Parashat Tazria – Shabbat HaChodesh - Shabbat Mevarchim

Walking around Jerusalem, you can smell spring in the air. The trees, plants, bushes are all in bloom creating an intoxicating blend of aromas. The bees hover around the endless groups of rosemary bushes bathing in the pollen, ignoring people as they brush their hands over needles to enjoy the smell. The sun shines, washing over me with warmth. It is the season of birth and rebirth here in eretz hakodesh.

As Pesach approaches, we open our windows, throw out the winter and welcome in the New Year, with all of its possibilities and opportunities. Cleaning for Pesach, which here is a combination of kashering and spring cleaning, is winding into high gear. We use up our old chametz, and get rid of that which remains, clearing out the cabinets in preparation for the new, special foods, that will fill them in the week to come. And as we clear out our houses and cabinets, we clear out our hearts and souls, ridding them of the shmutz that gathers in the winter, opening the chambers of our hearts, and inhaling the new along with the smells of the season.

Even our parashah, Tazria, which focuses on states of ritual purity and impurity, opens with a focus on new life, on birth, on brit, and on the purity of the soul. In cases where sources of impurity would appear, we would turn to the Cohen, the priest, to recognize the nature of the impurity, to determine when it was gone, and to purify the setting. As we clear out our souls, it is now to us to recognize that which creates impurity – jealousy, hatred, anger – to remove it, creating space for goodness, hope, and joy.

Tomorrow, we focus on three new beginnings: the beginning of life in Tazria, the proclaiming of the new month, Nissan, which we will announce and bless, and the arrival of Pesach and the Exodus, when our family became a nation. As we listen, announce, and read, I pray that we all take time to insure that the windows of our soul are open wide, that we are clearing them out and making room for good at this, the springtime of our People.

Shabbat Shalom.

Parashat Vayikra

In some ways, it was a brief conversation like any other at Hebrew University. Walking down the hall with my friend Zehava, a woman in a long skirt and head covering smiled and said hello. Zehava smiled and said hello right back. Nothing out of the ordinary, except that the long skirt and head covering were not the ultra-Orthodox but the Arab flavor. We kept walking and then I just had to stop and reflect. It was a beautiful moment, actually, one that is all too rare these days.

Last week, there were protests at The Hebrew University led by Israeli Arab students demonstrating against Israeli actions in the Gaza Strip. They were free to exercise what Americans call their “First Amendment Right to Free Speech.” While they were separated from Israeli Jewish students who were also protesting that which was being shot from Gaza, they were nonetheless able to protest freely and safely. They made the news, just as the protesting Arab Israeli citizens in Um-el-Fahem did. And while some Israeli Arab groups were making their voices heard collectively, other individual Israeli Arab citizen students freely walked through the hallowed halls of The Hebrew University happily going to classes, learning, growing.

This is Israeli Democracy at its very best. Students with completely different views in the same school, in the same classes, receive the same degrees, and express positions on each extreme freely and honestly. While I am not a citizen, I cannot help but be proud of the democratic country I am living in right now. For those screaming and yelling all over the world that Israel is not a democracy, let them come and stand in the hallways of Hebrew University, let them watch the ballot box on election day, let them come and see the composition of the Knesset.

After they are done with that tour, they should go to Bir Zeit or Al Quds University. There too, they will see protests and demonstrations. They will see Palestinian students standing and protesting Israeli actions in the Gaza strip. But they won’t see any other perspectives because they are not allowed – not from Israeli Jews nor from Palestinians with a different perspective. There are no Jewish Israeli students at Al Quds or Bir Zeit, at least not as far as I can tell and if there are Arab students expressing moderate or conciliatory opinions about Israel, they certainly don’t make their voices heard because such a choice leads to beatings, threats and murder…

STOP.

The above four paragraphs were written a week ago Thursday night before I got an SMS to turn on the television, which is never a good sign in this country: A terrorist attack in Jerusalem on a yeshiva high school. The first major attack on Jerusalem in a long time, this one was perpetrated against children, adolescents. Not soldiers, not the police, not anyone armed (not to say that those would be any more acceptable) but kids studying Torah and getting ready for the month of Adar, a joyous time on our calendar, shot to death by a terrorist. I stopped writing. I just sat in front of the television, watched and wept.

