Love and fava beans

 

So what did I do today? Joined several groups of volunteers helping out on an Iranian-Israeli (Jewish) family farm in the heart of Israel sorting and shelling fresh ful (fava) beans with a friendly Iranian-Israeli woman who came to Israel from Yezd when she was a teenager more than 50 years ago.

As we worked conversation flowed, Pesah customs and recipes, like Persian green rice with fava beans, "traditional women's talk" that made us feel grounded and connected with our female ancestors from Jewish history, sitting in a circle, assorted Jewish women of different ages and backgrounds, preparing vegetables from the farm for the upcoming holiday.

The farmer's mother stopped by to say hello, chatting for a while in Farsi with my work companion. She also brought with her a still steaming dish of freshly cooked fresh green fava beans for us to taste, a seasonal delicacy, a sign of spring, for the fresh ful season is short. In some communities dishes like this are traditional for Pesah, in others we refrain from eating beans on Pesah, but either way, fresh green ful in the market stalls is a sign of spring in Israel.

And from time to time we got alerts of incoming Iranian missiles and work stopped while we all made our way to the big central shelter in the centre of the moshav village, Jews of all kinds, including those with Iranian roots, non-Jewish migrant workers, Arabs - we all get the Home Front Command alerts on our phones, everyone takes cover together, knowing that Iranian missiles target us all.

On the bus home I sat up front near our Arab driver. He worried about incoming missiles while we were on the road. Worried that I get off at a major junction that's out in the open without close shelter (I knew a friend was giving me a lift from the bus stop so I wouldn't be standing around waiting, not to worry).

The people sitting up front talked about cancelled Pesach plans and vacations, cancelled Eid ul Fitr (the Muslim holiday concluding Ramadan which just finished) plans and trips, life put on hold by the war, spur of the moment ad libbed plans to keep living within the strange new rubric of this war. Strangers, friends and acquaintances, but all with a deep genuine empathy for each other's experiences because we are all in this war together, we all get it, understand each other despite our different communities.

"Safe journey, quiet journey", "Good tidings", "peace" we call out to each other as people get off at their stops. They aren't just words, but blessings and wishes from the heart.

 I don't know whether to laugh or cry when people overseas decide to lecture me on 1) "just stop this mutual baseless hatred with Iran" and 2) "war is bad". 

Because someone in the West who has never experienced war or living with missiles being lobbed at them clearly needs to explain to the person who's lived through years of it what war is like. We here wouldn't have a clue otherwise. We'd think it was hunky dory fun and games and glory. Not like we live in a country where running for shelter from ballistic missiles is a fact of life or where there is a national draft and people spend the cream of their young years serving their country. 

Forgive the sarcasm, but it's really getting a bit much to be lectured on how to best to protect our lives by people on the other side of the world who's main concern is the price of petrol and whether war looks bad on tv, rather than whether an Iranian missile is going to hit their home or whether Iran will get to have the nukes they keep promising to use to wipe our country off the map. 

War is horrific, but sometimes not fighting a war has even more horrific consequences. 

Which brings me to #1. There is no "mutual hatred" of Iran from Israel or even from most Iranians I've ever met. There is a fanatical revolutionary regime in Iran though which for 40 years now has been teaching its schoolchildren every day to chant "Death to Israel", and who's leaders burn with a passionate ideological hatred for Israel, believing the existence of a non-Islamic, let alone non-Shia state in the Middle East to be an affront to their faith and an impediment to the coming of the Twelfth Imam, meaning Israel must be destroyed to hasten the coming of the Mahdi and their version of "end times". 

By contrast prior to Khomeini's revolution in 1979 Israel enjoyed diplomatic relations with Iran, the two countries had close ties, include direct flights, tourism and commerce. 

Jews have had ties with Iran going back to the ancient Persia of biblical times, whether it's the Persian court drama of the Purim story or the Cyrus proclamation that allowed the Jews exiled by the Babylonian empire to return home to Zion and rebuild Jerusalem and the Jewish Temple with the Persian king's blessing. 

There is a mutual respect and affection between Iranians and Jews, two ancient Middle Eastern people still clinging to ancient language and culture that predate the Arab Islamic colonisation of our region, our countries dotted with ruins testifying to millennia old civilisations, spoken Farsi and Hebrew stubbornly preserving languages spoken by our ancestors. I have seen so many messages about this from Iranian people, both living as emigres in the global Iranian diaspora and from within Iran. 

