This past summer was a powerful one for the Jewish people. I will always remember where I was on June 12th when I found out that Gilad, Eyal and Naftali were kidnapped. I will always remember the look on my sister’s face on June 30th when she told me that they were found. I will never forget those 18 days of doubt, faith, and hope. Never before do I remember the Jewish people being so united.
I was privileged to help lead a high school Israel summer program this year with participants from all over North America. The program began shortly after the aforementioned events unfolded. In the days leading up to the trip I found myself swamped with emails and phone calls from participants and their parents, all wanting to know the same thing: How will we keep their kids safe over the summer? I told them all, “We are connected to the best tour provider in Israel. We get updates daily from the people at cheder hamatzav, ‘The Situation Room,’ who have connections to the Israeli army. They will tell us if any location is unsafe and, no matter what the circumstances, we will change plans accordingly.” This seemed to settle most parents – after all, not many rockets had been making their way into the county yet and many assumed that things would settle down.
As the hours to our departure crept closer, the tension in Israel continued to rise (and for me, so did my international phone bill). On the day we left, I was convinced not everyone would show up. I was sure someone would decide to make alternative summer plans. Much to my surprise, we boarded the EL AL flight at JFK with everyone who had signed up. Before we even left America, this group of high schoolers surprised me.
We landed at Ben Gurion at 5:30 a.m. and had a full day of activities planned for the group. For the first week of the program we were supposed to be based in Jerusalem and tour the surrounding area. Circumstances changed our initial plans and schedule, but we were still located in the holy city of Jerusalem. That afternoon we went to the Kotel as a group. Some of the participants had never been to Israel before so this was quite an exciting event. Together we davened Mincha. We tore kriah, kissed the wall, and then headed back to the hotel. That night everyone went to bed early, excited to spend the next day touring Jerusalem. Overall it was an amazing “excitement-free” day.
After everyone had gone to bed I was sitting in the hallway with another staff member uploading pictures from our first day of activities. We had just sent out an email to the parents updating them on the success of the day when we heard it – the muffled, chilling sound that sent needles down my spine: the air raid siren. The staff member and I shared a nod, then he ran to the boy’s floor and I, to the girl’s hallway. In most places in Israel you have approximately 90 seconds to get from wherever you are to the miklat, the bomb shelter. Now if you have ever been a counselor for high school students, you know that wake up is not the easiest time of the day. In fact, I normally spend most of my summer coming up with different creative ways to get them out of bed. This night was no different. It was not easy to get a group of high school students who have a loving relationship with their pillows out of bed and into a miklat in 90 seconds. And truth be told, we didn’t. Thank G-d the rocket was nowhere near us, and thank G-d the iron dome knocked it out of the sky. We did eventually get everyone into the shelter just in case more rockets came. We stayed inside trying to get everyone’s mind off of the outside by playing mindless games and singing songs. But everyone was thinking the same thing: “It’s our first night. I don’t know these people yet, and I’m sitting in a bomb shelter.” After fifteen minutes we sent everyone back to their rooms and told them to try to get some sleep. I’m not sure how many of them did. Needless to say, the next morning we packed up our bags and traveled north, where we ended up staying for the next few weeks.