The beautiful moment in the Hebrew University hallway was long forgotten. All that was left was sadness, anger and questions:

Sadness – Sadness over eight lives snuffed out too soon; sadness for the families, for the Yeshiva community, and for the entire Jewish People. How can you not be devastated whether or not you knew the students or their families?

Sadness – Sadness that the promise of Peace, the talk earlier in the year, delusional of course, that a final Peace agreement could be reached by the end of the year, is just that – delusional.

Anger – Boundless anger, rage, the kind of ferocity I am uncomfortable with. It is raw. It shows its ugly face in little ways, like the extra emphasis I find myself placing on phrases like “Blessed are You, Who destroys enemies…” in the silent Amidah, or other places where our liturgy speaks of Revenge and Divine Retribution.

Anger – Anger at the Terrorist and those who funded, supported, and encouraged him. Anger that he held an Israeli citizenship card, a real one not a forgery, and thus a person who enjoys the benefits of living in a democracy, not a perfect democracy, but a democracy nonetheless, where he can vote, make his voice heard, and get the benefits of being a citizen.

Anger – Anger at a world that screams in protest against Israeli “overreaction,” but sits silently when young Jewish Israeli kids are intentionally targeted and slaughtered by terrorists.

Questions:

Are there limits to Democracy? If so, what are they and how can they be applied here of all places?

Does a dead terrorist deserve a funeral paid for by the State, a benefit afforded other citizens?

If terrorists now come from Jabel Mukhaber (Ja-bel Mu-kA-bear), a neighborhood in South Jerusalem, is it possible to still be a liberal and not consider the Israeli Arab minority a “Fifth Column”?

And what is worse, if they are, if the majority of the Israeli Arab population is part of a fifth column, what does Israel do about it? Which brings me back to the Democracy question…

In the midst of the never ending violence here, we are also on the cusp of never ending renewal, the ending of one book and the immediate beginning of the next book of Torah. Last week, we finished Exodus. This week, we start Leviticus. Last week, we read the last verse of the Exodus and proclaimed, “Hazak Hazak V’Nithazek” “Be Strong, Be Strong and We Will Be Strengthened.” The words meant something different to me last week. There were two different “strengths” in my head – the strength of liberal democracy and the strength of The Jewish People. At the end of the day, all of the awful things that I imagine needing to happen to bring this conflict to an end, at the angriest of moments, are always overtaken by the dual values of democracy and the ethics and laws of our Torah. Taken together, we are strengthened to overcome the anger, to avoid extremism, and to look forward…

This Shabbat, I hope and pray that until there is Peace here that the voices of democracy and Torah always triumph over the voices of extremism and fascism. The other option is too frightening to consider, even in the angriest, deepest recess of my heart.

Shabbat Shalom.

Ashkelon - A Friend's Personal Story

The situation in the areas near, and now farther from, Gaza is worsening. The following is from a friend of ours, Maxine Dorot, mother of our friend and former Shaliah, Tal Dorot. It is a first person description of what it is like to live in Ashkelon right now, which is being heavily targeted by Hamas Grad Missiles from Gaza:



It's 11:54. Monday, the 3rd of march. At 8:44 exactly, without warning, a massive explosion shook the quiet morning. Seconds after, there was one more. Once again, my area did not hear the warning of "tseva adom". Probably just as well. with 15 seconds to find shelter, i probably wouldn't have made it...well, maybe just.

i was sitting at the computer writing to my sister. The windows, as is the norm now, are open. Doesn't matter if it's cold out or not, they're opened, except for a few that remain "protected" by the shutters. Those are the windows directly over the beds. Wouldn't want glass shattering on you, now would you? (Like the shutters are really going to help but maybe a little).

This the first time a missile fell while elementary and high schools were in session. My cleaning lady is here. She arrived late because her 8 year old son was afraid to walk to school alone. Since last week, he has been escorted by someone in the family; he always used to go alone.

When the first missile went off, Malka didn't know what to do...phone the school? Go there? I calmed her down and we waited. The 2nd one went off very soon after. She called the school but after a missile attack, cell phones don't work. "Network busy" reads the screen. She used the house phone to reach the school but of course, the lines were busy. So we waited and soon, her son called her. "Take me home," he asked. He wasn't crying but his voice was very small.

