[etni] Fw: Unity
- From: "Ask Etni" <ask@xxxxxxxx>
- To: "Etni" <etni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2009 08:50:34 +0200
----- Original Message -----
From: Esther Revivo - estherrv@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Unity
(A blog post called "Unity")
Finally back home. A whirlwind of buses are going through my brain. I feel
like my 4 year old grandson going "vroom, vroom, vroom" while holding a toy
truck. Within 5 days I have traveled throughout more cities than I care to
count including: Maale Adumim; Yerushalayim; Petach Tikva; Modiin; Nof
Ayalon; Lod; and finally today, moshav Tzafaria to get to Ulpanat Tzfira
(which is hosting our tenth, eleventh and twelfth grade classes.)
Our girls and I feel overwhelmed. Everywhere we go and everyone we speak to
has the same reaction. "From the south? How are you managing? Is there
anything I can do to help you?" Despite exhaustion from transit, I return
home revitalized. I have seen and heard parts of the great mosaic of our
nation, and I like what I see.
I like the fact that the girls (around 1000 I was told,) were so warm and
accepting of our pupils today at Tzfira. I adore the fact that everywhere we
see people saying Tehillim (Psalms) or praying in their own words for our
boys at the front. Not only that, a chocolate brigade (with cookies; cakes;
bisli; bamba-- you name it; it's there) is on its way to the front with
letters scrawled by children barely able to scribble along with packages
brought by men like my neighbor, Avraham --a very special Jew. American, I
don't think he likes to be categorized either as Dati Leuimi or Charedi. He
is simply a remarkably sensitive man with Ahavat Yisrael beyond measure.
Retired, these days he's never home. He's either at the Tze'elim army base,
or somewhere else on the war front, praying with the boys; talking with them
and spoiling them silly with treats.
Then, take Oshrat. She is from Nof Ayalon and spends a full day working with
pupils as her Sherut Le'umi post demands. Come evening, rather than relax
and unwind, she spends hours at her keyboard implementing Rav Kook of
Rechovot's initiative: sending people one name of one soldier they should
pray for until the fighting ends. (Interested? Write a note to
oshrati253@xxxxxxxxx)
Also, there's the retired elderly woman who used to teach at a Charedi
Seminary in Jerusalem. She saw busloads of soldiers waiting to leave Bar
Illan Street for the front. She ran into the nearest grocery store and came
rushing out with arms laden with sweets. Climbing aboard each bus, before
the driver could tell her, "Lady, this isn't the bus going to the Kotel...."
she said, "Dear men! Please know that we here in Israel all love you and
appreciate what you are doing for our people! We will pray daily until your
safe return home!" (My daughter witnessed this story which was published in
this week's Hebrew newspaper, "Mishpacha.")
Additionally, people of every walk of life: irreligious, religious,
traditional or simply.... Israeli, volunteering in every which way. Some
folks have opened their homes to total strangers for a week or more. Others
have donated everything from socks, undies, soap and snacks to send our
soldiers and toys plus other items to bomb shelters in needy areas of the
south. It is totally awesome, this tremendous outpouring of chesed-- one
giving another with no wish for recompense!
Still, one question keeps niggling at my conscience. Yes, these days are
heady with the glow of unity in the air not felt since Nachshon Waxman's
kidnapping. I can't help feeling sorrow however for the fact that it took a
WAR to make us quit squabbling like a rowdy band of children! If we could
only capture this aura, this delicious feeling of "us against the world,"
that reminds me of why so many of us made aliya and bottle it with a cork.
Anxious for the madness of these days to end, we all await the return to
normalcy. Nevertheless, I fear that come victory (I won't consider the
alternative!) this addictive fusion of our people with evaporate. Perhaps
either politics; religion; fashion; people with alternative lifestyles or
dress, will ignite another wildfire to divide us into opposing camps or
ghettos.
In the meantime it is quiet here in Netivot. This is a time for home and
hearth away from open spaces. A time for prayer, reckoning and hope.
Esther Revivo- Netivot
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