War with Iran, a teaching opportunity

Israel is at war with Iran.  Those looking to leave Israel for the United States and destinations around the world have found their flights canceled.  So, too, have those wanting to be in Israel. Thousands are affected with no date for flight resumptions in sight.

Each year, thousands of American Jewish families pack suitcases, kiss their sons and daughters goodbye, and place them on planes bound for Israel. Some are headed for a “gap year” between high school and college, others for immersive Torah study or a deepened connection to Judaism and the Jewish homeland. It has become, for many, a rite of passage—rooted in faith, identity, and belonging.  Others come for summer programs of studying, volunteering, and touring in a foreign country they think of as home.

In Israel, no matter what brings them, these young people live much like their Israeli peers. They ride the buses. They walk through the shuq at Machne Yehuda in Jerusalem and shop at their local makolet (grocery store.) They find favorite falafel or schwarma stands and coffee shops and learn to argue in Hebrew. (“They are not really arguing,” my then 10-year old granddaughter told me some years ago, “they’re just talking loud.”) Some go further still, joining the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) out of conviction, love of Israel, or a sense of destiny. They take on the uniform not out of obligation, but devotion.

But Israel is not Switzerland or, as I told a parent 30 years ago as we waited at JFK for our daughters to board a flight to Israel, “it’s not Uganda.” We know this. And tragically, sometimes, the risks become real.

Now, war once again rages. Sirens sound, everyone runs to shelter, rockets fall, there are casualties and every parent’s heart sinks. In communities across the United States, Jewish parents check WhatsApp obsessively, glued to updates from Jerusalem and Sderot, Tel Aviv and the Galilee. The instinct is primal: for parents with children in Israel now, bring them home. Get them out. For those with children heading to Israel for the summer, cancel the trip.  Why should “our” children be caught in “their” war?

It’s a fair question. But we must respond with a deeper one: What are we teaching our children about the meaning of Jewish peoplehood, of Zionism, of responsibility and resilience, if we evacuate them or don’t permit them to travel the moment Israel is tested?

Israel was never supposed to be just a summer program or a semester abroad. It is not a theme park version of Jewish identity. It is real life—and real life includes struggle. To learn in Israel is to live Judaism not as theory, but as practice. To love Israel is to embrace her not just in times of song and sunshine, but in moments of sacrifice.  Israel is Biblical prophecy come true, as the navi (prophet) announced God’s promise: “Old men and women shall yet sit in the streets of Jerusalem, each man with his staff in his hand because of old age. And the streets of the city shall be filled, with boys and girls playing in its streets.”

This is not a call for recklessness. Safety matters. Programs must make responsible decisions, and individual families should act in consultation with educators and professionals. But we must not let fear alone drive our choices. Our children come to Israel to learn—and this, too, is part of their education.

They are learning what it means to be part of a people that carries memory and mission, often in the face of enemies. They are learning what it feels like to pray in a bomb shelter and sing “Am Yisrael Chai” in defiance of terror. They are learning that being Jewish is not only about personal growth, but national commitment.

Most importantly, they are learning that the Jewish story is still being written—and they are part of it. When he penned Magesh HaKessef (the Silver Platter) before the War for Independence broke out, Natan Alterman recognized this and concluded the poem “and the rest will be told in the chronicles of Israel.”

This war will end. As all wars do. And when it does, I pray that on one will tell their child, “You can’t go.”

Let us not teach them that Israel is only theirs in good times. Let us teach them that their presence matters especially in hard ones. That to be Jewish is to wrestle with risk, with faith, with history—and still to stand proud.

They do not come to Israel to run. They come to belong. Let them learn what that truly means.