When he walked into the house, he seemed fine. I asked him to tell me what had happened. They didn't hear the alert but the principal, whose office is next door, ran in and told the kids to get under their desks, hands over their heads. The girl next to Gal was singing the whole time, I guess to keep herself calm. Since they've been practicing for this for weeks, they were all fine....no one in the 3rd grade class panicked until it was over. Then the girl who had been singing began to cry. Most of the kids wanted "Ema". Those who wanted to go home were dismissed when an adult came for them. Some of the kids wanted to stay.

It's hard to describe these "booms". Depending on how close you are to them, they have a reverberating deep sound. Then there's like an echo that reverberates for a few seconds. If you're close enough to a house or a building that 's been hit, you hear the sound of rubble falling. Then you listen for sirens to judge how close it is to you. Within a minute, your house phone starts ringing...people checking on you and yours and then speculating as to where the rockets fell. Somehow, Tal finds out pretty fast where it is. He took a bus to school today (yesterday, Sderot was hit by almost 50 rockets) because they learn in a protected room and then are going to a seminar in Tel Aviv. He won't take his car there anymore and doesn't plan to go back for a while after today. However, all the students are worrying about their studies. Yesterday, in "my" college here in Ashkelon, less than 1/3rd of the students showed. I bet there are even less today.

There was not one room booked in the hotel last night. We are usually 35-40% full during the winter weeks but I think we're going to be in for a rough time now. All the hotels here will be.

Living from missile to missile is nuts. I woke up at 6:30 this morning playing "tseva adom" in my head. Checked the news and then forced myself back to sleep til 8 but it's just nuts. Took a shower and washed my hair. While still in my pajamas I washed my hair over the sink, then ran into the shower and was out in less than 4 minutes, dried and dressed in another 3. A record for me!! Dried my hair in front of the open window so I would hear anything fall, just in case.

Shani woke up from the grads, checked that we were all okay and then muttered, "this is crazy" and went back to sleep. Today she works from 4 to 10 but she and another girl from Ashkelon decided to go in earlier. The office is in Kiryat Malachi, 20 minutes from here and way out of missile range.

I don't teach on Mondays and have to do some errands. Am not too crazy about going out but will not stop my life, at least not yet. If we get to the point that we have to live in our shelters, Shani and I and the dogs are out of here, but I hope we never get to that. Rafi has a business to run but we'll see.

Will take a deep breath and go outside. Knowing me, I'll take a detour to see where the grads fell today. Feel free to pass this on to anyone who might be interested.

Maxine, Ashkelon



While the IDF conducted a brief, two day mission to slow the launching of rockets toward Sderot and Ashkelon, and other places, Hamas "celebrated" their survival despite the fact that over 100 terrorists were killed over the two days. Sadly, civilians in Gaza were killed also, some by errant missiles launched by Hamas that fell short of their targets and others who were killed as bystanders during Israeli action. More to be said later. For now, let us hope that there will be a quiet night for everyone.

Parashat Vayakhel

It was festive downtown on Friday. From the high fives and handshakes, hugs and smiles, you might have thought this was a family reunion. A DJ played Israeli music in the square and while nobody danced, it added to the sense of simcha – joy. Streamers hung from windows, cars, wrists, hair increasing the party like feeling. In many ways it felt like any town festival on any given Friday. What was different was the location – not downtown Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, but downtown Sderot.

On Friday morning, we joined over 10,000 people who answered the call to demonstrate solidarity with the residents of Sderot and other embattled towns near Gaza by going to there to do our Shabbat shopping. As we approached the town, we could see large blimps in their air – not the Goodyear type you see at sporting events – but large white balloons that the IDF uses to conduct surveillance on areas. I am sure the cameras were pointed toward Gaza as a way to provide an added measure of security. There was a strong sense that this would be a quiet day in Sderot – that Hamas would hold off doing any shooting, or would be held off by the IDF – until evening.

Red streamers were everywhere. In Sderot, “Red Alert” means that you have very little time, a few seconds at best, to get into a shelter or a safe area before a Qassam lands, and so the color of solidarity is red. We bought bright red t-shirts for the family, the money from which goes to support families still living in this front-line city. We made donations for bumper stickers to support youth group chapters in Sderot. And everywhere we turned, there were signs, stickers, shirts, people colored in bright red.

