I’ve lost count of how many times over the years, when writing or speaking about the modern State of Israel, I’ve used the phrase “never to be taken for granted.”
And each time, I’ve thought: It’s even truer now.
And so it is, I believe, again today, as we celebrate Israel’s 78th anniversary.
Never in my lifetime has the need for a Jewish homeland seemed more urgent.
From Bondi Beach to Michigan to London, attacks on Jews and synagogues aren’t just increasing; they’ve become normalized. Terrorists target Jews indiscriminately. The oldest hatred reconfigured to fit a new agenda.
On so many levels, Israel is absolutely core to the Jewish future.
Which is why it’s ever more concerning that our Jewish homeland faces such uncertainty in this moment.
Israel has achieved enormous military gains since October 7, dramatically diminishing the threat from Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas. But those entities are all still standing and rearming, with tens of thousands of Israelis still fearful of returning to their homes in the north.
At the same time, Israel has only become more isolated on the world stage, including here in America, where support for Israel has sharply dropped across all political parties and age groups. Working to reverse this trend must be one of our community’s greatest priorities.
Within Israel, the challenges have also grown far more intense, with accelerating internal divides and a bruising election ahead. And Jewish extremists, while representing a small minority in Israel, are engaging in despicable acts that undermine the standing of our Jewish homeland.
Still, this is all only part of the equation.
Because, even now, according to a recent survey, Israel remains one of the happiest countries in the world. It has a higher birth rate than any Western nation. Its stock market is strong, and the shekel has reached long-time highs against the dollar. There is a vitality to life there that is impossible to ignore.
So how do we hold all this at once? How do those of us who love Israel make sense of its complexity, allowing this love to exist alongside criticism and debate — and help others do the same? How do we speak to young Jews who increasingly disapprove of Israel's policies while still embracing its core principle: the Jewish right to self-determination in our ancestral homeland?
Last night, I heard Rachel Goldberg-Polin speak before an audience of 1,300 at a packed UJA event in Westchester.
We’ve all come to know her as the mother of Hersh, z”l, who was killed in a Hamas tunnel on day 328, along with five other heroic young Israelis. Rachel calls them "the Beautiful Six.” I’ll never forget the haunting video of them lighting Hanukkah candles deep in the tunnels of Gaza, maintaining their faith — and even their sense of humor
While fighting for the return of Hersh and all the hostages, Rachel became the embodiment of moral clarity, dignity, and strength in the most impossible of circumstances.
Not that she ever asked for it.
She just released a book called When We See You Again, detailing her experience as, in her words, “a nobody” who did what she did out of love for her son.
At the event, she was asked if she focused now on the “what ifs,” including the decision to make aliyah and raise her family in Israel. Without hesitation, she said no. Even now, even while feeling in her bereavement that she walks with a dagger in her heart, she has no regret. Life in Israel is a blessing.
And maybe that’s the answer.
To love Israel is to feel love and pain. Gratitude and grief. The miracle of its existence alongside the very real cost of sustaining it.
I don’t know if, in our lifetimes, we will ever stop saying the words “never to be taken for granted.”
If there is a single hope, it’s this: to one day have the luxury of knowing that a secure, Jewish, democratic state is simply a given.
Like the most fundamental, unquestionable things in life.
Like the very air we breathe. Or a mother’s love.
Shabbat shalom