10th
January, 2025
10th of
Tevet 5785
462 days of captivity
for those hostages that may just be alive
Shabbat Shalom dear
friends. This week has been both wonderful and incredibly sad, a true
representation of the honey and the sting. It’s strange, someone asked me why I
left the green green grass of Wales for the arid deserts and multicultural society
of Israel. My answer is twofold. Life here has deep meaning, each and every
citizen is important and has a purpose in the big picture, and of course, I
came home. Wales will always be in my heart as the country that gave safe haven
to my parents and many others Jews who fled the pogroms and Shoah and the
community that gave me my sense of Israel and Judaism, but here it is home and
even if the missiles fly, or maybe because of the purpose of those missiles, I,
we, aren’t going anywhere.
I hope and pray that our friends and family in California are safe.
The earthquakes and bush fires are terrifying, indeed I often think of the
natural disasters, the power of fire and water, the uncontrollable danger to
life and limb that living in such places presents (and the hurricanes of Miami
and large tracts of land in the USA), and now hundreds of people died in Tibet and
Nepal from a violent hurricane and quite honestly I feel safer with missiles
flying!! Please look after yourselves wherever you are. Stay safe.
The question of
judicial reform has raised its head
yet again. The surprise factor is that Gidon Saar and Yariv Levine, after an
impasse of two years had no choice but to accept a compromise suggested by two
people who lost their children on October 7th; one a former Minister
and the other a former Chief of Israeli Fire Fighters. Finally, one less fight
for the people of Israel. The change will come into effect in the next Knesset
sitting. Apparently those of us who criticised Saar for joining a government
that he clearly and vocally disliked were wrong.
The PM underwent surgery this week, a simple masculine operation,
and, incredibly against medical advice, two days later released himself to come
to the Knesset for a vote (ashen and weak) apparently Ben Gvir called the vote
and demanded that both the PM and Boaz Bismuth (who was sitting Shiva for his father)
attend the vote. The PM immediately went back into hospital. Apart from stupidity
there is nothing special about that, however, the PM cancelled his court
appearance in which he was to give evidence, for medical reasons!
Each day of this war brings tragedy.
Soldiers, young and reservists, are dying. Yesterday three more, each of them
has a family, our news tells us all about them and we watch their funerals,
each and every one. Yesterday we discovered that two of the remaining hostages
had been killed, we don’t know how but they survived until recently, and the
probability is that father and son were together. Youssef al Ziyadne and his
son Hamza, Israeli Bedouins from Rahat, whose family suffered the horror of
uncertainty for 461 of the 462 days since October 7th when they were
kidnapped from Kibbutz Holit. Youssef’s children, Aisha and Bilal, were
released in a hostage exchange after 40 days of captivity. The eulogy was given by Youssef’s close friend
Farhan al-Qadi who blamed the government’s inaction on the hostage release for
Youssef’s death. It is believed that they were together throughout their
captivity. Those kidnapped and held in dire conditions, in dark, dank tunnels, starved
and tortured will not be released until this war is over, and even then, they
may well be killed before we get to them. The list that was given is a cruel
game played by someone, not real.
Australia is suffering too many anti-Semitic attacks in the
guise of anti-Israel activity. Unlike the USA and Canada, however, there is one
excellent media source, unless I am much mistaken, owned by Rupert Murdoch,
which is honest in its reportage of this war, this arena, both the Australian
and Israeli scene concerning Israel. Dave Sharma was the Australian Ambassador
to Israel. His children went to Israeli schools and he was very open (still is)
about his love for this country. Dave is a Member of the Australian Parliament.
I want you to listen to this interview on Sky News Australia you will see why I
want Dave Sharma for Prime Minister!!! https://youtu.be/b6bCaS1uw_Q?si=ALk_aoh-L7BcdI8K
Talking about Australia, two Australians were among the
recipients of the Israeli Presidential Medal of Honour this week. The auspicious
list of recipients is Frank Lowy and Mark Leibler of Australia, Trevor Chinn
from the UK, Ronald Lauder and Julie Platt from the USA, Maurice Levy from
France and of course Malcolm Hoenlein who belongs everywhere. President Herzog presented
the awards on Thursday but the night beforehand we were invited to a dinner at
the Great Synagogue in Jerusalem to honour their new President, Dr Malcolm Hoenlein.
It’s very difficult to quantify his work and who he is and how, despite leading
the Jewish world, everybody loves him! Try looking him up on Wikipedia and you
may see a tiny portion of what he has done for the world but for me, he is the
provider of great adventures, fascinating information and a friendship that
does not require constant contact, just the knowledge that they care deeply. So
let me tell you about the dinner.
First of all, we met, congratulated and hugged Malcolm, then, as we
found table number 6, we discovered that another couple were already seated
next to us. Of course, we struck up a conversation with Rikki and Abe from
Melbourne, Australia and so enjoyed our first meeting that we exchanged business
cards and decided to meet again. Abe was born in Jaffa, grew up in Austria and ended
up in Australia where he met the lovely Rikki. When I joked that he lived in Vienna
like Herzl he commented “Yes but I lived to see his dream come true right here in
Israel” After a beautiful cantorial rendition of the prayers for the State of
Israel and the soldiers of the IDF, a very few people stood up to speak,
including our friend Prof Yonatan Halevi, President of Shaare Zedek Hospital,
so appropriate since Malcolm’s late mother had been a nurse in Shaare Zedek in
Germany. All spoke of Malcolm’s untiring efforts and ability to reach political
and diplomatic heights unknown to others. Such was the speech of former
Attorney General and Deputy Supreme Court President Eliyakim Rubenstein, with
one heartwarming addition when he spoke of the hostages and the war, urging the
government to increase their endeavour to bring the hostages home since their
efforts until today have been insufficient. I’m not sure that the room
appreciated his stating his disappointment but he did receive applause.