Those of you who know me well know that when it comes to driving, I am exceptionally directionally challenged. While the GPS guided us into Sderot, it could only tell us where to go if I knew our actual final destination, which I did not. I Fortunately, Udi’s friend, Avichai, who lives in Sderot, talked us directly to the parking area. We got out of the car, got big hugs from Udi and were welcomed by his friends from Ashkelon – now a frontline target for Hamas as well. We walked together to the center and were introduced to Eli Moyal, Mayor of Sderot, and Doron Jamchi, a former star basketball player for Maccabi Tel Aviv, who also came to demonstrate solidarity with the community.

Eli Moyal thanked us over and over again, and Doron finished giving autographs, and then Udi, Meital, Nimrod, Avichai and Moriel took all of us shopping! We went into the main area and found hundreds of people shopping at the local branch of a major supermarket chain in Israel. A woman was standing out front lecturing people to go and buy from the small makolets – small, privately-owned groceries or mini-markets – that were owned by residents of Sderot” “The big chain needs your money a lot less than the small store owner does!” She was right and so off we went.

We walked down a few side streets until we found a makolet, grabbed a few baskets and started to load up on soda, bread, and basically a lot of junk food since that was all he had. As we paid, he thanked us again and again for coming. It was embarrassing. We weren’t doing anything other than what Jews do. This was like Bikkur cholim – visiting the sick – or any other mitzvah. Sderot is part of Medinat Yisrael and its residents part of the kehillah – the community of Am Yisrael – the People of Israel, and, therefore, family. And this is what you do for family. We talked for a few minutes about what it was like to live under the threat of Qassam missiles. He asked if we wanted to see how close they fell and then he sent us to a playground just a minute walk from his store where a missile landed months ago. “Go and look, and then you will understand.”

We crossed the street and Udi showed us the new bus stops in Sderot. They are dual purpose – wait for the bus or run inside when the red alert sounds. They are reinforced concrete designed to protect you from a missile landing. From there, we crossed the street to the playground where the evidence of the damage, and potential damage, was clear. The slide was damaged from a missile attack months before and had holes all over it, as did nearby posts. This was a playground, not a military installation; a place of civilian kids, not soldiers, but it was targeted nonetheless. “Momi,” short for Shlomi, an older gentleman, told us about how children had been playing at the spot just moments before the missile hit, just a few weeks before our visit.

We walked back to the center of town to drop off our purchases and then went for lunch at a local Shawarma place. We listened to more stories from Moriel and Avichai about what it was like to live under fire and listened to Meital as well, a student at Sapir College in Sderot. They told us about how little time they had once an alarm went off, how stressful it was for everyone, and how difficult life was. Walking back we saw cars with signs reading “We are with Sderot!” and other slogans. We bought our flowers and Shabbat cakes, and headed back to the car. Hugs all around, resetting the GPS and then back to Yerushalayim to get ready for Shabbat.

During our time in Sderot, all was quiet. Not a single Qassam rocket was launched, there were no red alerts, and we did not have to run to seek cover. While I explained in general terms to the children why we went to Sderot, the absence of alarms made it almost too easy. We drove back and other than Amalya getting car sick, the drive was quiet and uneventful. We went, we did our mitzvoth, we demonstrated solidarity, spent some money, and then returned to safe Jerusalem while the residents of Sderot waited for the next alarm.

We were lucky. Roni Yichyeh, a 47 year-old father of four, was not. He was killed this week by a Qassam that crashed into Sapir College where he was a student. He was not fighting in a war, he was not invading a place, he was not in so called “occupied territory.” He was just going to school, like our friend and former shaliach, Tal Dorot, or Udi’s friend Meital, at Sapir College. He was going about his business, learning, growing. And now he is gone and his children are fatherless and his wife a widow. This week, over 100, if not 200, rockets were fired from Gaza, many from the sites of former Jewish settlements in Gush Katif, at Sderot and other places. The fight escalated further this week when Hamas launched over 20 missiles at Ashkelon, a large Israeli city on the coast. The Defense Minister announced that Ashkelon now will also have a red alert system, a further indication that the escalation is not expected to be short lived. And Itzik, the owner of the makolet around the corner from our apartment, reminded me that it if you add just a little more powder and a slightly larger tube, you have a missile that can reach Ashdod and Tel Aviv. Oy.

