I’ve been asked a lot what it’s like here in Israel now and how we are coping and what can people do to help. First, offers to send care packages are really sweet, but there is much delay in the post. Everything is very backed up. Only one airline is operational now, and because so many people are at the front, and there is so much mail, there will be a crazy delay. Plus, all letters and packages have to be thoroughly checked in customs.
The North is very quiet and we are trying to go about our daily lives with as much normalcy as possible. Most men and many women 18-60 are gone. If not at the front lines, they are working support personnel in logistics , warehouses, guards, etc.
It’s harvest time here – the autumn harvest before the winter. The olive hand plump on their trees. Avocados, apples, pears and veggies are ripening to be picked. Because most of our laborers are absent, the older folk are volunteering. The man who is living with us is harvesting avocados today. Tomorrow he will pick tomatoes. Everyone who can is volunteering to help out in one way or another.
When I was in the hospital, the husband of the lady next to me was driving with a pickup truck full of friends, all men in their late 60s, to the Gaza envelope. He fought in the Yom Kippur War and knows what it’s like. Despite the threat of constant rocket barrages, tough old Doron was determined to harvest sweet potatoes and carrots. The land where the attacks happened is some of the most productive farmland. He said that in the next week, they were going down to plant the winter wheat. It needed to be done. He’s a gibor (gee-BORE), a real hero.
We have decided to make food for the troops three times a week. There are literally at least a hundred thousand up at the northern front, tank and artillery corps, infantry, medics, base guards, home front command. There is plenty of food on the base, but it’s the people in the field who need to be supplemented. Next week it will be personal sized quiches, a rice and vegetables salad, fruit salads and muffins…. banana with peanut butter protein powder.
Everyone comes together in this country. In the past there was a deep divide between the secular and the ultra religious Jews. Mostly because the Haredim (think Shtissel) were exempt from military service in order to study Torah and pray. It caused a lot of animosity.
Now the Haredim are enlisting by the thousands. They are cooking and setting up barbecues at army bases. Rabbis go around to each base to pray with the troops – and to dance and sing joyful Psalms and the most uplifting songs.
In the army, so many soldiers are requesting undershirts with fringes on each corner called a tallit catan to fulfill the Biblical law in Numbers 15:37-38 and Deuteronomy 22:12. And the L-rd spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the Children of Israel and tell them to make fingers in the borders of their garments throughout their generations….that you make look upon it and remember all the commandments of the L-rd and do them. The Haredim are working round the clock to produce and distribute these tsitsit and also kippot, yarmulkes, to all the troops.
There is also a commandment in Deuteronomy 6:8. You shall bind them as a sign upon your hand and keep them as frontlets between your eyes. These are the t’fillin, or phylactery boxes Jewish men strap on as they say their morning prayers. Soldiers are lining up to put on t’fillin for the first time since their Bar Mitzvah.
There are community Bible studies popping up. I am part of a group that discusses the weekly Torah portion. There are so many groups on WhatsApp and Facebook- round the clock prayer groups and groups praying Psalms. One group I’m a part of on WhatsApp prayers the Psalms out loud sequentially. Join in, pick your number and pray. When I can’t sleep at night I see what number Psalm I need to pray and enter it. The other group is for women studying the Psalms intensely, one each day. Prayer groups for wives, mothers, young people, you name it. It’s happening everywhere.
The radio is full of Hebrew songs that are actually modern songs straight from the words of the Bible. There are songs of repentance, hope, healing and pleading to G-d. Everywhere people are praying.
Women are making challah. Women are lighting Shabbat candles. Even Christian women are joining in to light candles and keep the Sabbath in solidarity with their Jewish friends. I have a friend who FaceTimes me every Friday evening to join me in prayer. It’s nothing short of amazing.
There are so many stories of miracles that have happened. It is getting quite late, so I will leave you with two. The first is the story of two religious kibbutzim right on the Gaza border. On 7 October, a holy Shabbat and the morning of Simchat Torah, the end of the fall feasts, the gates/entrances to the kibbutz were closed. The mechanical gates were not operational on Shabbat. Pickup trucks with ten terrorists each were trying to enter, but they could not get in. They tried bombing the gate with grenades, but no luck. So they moved on.
The next is the story of the young IDF soldier, a 20 year old girl, kidnapped by Hamas and rescued….her family had the strongest faith in G-d I’ve ever seen.
Israel Dreams 