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“Why was the Second Temple destroyed? Because of Sinat Chinam, senseless hatred of one for another.” (Bavli Yoma 9b)

It is my responsibility to treat every human being with dignity and respect and with the call to justice, and to speak up when they are not treated well by others.

On the day when we’re supposed to be celebrating the reunification of Jerusalem, I feel especially alienated from the city in which I live and work.

As a citizen of Israel, I remember standing silently in my Jerusalem café as the sirens went off on Yom HaZikaron – Israel’s Day of Remembrance, honoring the memory of those who have fallen while on active duty as well as the civilian victims of terrorism. 24 hours later I was in my seat on Mount Herzl, celebrating Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel Independence Day. Weeping had given way to celebration.

I invite you to listen to a conversation between two individuals in the Jewish Community Centre in Kyiv. We hear a grandmother, whose family left her behind in Kyiv, and an unrelated teenager learning from the older woman:

For me, the key issue is not how a nation was founded, but how it sustains itself, how it treats all of its inhabitants, and how it strives to live up to the ideals enshrined in its sacred myth.

In the moments when I feel frustrated by a lack of instant gratification, I remember the hero of this Tu Bishvat story: the anonymous carob planter who knew he would never enjoy the fruit of his labor, but decided to plant anyway.

There is something beautiful and comforting in the notion that we know the cycle that life will follow and that it will repeat predictably. We are blessed with the Jewish year encompassing this regularity. Simchat Torah symbolically re-enacts the annual turning point between death and rebirth.

Join us this Tisha B’av in visualizing, thinking about and creating this new meta-narrative where both our Zionism and our liberalism can flourish, and peace can reign throughout the land.