October: A Month of Hope and Despair for Jews

”April is the cruelest month” That famed opening sentence of “The Wasteland” written by (the antisemitic) poet, T.S. Eliot.

Jews and Israelis might think that description applied to the month of October, which over the years, has been a month which has seen and experienced tragedy.

This October; Jews will be observing Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot. (Welcome to 5785).

Sadly there is a new “Secular” day of mourning which Jews will remember and mourn for decades and perhaps centuries to come: October 7th. This October 7th, Israelis and Jews across the World (with the possible exception of some Jewish haters of Israel); will mourn this first October 7th Anniversary and remember the slaughtered victims of that October Shabbat day and in the aftermath. Victims which included American men and women, some of whom were taken hostage and subsequently murdered. As we start a new October; Scores of Israelis remain hostages of Hamas in Gaza after almost a year.

Besides “October 7;” there have been other tragic October events for Israel and Jews, over the decades.

In 1973: “The Yom Kippur War” (or the “October War” began as Egypt and Syria launched their surprise attack on Israel. (It was a moment which almost no Jew in his sixties or over, will forget till he dies. (Certainly not this Jew, who followed the war news on British TV, for hours a day during those early shocking days.) It was a period when Israel’s very-existence seemed very-much in question (and was much-hoped for by some!)

October 1943, saw the famed “400 Rabbis March” in Washington DC when American Rabbis sought to urge President Franklin Roosevelt to get the US help in the rescue of European Jewry in the process of being exterminated in Nazi-occupied Europe. The Rabbis were famously refused that meeting with President Roosevelt – illuminating the then ultimate political helplessness of American Jewry. (A lesson which American Jewry has never forgotten)

There have been other October horrors. Just some of them listed below:

The 1985 hijacking by Palestinian Terrorists of the cruise liner, the Achille Lauro and the subsequent murder of the wheelchair-bound American tourist Leon Klinghoffer whose body was then callously thrown overboard.

In 1985: There was the Ras Burqa Massacre when an Egyptian solider opened fire on Israeli tourists in the Sinai; and then the wounded Israeli tourists were allowed to bleed to death on the Egyptian sand.

There were terrorist suicide bombings such as in 1994 on Tel-Aviv’s Dizengoff Street and at Maxim Restaurant in Haifa in 2003.

America too has been the victim of terror attacks in October: Hezbollah’s 1983 bombing of the US Marine Barracks in Lebanon, which killed 241 Americans and 2000 saw the AL-Qaeda attack on the USS Cole.

And in 1981 came the tragic, traumatic and actually unbelievable, assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat

There were of course also some positive actions which also occurred in Octobers as steps were taken to mitigate horrors.

In 1943: There was the famed rescue of Danish Jewry by fellow Danes and taking them to sanctuary in Sweden (something that no other country in Europe attempted to undertake with their own Jewish citizens. Sadly most but not every Danish Jew made it to safety. A few Danish Jews died and a number failed to escape and were  sent to Theresienstadt (including my Grandparents; Aunt and Uncle; but they all survived)

In 1973, the Nixon Administration enacted “Operation Nickel Grass.” The mass US air resupply of Israel as Israel fought on against Syria and Egypt (and so many countries just watched.)

October 1946: The first Nuremberg War Crimes Trial of senior Nazi leaders concluded with the conviction, sentencing (and execution) of a number of  High-Level Nazi officials…

And 1936: There was the famed “Battle of Cable Street” as Londoners actively opposed Sir Oswald Mosley’s Blackshirted British Union of Fascists” as they attempted to march through the Jewish East End.

1965 saw Nostra Aetate in which the Vatican Church and Pope Paul decreed that Jews were not responsible for Crucifixion of Jesus. Thus at least in theory, removing one prominent cause of antisemitism (although clearly not!)

Octobers have seen moments of advancements towards peace (or believed peace). In 1979: Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin received the Nobel Peace Prize for their Israel-Egypt peace agreement. In 1994, Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat shared the Nobel Peace Prize. 1991: saw the start of the Madrid Conference; 1994 saw the signing of the Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty and 1998: saw Benjamin Netanyahu and Yasser Arafat sign the Wye River Agreement.

As another October begins, with fighting in the North and South of Israel and with Hezbollah and other terrorists and haters of Israel and Jews, present around the World; one can’t help wondering how October 2024 will appear in retrospect.

Shana Tova and Gemar chatimah tovah