Taanit Esther
Mar. 7th, 2012 09:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhuToday is Taanit Esther, the fast that precedes the holiday of Purim. I will never forget Taanit Esther of 16 years ago.
Heather and I were spending two weeks in Israel. It was my third visit, and her first. We were staying with our friends the Kamenses, who were there for a year. Purim is my favorite holiday, and our plans included something I'd always wanted to experience: a two-day Purim. Purim is celebrated one day later in Jerusalem than practically anywhere else in the world, so by going to Tel Aviv for a few days and returning to Jerusalem on the afternoon of Purim, we could have Shushan Purim as well.
A few days earlier, we had taken the bus to the Old City to take a walking tour with Menachem. I don't know his last name, but at the time, everyone said "Sign up for a walking tour with Menachem" -- and everyone in the Old City seemed to know him. The preceding Sunday, a bomber had struck the #18 bus. This morning, soldiers kept boarding our bus, walking down the aisle, sometimes asking to see people's papers or to spot-check bags, then getting off at the next stop to wait for the next bus. As we rode downtown from Talpiot, there was heated discussion on the radio of a #18 bus being bombed. While my Hebrew wasn't good enough to be certain, it seemed like they were talking about a second bombing of the same bus route that very morning, rather than continuing discussion of the previous week's attack. When we got to the Old City, Menachem confirmed the sad news.
After our walking tour, we walked to the modern section of the city for some more sightseeing. I don't know how it happened; we must have taken some twisty side street that no one had closed off, but we ended up walking down the closed-off street where the scorched empty husk of a bus sat in the middle. Pebbles of shattered safety glass crunched beneath our feet. Men were climbing the trees to gather every last scrap of bloody flesh, no matter how small. We hurried on by, realizing that we were where we weren't supposed to be. At the end of the street a large crowd stood behind the barricades, angry and shouting and chanting slogans.
The attacks had all been in Jerusalem. We continued with our plan, and took the inter-city bus to Tel Aviv for a few days of sightseeing there. We were looking forward to the "Ad Lo Yodei" parade, and we'd made arrangements through friends to attend an Anglo shul for megillah reading. The Kamenses joined us for Purim.
On Taanit Esther, we debated going to the Dizengoff Center, the main downtown shopping center, for some last-minute Purim supplies, but decided we were too tired and just went to the beach to relax instead. While we were there, we heard a loud dull "bommmmmmm". Although we'd never heard such a sound before, we knew instantly what it was.
The bomber, having been turned away from the mall by an alert security guard, found a group of teenagers and pre-teens getting ready for Purim and blew himself up next to them. The victims ranged in age from 12 to 81. In addition to the kids, those murdered included a mother and daughter, out shopping for a wedding dress.
We went back to the hotel. A chambermaid was sitting in the emergency exit stairs, the ones that had been converted to a safe room during the first Gulf War to protect hotel guests from chemical or biological weapons that might rain down, riding on Iraqi Scuds. She was racked with sobs. Everyone was staggering around in disbelief. We had not been the only ones to feel that even with Jerusalem's buses under attack, Tel Aviv would somehow be safe.
We made the obligatory phone calls to family and friends in the States. "Hi, we're safe, it's us, turn on the news, gotta free up the phone line for someone else. Talk to you later."
Then we tried calling the airline to see if we could reschedule our flight home. We were, in a word, terrorized. Filled with terror. I remember sitting on the hotel room bed, sobbing, "I don't want to die." We wanted out, as much as I'm ashamed to admit it now. Fortunately, I guess, we couldn't get through.
We watched the news coverage on TV. They showed things that would never pass muster on American news coverage at the time.... and, I think, were even more disturbing than what was aired after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks here.
We weren't leaving the hotel any more that day. We called the friend's sister who was our contact at the shul we had been planning to attend, to let her know that we weren't coming and she shouldn't worry. Jon read Esther for us from his tanach, not from a kosher scroll, but that was enough. We discussed the story: For the enemy had set out to destroy, murder, and annihilate the Jews, from young to old, children and women, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar.... And we went out into the midst of the city, and cried loud and bitterly.... For how can I bear to witness the catastrophe that befalls my people? How can I bear to witness the destruction of my people?
The next morning, we decided we'd feel safer taking a taxi back to the Kamenses' apartment in Jerusalem instead of the inter-city bus. By the time we arrived in Talpiot, it felt like a different world. In the evening, we walked to their minyan for megillah reading -- a kosher one, this time. And there was a defiant joy in the room. We were joyous because we were commanded to rejoice, but we were defiant because by being joyous in the face of murderers we weren't going to let evil destroy our spirits and our souls.
Every year, I think back to what I learned that Purim.
I saw what murderous anti-semitism looks like, and I had seared into my gut the lesson that the text from the Pesach seder is not just a rote liturgy with a catchy tune. In every generation they have come to destroy us. Not just some abstract history lesson about the people of whom I happen to be a part, no. In every generation, including mine, they have come to destroy us, including me, if they can.
But I also had poured into my heart the Jewish answer to that. In part, it's Plan your plans, but they will fail. Plot your plot, but it will not stand. For God is with us. But perhaps more important even than God's response is our own. We will rejoice in who we are, in the face of their determination to murder us. We believe, in the words of the megillah, at the moment when God's hidden hand saved us: For the Jews there was light and gladness and happiness and rejoicing.
So may it be for us.
----
May the memory of Rahel Sela, age 81; Sylvia Bernstein, age 73; Leah Mizrahi, age 61; Dan Dversky, age 58; Gail Belkin, age 48; Tali Gordon, age 25; Inbar Atiya, age 22; Assaf Wachs, age 21; Hadas Dror, age 15; Bat-Hen Shahak, age 15; Dana Gutherman, age 14; Yovav Levy, age 12; and Kobi Zaharon, age 12 be a blessing.
