We are coming to the end of a turbulent and upsetting week, a week that no one imagined at the beginning would end like this. Every day of this week has shaken us emotionally and mentally.
On Sunday, tens of thousands gathered for a unity and prayer rally in Rabin Square. Young and old from all walks of life in Israel listened to the mothers' faith speech, listened to the politicians' statements, and embraced the artists' singing.
Only hope, faith, and unity floated in the air.
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The people of Israel prayed for the peace of "our sons." Some organized prayer rallies and singing evenings, and some were content with taking a selfie with a sign calling for the sons to be returned home. The slogan that penetrated the hearts of the people was "One people, one heart.".
The next day was completely different.
I was studying, the lecturer was speaking and the students were diving into their smartphones, WhatsApp was abuzz, reports, denials, photos, and countless hypotheses were exchanged with each message until the decisive message arrived:
""This is final.".
Two tense weeks of searching, an entire people united, and great hope shattered with two words: 'It's final.'.
Tuesday arrived, the feeling of a national day of mourning hung in the air, events were canceled, parties were postponed, and the entire Israeli people bowed their heads in memory of the murdered.
The funerals came from three locations. Tens of thousands of people flocked to the main funeral at the Modi'in cemetery, and everyone else listened to the obituaries via the media. The mothers' voices tore hearts and broke through the barriers of tears.
That's how I found myself standing in traffic on Ayalon with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand wiping away tears, and when I noticed that the driver in the car next to me was doing the same, I understood the meaning of "In their death, they commanded us to live.".
One people, one heart, one destiny.
Even Yair Lapid spoke about this, about unity, about the will of the children who would probably ask us to declare every morning, "I take upon myself to love each and every one of Israel as my own soul and my own body.".
Yes, Yair Lapid asks that we love more and hate less, that we engage in what unites and not what divides, and that we love each and every one, even if they are ultra-Orthodox, secular, settler, or leftist.
It was a defining moment. I prayed to the Creator that it would never end. Collect these moments of unity for us in a bottle and drip one drop every day, we owe it to you, Father, we owe it like an elixir of life for this complex and divided country, I hoped, I prayed, but I didn't know how quickly I would be lost.
When I opened the computer and saw the picture of Michael Ben Ari hoisted onto the shoulders of the protesters with his hands clenched into fists, I realized that this was it. It was over.
What was, will be no more, hatred has taken the place of love, bravado has replaced faith, and impulsiveness has shattered hope.
I have met Michael Ben Ari more than once or twice. He is an educated and intelligent man, I identify with most of his statements because the truth is a candle to his feet. I regretted that he was not elected to the current Knesset.
But it pained me so much to see that instead of participating in the funerals of the saints, instead of singing together with the whole nation and preserving this unity, he chose to demonstrate in Jerusalem, march through the streets of the city and imitate the best of our enemies in raging processions and cries of revenge with blood in his eyes.
The believing Jewish public has been revealed at its peak in the past two weeks. The Israeli public has been exposed to the power of faith, the greatness of prayer, and the uniqueness of the public that observes the Torah and the mitzvot. Yair Lapid wore a kippah and spoke about his prayer book. Completely secular people lit candles in honor of Shabbat, and dozens of young people asked me in meetings how it is possible to reach such a level of faith.
This was the golden hour of Judaism in the land and around the world. The world was amazed by the strength that the people of Israel radiated with restraint, hope, and faith in the face of the lowest of human beings, until that extremist group came and shattered everything in our faces.
Demonstrations of power, revenge marches, calls for murder, lynching of passersby - this is not our way!
This is the way of our vile enemies, and to defeat them we do not need to stoop to their level. Our pride is that the Jewish people are not war-loving and murder-hungry. Maran Rabbi Schach is well-known for saying after the Holocaust: "I am happy that I am a member of the people of the murdered and not of the people of the murderers.".
True, the pain is immense. The feeling of humiliation hurts and immediately leads to a desire for revenge, but let us not forget the rebuke of our forefather Jacob to his sons, after they killed all the men of Shechem: "And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, You have troubled me to make me a reproach to the inhabitants of the land... and they will gather against me and attack me, and I and my house will be destroyed.".
And today, the prophecy of our forefather Jacob is being fulfilled. We were at the height of our glory, the people of Israel identified with the faithful public and the world identified with Israel, and in one fell swoop we lost the legitimacy to act against our enemy and restrained ourselves from returning a single bite to them.
The media was quick to link the murder of the Arab boy to incitement by the far-right, and in one moment, "we were disgraced as a citizen of the land.".
How unfortunate that a week that began with the strength and love of the people of Israel ends with shallowness and hatred that erupts in all directions, and all this precisely in the week in which we read about Balaam, the most senior prophet of the nations of the world, who blesses the people of Israel and marvels, "How good are the tents of Jacob, your dwellings, O Israel... for they shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations," "How good are the tents of Jacob," because "they shall not be reckoned among the nations.".
We must denounce those extremists who try to imitate the shallowness of our enemy, thereby harming the uniqueness of "the tents of Jacob and the tabernacles of Israel," and remember that only with love will we win!
