Posted on 09/02/24
Baltimore, MD - Sept. 2, 2024 - Maybe it’s a chutzpah that I’m writing. And yes, I know you don’t start an essay with “maybe,” however all rules fly out the window after hearing the tragic news of the hostage bodies found. The world is upside down right now and has been for nearly a year, so goes the grammar at this moment.
I can’t claim to offer chizuk to the families. I can’t aspire to write divrei torah, I can only hope that in sharing my feelings with others in pain, we can comfort each other.
We were hoping so hard. We were praying so hard. And then we heard the news about the hostages discovered no longer alive, Hashem Yikom Damam. Hersh Goldberg-Polin. Alexander Lobanov. Carmel Gat. Almog Sarusi. Eden Yerushalmi. Ori Danino. Z'L.
I Whatsapped my cousin in Israel this morning that I was frozen. She responded with the same answer and added , “Kasheh mammash, kashe l’nshom.” My sentiments exactly; it is so very hard , it is hard to breathe.”
We plod along somehow in between the tears, cleaning up from Shabbos, checking for more information while watching the funerals, getting ready for school, and more tears. I had parent orientation to give and I had no idea how I was going to stand up in front of my classroom with a smile. I told myself to get it all out during the day and somehow I managed, but once back in the car ride home, my head went to all the families of the hostages.
I have been wearing tape for almost the whole time Rachel Goldberg-Polin, mother of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, initiated it. That’s almost 300 days. I have written on this website about my tape and the positive responses received. I admit that I have also gotten lazy over the summer and not taped every day. Either I forgot, or I ran out of the house, and so the tape was not an everyday reminder, even while I was davening every day and saying Tehillim. Today the tape went back on. It was my connection to Hersh, z'l. He was not my son, but he became my child. I have not mothered him. I have not raised him, but I have cried for him. I have hoped for him. Every day when I put the tape on Hersh was in my mind with all the others as I davened Acheinu while smoothing the tape on my shirt. Today, I put the tape back on to honor him and all the other kedoshim. Today I put the tape back on to honor his brave parents and the families. Today I reinforce the tape on as to remind myself not to give up hope, even still.
My daughter had the honor, if you will, of hearing Mrs. Danino speak in her school after visiting in Washington to plead her son’s case. When she came home from school that day she was quite upset, naturally, as the picture on a poster became real to her after hearing from a family member who was living this nightmare. We cried together. What else could we do? I asked her to share with me what she shared then what Mrs. Danino said that made an impression. She still remembers after so many months. Mrs. Danino spoke in Hebrew and a teacher translated. These were her words: “Hashem knows what He is doing. In situations like this there is nothing left to do but turn to Hashem. If I got the opportunity to go back to the beginning and change what happened, I wouldn’t.”
These are the words I now whisper to myself to comfort my own soul. Hashem knows what he is doing, there is nothing left to do but to have emunah. And as Hersh’s parents ended every public message with the following words, I reiterate the same, “Stay strong. We love you.” Hersh, Alexander, Carmel, Almog, Eden and Ori, who have joined their holy brothers and sisters in the Heavens, I implore that you daven for us this very same message.
Am Yisroel Chai.