Heather and I were spending two weeks in Israel. It was my third visit, and her first. We were staying with our friends the Kamenses, who were there for a year. Purim is my favorite holiday, and our plans included something I'd always wanted to experience: a two-day Purim. Purim is celebrated one day later in Jerusalem than practically anywhere else in the world, so by going to Tel Aviv for a few days and returning to Jerusalem on the afternoon of Purim, we could have Shushan Purim as well.
A few days earlier, we had taken the bus to the Old City to take a walking tour with Menachem. I don't know his last name, but at the time, everyone said "Sign up for a walking tour with Menachem" -- and everyone in the Old City seemed to know him. The preceding Sunday, a bomber had struck the #18 bus. This morning, soldiers kept boarding our bus, walking down the aisle, sometimes asking to see people's papers or to spot-check bags, then getting off at the next stop to wait for the next bus. As we rode downtown from Talpiot, there was heated discussion on the radio of a #18 bus being bombed. While my Hebrew wasn't good enough to be certain, it seemed like they were talking about a second bombing of the same bus route that very morning, rather than continuing discussion of the previous week's attack. When we got to the Old City, Menachem confirmed the sad news.
After our walking tour, we walked to the modern section of the city for some more sightseeing. I don't know how it happened; we must have taken some twisty side street that no one had closed off, but we ended up walking down the closed-off street where the scorched empty husk of a bus sat in the middle. Pebbles of shattered safety glass crunched beneath our feet. Men were climbing the trees to gather every last scrap of bloody flesh, no matter how small. We hurried on by, realizing that we were where we weren't supposed to be. At the end of the street a large crowd stood behind the barricades, angry and shouting and chanting slogans.
The attacks had all been in Jerusalem. We continued with our plan, and took the inter-city bus to Tel Aviv for a few days of sightseeing there. We were looking forward to the "Ad Lo Yodei" parade, and we'd made arrangements through friends to attend an Anglo shul for megillah reading. The Kamenses joined us for Purim.
On Taanit Esther, we debated going to the Dizengoff Center, the main downtown shopping center, for some last-minute Purim supplies, but decided we were too tired and just went to the beach to relax instead. While we were there, we heard a loud dull "bommmmmmm". Although we'd never heard such a sound before, we knew instantly what it was.
The bomber, having been turned away from the mall by an alert security guard, found a group of teenagers and pre-teens getting ready for Purim and blew himself up next to them. The victims ranged in age from 12 to 81. In addition to the kids, those murdered included a mother and daughter, out shopping for a wedding dress.
We went back to the hotel. A chambermaid was sitting in the emergency exit stairs, the ones that had been converted to a safe room during the first Gulf War to protect hotel guests from chemical or biological weapons that might rain down, riding on Iraqi Scuds. She was racked with sobs. Everyone was staggering around in disbelief. We had not been the only ones to feel that even with Jerusalem's buses under attack, Tel Aviv would somehow be safe.
We made the obligatory phone calls to family and friends in the States. "Hi, we're safe, it's us, turn on the news, gotta free up the phone line for someone else. Talk to you later."
Then we tried calling the airline to see if we could reschedule our flight home. We were, in a word, terrorized. Filled with terror. I remember sitting on the hotel room bed, sobbing, "I don't want to die." We wanted out, as much as I'm ashamed to admit it now. Fortunately, I guess, we couldn't get through.
We watched the news coverage on TV. They showed things that would never pass muster on American news coverage at the time.... and, I think, were even more disturbing than what was aired after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks here.
We weren't leaving the hotel any more that day. We called the friend's sister who was our contact at the shul we had been planning to attend, to let her know that we weren't coming and she shouldn't worry. Jon read Esther for us from his tanach, not from a kosher scroll, but that was enough. We discussed the story: For the enemy had set out to destroy, murder, and annihilate the Jews, from young to old, children and women, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar.... And we went out into the midst of the city, and cried loud and bitterly.... For how can I bear to witness the catastrophe that befalls my people? How can I bear to witness the destruction of my people?
The next morning, we decided we'd feel safer taking a taxi back to the Kamenses' apartment in Jerusalem instead of the inter-city bus. By the time we arrived in Talpiot, it felt like a different world. In the evening, we walked to their minyan for megillah reading -- a kosher one, this time. And there was a defiant joy in the room. We were joyous because we were commanded to rejoice, but we were defiant because by being joyous in the face of murderers we weren't going to let evil destroy our spirits and our souls.
Every year, I think back to what I learned that Purim.
I saw what murderous anti-semitism looks like, and I had seared into my gut the lesson that the text from the Pesach seder is not just a rote liturgy with a catchy tune. In every generation they have come to destroy us. Not just some abstract history lesson about the people of whom I happen to be a part, no. In every generation, including mine, they have come to destroy us, including me, if they can.
But I also had poured into my heart the Jewish answer to that. In part, it's Plan your plans, but they will fail. Plot your plot, but it will not stand. For God is with us. But perhaps more important even than God's response is our own. We will rejoice in who we are, in the face of their determination to murder us. We believe, in the words of the megillah, at the moment when God's hidden hand saved us: For the Jews there was light and gladness and happiness and rejoicing.
So may it be for us.
----
May the memory of Rahel Sela, age 81; Sylvia Bernstein, age 73; Leah Mizrahi, age 61; Dan Dversky, age 58; Gail Belkin, age 48; Tali Gordon, age 25; Inbar Atiya, age 22; Assaf Wachs, age 21; Hadas Dror, age 15; Bat-Hen Shahak, age 15; Dana Gutherman, age 14; Yovav Levy, age 12; and Kobi Zaharon, age 12 be a blessing.