Israelis never gave up on finding Ran Gvili and bringing him home, even our fallen who's bodies were kidnapped and held to ransom, checking cemeteries and morgues to bring home every one of our people.

I've had messages from abroad along the lines of, "well, that means it's all over now." If only, the hostages dead and alive are home, but those who are alive have a lifetime of therapy ahead of them, both to cure the physical damage of abuse, torture and starvation, and the psychological trauma of what was done to them. The dead can now all be buried, but they leave behind gaping holes in families shattered not only by their loss, but by the endless torture of the mind games Hamas put them through during their loved ones' captivity, were they dead or alive, would they ever see them, phone calls from Hamas and twisted videos.

That 250 hostages are now one way or another home doesn't change the evil of what Hamas did, or the way their supporters, including huge numbers in the West, have gloried in Hamas' atrocities, laughed at the hostages and their families and reveled in their suffering.

“וַיִּקַּח מֹשֶׁה אֶת עַצְמוֹת יוֹסֵף עִמּוֹ, כִּי הַשְׁבֵּעַ הִשְׁבִּיעַ אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל לֵאמֹר: פָּקֹד יִפְקֹד אֱלֹקים אֶתְכֶם וְהַעֲלִיתֶם אֶת עַצְמֹתַי מִזֶּה אִתְּכֶם”

כך מתחיל פרשת השבוע, פרשת בשלח, וכך קראו הבוקר בבתי כנסת בכל ישראל ובכל העולם.

ושבו בנים לגבולם.

 All over Israel people are praying for the safety, well being and success of the Iranian people in their fight for freedom.

Israel and Iran are the only countries in the Middle East where the ancient cultures have survived the 7th century Muslim Arab conquest of the region and where the native languages, Hebrew and Farsi, are the lingua franca, a direct link to the millennia old archaeological sites bearing witness to the historic civilisations dating to biblical times.

As such many Israelis and Iranians feel a connection, a shared history going back thousands of years. The bible records that it was Persian emperor Cyrus who famously permitted the Judean exiles to return home to Zion to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem that had been destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnetzer who's empire was absorbed by an ascendant Persia.

Persian-Israeli singer Liraz is a Farsi pop sensation with a following all over the Iranian diaspora as well as in Iran itself. She has made a point of recording with Iranian musicians in Istanbul and other neutral countries. Her album "Roya" featured Iranian women musicians who's fight for freedom she highlighted in songs on the album.

"Recorded in secrecy in Istanbul with her band from Tel Aviv and risk-defying Iranian musicians from Tehran. A musical portal to a place of peace, joy and unfettered freedom."

Liraz dedicated the album to the women of Iran:

"It’s finally happening. For years women's freedom has been my fight. I create my music inspired by their powerful life stories.

I always believed women would be the leaders of the revolution in Iran. I am watching these courageous women fighting right now for their freedom. Some of them collaborated with me last February inside an underground studio recording in Istanbul for this album.

Meeting and creating music together physically gave us the hope we would meet again soon and be free. Our ROYA / fantasy was our secret. Now we can shout it out to the world. They can shout it out to the world."

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"Zan Zendegi Azadi" (Women, life, freedom) This poster is for a rally in Tel Aviv support of the Iranian people

 Jews and Kurds have a long history together, with Jewish communities in the region dating back to the forced exile of Israelites by the Assyrian King Sanherib, destroyer of the independent Israelite Kingdom about 2700 years ago. There is a large and proud Jewish Kurdish community in Israel which continues to celebrate Kurdish culture and support Kurdish independence aspirations. Many Israelis sympathise with the Kurdish opposition groups in Syria and have deep respect for the Kurdish fighters, especially the women, who did so much to defeat ISIS in the region, looking on with despair in recent days as the US and other Western governments seem to abandon their Kurish allies to be crushed by the nascent Syrian government with its dubious jihadi connections.

 

Still raining.

We have been blessed with several abundant rain storms so far this winter, this week's has been particularly impressive. Seasonal watercourses in central Israel are in full flow, some causing local flooding after intense sustained torrential rain. Several roads in our area were closed earlier today as nearby seasonal streams burst their banks. To see this in temperate areas of Israel is incredible. To see how these rains have transformed desert regions of the country is to experience an element of the miraculous: greening arid landscapes and usually dry canyons and stream beds flowing with powerful torrents of rainwater, desert cliffs and mountains temporarily turned into thundering waterfalls cascading down usually barren expanses of rock. This is what we sing about every Shabbat, the Jewish exiles returning home to Zion, Jewish captives streaming back to Israel like flooding seasonal watercourses in the Negev desert. Seeing this blessed rain in the desert is like watching the music video for Psalms 126. We haven't seen water levels like this in several winters, very grateful after last year's dry winter of drought.