life. The same Torah they study so diligently teaches the concept of Milchemet Mitzvah—a sacred war. Maimonides (Rambam), one of Judaism's greatest scholars, ruled clearly that "a war fought to assist Israel from an enemy which attacks them constitutes an sacred war." It could hardly be more relevant today.

 

The great sages understood this. Rambam, one of the greatest Jewish scholars who ever lived, was also a renowned physician whose medical knowledge was sought by rulers and ordinary people alike and whose medical writings influenced generations. Centuries before modern medicine began speaking about preventative healthcare, he taught that what we eat, how we exercise and the way we care for our bodies directly affects our health. For Rambam, looking after one's physical well-being was not separate from Judaism; it was part of serving God. Hillel worked as a labourer, Rabbi Yochanan as a sandal maker. They prayed, they studied, they worked and they cared for their communities. When danger threatened, Jewish law recognised the concept of Milchemet Mitzvah—a sacred war to defend the Jewish people. As Rambam himself ruled, "A war fought to assist Israel from an enemy which attacks them constitutes a sacred war."

 

That is why I find the cries of "better to die than serve" so distressing. Nobody is asking young Haredi men to abandon their faith. The question is whether caring for one's fellow Jew ends at the door of the study hall, the Yeshiva. Judaism teaches responsibility, not withdrawal; contribution, not exemption. Faith and duty were never intended to be enemies. They are, and always have been, partners.

 

At its heart, Judaism is not simply about ritual observance but about our responsibility towards one another. When the great sage Hillel (110 BCE to 10 CE) was challenged to explain the entire Torah while standing on one leg, he replied: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. The rest is commentary; now go and learn." Of all the commandments and all the complexities of Jewish law, that was the principle he chose as the foundation.

 

The question is not whether one can be religious and serve, but whether one can enjoy the protection provided by others while refusing to share the burden. Judaism survived because Jews accepted responsibility for one another. Faith and duty were never intended to be enemies.

 

Perhaps that is why the next election matters so much. No matter where you live, election campaigns are messy affairs, full of slogans, accusations and half-truths. Here in Israel we seem to be moving towards a choice between two very different visions of leadership. On one side stands a polished diplomat, fluent in the language of international politics and admired abroad, but whose long years in office have deepened divisions within Israeli society and empowered coalition partners whose vision for the country many Israelis do not share. Through political necessity or personal choice, he has given extraordinary influence to religious parties and figures whose priorities often seem at odds with the broad, inclusive Judaism on which the State of Israel was founded.

 

On the other side stands a soldier who rose from modest beginnings to become Chief of Staff of the IDF, a man known less for polished speeches than for integrity, intellect and service. In the end, Israelis will have to decide what they value most. At a time when the nation is crying out for unity and shared responsibility, I find myself wondering whether impressive credentials matter as much as character, honesty and the ability to bring a fractured people back together again.

 

When people hear of Hezbollah's latest drone attacks, they often imagine military targets. In reality, the victims are frequently the families of northern Israel living amongst some of the country's most beautiful scenery. These are farming communities, kibbutzim and villages that grow much of Israel's fruit and vegetables. Children here have spent years interrupting lessons to run to shelters. It is hard to learn mathematics, history or simply how to be a child when sirens can sound at any moment. The tragedy of the north is that these communities are not threatening anyone. They are growing peaches, apples, avocados and grapes, raising families and building lives. Yet they find themselves on the front line of a war they did not start. The orchards should be filled with the sound of children playing, not warning sirens. That is the reality too often missing from the headlines.

 

After the Iranian missiles this week, missiles that sent us running for the mamad yet again, this hardly feels like the moment for lectures from abroad. There is an interesting historical contrast. In the 1970s, Richard Nixon briefly considered pressuring Golda Meir but quickly concluded that squeezing Israel would not bring peace. Today, media reports suggest a very different approach, with President Trump openly seeking to impose upon Israeli decisions. Whether one supports Netanyahu or not is irrelevant. Allies may advise, friends may disagree, but Israel is a sovereign nation, not a client state. Mr President, the Jewish people were here long before the United States existed and, with good leaders and bad, triumphs and disasters, we have survived. Friendship is precious; independence is priceless.

 

The Russian Revolution, Communism, the history books have a tendency to romanticise even the dire violence of the fate of the Romanoffs, but it has rarely been better explained than in the brilliant television series “A Gentleman in Moscow” https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8230448/ Ewan McGregor excels himself as the aristocrat Count Alexander Rostov, sentenced to indefinite house arrest at the real-life luxury Hotel Metropol in Moscow, located directly across from the Kremlin. I highly recommend it.

