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Rachel Peck

Israel At War 5785: Va’eira – At Long Last, Let My People Go

What does it take to persuade tyrants to let enslaved people go? From Pharaoh to Hamas, too much.

In this week’s Torah portion, Va’eira, we read how even increasingly devastating plagues did not persuade Pharaoh to set the children of Israel free. In our time, Hamas, despite unprecedented death and destruction, has waited more than a year before finally agreeing to let the remaining hostages go. And the price, releasing murderers who may kill again, is high.

Why and how did Pharaoh then, and Hamas now, hold out for so long?

Both played for time, delaying plagues or military attacks by making partial concessions. Pharaoh agreed to let the slaves go, but just for three days, or without their livestock or their children. But he never really intended to let the people go; he was trying to end the plagues without giving up his slaves. Similarly, Hamas, after an initial hostage release in November of 2023, pretended to negotiate but only as a delaying tactic to allow their fighters to regroup. They demanded a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, knowing this would be a nonstarter. They insisted on a permanent ceasefire and withdrawal of IDF troops from the Strip, another nonstarter.

Both upped the ante. Pharaoh commanded that the Hebrew slaves would now have to collect their own straw to make bricks. Hamas threatened to repeat October 7th until Israel was eliminated, and broke a temporary ceasefire by firing rockets into Sderot. And after the initial hostage release, they not only refused to free more captives, but murdered some when the IDF got too close.

But for both Pharaoh and Hamas, the strongest card was what the RAND Corporation, a prominent American think tank, calls “will to fight.”

The Torah tells us that, initially, Pharaoh hardened his heart. But midway through the plagues, something strange happened. The text tells us that Hashem hardened Pharaoh’s heart. But why? Why would He not only strengthen the enemy but also prolong the people’s suffering? Hashem told Moses: “And I will harden the heart of Pharaoh, and I will multiply My signs and My wonders…Not listen to you will Pharaoh…and I will take out my people with great judgments. And Egypt will know that I am Hashem when I stretch out my hand over Egypt…” (Exodus 7:3, 4, 5)

Reading this, it is difficult not to conclude that G-d was deliberately prolonging this drama to glorify Himself. But couldn’t he have done that without hurting the slaves, his people, in the process?

Moses apparently thought so. He demanded: “Why have You done evil to this people?…You did not rescue!” (Exodus 5:22, 23)

But perhaps we have cause and effect confused. Hardship frequently has the effect not of weakening resolve, but of strengthening it, whether in our personal lives or in war. Did Hashem harden Pharaoh’s heart to help him resist, so that He could keep sending more plagues, showing His power and building up His reputation? Or did He send plagues knowing that they would initially make Pharaoh’s will firmer before ultimately breaking it? Was He telling Moses the point was to increase His glory, or warning him that Pharaoh’s hardened heart would be the natural consequence of the plagues?

G-d knows human nature, including Pharaoh’s. He knew that the devastating plagues would, for a time, strengthen Pharaoh’s will to resist. He was warning Moses that this battle would not be easy. It would take many plagues, concluding with a final terrible one, to break Pharaoh. And even after caving in and letting the Hebrew slaves go, Pharaoh changed his mind and pursued them, only to have his army wiped out at the Sea of Reeds.

So, too, the total destruction of Gaza only seems to have strengthened the hearts of Hamas, who are as oblivious to the suffering of their people as Pharaoh was to that of his subjects. And like Pharaoh, the callousness and stubbornness of Hamas only resulted in their own destruction, along with that of their ally Hezbollah and sponsor Iran.

In any war, it always comes down to who can impose the most hardship and who can strengthen his resolve the most and the longest. While Hamas seems to have unlimited hard-heartedness, the Jews do not. We cannot harden our hearts indefinitely. The suffering of the hostages, prolonged for many of them now for more than a year, makes us, too, cry out, “Why have You done evil to this people? You did not rescue them!” And so we accept a horrible deal, freeing hundreds of murderous, Jew-hating terrorists as the price for bringing our people home.

We will never know whether continuing the war in Gaza would eventually have forced Hamas to free the hostages without receiving murderers from Israeli prisons in return. And even if Hamas had unconditionally let the people go, would they, like Pharaoh, have pursued, or, in the present context, repeated October 7th? Will they yet have the strength, especially with fresh troops from released prisoners, to do so? An analysis of the list of Palestinian prisoners to be released shows the vast majority are men of fighting age guilty of violent offenses. While Israel prioritizes the release of women, children, elderly, sick, and wounded first, Hamas clearly has other priorities.

Perhaps, as in Egypt, the Gazan Pharaoh’s troops can be wiped out after the hostages’ liberation. But there may not be a clear-cut, satisfying ending.

We can only hope to see a Sea of Reeds moment.

About the Author
I was born in Washington, DC, and raised in the suburbs, but now reside in the temperate rain forest of the Pacific Northwest. I am a retired editor and proud Zionist. After October 7th, with our beginning again the yearly cycle of Torah readings, I kept seeing wisdom from our Torah that related to the current war and felt moved to write about this. In addition to finding some of my posts here, you can find all of them at https://kosherkitty.wordpress.com/
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