An Understanding Heart

  wing October 7, when the scope and horror of the Shemini Atzeret massacre became clear, I felt my mother’s experiences during the Holocaust come to life before my eyes. I felt overcome with grief and fear.  Yet, in the days that followed, something else became abundantly clear, and I was overwhelmed by its power.  I saw and heard how, on that terrible day, people put their lives on the line—and indeed many gave their lives—for fellow Jews they had never met before; how a divided Israel and a fragmented Diaspora Jewry came together in love and unity. I saw a new Jewish consciousness emerge, a realization that Jews share an essential bond with Israel and with each other that transcends all our differences. To quote the Tanya , “ It is on account of this common root, shared by all the Jewish people in the One G-d, that all of Israel are called siblings—in the full sense of the word.” Like siblings, we can disagree but the unbreakable bond is always there. But this new consciousness has