Early the morning of October 7th, 2023, I took a call from my daughter in law Marie who, unbeknownst to me, was in the process of becoming Jewish.
She said, “My mom called to tell me how upset she was about the attack on Israel.” I held my breath. Her mom lives in France. I’d been awake for all of 20 minutes, blissfully unaware. When we hung up, I turned on CNN and began to grasp the magnitude of the still unfolding catastrophe. In the moments and weeks that followed, I understood that Hamas had unleashed the worst assault against the Jewish people that had taken place in my lifetime. The pain and confusion were just beginning.
I felt personally attacked – the first time I’d questioned my safety as a proud Jewish American. From the start, people on the left, my people, or so I’d always thought, were justifying Hamas’s actions, couching the unbelievably gruesome assault in the larger context of the occupation, as though there was any way to justify the slaughter of peace loving concert goers, as if there could be an excuse for attacking the very Israelis who lived close to Gaza in hopes of building bridges, of helping people whose own government put them in danger.
I read a post that my young Muslim friend posted - the friend who, on behalf of her mosque, sent flowers to the JCC after a bomb threat forced our evacuation. She’s the partner with whom I planned interfaith activities to bring Muslims and Jews together – an Iftar, an art exhibit – as part of the Salaam, Shalom, Speaking of Peace initiative. Her post, like so many, condemned the actions of the Israeli military, the killing of innocent Palestinians. Her tone stung and I reached out, asking if we could meet to discuss our collective pain. She responded with an emoji – a tiny symbol that may have meant we were okay, the two of us, but that was it. Our people, I feared, were no longer okay with one another.
I felt betrayed by the left, by the very people with whom I’d spend decades marching for justice, reproductive rights, voting rights, affordable housing, against racism and Islamophobia. I watched what was happening on college campuses, wondering where I would have stood as an eighteen-year-old. Would I, too, have seen Israel as the all-powerful occupier, the military giant, a puppet of the United States? Would my sympathies have gone to the thousands of Palestinians abandoned by their leaders yet killed by Jewish bombs? Why is no one on the left talking about the Israeli women who were raped, whose bodies were mutilated?
During the first intifada, as a radio talk show host, I felt pressure from the Jewish community to speak out publicly. “You have a platform,” they said. But I was a journalist. I hosted debates giving both sides a chance to make their case. I asked questions, like my people have done for centuries. We learn by asking questions. With age comes perspective and, knowing so much more now about the history, it’s hard to listen to people who haven’t taken the time to learn. “From the river to sea,” they’re chanting but, when asked, too few knew which river and which sea were being referenced, not to mention the fact that their chant was calling for the end of Israel. Too few of those sacrificing sleep in encampments, feeling solidarity with the oppressed, had knowledge of all the attempts that have been made to make peace with Palestinians while ensuring the security of Israelis. As Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir famously said, “You cannot negotiate peace with somebody who has come to kill you.” On October 7th, 2023, Hamas came to kill, rape, torture, and kidnap Jews, as many as they possibly could. Hamas denies Israel’s right to exist, therefore a peace treaty with Hamas will never be attainable.
It’s human nature to try to fix things, to come up with solutions, to reduce conflict to good and evil, us and them, the occupiers and the occupied. But most conflict is filled with complexity and nuance and, as such, demands empathy. We are meant to struggle. We make a grave mistake when we tell ourselves that we are totally in the right and not at fault at all. Our tradition offers us an opportunity to make teshuvah, to accept our human frailty, to look, to see, to acknowledge, to turn, and to try harder next time.
My heart feels the pain of the hostages and their families, the displacement of families from Israel’s northern border, the trauma of Israeli soldiers who put themselves at risk every day, and the worry that plagues all Israelis and all people who fear for their safety. And my heart cannot grow cold to the suffering of innocent Palestinians, people displaced from their homes time and again, people used as human shields by their terrorist government. They didn’t ask for this and the hatred they’ve come to feel for Israelis, for Jews, for me, is understandable. May this war end. May something good come from all this horror and loss. May there be answers.