There are huge numbers of Farsi speaking Jews hailing from Iran, Afghanistan and central Asia, including a significant and influential community in Jerusalem dating back around 200 years, among the builders of the first neighbourhoods outside the walls of the Old City. 

There are many Israeli Jews who have Persian Jewish ancestry, including senior politicians, rabbis and military leaders, as well as beloved popstars like Rita and Liraz Cherkhi. Iran is not some vast unknown to many Israelis, but a living culture that is part of their lives too. 

So no, this is not a war about peoples hating each other, ignorance of other cultures or a need for everyone to just learn to love each other. There is a serious ideological motivation for the Khomeinist Iranian leadership to oppose Israel, just as there is a serious historical cultural connection and mutual appreciation between many Israelis and the Iranian people. 

The deepest hope of the peoples of Israel and Iran is that this murderous Khomeinist regime will fall or at least be weakened enough so that our countries can again openly and officially be friendly with each other, to the mutual benefit of all.

Thanks to all our friends and family overseas who have reached out to us and my apologies if I haven't responded to everyone, it's been rather hectric around here.

I'm not online a lot these days, I find I have less patience for it than I used to and there is a weird cognitive dissonance in reading people around the world theorising from the safety of their distant countries about whether I and my people have a right to self-defense or whether we should just politely capitulate to people who proudly say they want to wipe us out. Me? When a bunch of people with a uranium enrichment programme have a clock in the middle of their capital city counting down to my country's destruction, I choose to believe it isn't just talk and they actually mean what they are saying. Not because I like war, but because I'm all too familiar with just how terrible war is and understand that sometimes there is no choice but to choose a pre-emptive strike against an enemy who is pledging to destroy you than to wait for that enemy to strike once they are at full strength and capable of making good on that horrific promise to erase your country from existence. Please don't patronise us with condescending talk explaining to us that "everything has a diplomatic solution", "war is not the answer", "nothing is ever determined by military means". Unlike people in countries which aren't under attack and haven't been for decades, I and my people are very aware of what war means, how very terribly awful wars are. We have paid the all too terrible cost of fighting for survival, everyone of us in Israel has lost someone or knows someone who has. We have no illusions of Hollywood action films and glorious war novels. We know exactly how ugly and devastatingly painful war is because our people have been forced to live it again and again and again. Unlike the Europeans and Americans lecturing us to just allow Iran to make a deal, what's the worst that can happen, we know what's the worst that can happen.

I know, I'm a broken record, but I can't say this often enough, go down to the Otef to volunteer or just to visit a community that's come home. It makes such a difference. Maybe I'm the crazy one, but I think I would not be in the same place emotionally if I hadn't been going to the Otef almost every week and keeping tabs on how the situation is changing, talking to people on the frontlines and seeing for myself the incredible rebuilding of the region, and especially in the last year, all the people coming home, kids playing again in the playgrounds of once evacuated yishuvim.

Week by week, month by month seeing the changes, people who had been haggard ghosts in winter 2023 slowly coming back to life, smiling and hopeful in winter 2024. The picture is so much more complete when you see it up close, it takes your mind to different places than when you are mostly fed by other sources. And doing something, however small, to help means that you are not just being flooded with news stories which can leave you helpless and overwhelmed, you have a chance to make a difference (however small) where it's needed.
I was in Nahal Oz yesterday picking avocados and the kibbutznik we were working with also took us briefly around the kibbutz afterwards.

Nearly half the residents came home this summer. It's one of the kibbutzim that was badly hit, one of the last where people are starting to come home. It's going to take time, but already families with young kids have made the choice to come back, there are young people there on shnat sherut. I saw the home of Omri Miran (hostage who came back on Hoshana Raba) renovated and waiting for him if he chooses to return to the kibbutz.

The neighbourhoods that were ravaged by Hamas on 7/10 are rebuilt/restored for the most part with some ongoing repairs and work on renovating roads and infrastructure. There is an air of renewal and fresh coats of paint, a bright freshly painted mural on the hadar okhel, shiny new farm equipment and tractors replacing what Hamas and their civilian supporters burnt and stole. The fields are ploughed and freshly planted, the lawns neat, gardens bright with flowers and flags.

And yes, we could definitely still hear stuff from just over the border in Azza (this is not over yet), and there were constantly drones and quite a few booms. Tzahal still has work to do in the zones it still controls, mostly dismantling tunnels and other terror infrastructure.

There are areas here and there where you can look directly into Gaza across the border and you can see how many more of the tall buildings have been levelled, so that they don't loom over the Israeli side anymore and be used by snipers or for gathering intelligence on Israel. Definitely a lot fewer tall buildings than when I was in the area few weeks ago.