Vaykhel, this week’s parashah, teaches about the construction of both sacred time and sacred space – the Shabbat and the Mishkan, the portable Tabernacle. It also tells us of the community, the Human contribution, required for the creation of both. Last Friday, sacred space was created in Sderot, if only for a few hours. But the city of Sderot and the people of Sderot form central parts of the State, the Land and the People of Israel every day and we, those of us who don’t live there, are obligated to continue supporting them every day. There are a multitude of tzedakot to which you can contribute to support the people and the city of Sderot. And there will be more organized trips you can join. I only hope and pray that this Shabbat, our sacred time, as the community tries to comfort the family of Roni Yichyeh, and others work to heal the wounds of those hurt in Ashkelon and elsewhere, that there will be quiet along the border and Peace for Shabbat.

Shabbat Shalom.

To learn more about Roni Yihye, go to:

http://www.israel-mfa.gov.il/MFA/Terrorism-+Obstacle+to+Peace/Memorial/2008/Victims/Roni+Yihye.htm

Parashat Ki Tissah

On Wednesday, 6,776 people attended “Empathy with Sderot Day.” This wasn’t a march or a gathering in a specific town; rather, it was a Facebook event linking people all over the world in an act of solidarity with a beleaguered city. Participation included: changing the profile picture on your Facebook page, wearing red, or just joining the group. With no infrastructure or overhead, and in about a week’s time, 20,000 people were invited and about one-third took part!

Why Sderot? On and off for the past seven years, communities in Israel proper that lie close to the Gaza Strip have been subjected to almost daily Qassam rocket attacks. Since the withdrawal from Gaza, rocket attacks have increased significantly and Sderot is targeted on a near daily basis. While most of the rockets land in open spaces in the Western Negev and cause no injury or damage, a growing number of Qassams are finding their way onto Sderot, causing damage to homes and injuries to Israeli citizens. And even when they fall in open areas within residential areas and cause no physical damage, the mental stress caused to residents of Sderot and other border towns is immeasurable.

At a time when the general consensus is that the government here in Israel is not doing enough to support and protect the residents of Sderot, when there is general lack of faith in the government on this issue, two young Israelis decided to step in and make a difference: Udi Ben David, a shaliah at Camp Ramah Darom and a personal friend, and his friend Yonatan Saban. They created the Facebook event that raised the attention of Sderot in the virtual world. Theirs is not the only Facebook group for supporting Sderot, but it has garnered media attention here in Israel on the website of Yediot Acharonot and other Israeli newspapers, and on one of the morning news shows here. Moreover, their virtual event inspired others to create real world events to take place in Toronto and other cities starting next week. On Friday, the two friends will lead a group to Sderot in a demonstration of support.

Among the key themes in parashat Ki Tissa is a message about leadership vacuums and lack of faith. In the absence of leadership, people will fill the gap: sometimes well and other times, as in the case of the Golden Calf, poorly, focusing energy on the wrong things or acting narcissistically. At a time when there is little faith in either short or long-term solutions, where there is a perceived or real leadership vacuum in Israel on this, and other, issues, people like Udi and Yonatan are filling the vacuum in the most positive of ways: looking beyond themselves, reaching out to the world, supporting those who need to be supported, and hopefully restoring a modicum of faith to the residents of Sderot. Yasher Koach Udi and Yonatan and thank you for inspiring us and so many others to stand in solidarity with Sderot.

Shabbat Shalom.

News:

• You can watch Udi on Israeli television by going to http://video.nana10.co.il/?ArticleID=538954&pid=1 and you can read the article in Yediot Acharonot, in English, at http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3509028,00.html . Hebrew readers can see the article on the event at http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART1/699/558.html .
  


• Limmud Southeast + Atlanta is right around the corner. The Limmud phenomenon, which started years ago in the UK, is a gathering of Jews of all flavors who spend one to four days together engaged in Jewish learning. Limmud is expanding across North America and this will be the first annual Limmud in the Southeast. The program takes place March 1-2 in Atlanta. Among the many volunteers coordinating the effort are Jodi Mansbach, a Ramah Darom parent, and Anna Robinowitz Hartman, a long-standing member of the Ramah Darom family and a master educator! Rabbi Aaron Alexander is among the many presenters. Surf to http://www.limmudse.org/mc/page.do for all of the information.
  


