Chanukah! It Happened Right Here!

Take a good look at this map.

The map isn't on a proper north-south axis. 

Most people, ok, Jews, are aware that there are two versions of the classic and still popular dreidle, sivivon, Chanukah spinning top. One has the Hebrew letters, נ, ג, ה, פ  and the other has  נ, ג, ה, ש. They stand for:

 !נס גדול היה פה Nes gadol haya poh!  
!נס גדול היה שם Nes gadol haya sham!

and mean

"A great miracle happened here!"
"A great miracle happened there!"

Many of the battles were right here in the Shiloh area. Maale Levona is just west of us, and Baal Hazor is to the south. As I noted in the map's caption, the map isn't on a proper north-south axis.

In the early years of our local elementary school, Ohel Shiloh (which has been divided into two separate schools, one for boys and the other for girls, for over fifteen years,) there used to be a school trip for the Second Grade before Chanukah. The children would be bused to one of those nearby historic mountains for a special Chanukah activity.

The last year I taught there as the girls PE Gym Teacher, I had been asked to accompany the classes, then there was one of girls and one of boys, on the trip. The children were equipped with fake swords and the boys were let off on the bottom of the mountain, while the girls were let off on top. They were instructed to meet and battle it out on the perilous (at least to me who has a fear of heights) cliffs. None of the children, that year at least, showed any fear, though I was terrified and needed the help of the accompanying soldiers to help me down.

Year after year this was done until the fear of Arab terror attack during the intifada made the school security official decide to stop the trips. That was when I learned that the Chanukah story, our history of battles against the Greek enemy didn't just happen in Jerusalem around the Temple Mount.

 !נס גדול היה פה Nes gadol haya poh! 
 "A great miracle happened here!"

Fellow Jews, How About Relocating to Israel?

The OU is promoting relocating to various Jewish communities in the United States.  Apparently, these fairs they've been running are so successful that the number of communities asking to be promoted is growing.  And some of those communities are in the Greater New York area, which has me very surprised.  I never would have guess that those communities need the extra support from such an event.

Now surprise, I'm sure, but I don't understand how Israel is not considered an option.  Granted the OU is an American Jewish organization that wants to perpetuate itself, but still there are Jewish principles, such as the mitzvah of ישוב הארץ yishuv ha'Aretz, settling the Land of Israel.

My husband and I made aliyah just two months after our wedding in the summer of 1970.  That was decades before the establishment of Nefesh B'Nefesh.  Today's olim have a much easier time than we did, and we consider our aliyah to best decision we ever made, tying with our move to Shiloh.

In 1970, not only weren't there cell phones, or internet, but not every Israeli family had a phone.  Many had to wait a minimum of a year or even seven to get a phone line.  We communicated with family and friends by sending letters, paper letters in envelopes with stamps.  Letters written between countries were frequently on aerogrammes, a one page, very thin and light paper, which we'd fold and seal.  It cost less than an airmail stamp. I have a number of friends whose very first trip to Israel was their aliyah.  Most people could not afford a "pilot trip" and the concept didn't exist then.

We weren't among the very first families in Shiloh.  We moved to Shiloh in time for the school year, the summer of 1981, when the population doubled from thirty plus families to sixty plus families.  Shiloh was the first Jewish community in our area, and we enthusiastically welcomed Eli and Ma'ale Levona.  Davka, last night a picture of the founding ceremony of Ma'ale Levona was posted on our email list as a quiz/challenge asking the veterans here who is in the picture.  I'm the young mother holding that adorable baby.

The establishment ceremony of Ma'ale Levona, spring, 1984, which we from Shiloh attended.

a more up to date picture of Ma'ale Levona

Today there are so many different sorts of places for people to live in Israel, from small communities to large cities.  Israel is now a modern high tech country.  If you're in the market to move, so move here and do yourselves a big favor!