What I saw in Israel’s streets today

What did you see in Israel’s streets today?

When I walked through the streets this morning, dazed and incredulous and a little drunk on happiness, I saw people with smiles that seemed too large for their faces, and feet that seemed to dance instead of walk.

But I also saw pained people, for whom this morning’s hope carries an edge of sorrow: their loved ones, their dear ones, won’t ever come back home.

I saw a man taking out a bottle of wine to share a toast with strangers in the public square.

I saw a woman weeping as she prayed.

I saw a man aglow with hope for his relative’s imminent return from captivity in Gaza.

I saw a man bowed down with worry, afraid of what we’ll pay, of all the ills that may yet come.

And I saw the sun break through the clouds and bathe us all – the joyous and the mournful and the hopeful and the sober. And everyone I saw was dear to me, was mine.

Their feelings – your feelings – may differ from mine in this moment.

You may experience the news through a different lens, a different set of experiences and expectations.

We all came into this war from different backgrounds and with different sensibilities, different abilities and fears and hopes and limitations. The challenges we faced were also different, and we tackled them in different ways, paying different prices. Some of us paid in pain and worry. Others paid in endless military service and hundreds of days away from loved ones. Most painfully, many among us paid in physical and mental wounds, in broken families, in loss of loved ones. And throughout it all, we often disagreed about the goals we should strive for and the right way to achieve them. So it is only natural that our hearts feel different things today as well.

But when I met your eyes in Israel’s streets today, I didn’t experience our differences as alienating. I wasn’t looking to see who shares my own response and who does not. I looked into your eyes because I wanted to show you that I care about you. Whatever you feel today: your hope or joy or fear or grief or pain or worry – I see it, I see you, and while I can’t always understand, I want to try. You – we – don’t have to carry our separate feelings on our own.

We lived through a cataclysm, and here we are, still together, almost, maybe, on the other side. Our difficulties aren’t over. Our future isn’t free of painful challenges. The ones we lost will not come back, and our disagreements won’t come to a sudden end. But I pray that we can make space for one another, for our battered hearts and complicated feelings, and hold the weight of this complexity together. I pray that we can walk through this day hand in hand, with love and caring. And I pray that in so doing, we can become a birthplace for the softer future we can share.