• And for those of you who get hooked on Limmud, you can attend Limmud Colorado at the Keystone Resort May 23-26 which is being coordinated by executive director Beth Steinhorn, a classmate of mine from Willowbrook Elementary and Maple Junior High School. Thanks to Sue Parker Gerson for making the reconnection. More information on Limmud Colorado can be found at http://www.limmudcolorado.org/.

Miracle Girl by Katie Green

Yonatan Ariel of Makom - The Israel Engagment Network - shared this powerful piece with me. for those of us who grew up demostrating for his freedom, celebrating his release, and viewing him as a hero, it is wonderful to read about joyous moments in the lives of Natan and Avital Sharansky. This is long but well worth reading and is shared with the permission of the author via Makom.


MIRACLE GIRL

A Diary Note
by Katie Green

There are weddings and weddings in our lives. The weddings of ourselves, our relatives and our friends, and one generation later, the weddings of our children and our friend's children, which of course, are even more poignant than our own. There are the regular, every day, run of the mill weddings, the weddings where we ate too much or the music was too loud or we sat next to somebody’s Relative From Hell, and then there are the other weddings - the one or two weddings, which for the rest of our lives, we will never forget.

The wedding of Rachel Sharansky, the eldest of Natan and Avital Sharansky's two daughters, and Micha Danziger, a new immigrant from the United States, was one of those weddings.

The Sharansky wedding at Kibbutz Ramat Rachel last Friday morning was never going to be, never could be, in any sense a normal wedding. During the coffee and cake reception before the ceremony, I observed among the hundreds of people there, two distinct groups: the young people who were simply happy to be participating in the celebration and who had little idea of the historical significance of the event, and the older people who had taken part in the drama of the Refusenik struggle and for whom Rachel's wedding was the grand finale and closing chapter of that astonishing narrative.

My husband I wondered over to an alcove in the reception area to congratulate the bride. Rachel, more than radiant, more than happy, positively sparkled with her enjoyment of the day. Her lovely face, with its expression of intelligence, warmth and humor, looked up smilingly at every guest without a trace of nervousness of self-consciousness. The thought crossed my mind, as I stood at a distance where I could just enjoy looking at her, that this magical person very nearly did not come to be. In the configuration of the universe as we knew it in the early 1980's, the chances of there being a glowing Rachel Sharansky standing here in her wedding dress in 2008, were statistically very small indeed. All of us who participated in the demonstrations of those years, remember perfectly well, that whether Natan was in solitary confinement or on hunger strike or doing both together, there were times when we very nearly lost him.

On one memorable occasion I remember how shocked my parents were when, twenty-five odd years ago, a group of us disrupted a concert of the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Half way through the performance, we shed our outside clothes to reveal the striped “prison uniforms” we were wearing underneath, and handcuffed ourselves to the railings of the balcony in the auditorium, yelling our Soviet Jewry slogans and shaking our fists. As the cellos and violins and violas of the Moscow Philharmonic came slithering to halt, we knew, in the deathly silence that followed, that our Refusenik brothers and sisters would be listening thousands of miles away on the BBC World Service. It was only a few minutes before infuriated police officers arrived on the scene with large metal pincers to cut us free from the railings, but it was enough.

I speak of it now as if it were a childish prank, but it was not an easy thing to do. We were young and idealistic, but we were also nicely brought up middle-class Jewish girls and boys. We had all been taken by our parents on one Sunday evening or another to hear a concert at the Royal Festival Hall. We had learned to sit politely and not fidget and not applaud between movements. For years we had enjoyed Tchaikovsky and Saint-Saens and Schubert in this bastion of British culture, and now we were more or less spitting in its face.

The second before I had to stand up along with my friends, and shout at the top of my voice into the silent abyss of the stalls, my courage failed me and I did not think I could do it. The only thing, the only thing, which enabled me to get to my feet, was the thought of Natan in his solitary confinement cell, the thought of him never seeing Avital again. The reason why so many Jewish youth were participating in these demonstrations all over the world, was that Natan’s story was not just a prisoner story, or a persecution story, or even a Jewish story. It was a love story.

