October 7, 2023, may become known as the Simchat Torah Massacre. Simchat Torah is the last of the Jewish High Holy Days, which begin with Rosh Hashanah. That was the day the world was outraged by the savage terrorist attack against Israel.
The biggest shock of the day, before details of the evil atrocities became known, was its success. For a while, on a day that’s been called the worst day in Jewish history since the Holocaust, it’s as though the state of Israel collapsed.
The vaunted Israeli army was nowhere to be found. The Israeli air force was absent. Israel’s world class intelligence failed to forewarn. It was an eerie reminder of what the world was like before there was a state of Israel: Jews were powerless against their vicious attackers.
The initial response has been that the whole world fell in love with Israel. The outpouring of support has been impressive and in some ways unprecedented. Buildings and monuments all over the world have been lit up with the colors of the Israeli flag. It seemed as if everyone was on Israel’s side. Then Israel began to strike back.
Two things to observe now that Israel has resolved to eliminate Hamas: one, Hamas misunderstood something very important. Hamas mistook the weakness they encountered. They didn’t understand the resilience of the Israeli people, and Hamas will pay dearly for that mistake.
In the days since the attack, Israel issued one of the largest call-up of reservists in the history of modern armies. How many would answer the call? Turns out, according to Micah Goodman, an Israeli philosopher, about 150% showed up for duty! More than were called.
This phenomena is a hint of a secret about Israel few understand. The failures of the state that so shocked the nation had been experienced before. The best example is the Yom Kippur war in 1973. Then too, Israel saw the failure of vital state institutions. But when Israel was caught off guard on that fateful Yom Kippur, Israelis rallied together and eventually prevailed.
The reservists called out of synagogues and from around the country reported for duty and were ready for combat in a matter of days. rather than the estimated week. No military line was broken, and by the time the war ended Israel was on the verge of taking Damascus and had the Egyptian army surrounded.
The same spirit has taken over Israel since the Simchat Torah massacre. Despite the anger at the government, Israelis, from the bottom up, are rallying a force that will hit Hamas hard. It’s impossible to imagine how Hamas will survive the onslaught it invited upon itself. This rallying of the people of Israel will be what saves the nation. The attack will not just be the story of failure; it will also be an inspiring story of a country rallying together for the common purpose of survival.
The second observation is this: unsurprisingly, the affection and good feelings people of the world initially had for Israel are beginning to wane as Israel prepares for an offensive against Hamas that will be brutal and costly.
There is an increasing cry for caution and restraint. Israel must obey international law. Israel must be extra diligent to safeguard the innocent residents of Gaza, even though their Hamas overlords impair their ability to leave the northern part of the strip; even though the Hamas elite luxuriate in and issue orders from hotel rooms in countries far away from the conflagration they called into being; even though Hamas commits the war crime of using hostages as shields; and even though Hamas uses Palestinians as shields against the Israeli forces.
We must remember that Hamas is not a political party, and cares little about Palestinians or a Palestinian state. They’ve diverted millions of dollars of aid intended to build schools and hospitals to building tunnels to hide in and missiles with which to kill Israeli civilians.
The problem is that whatever Israel does to win the affection of the world makes it less feared by its enemies; and in Israel’s part of the world your enemy has to fear you if you are to survive. Hamas struck because it didn’t fear Israel. Now that Israel is about to strike back, its goal is to make its enemies, including Iran, fear it.
Here is how Goodman put it in a Times of Israel podcast: “There is a zero-sum game between these emotions: Everything that [Israel is] going to do to restore the fear is going to erode the love. Everything we do that will guarantee that the Middle East is afraid of Israelis… everything we do in order to build that myth back again is going to make people in the West not like us, not love us. The other way around, if we try to keep the West loving us and writing songs about us, we will not restore the fear of the Middle East from us.”
“If people are asking questions about what they can do to help us, here’s what you can do: Break the zero-sum game.”
In the days and weeks to come, Goodman asks of Jews and non-Jews alike, “Please remember how you feel now at this moment of moral clarity. What you feel now, you’re not going to be feeling in the future. That’s fine, that’s natural. Emotions are impermanent, but loyalty isn’t. I want to ask you to be loyal to this moment and loyal to what you see now… even when you won’t feel what you feel now.”
It’s not hard to understand the purpose of Israel. Two thousand years of life in the diaspora taught Jews that the welcome of Jews by the nations of the world was fleeting, and there was no security that couldn’t be ripped away with a pogrom or an edict ordering the expulsion of Jews. So, after the Holocaust, the Jews created one place on the planet where Jews would be safe; and they called that place The State of Israel.
We live in a time where Israel needs the Jewish world, and all the people of the world who understand the nature of the task ahead, to stay loyal to Israel and the understanding of the righteousness of the fight ahead that is so clear right now. Israel needs our support in the days ahead as it fights for its existence.
Michael Berk is Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Beth Israel, the largest Jewish congregation in San Diego and the oldest in Southern California.
