Sitting Shiva Once Again

It's that time of year again. Every time the Tisha B'av season rolls around, I feel my chest tighten up. Both our holy Temples were destroyed on that date, but sadly, I'm not on a spiritual level to feel this in any but an abstruse sense. The expulsion of our brothers and sisters from Gush Katif, on the other hand, seared my heart and scorched my soul.

Only one who has sat shiva can fully relate to what I am writing. Only if you have buried a loved one can you comprehend the most heartbreaking despair that exists in our world. That despair revisited my life for a second time four years ago. I can say without hesitance, that had I been one of the brave Jews forcibly evicted back then, I believe today I'd be in a lock-down ward in a psychiatric hospital somewhere.

I had already decided to make aliya at age nine, six years before I became religious thanks to my grandparents. (They themselves made aliya, but returned to the USA because they couldn't abide living so far from their children.) They bombarded their grandchildren with stories, postcards, and books about Israel throughout the year. Aged nine, I told my parents,"When I finish college, I am going to live in Israel." My parents were certain it was a phase that would pass. Thankfully it was not.

In the months leading up to the Gerush I participated in all the anti-expulsion demonstrations. Even though a alumni of the famed black hat Ponevitch Yeshiva, my husband asked me, "What will we say after 120 when we are asked in Shamayim what did we do for Eretz Yisrael??" I went to demonstrate; he sat and learned praying his zechuyot would help strengthen the fight to keep Gush Katif ours. Sadly, this was not standard practice for people in neighboorhoods such as mine. Tehillim for the Gush, yes; demonstrations, no.

The week following Tisha B'av was one of the most traumatic in my life. On the radio I heard distraught cries of many of my friends. For, the Ulpana where I teach has many teachers formerly from the Gush Katif settlements. The voices from the radio during those days will never be forgotten.

Aderet, an English speaker, moved to a settlement from Sederot two years before the expulsion. One grandmother was not told of her move; the other gave her a "shachpatz" (bulletproof vest) for her birthday!!!I recall hearing her cries as she was forcibly removed from her home in Morag.

Miriam and Shabtai Namburg were evicted from Yamit years ago before their second expulsion. Rav Shabtai was a Ram in Yeshivat Yamit. This couple ran an unofficial "Yad Eliezer," distributing cash and food to the needy for many years.

Smadar and her dear husband, Rav Gabi Kadosh lived through many trials during their lives while at Ganei Tal. Rav Gabi picked up a hitchhiker once who was shot dead from point blank range. How calmly the commentator spoke, "The Rav of Ganei Tal is now being led from his home...."

Bat Oren Mazaki recieved a troubling phone call while on our Ulpana's school trip one spring. "Don't worry," (When someone says this you know you have reason to worry!)"but a patzmar mortar landed in your living room. Your children were there but Boruch Hashem, nobody was hurt." What took the cake was that after this attack on his way home from work, her husband's station wagon took a direct hit through its back window. Mercifully, the mortar lodged in the back of the driver's seat without exploding.

One of the things I could not accept at that time was the apathy of many people in our country. I would speak to folks here in Netivot begging them to join me at rallies. "Even if you are not pro-settler," I would argue, "be selfish! Think logically: if these brave people are no longer there in the Gush WE in Netivot will sustain rocket attacks." People looked at me as if I was crazy! I hate saying, "...told you so!"

So tonight, tired from the fast I brace myself emotionally for a difficult week. A week steeped in memories made even more poignant when I see the sad situation of so many of these dauntless settlers. Unemployed, many have used much of their meager compensation payments to keep food on their tables. Compenation settlemnets? What a joke- as if anything physical could possibly compensate them for the horror they endured!

Let us pray as one that next year at this hour we'll be drunk with elation. Dancing, leaping and singing in ecstasy at the Kotel Ha'maaravi with the coming of Mosiach, no longer in fear of yet another expulsion led by those blind with self-importance and drunk with narcissism.