And it is this love story I am thinking of as I watch Rachel laugh and talk with all her guests, before her parents accompany her to her Chupah, before she marries Micha under the Jerusalem skies. I am here with her but I am not really here at all; I have risen in one second to my feet at the Royal Festival Hall, and have screamed : “Free Sharansky!” like an animal, at the respectable Russian musicians playing classical music on the stage below.

I have always known, across all of the years, what I was shouting for that night. But today, looking at Rachel’s face, at that beloved and wonderful genetic combination of Natan and Avital, today I really know.

At the wedding reception I did manage to exchange a few words with the mother of the groom, Mrs. Danziger. “It’s a great day for all of us”, I said and she smiled and answered, “I know it is”. But I couldn’t leave it there. “She’s the nation’s baby” I explained, trying to hold back my tears. “She’s our miracle girl”.

The weather forecast for Thursday, Friday and Shabbat had been discouraging – Rain, rain and more rain. On Thursday it rained all night. But G-d, one of the guests at the wedding, had decided to momentarily dispense with regular weather patterns for January, and Rachel and Micha took their place under a raised outdoor Chuppah, with a stunning view of the Judean hills behind and below them. The sun shone warmly and benevolently on the hundreds of people, Russians and Israelis and Americans and Brits, members of Knesset and rabbis and journalists and intellectuals, millionaires and philanthropists and activists and chairmen of committees, family and friends and very young babies and old age pensioners, who had gathered, with upturned faces, to watch the wedding ceremony unfold. A soft breeze played across the bride’s face and lifted her veil into the air, so that she looked, for a moment, like a floating figure from a Chagall painting.

“Sometimes a place is named for its future”, said Rabbi Moti Elon who was the officiating Rabbi. “Kibbutz Ramat Rachel was named for you, Rachel. It was named for you to get married here.”

When it was time for the groom to break the glass, Natan took the microphone to say a few words. “I’d like to say something about why we are breaking this glass” he said, alternating seamlessly between English and Hebrew. “Thirty-four years ago, in a Moscow apartment, Avital and I stood under a sheet held up by four boys, for our own Chuppah. There were barely enough people to make up a minyan. We had never been to a Jewish wedding before, and we had no understanding of what to do. We mouthed the words that the Rabbi told us to say, without knowing their meaning. But the breaking of the glass, this we understood very well. We had one challenge, and the challenge was very clear to us. We knew that we had to get to Jerusalem. No matter what it would take, no matter how many years, we had to get to Jerusalem and build a home there. And this is what we did.”

“So now you are standing under the Chuppah Rachel, a child born in Jerusalem, overlooking Jerusalem, the first sabra in our family, marrying Micha, the first Oleh Hadash from his family. And this begs the question: Why should we break the glass at all? We are here, after all. Jerusalem has been rebuilt, and it is a vibrant city.

But the reason we are breaking the glass is this: the challenge that faces you, Rachel and Micha, is different to the challenge that faced us. You will make a home in Jerusalem, yes, but you must simultaneously have your feet on the ground, building a Jerusalem shel mata, a physical Jerusalem, while always keeping an eye on the Jerusalem shel ma’alah, on what it means, on what it represents. It will be your mission, and the mission of all your generation, to defend Jerusalem, to protect her, to keep her safe. And I think that your challenge may, in the end, be even more difficult than ours”.

It will rain later, but not yet. I am standing in the sunshine, listening to Natan, looking at Avital, and glorying in Rachel, who has pushed her veil away from her face, so that she can see better, and hear better, everything that is going on at her wedding. She looks up at her tall, straight, young husband and smiles, and all of us watching her feel, that this is the just kind of person to whom we can entrust the future of Jerusalem.

Mazal Tov on your wedding Rachel Sharansky. Mazal Tov, miracle girl.

Man of La Mancha

This week saw the return of my incredibly talented soul-mate, Becca, to the professional stage. Starring as Aldonza in The Man of La Mancha, Becca was glorious and powerful, her voice rich in depth and intensity. She was clearly back in her element and took the breath of the audience away! One couple told me it would just be wrong for such an exceptional voice and talent to leave Israel. Kol HaKavod! You can see Becca as Glinda the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz in just a few weeks, where Mira will make her debut as a Munchkin!