Current Events

May 12, 2021/1 Sivan 5781

Dear Adath Israel Family,

We watch the news from Israel with a combination of heartbreak and anger, as lives are lost and people continue to live in fear, with hundreds of rockets falling from Gaza into Israel, directed at civilian targets.

As happens too often, there will be finger-pointing and recrimination as to how this flare-up in violence happened. But in this immediate moment, as our brothers and sisters in Israel are faced with rocket fire from the terrorist Hamas organization… As Hamas only benefits politically from further destabilizing the fraught, emotional overlay of the end of Ramadan and Yom Yerushalayim… As rockets fall not on territories disputed, but on Israeli cities including Jerusalem and her holy sites… As Israel worked to keep holy sites open for all faiths, even as those sites were used as staging areas for stonings and violence… As Israel finds itself, once again, in an impossible, untenable position of having to defend its populace against attacks on civilian dwellings, while knowing full well that any counter-attack will bring one-sided, reductionist international condemnation… In such a moment, we must as the Psalmist says, “Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.”

We mourn the loss of life – both Israelis who are seeking shelter from rockets, incendiary balloons, and riots, AND Palestinians who are currently victims of the political opportunism and terrorism of Hamas. We pray for a de-escalation of violence and rhetoric, so that even a tense peace can be restored. And we hope for an escape from this cycle of violence that has no clear solution.

Sha’alu sh’lom Yerushalayim – we pray for the peace of Jerusalem, Israel, and the entire region. Amen.

Rabbi Andrew Markowitz, Rabbi Eric Yanoff, and Cantor Elizabeth Shammash