The terrible news knocked on too many doors in Israel this week.
Each knock causes waves of pain that flood us all.
Sorrow for the loss and decay, the youth and the strength of the spirit, and the lost beauty that emerged from the images of the spaces.
The pain is physical.
A heart attack.
Circles expand around private grief that we are all part of.
Why?
Because that's who we are.
And woe to us if we were not like that.
The feeling of partnership and guarantee takes a heavy price from us, because how much pain can we bear?
And the necessity to search for meaning in the life they took, to swear that their death was not in vain, is not simple either.
How much death can you find meaning in?
The Israeli pain is not obvious.
It would probably be much easier if our hearts were rough.
If only we could isolate the pain a little.
After all, there are such nations.
More indifferent.
thick skin
We know some of them.
We often get to fight them.
They shrug as if it didn't hurt at all.
And although it is absolutely not easy to sanctify life and take it to heart, we are not jealous of any other possibility.
We may not have chosen to be that way.
But factually, the attitude towards human life is a main element of identity in Israel.
I say these things, and think of those who recently offer to give up the abductees.
According to them, this is the order of logic and composure.
They claim it is the common good.
This argument has already stopped being wrapped in thin layers of politeness.
Lately it has been openly and blatantly printed.
Which invites talkbacks along the lines of: "Families of the kidnapped, have you had enough!!"
(Blessed is the believer that these are Iranian bots).
The logic is pretty clear.
We live in the Middle East.
It's not good to be sensitive.
In order for us to exist here, we must become someone else.
Someone who resembles an enemy.
More indifferent to the lives of his loved ones and certainly to the pain of others.
More shawarma and less sushi.
• • •
This week, researcher Adi Shortz wrote here in Israel Hayom: "In the cruel choice between releasing the hostages in exchange for an end to the war, and ending the fighting even at the cost of the lives of more than 100 living Israelis who are being held by Hamas - there is no doubt that the common good prevails ".
He has no doubt what the common good is.
He has no doubt that the loss of the lives of the hostages has no significance as far as the rule is concerned.
They are all private cases.
100 or 136, who counts.
They were kidnapped to their families.
Not to us.
Neither to the general nor to the State of Israel.
Even the fact that the abductees are remnants of bruised communities and displaced communities, who need them in order to restore some of the security and trust, has no significance regarding the "rule".
There is no doubt.
Adi Shurtz, who calls for privatizing the abductees, and perhaps the pain as well, is a research fellow at the Mashgav Institute for Zionist Strategy.
This is what is written at the bottom of the article.
And I fear strategists who have no doubts.
And if the Zionist strategy is that we must become less Israelis, less Jews, less who we are, in order to be, there is no doubt that this is a strange and very dangerous strategy.
And by the way, it has already been tried and failed many times.
In fact, it is a strategy of exile.
• • •
In the previous week, at least two completely unnecessary events took place, both related to the world of dance and dance, and although there is seemingly no similarity between them, I find a rather deep connection between them.
And quite unfortunate, to be honest.
One of them took place in the Channel 14 studios. The journalist Yanon Magal said something about the participants in the Nova festival dancing in front of a statue of the Buddha.
It really bothers the sickle, he said half-justifiably.
It hurts so much that he has to say it on air, causing (again, as expected) a big storm.
The other event took place in Ra'anana, and it is also related to the world of dance.
The Minister of Education, Yoav Kish, arrived at the scene of the stampede attack.
He intended to give an interview to the media, but was soon dragged into a circle dancing with the young friends of those injured in the attack.
They sang "The people of eternity are not afraid of a long journey" and danced the eternal, basic and not so photogenic Jewish dance - step in and step out.
The responses were not long in coming.
They attacked Kish on the grounds that it was rude to dance when the country was in mourning.
They accused the minister and the boys of "dancing on the blood".
There is no doubt that when we don't like someone we really don't like to see them dance.
We call it the evil eye.
Besides the evil eye, it is important to note, there is also just plain ignorance.
Whoever attacked Minister Kish does not understand the text in front of him.
He does not understand the very dance.
He assumes that every dance is necessarily a celebration, sticking out a tongue and pointing a finger.
That is why the dance is the Hebrew equivalent of handing out candy after a terrorist attack.
The attackers were not at all aware of the fact that such a traditional dance is an attempt to overcome and comfort.
A kind of hug, if you will.
In the end, if there was rudeness here, it was on the part of those who rushed to condemn Minister Kish and the guys who dragged him to dance.
When a person does not understand what his eyes see, the reaction depends on the quality of his eye.
Those with a good eye will ask and find out.
They will try to learn, or at least discuss properly.
The evil eye will immediately go for the worst case scenario.
Magal didn't understand anything either.
Contrary to what has been implied, the party was not a pagan ritual, nor a contemporary version of the sin of the calf.
The statue does not stand on the standard of divinity, and what killed the youth was Hamas and not God's wrath.
But even in the Arutz 14 studio, when we don't know, then we don't try to find out, and certainly not to discuss merit, but to slander and hurt.
And I wish the style problem was the main problem.
Yanon Magal (full disclosure: we used to be friends) chose to look down on the bad party participants.
He could ignore the fact that there was some statue standing there.
He could believe that the dancers themselves ignored the statue.
That is none of our business.
that in light of the terrible disaster, it is not appropriate to deal meticulously with the matters of the setting that accompanied the event.
Maybe even smile and mention that even in Chabad it is customary to pray and dance in front of the image of the Rebbe, and not in all currents of Judaism this is frowned upon, but encouraged.
But he didn't want to brag.
He wanted to incriminate.
Personalize the party disaster.
We call it the evil eye.
We call it the evil eye.
Yanon Magal, photo: from Channel 14
• • •
I will never forget one of the days last week.
Contact us with a request to appear before the reserve battalion that deals with space detection.
For the first time since October 7, they went out for a day of refreshment.
For the first time, they had dinner with their spouses.
Of course we arrived.
Of course voluntarily.
I will tell more about how it is to make such people laugh.
and dance with them.
Because we danced, and I hope that's okay with you all.
Volunteers lined up to pamper these pure souls.
Tour guides, chefs, artists.
One of the people of Jerusalem insisted that the dinner be held in his nice house.
But as the catering volunteers started setting up tables, it became clear that there was not enough room for everyone.
The man did not think twice and broke a wall.
You read that right.
We call it a good eye.
And that's exactly what we need.
That and wall breakers.
were we wrong
We will fix it!
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