 

Changing direction completely, I was delighted to see photographs from the Trappist monastery at Latrun, where the monks of the silent order celebrated Corpus Christi last week. For days they had been collecting flowers and arranging them into beautiful carpets of colour for the procession of the Blessed Sacrament. It struck me that this, too, is Israel. Not only synagogues and Jewish festivals, but churches, mosques, monasteries and communities of every faith able to worship openly and freely. Amid all the noise of politics and conflict, it is worth remembering that freedom of prayer is one of the quiet miracles of modern Israel.   So much attention is focused on conflict, politics and headlines that the quieter realities are overlooked: Trappist monks gathering flowers, Druze families welcoming visitors, Christians celebrating Corpus Christi, Muslims attending Friday prayers, Jews preparing for Shabbat. These scenes rarely make the news, yet they say a great deal about the country.  

 

The day began very early, by default, because we were supposed to go to a special performance at the Khan Theatre, my favourite, housed in a beautifully restored 19th-century Ottoman caravanserai. The repertory troupe that performs there is world class, their plays often touring the country after its first run. However that doesn’t explain why I said “supposed to go” We woke at 6 to find a WhatsApp postponing today’s performance so I really have time to write to you, prepare some food and go to see Rachel and the grandchildren. The only problem with going really early is that Yosef, Talia and Ayala may not be awake yet since the don’t work today. I’m so proud of them, they work hard while studying, not a lazy moment. Anyway, getting there earlier means that the challah will be fresh from the oven. Despite quoting the Rambam’s healthy advice, there is nothing like bread burning hot from the oven and dripping with butter! I did it for my children, to welcome them home from school on a Friday and now my daughter does it for me!!

 

Zvi will go to his parliament when about 12 good men will try to make sense of what is happening in our country, try to make sense so that they can explain it to their grandchildren and to family and friends abroad. I watch Zvi, daily trying to explain to the world, in Spanish, Hebrew and English, arguing when necessary but every word written from the point of view of a man born before the State and raised in a truly Jewish Israeli home; a man who feels the responsibility of elucidation, of explaining that despite the news, this little country is still the safest place for Jews. It has become our raison d’etre.

 

So to preparing food, not just food but special food for special people who are coming to us for Shabbat Lunch. Sharman and Melvin Berwald, Shaiela and Eugene Kandel and hopefully Ora and Avner Rosengarten. A fascinating mixture of very bright people who don’t know each other and I promised to abide by their food preferences! We will start with guacamole, go on to red pepper soup, then to chicken (which part uncertain still) stuffed veggies and a big green salad. Dessert is always a question. Should I present the tipsy peaches or make a chocolate mousse or both? What would you prefer? Sharman and Melvin haven’t been to our abode so Zvi will show them the exquisite former Convalescent Home for the upper levels of the Histadrut Union, the Avenue of the Presidents, under our veranda, where all Presidents have planted a tree in the manner of Theodore Herzl who planted the first one.

 

Music, music, music.

 

YStuds and Shai Abrahamson sing, Hineini Kan, I’m Here. A tribute to Jerusalem, not only a beautiful voice but a tour of the Old City of Jerusalem. https://youtu.be/Lyp_PsJ0NX0?si=Z65IBhRw9HXIF0Qj

 

The late Uzi Hitman wrote simple melodies with almost childlike lyrics, lyrics that explain Israel better than almost any other. Ani Noladeti leShalom, I was born for Peace. https://youtu.be/192t-KvtK2M?si=ShmhimRxW2GRpyXY

 

Sarit Hadad sings Israel, really! I had never heard this song before and now I can’t stop singing it!! Welcome to Israel, Baruch Ha Ba l’Yisrael. Honest, straight forward, fun. https://youtu.be/6pl9sWyHQpY?si=Jakuc0pNy25c2IXY

 

I won’t be writing next week, we are taking a short break with our friends Ami and Zehava Sever, so don’t worry, we are fine, just having fun!

 

Please, lovely people, remember that you are our mouthpiece, you are our heroes, you stand up when others stay silent, you are the front line. Tonight, as we all light candles, remember to bring light into this crazy situation, don’t argue with others, just paint the whole picture.

 

Shabbat Shalom, a peaceful one in the knowledge that we are thinking of you.

With all our love from Jerusalem

Sheila

 

 

The Good, the Bad and the Really Ugly

 

5^th June 2026

19 of Sivan, 5786

 

Shabbat Shalom everyone! Just for a change, let’s begin with the good people, the good news, the very good news, and the utterly thoroughly distressing news.

 

After New York Mayor Mamdani refused to walk in the Celebrate Israel Day Parade, former mayors Eric Adams and Michael Bloomberg headed the celebration and Anila Ali, a Pakistani-born civil rights advocate and founder of the American Muslim & Multifaith Women’s Empowerment Council, together with dozens of Muslim supporters, including an imam and several children, marched alongside Israeli supporters. “We were a little worried after received calls telling us to wear bulletproof vests, but we’re fighting to take back our country, and it’s a fight that every American should join.”

