Maybe this year in Jerusalem

It is almost Passover again.

The matzah boxes have returned to the supermarket shelves

Kids cut out frogs and pyramids in kindergarten, not yet knowing what it means to be enslaved or free.

And the Haggadah waits, quietly, on a high shelf, like a story we tell ourselves every year in hopes that one day it might come true.

But this year, this year feels different.

Because this year, someone’s son is still in Gaza.

This year, a daughter still wakes up screaming in the night.

This year, there are empty chairs at the seder table that no one dares fill.

Not yet.

And yet — maybe this year in Jerusalem.

Not the Jerusalem of headlines and heartache,
not the Jerusalem of bureaucracy and broken promises, but the Jerusalem of the heart — the one hidden beneath the asphalt and the ancient stones. The wild, hungry, desperate hope and all of us — that Jerusalem.

Maybe this year, Jerusalem means coming home, not triumphant, not whole —
but tired.

Tired of war songs and sirens.
Tired of making peace with pain.
Tired of being the symbol everyone else fights over, while her people just want to sleep through the night without checking their phones to see who didn’t make it home.

Maybe this year, Jerusalem is less a destination and more a conversation.
A whisper. A reaching across the table, the divide, the silence.

“Why is this night different?”

Because we are.

Because after everything —
after too many plagues and endless deserts — we scan the sky for miracles and still insist on telling the story.

We are still setting the table.
We are still marbling at the youngest who asks the four questions.
We are still singing Dayenu, even when we don’t quite believe it.

(No, Gd, It WONT ever be enough until the hostages are home.)

Maybe this year, Jerusalem is a woman lighting two candles with trembling hands, whispering blessings for a world she no longer trusts but hasn’t given up on yet.

Maybe this year, Jerusalem is the soldier who carries a piece of matzah in her vest pocket, and the child who hides the afikoman behind a photo of someone they miss.

Maybe this year, Jerusalem is Yarden Bibas and Eli Sharabi, who humble us with their courage and strength — simply by waking each morning, having survived the deepest hell, only to step out into a world still scorched, desolate and broken.

Maybe this year Jerusalem is that sense of  understanding that we Jews of all backgrounds and walks of life must truly understand that we are brothers and sisters if we are to survive.

Maybe this year, freedom looks like NOVA survivors dancing again.

Or leaving our phones on silent.

Maybe this year, the hostages comes home.

Not to parades or speeches,
but to homemade chicken soup.
To silence.
To arms that remember how to hold, even after everything.

And maybe that is enough.

Maybe it has to be.

Because even now — especially now —
we end the meal with the same ancient wish:
L’shana haba’ah b’Yerushalayim.
Next year in Jerusalem.

But next year seems too far away. So maybe this time, maybe we dare to believe that this year, maybe this year — even though we are still in the desert –  we are already on our way.