Po Ve Sham

November 4th is probably one of the saddest days in the Jewish calendar. This day 19 years ago Yitzhak Rabin, Prime Minister of the State of Israel, was assassinated by a Jewish terrorist.
It is a sad day because a beloved person, serving the Jewish people died as the result of a political disagreement. But it is even more terrible when we think about what it symbolizes.
We are reading now the book of Bereshit (Genesis). We just learned about Cain and Abel, soon we are going to read about Jacob and Esau (sons of our ancestors Isaac and Rebecca), but this enmity between brothers is perhaps too far away from us… Ninth of Av is the day in the Hebrew calendar in which we remember the destruction of the Great Temple of Jerusalem, ascribing this tragedy to unjustified hatred or in other words religious fundamentalism. But this day is also far away….
Just a few months ago, this summer, at the time of “protective edge” when Israel and Hamas were fighting, other fighting was going on in parallel but that one was among us. Terrible words of incitement were said and written in the social media and everywhere. We were again Cain and Abel, we were again the brothers who didn’t know how to talk to each other… Again the magazine of the gun was being charged to “shoot” Yitzhak , but don’t worry , he was killed 19 years ago, so why do we cry today?
We cry today because we still hold in our hands the stones of our destructed house (the great temple) but we don’t know yet how to build together and with love.

Image: Eitan Moller