Two Worlds, One Tragedy

In the wake of the return of the remains of Meny Godard, a 73-year-old Israeli who was mercilessly slain on October 7th, there is a deep truth that demands to be faced. The truth is that within this one tragedy — the war between Israel and Gaza — two different worlds exist side by side. And I believe it is important for society and world leaders to be aware of this truth, because only when they truly incorporate this understanding will they recognize what they themselves may be facing in Europe in the very near future.

Meny was a man full of life. In his youth, he was a soccer player, and later he enlisted to fight in the Yom Kippur War. Throughout his life, he kept the balance between being an open, caring member of his community — a devoted father and grandfather — and fighting for the survival and the right to live in his land. From his family we know he was the kind of grandfather who always arrived first to his grandchildren’s functions. We know that his wife, Ayelet Godard, who was also murdered on October 7th, was a caring teacher, beloved and remembered by all. Ayelet witnessed the murder of her husband and waited in terror until they murdered her too.

The partial remains of Meny had already been buried. Because one horrible truth of October 7th is that the invaders were not just happy with killing people — they wanted to destroy them. They wanted to burn them, to erase them, to make them disappear down to their memory. They wanted to take the last dignity of a person and burn them to the core. Many people who were murdered that day were identified not by their faces, which were destroyed, but through belongings, fragments, or whatever remaining DNA could be found. Archaeologists had to resort to techniques normally used for ancient remains in order to help identify the deceased.

This cannot be forgotten or confused with another war. This was something else entirely — a complete disregard for human life, the playing out of violence with no rules at all. And this should not be allowed, accepted, or condoned by any civilized world, no matter what justification or idea stands behind the attack.

And then we learned something even more unthinkable. Another partial piece of Meny’s body was recently returned by the Red Cross, as part of the latest agreement. Which means that after death, they mutilated his body, keeping a portion of it with them — essentially kidnapping it — to be used as a bargaining chip.

I ask all of us to bear witness, for Meny. Because we owe it to him not only to remember how he died, but how he lived. And we owe it to ourselves to understand what these organizations stand for. A terrorist organization cannot be normalized. It cannot be legalized and placed in a suit and invited to polite dialogue between parties. The real world must understand who we are dealing with here.

And this is important not only because this is Israel’s problem. Fundamentalism is around the world. It has spread like a bad flu. What we saw on October 7th can, and possibly will, take place in other places. People need to wake up to the dangers of fundamentalism left unchecked.

There is another point I want to raise, and it has to do with the double standards toward Israeli victims. Recently, a UN official stated that they were conducting an independent investigation, and that they had “inconclusive evidence” regarding the atrocities that took place on October 7th. And I ask: How can we allow this type of rhetoric at all, when there is footage filmed by the terrorists themselves? When we have testimony from the morgues describing bodies in horrific shape that reflect exactly what happened? When no less than three different hostages have come forward and testified openly about these crimes?

To turn a blind eye to the tragedy and the injustices that took place on October 7th — to imply that the evidence is unclear — is a disrespect to life itself. It is a direct challenge to humanity’s moral compass. And it is easier for some people to doubt Israel than to confront the reality of what evil looks like. But denying the truth does not protect anyone. It only empowers those who commit these crimes.

Let us learn the lesson from the oldest warning sign known to history: the Jewish people have always been the canary in the coal mine. It starts with the Jewish people, but it never ends with the Jewish people. What happened to Meny Godard is not just an Israeli tragedy; it is a warning to the world about what happens when fundamentalism is excused and when moral clarity is lost.

May we bear witness. May we honor Meny — how he lived, how he loved, and how he showed up for his family and his community. And may we have the courage to see the truth before us, and to speak it, even when others prefer to look away.

Food for thought.