Israel’s airspace and the canaries at the coal mine

It may sometimes be hard to understand the extent of the aggression against the Jewish people. The most recent terrorist attack in the city of Halle, Germany, claimed the lives of two innocent people who were at the wrong place at the wrong time. They paid with their lives because of the frustration of a maniac for not being able to enter a synagogue, despite trying hard, to assassinate as many Jews as possible on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur, the day of forgiveness.

Jana Lange and Kevin S, the victims of Halle’s terrorist attack.

This is undoubtedly the day when synagogues around the world are at full capacity. The day that even members less devout to the daily rituals of religion make a point of being present and participate.

It is the moment of the year that we stop for twenty-five hours fasting, both liquids and solids, trying to wrap up all the memories, good and bad, that were recalled in ten day period between Rosh Hashana (New Year) and Yom Kippur the the day of atonement, the day we are confirmed in the book of life.

It is a rare opportunity to retreat, to detach, to meditate, to pray, but also to meet, to congratulate, to embrace, to wish the best to all, to come closer, to come together, to celebrate, to be proud, to love and be loved.

On this very same day, of so many emotions, so much exposure and in our moment of greatest “weakness”, we were attacked in our temples with the most sacred thing we have.

In the place of love, hate;
In the place of joy, fear;
In the place of calm, panic;
In the place of forgiveness, punishment;
In the place of peace, blood …

The fact is that Jews are like the canaries in the coal mines, the first ones to realize the evil to come.

And now, in the 21st century, in the same Germany, almost seventy-five years after the end of the holocaust in which six million innocent people were murdered simply for being Jewish, Jews are the target again. This is not only an attack against Jews, it is indeed an attack on every free society, an attack on everyone that loves liberty, at a time of increasing antisemitism everywhere but especially on the old continent that insists on making the same mistakes, century after century….

They want our end, they want us not to congregate, they want the end of our traditions, our struggle for a fairer world, our millennial history, our future ….

They will not succeed, but the civilized world must stop only sending condolences and take action before the mine has no more canaries to alert them.

Pictured below is a reproduction of the Israeli airspace map during the day of Yom Kippur 5780, the only Jewish state in the world, the Jew among the nations.

Israel’s Airspace temporarily closed for all flights until the end of YomKippur