 

MP Kemi Badenoch is the leader of the Conservative Party in the UK and a huge supporter of the British Jewish Community and very outspoken about the spate of racist attacks recently. Her clear statement, as a black woman, if the level of hatred and racist attacks had been against black people the outcome would have been the declaration of a State of Emergency. For me this is not a political statement, she goes well beyond that.  https://www.instagram.com/reels/DZHfKTOidHK/

 

Barrie Davey, one of the two Jewish Chelsea Pensioners still alive, served in the Royal Air Force, Merchant Navy, and Royal Army Veterinary Corps finally celebrated his bar mitzvah on Thursday, at the age of 86. The ceremony took place in the stunning grounds of the Royal Hospital Chelsea, the iconic retirement home for British Army veterans. Barrie’s mother fled Europe and denied her Jewish identity; he only found out that he is Jewish 2 years ago!

 

Chantal and Marc Belzberg started a small organisation, a haven for the families of people harmed both physically and psychologically during the 2^nd Intifada. One Family has grown and grown and cares for tens of thousands. This week they were honoured at the Jerusalem Post Conference in New York City.

 

Professor Eugene Kandel is a close friend and an exceptional man. Here is a precis of an article he wrote this week to honour the Screenwriters Guild of the past and the part they played in his family’s freedom. “I always feel a little emotional when I land in Los Angeles and see the Hollywood sign. Few people realise that, in a very real sense, my family's freedom owes something to Hollywood. As Soviet Jews and refuseniks in the 1970s, we were denied permission to leave for Israel, and after my father's activism on behalf of Soviet Jewry, I was brutally beaten as a warning to our family. What helped secure our release was an extraordinary act of solidarity: members of the Writers Guild threatened to boycott the 1978 Moscow Film Festival unless our family was allowed to leave. The pressure worked, and shortly afterwards we received our exit visas and came home to Israel. Whenever I think of Hollywood, I remember that there was once a time when people there spoke out clearly and courageously for Jews in danger. My children and grandchildren exist because of that moral clarity, and for that I will always be grateful”. https://jewishjournal.com/commentary/opinion/388910/in-debt-to-hollywood/

 

Sadly, that is about where my list of admirable people ends. Media reports this week alleged that President Trump spoke to Israel’s Prime Minister in terms that no leader of a sovereign nation should ever have to hear. Whether one supports Netanyahu or opposes him is beside the point. This is not about politics; it is about respect between allies and between nations. No leader should be spoken to as though he were a naughty child, and no country should be told that its existence depends solely upon the favour of another. Mr. President, the Jewish story in this land is more than 5,000 years old; the United States is approaching its 250th birthday. During those millennia we have endured exile, persecution, expulsions, pogroms and repeated attempts to erase us from history. We have had wise leaders and dreadful ones, somehow, we have survived and even thrived. Allies are precious and friendship matters enormously, but Israel's story did not begin with any American president, and it will not end with one either.

 

So much for the ceasefire President Trump announced. While the EU pledges a further €100 million to help the Lebanese Army curb Hezbollah, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards accuse Israel of occupying Lebanon, and yet another armed drone is launched at northern Israel. This time it struck near the small town of Shlomi, where a father sheltering in his safe room with his daughters described the explosions as “very loud and very close”. For families in the north, ceasefires are not measured by diplomatic announcements but by whether the sirens remain silent.

 

There is no polite way to describe what happened at the home of Deputy Supreme Court President Noam Sohlberg. An extreme Haredi mob protesting the arrest of draft dodgers smashed windows, destroyed property, shattered his car windscreen, and terrorised the family sitting inside their own home. Mrs Sohlberg, the daughter of Holocaust survivors, was left in tears, comparing the scene to memories she thought belonged to another era, to Kristallnacht. The two police officers on guard stood no chance against the crowd, but reinforcements arrived and the mob were stopped from getting back on their bus and arrested. If this is what they call defending Torah values, then they have forgotten the most basic Jewish value of all: respect for fellow human beings and the rule of law.

 

I confess that few things infuriate me more than journalism that appears to abandon its responsibility to the truth. The New York Times has faced criticism before over its reporting on Jewish issues, including its coverage during the Second World War, and many feel it is repeating old mistakes. This week, protesters gathered outside the newspaper's headquarters demanding the dismissal of columnist Nicholas Kristof and the retraction of an article alleging systematic sexual abuse of Palestinians in Israeli prisons. Carrying signs proclaiming "The New York Times Lies" and "When You Lie, Jews Die", they expressed a frustration shared by many who believe that serious allegations should be subjected to the same rigorous scrutiny as any other story. One need not agree with every protester to understand the underlying concern: when reporting abandons balance and accuracy, the consequences can extend far beyond the printed page.

