CM Mission to Israel Second Day Report - Tuesday August 19, 2014

We then headed to Ashkelon and visited Kehilat Netzach Yisrael. We heard from a number of speakers there. Marty Davis spoke about the effect of the rockets on the community, particularly the children. The community is starting two therapy programs to help children deal with PTSD and anxiety caused by the rockets. Marcelo Burdan, a member of the community (Speaking of rockets, I was just interrupted from writing this update by a siren in Jerusalem. More on that later) works for the Ashkelon municipality and is responsible for sports and recreation. When the rockets started, all the summer offerings had to be canceled and he had to find alternative programming. Nir Yaakovson, a parent, told us how he had paid for summer camp for his two daughters but it was canceled and they had to scramble to find coverage. We were also privileged to meet David Ariel, a Holocaust survivor who came to Israel on the Exodus. He's lived through every war since. Then, Rabbi Gustavo Surazski told the group that life doesn't stop during the rocket fire. This summer he's visted the sick, and performed funerals and been interrupted by sirens and rockets all the while. We were impressed with the resolve of the community and with the work they were doing to support the entire Ashkelon community throughout the summer.

 

Next we met with Lt. Col. Gadi Dror, son of our colleage Gilah Dror. Gadi is responsible for commanding an artillery batallion and his unit has been active for 8 weeks, first in searching for the 3 Israeli teenagers and then with providing cover fire for Golani and Givati brigades while they destroyed the Hamas tunnels. His troops fired over 10,000 shells in the last operation. We met Gadi in the field, a temporary camp that was set up for this operation. He told us that each artillery target is examined and is determined to be military and that there were potential targets that they aborted because of civilians in the area. In response to a question about the upcoming UN investigation, Gadi told us that he was there for the whole operation and the rules of engagement were followed. He was proud to tell us that Israel leads the world in minimizing civilian casualties in war.

 

The group then traveled to Kehilat Eshel Avraham in Be'er Sheva. We did not get to see Mauricio Balter as he is on a well deserved vacation, but we felt his presence. Heidi and Elizabeth, community leaders, told us about what their community is doing to help their members and members of Be'er Sheva generally cope with life under rocket fire. For example, their community has a phone tree to in four languages to check up on community members after rocket attacks. We also heard from Rakefet Ginsberg, the Masorti staff member who has been dealing with movement efforts to support communites since the last war. The war has affected not just those under fire, even with a largely expanded range, but even communities from further north that had children or parents called up to fight. The Masorti movement has been there for rabbis and lay leaders, and helped them to cope. 

 

After Be'er Sheva we headed towards Omer. On the way we heard that there were rockets fired from Gaza, though no alarm sounded. While there we heard Israeli jets overhead on their way to respond to the broken ceasefire. Yonatan Sadoff welcomed us to his community and told us that like Aaron and Hur supporting Moshe's hands, our presence was supporting the Israeli people. 

 

The group next traveled to Modiin where we met Racheli Frankel at Kehilat Yedid Nefesh. She told us of the strength she drew from the support of Jews around the world and answered questions from the group. She spoke about getting up to say kaddish and how she hadn't contemplated it, but that it felt natural to say it. She said it was received well in Israeli society, perhaps because it was an eit ratzon, the right time. 

 

During dinner, members of Ramah, Noam, Masorti and USCJ staff joined us. We met each of them and heard a bit about their programs. Loren Sykes told us that the Conservative movement should be proud that we were the only movement that did not send kids home from summer programs as a result of the war. 

 

As I mentioned above, I was interrupted from writing this update becuase of a siren in Jerusalem. It looks like there were many sirens all over the country. The Iron Dome battery we visited earlier intercepted several rockets as did the one near Jerusalem. Here at the hotel we calmly went to the stairwell and met fellow hotel residents in various stages of awakeness. We chatted for a bit and then went back to our rooms to try and get some sleep.