And the southern part of the now infamous Route 232 ("Death Road" as yesterday's group leader helpfully called it) is now being widened to two lanes in each direction, scorched trees on the verges cut down and covered by asphalt. 

All along the drive down posters welcoming back the hostages "כמה טוב ששבתם הביתה" and the roadsides lined with flags so that the returning hostages would see.

 I'm thrilled that the hostages are home but I feel angry that so many people are like "well that's it", as though there aren't people in the Otef, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, who've been living with hell for years, and there seems precious little care for what they will go through if Hamas is allowed to reset everything to October 6th.

Like they took down the big concrete barrier which overshadowed Nahal Oz, because now Hamas has been taken care of, that's what our soldiers have been doing, avodat kodesh in destroying the vipers nest Hamas built in Gaza. But what happens next?

With all the hoopla over "The Deal" I don't hear people saying well what does this mean for people living in the Otef? What does it mean for Israel in general? With Muslim Brotherhood affiliated Qatari money and Muslim Brotherhood affiliated Turkish contractors, what safeguards that Hamas (or a clone) won't just rebuild and start the whole thing over again?

Because Tzahal hasn't had a chance to do everything that needed doing. Just the other week I was in the area and a local guy pointed out to me places where they knew there were still tunnels but he wasn't sure if due to the ceasefire Tzahal would still have the chance to blow them up. Officially part of Hamas disarming is also the dismantling of their terror infrastructure, including destroying remaining terror tunnels, weapons workshops and so on.

Can we rely on whomever is supposed to be enforcing the deal that this will actually happen? What does it mean for Israel if it doesn't? It's wonderful that most of the hostages have been released, but we also need to look at the bigger picture of the war and our country's security, if all the big words are not enforced then nothing has changed and the sacrifice of our soldiers has been squandered to invite Muslim Brotherhood states like Qatar and Turkey to restore the Hamas "balance of terror" threatening Israel.

I know it sounds terrible but I meet so many people in the Otef who feel forgotten. They are desperate for all the hostages to come home, but I've met too many who've said to me that the only thing people in the merkaz seem to care about is the hostages, not whether Hamas is no longer a threat and they still have to raise their children in fortified gannim (literally fortified gannim).

No one has been marching in the streets demanding safety and security for Netiv Haasara or Nirim and if you even dare to raise concerns that are not the hostages then no one wants to hear or they accuse you of being a heartless b@!ch who doesn't care about the hostages. It makes me angry because the writing is on the wall but most people do not want to see. This deal is only as good as the enforcement of the grand promises made to guarantee Israeli security.

All of the hostages, alive and dead, were supposed to be home by now according to the deal, there are still hostage bodies held in Gaza (as far as I know), while Hamas is flexing its muscles (and guns) everywhere that the IDF has withdrawn from. This is greatly concerning. That is what is on my mind.

 Today is Hoshana Rabba, the last day of Sukkot. According to Jewish tradition the date when God makes His final decision on how we will be judged for the coming year. The final date for appeals as it were for the verdicts reached on Rosh Hashanah (the Day of Judgement) and Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement).

For traditional Jews the return of our twenty live hostages on this date is highly symbolic in so many ways. A sign that maybe God has received our fervent prayers for them to come home to their loved ones alive. A closing of the circle that started on Simhat Torah (the day after Hoshana Rabba) two years ago when our country was invaded and they were kidnapped.

And so we say farewell to the sukkah for another year.

And what a strange Sukkot it has been, between the commandment to be joyous on Sukkot, our nation collectively holding its breath over whether Hamas really would free the hostages and whether this peace deal would really happen, the agonising two year anniversary of the brutal Hamas invasion and gratitude for the miracles and rebirth we have witnessed in the wake of the barbaric Hamas attacks.

When I was a child I had a Shlomo Carlebach record I loved to listen to which included "The Song of Shabbes". As a child I used to ponder its meaning, listening to it over and over: we were slaves in Egypt but we sang the song of Shabbes, we saw the Holy Temple destroyed but we sang the song of Shabbes, the Romans sold us as slaves but we sang the song of Shabbes, we saw 6 million Jews murdered but we sang the song of Shabbes". What was this song of Shabbes that we kept on singing no matter what, no matter why?