 

My week began at my Moadon, our wonderful club, with chair exercises; if you think it’s a pleasant sit-down and a gentle stretch, think again. The chair does very little while the rest of us work remarkably hard. Afterwards we celebrated Rami's 90th birthday. He is one of our oldest members and somewhat infirm, but he loves being involved and is always the first to help anyone who needs it, always with a smile. The look on his face when we Hannah came out with a big chocolate cake and we all sang Happy Birthday was worth seeing.

 

This week was all about family and friends. On Tuesday, my granddaughter Ayala celebrated finishing her final baccalaureate exam by requesting nothing more complicated than an afternoon with Safta at the hairdresser. We spent hours chatting about absolutely everything and nothing, while our friend Rachael Risby Raz popped in for a visit. The following day, Ayala's big sister Talia claimed me for herself, filling me in on her six months in South America, her new "bestie" Sally in Panama City, and the Chabad houses that welcomed her along the way. We ended up painting ceramics and, in true Talia fashion, she spent four hours carefully painting two turtles onto a bowl before we rewarded ourselves with supper.

 

Last night I finally met some of the women from my old water aerobics group in our coffee shop. Half the village seemed to have had the same idea before a performance in the auditorium, and my friends were highly amused as what felt like half the audience stopped by our table for a hug. That's one of the joys of village life: wherever you go, you meet people you know and care about.

 

Today, four grandchildren aged between eight and fourteen arrive for the weekend while their parents enjoy a well-earned break. Saba Zvi will collect them from various corners of the country before delivering them to the pool to burn off some energy. Then comes Shabbat dinner, games, probably Rummikub, and whatever adventures Saba devises for the weekend. It will be noisy, chaotic, exhausting and absolutely wonderful. Best of all, for a few precious days we won't be thinking about politics, diplomats, wars or worries, just enjoying the company of the next generation.

 

Time for music. Zvi always laughs at me because it takes me more time to choose the music than it does to write the newsletter. Of course he says it in fun but it isn’t far from the truth. Maybe about New York? Maybe about Hollywood’s Jewish past? Maybe about grandchildren, friends…..let’s see.

 

This song expresses a paradoxical message: profound attachment and love for one's homeland alongside a refusal to ignore its flaws.  Ein Li Eretz Aheret written by Ehud Manor– which means I have no other land. For better or for worse except without the option of divorce. A home for the Children of Israel. https://youtu.be/4n7DA3sZk2Y?si=k1iwwPrapP4ipU5J

 

This song began as Nomi Shemer's attempt to create a Hebrew adaptation of the Beatles' Let It Be. The title Lu Yehi is a direct Hebrew equivalent of “Let It Be,” but as the Yom Kippur War erupted, the project evolved into an original work reflecting the mood of the country. It became a national expression of hope, prayer, longing, and resilience during a period of uncertainty and loss. https://youtu.be/xJoZ9R4i-N0?si=FA2blZXDkwC2KksV

 

My last choice needs no explanation but you’ve never heard it quite like this. The 2021 A Star is Born Israel and this duet of A Little Help from My Friends blew the judges away – me too! That’s all we need, each of us and more importantly our beautiful, crazy, essential, noisy, innovative, spiritual and fun country called Israel. We need you; we need your friendship and then we can survive anything. https://youtu.be/hyRwhXAzaGY?si=-xEWc6Ik52bSVqW5

 

As Bugs Bunny ended his cartoons, That’s All Folks! We look forward to an exciting Shabbat, one full of love and children. Yesterday I spoke to some of the women in the coffee shop to see who else had grandchildren staying and ours should have a ball, meeting new friends.

 

I can’t wait to see their faces shining as we light the Shabbat Candles, as Saba Zvi recites the blessing over the wine in his glorious Bass-Baritone, then invites the children to bless the Challah, always an honour since whoever blesses gets the first piece! That’s really what it is all about, passing on traditions to the next generation so that they understand why this beautiful country is of ultimate importance, so much so that it is worth fighting for, be it verbally or militarily.

 

Shabbat Shalom dear friends. Shabbat Shalom whether your prayers are in Temple, Synagogue, Shul, Tabernacle, Church or Mosque, I wish you a peaceful, contemplative Shabbat.

 

With love from our veranda which overlooks Jerusalem glistening white on the horizon.

 

Special love to my big sister Doreen who has her birthday on Monday. Still as beautiful, busy, slender and loving as ever she will be 88. Happy birthday Dordi!

 

Sheila