To All Our Moms, This One’s For You

This past week, I had the honor of working with one of Israel’s most impactful organizations – Momentum – helping guide a group of nearly 300 women on a seven day journey exploring their Judaism, the Land of Israel, their role as Jewish mothers, and the path through which self-discovery can be transformed into meaningful action.

Nearly 600 days ago, when the war broke out on October 7th, 2023, I, like most people, asked myself the question – “what can I do to help? How can I take action, using the skills that I have, to mend the brokenness that cast a spell across the world, especially amongst the Jewish people?”

On January 1st, 2024, I was called to action. Not to serve in the military, but rather to serve as the Madricha (guide) for Birthright’s first group to return to Israel after the war began. For 10 days, my purpose was rediscovered to me – to act as a bridge to the outside world, showing them that while the Land that can be shattered, it can never broken. I was called to reinstall a sense of hope and resilience, to be the vessel through which participants can see that the place they feel the most safe, the most optimistic, the most at home, is actually Israel itself.

Since then, I have had the opportunity to staff 16 volunteer trips, and last week, working with Momentum, I had the chance to work with the community from which the root of change emerges – Moms.

300 women from around the world – Israel, the US, India, Montenegro, Spain, Venezuela, France, Switzerland, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Chile, Argentina, Belgium (to name a few) – came together for a week long journey that lit up not only their own souls, but the souls of this country we call home. 300 women, 300 mothers, strapped on their boots and despite all challenges – flight cancellations, rockets, sirens, fears, worried family members, warnings, full-blown war – embodied the resilience and determination that is the essence of the Jewish people. They boarded their planes headed towards the unknown, guided by an unspoken faith can only be understood by experiencing it yourself.

Each trip I lead, I hear the same sentiments echoed – “I feel safer than I’ve felt since the beginning of the war”, “this place is home”, “I don’t understand the language but I feel that I know exactly what they mean”, “I’m going home a different person”, “how can so much pain still leave me feeling more joy than I’ve felt in years?”, “I can’t remember the last time I felt so alive”, “so many random acts of kindness”, “why are they thanking me for coming? I’m just grateful to be here”, and most importantly, “everything I’ve seen by coming here I could never have understood without seeing it in person”.

This trip, I walked beside 45 moms and watched as they put water into their roots system. I watched them ascend –  dancing at the Kotel, walking solemnly through the Nova memorial site seeing the faces of kids that could have been their own, I observed them as they sat inside a cramped bomb shelter-turned-community center in Ofakim making art for families who lost everything, I wiped a tear of resonance as they packed boxes of essential oils and notebooks for girlfriends and wives of our brave soldiers in reserve duty and thought about my own partner serving his duty now in Gaza, I sung the prayers that have united Jewish people for generations, through every war and struggle, and smiled on our last day as we all dipped our toes in the Dead Sea, floating both in our bodies and our souls. I marveled as these women rediscovered their inner light, moving from skepticism and fear from global antisemitism through grief and pain, followed by a softening into supporting one another to release everything they’ve been holding inside, concluded by the ultimate release, the ultimate communal breath of Oneness, of pure joy, for the radiant sense of belonging and peace they nourished as they made their way through the week.

A mom is an entire world – she is the connection from above to below, from child to adulthood, she is the bearer of life and the cultivator of the seeds. She is the teacher and the student, the listener and the speaker. She is the guide, but she will also follow you with every step you take. There is nothing more sacred in Judaism than the role of mother for her children. A Jewish woman is the trunk in which this incredibly intricate system, composed of roots, branches and leaves, blossoms again and again. These women didn’t just come to Israel to site see, for tourism, for fun, they came to wakeup. Stepping onto the bus in the morning, I saw them emerging, waking up physically, emotionally, spiritually, surrendering to the process that took place within them as they bore witness to the stories of families who’s lives had been turned upside down, who have lost parents, children, homes, entire communities, and yet still sit before us with the spark in their eyes that is the light of the Jewish people.

Prior to October 7th, participants coming to Israel on organized trips came to receive, to receive everything this country has to offer. They came for site seeing, for fun, for tourism, to receive the love and life that Israel pulses with in every inch of its being. Post October 7th, the dynamic of tourism in Israel has been transformed completely. For as much as the participants receive from this country, they give even more. With each step they take, I watch as the eyes of Israeli’s wake up in surprise, in curiosity, often asking me in my staff T-shirt, “where are they from? Why are they here?”, in disbelief that despite all the “danger”, all the warnings, all the concern, all the antisemitism, thousands of people from across the world are still boarding the plane to their shared home land. And they’re doing it with their hearts wide open.

The point of tourism is bridge building. Bridges cannot be built when one side is receiving and the other is giving. But these trips mean something else. They are a testimony that we are not alone, that the world has not abandoned you, that there are loving, kind, generous, open minded, steadfast individuals who are here through darkness and light, through health and sickness, through rich and through poor, through better and through worse. Standing there, hand in hand at the Kotel on Thursday evening, watching tears stream down the faces of women just days before Yom Yerushalayim, as simultaneously a wedding, bar mitzvah, and army initiation ceremony took place all at once, we were reminded of the most key part of our Jewish story – no matter where we come from, what tradition we practice, what food we eat, what language we speak, we are part of an eternal nation, a nation whose story is ancient, who’s roots stem further down than any other in history, and who’s branches continue to blossom even when the sun stays behind the clouds for months on end.

But for this dream to continue, we must remember, every single day, our shared unity, our shared goal. We must treat each other with the respect, curiosity, and openness that these women embodied on their trip through Israel.

For the past eight months, I have been traveling around the world. I took a break from guiding trips to recharge, to heal my own pains I have carried through this war, and to return, in the right time, to Eretz Israel ready to serve my people once again. And thanks to these women, these magnificent mothers, these worlds upon themselves, I have seen this country with fresh eyes, with the eyes of a mother who loves her child so much, that she knows she must teach it the lessons it needs in order to survive. Israel is our common child – and it is up to us to be the example, of courage, of listening, of abandoning fight or flight mode to make intentional, caring decisions for the wellbeing of our shared child. Day in and day out, it is up to us who our child will be in this world. Let us choose love.

Selah.