Malcolm, ever humble, spoke beautifully of his belief in a higher power that
led him to do what he has done since a student, genuine Tikkun Olam, making the
world a better place for our children, grandchildren and all the generations to
follow. He emphasised that we cannot
hide behind a cloak of ignorance, we must look to the past to change the future.
As we were leaving, I saw another exceptional
man and friend, Marc Belzberg across the room, we hugged and spoke of Kinneret
Chaya which is how we met. Marc, together with his beautiful, dynamo (yes
dynamo not dynamic which is too weak a description) wife Chantal created “One
Family” the organisation which takes care of the injured, whether as a result
of terror attacks or soldiers, and their families. Meeting exceptional people
is uplifting and enriches one's life in ways that are difficult to
quantify. Hearing good people has a ripple effect of wisdom, of learning, that
can rarely be matched.
After the dinner Zvi and I crept away to the surprise birthday party
of a dear friend Dina (Shiro) Sofer held in a tiny theatre in the grounds of
the Bell Park, right next to the model of the Liberty Bell. The performance was
not of some stranger singing to Shiro, she sang herself in her amazing pure
voice, singing out Israeli songs with great passion. The perfect end to a
perfect day. As we walked back to the car, humming along the way, a group of
young Israeli Arabs were playing basketball in court along the path, clearly
having fun. Just another aspect of Israeli life.
After that minor digression, well it wouldn’t be me if I didn’t
digress and anyway, who wants politics all the time, we all need a break to
speak of good people along the way. I
want to talk about Syria. Now is the time, the very short opportunity, to
influence the new powers in Syria. We must be firm, no supplicatory approaches,
as a strong leader in the region offering a better alternative to constant
upheaval and war. It could well be a game changer in the region.
Talking of game changing in the region, we
held the Annual Board Meeting for Impact-se this week. Our 31 page report was
staggering! How could such a small team, in an even smaller office space in
Ramat Gan, possibly fill 31 pages of successes! The research reports and the ever
growing phenomenon of countries in our region and further afield, that want to
change the way they teach their children and turn to Impact-se to take hatred
out and introduce tolerance for the other, is encouraging and the amount of
work put in by the small team led, of course, by Marcus Sheff and Arik Agassi,
Marcus taking on the international aspects and Arik the team, makes me prouder
than I can possibly express. We prove yet again that one doesn’t need a large,
bombastic, costly team and accommodation to be successful! Just check out the
website and see why I am so proud to be the Board Chair. www.impact-se.org
On the 10th of Tevet (today) 586
BCE the Babylonian leader Nebuchadnezzar began the siege of Jerusalem, the
walls were breached and on the 9th of the Hebrew month of Av the
Temple was destroyed and the Jewish people exiled (taken hostage) to Babylon.
Hence the fast day on the 9th of Av. Another January milestone, albeit
more recently, on the 13th of January, 1898, Emile Zola wrote the
famous open letter entitled “J’Acuse” forcing the revision of the trial of
Alfred Dreyfus. Another important event took place the next day on January 14th
1946. I was born!!
If there is something we have to do to make this world livable, it
is to close the Pandora’s Box of hatred. It is possible, it will take great
effort, it demands unity where right now there is discord and dissent, coming
together in rational and unified effort to take our world back to the moral
code and simple intelligent thought of our childhood. As you know, I love to
quote Winston Churchill, partly because he was so clever, nay brilliant, and
partly because he managed to express the wisdom of great leaders with
incredible wit. One that probably sums up our current situation is “The malice
of the wicked was reinforced by the weakness of the virtuous.” Or possibly “Now
this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is,
perhaps, the end of the beginning.” And finally, to our incredible IDF ‘Never
in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.’
We had a very normal week, busy, busy because that’s what we
like. I went to my craft session and yesterday to my movement class and Zvi
went to his Mevasseret, Tel Aviv and now Jerusalem parliaments. Last night was
a very Jerusalem night. We went to a lecture about AI and the human brain then
an exceptional concert of the Jerusalem Symphony together with Dan Biran’s Band,
the concert in honour of Dan Biran. The musicians and programme were
outstanding and to my own surprise I stayed wide awake and enjoyed every
moment. Afterwards we met so many old friends including Gideon Selinger who reads
and comments on my newsletter every week!
Gosh, I had so much to write about this week, but on the other hand
the week is coming to an end, tonight we will celebrate the arrival of the
Bride of Shabbat. As always, Zvi will sing the Kiddush (the blessing of the
wine) it’s crazy but after 33 years I still get teary when he sings; the
children will say the blessing over the Challah and then we will eat, and eat,
and eat…….. well it is Shabbat!!
Our first song is really a Chanukah song but fits our life every
day. It’s all about the light shining forth from the simple act of candle
lighting. Enjoy https://youtu.be/xfDoGqDkP50?si=qQAMhoJXBqAfch7I
Hanan Ben Ari sings about being a father, a parent. I just
discovered this song and love it! https://youtu.be/gkmUhUw30Yg?si=8mvFn7PZO_JfiCbY
Finally, to honour Peter Yarrow z”l of Peter, Paul and Mary.
Peter Yarrow passed away this week. He always expressed his love of Israel,
indeed Zvi met him here, always supportive. If I Had a Hammer, written by Pete
Seeger in the ‘60’s but oh so relevant today https://youtu.be/XxWTDcP9Y5E?si=-4J6n7168lc-7c1N
I wish you a Shabbat Shalom, a truly peaceful and contemplative weekend,
whether it is Shabbat or the Sabbath day, whichever direction you pray, pray
for peace and the return on the remaining 98 hostages before the number goes
down.
With much love from our beautiful veranda overlooking Jerusalem,
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