Only in my late teens did I start to understand the concept, the symbol of Shabbat, Jewish heritage and tradition, our holidays, our Hebrew language, our culture and our beliefs which we held onto no matter the horrors our people suffered. Stripped of everything, even our homeland, we clung to the heritage that we could keep in our hearts, no matter where we were exiled, no matter how harsh our circumstances. Even in the death camps of Europe and being torched alive by the Inquisition our people continued to "sing the song of Shabbes" in whatever way they could, holding on to our eternal peoplehood so that a future generation would see a new day and let us thrive once again.

Finding joy in these last two years has often been that "singing the song of Shabbes" for so many Israelis. This Sukkot, coinciding as it did with the secular October 7th anniversary was difficult for so many Israelis and Jews around the world, but still they were joyous and celebrated life, our people's life, our survival, how despite the terrible pain we have persevered and beaten back enemies who wanted us dead and our heritage erased.

And this year perhaps on Simhat Torah we can shine brighter and celebrate with a fuller heart, knowing our living hostages are home and twenty more families can hopefully start to find comfort. Knowing that maybe, just maybe, there is finally some kind of peace deal that can bring hope, life and joy to our entire region.

We're still waiting to see if Hamas will truly honour the deal, if they will hand over the 24 dead Israeli hostages they are still holding, if they will disarm and clear the way for a new future for a peaceful Gaza. This deal will only work if it is truly enforced.

Maybe this Hoshana Raba there is hope that we will yet witness a new day in the Middle East, and even if it still looks uncertain, and even if we don't yet know that the war is really over, there is hope for finding a new way that wasn't there yesterday. Tonight, the eve of Simhat Torah we will dance again with a new song in our hearts.

If it was only about the hostages, if it was always about the hostages, then the people of the Otef go back to being screwed over and the clock resets to October 6th and the countdown to the next round of Hamas atrocities and hostage taking. It can't be just about the hostages because then we would have learnt absolutely nothing and to get the freedom of the last 48 held by Hamas the nation would have accepted the return of a Hamas terrorist state in Gaza rebuilding and preparing the next assault on the Israel.

This is the niggling fear I feel today alongside the joy of seeing our live hostages return to their families. Too many Israelis say, fine, that's it, peace, it's all over and the people living on our border, the people in the Otef who've suffered so much will be forgotten again, left to their fate, as though on October 7th Hamas wasn't halfway to Beer Sheva and their death squads weren't this close to rampaging through Ashkelon. I've met too many people in the Otef who've said as much to me, it was always about the hostages and never about truly restoring safety and security to their communities.

The hostages were a clever diversionary tactic by Hamas to stop us from being able to fight effectively in areas where the hostages were held, giving Hamas extra cover and distracting Israelis from the war aims of defending the thousands and thousands of Israelis, millions really, held hostage by Hamas' rockets and terror.

Hamas is already jubilant, murdering anyone they suspect of helping Israel, restoring their iron fist terror on the people of Gaza and with Qatari money and Turkish construction companies help, officially sanctioned by this deal, they pledge to rebuild their tunnels and bases and terror machine. It's like on the day Gilad Shalit was released, Israelis were euphoric with hope and relief but the other side was celebrating with gunfire the return of unrepentant terrorists, like Sinwar, already planning how to use their new freedom to kill more Israelis.

I know today is supposed to be all about joy, people are very angry at me for saying these things but I spend so much time in the Otef that I can't not see this bigger picture and all the red flags. The fear is that like Ahashverosh in the Purim story people will say well that's that then, all over, war aim accomplished, nothing to see here. And the people of the Otef will be screwed over again and Hamas, already striving to reassert its iron hold on Gaza, will be left to rebuilt and rearm (Qatari money, Turkish construction companies) counting down to the next Oct 7, the next round of hostage taking, the next invasion of Israel.

As though two years ago the Nuhba death squads weren't halfway to Beer Sheva and this close to rampaging through Ashkelon. The fact that Israel capitulated in the end to negotiating with Hamas, to freeing murderers, to giving hostile, Muslim Brotherhood affiliated states like Qatar and Turkey key roles in supposedly creating a future peaceful settlement in the region is very concerning and in Hamas quarters is seen as victory.

And yes, I'm beyond grateful to Hashem that the live hostages have been released, but I'm also beyond concerned that people are so glad they will forget the dead hostages still being held and worse, forget that Hamas and friends still want to finish the job they started on Oct 7 2023.

So yes, we can celebrate today but it has to be with the understanding that this isn't the end of the story and even if this deal creates some kind of ceasefire for now, Israel can't relax its guard, must remain vigilant against the multiple threats still looming, or else we are back to the Oct 6 mentality.