Imagine UN Me
Save the date for an LA Meetup February 24th!
Hello from the tunnels of midtown Manhattan! This will be a heavy one, with photos of fallen soldiers and destroyed homes. Fear not though, the episode leaves plenty of room to talk about pickled fish, how a bunch of NYPD cops found themselves at a kosher sushi joint, and a personality breakdown based on your favorite Ninja Turtle.
We discuss the personal stories of two fallen IDF soldiers - Ahmad Abu Latif and Cedrick Garin. Both young and motivated newlyweds, who fought to join the IDF despite not being Jewish. They are Israeli heroes. Here’s a video taken just days before they were killed:
Our friend
wrote a beautiful piece about Ahmad in Reason. Nancy and I drove to Rahat to visit Ahmad’s family and pay our respects, and got to meet his lovely father who offered some words about his son. While in Rahat, we also met a Sheikh who moved into a tent and vowed not to go back home until all the hostages are home.
You can read more about Cedrick Garin here, and also in this tweet that got piled on by Filipino/K-pop tankies:
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Finally, here are my photos from the site of the Nova Massacre, which has become a memorial, with trees planted for each of the victims.
I also visited Kibbutz Kfar Aza, where 79 people were brutally murdered on October 7th by Gazans who walked over from their homes a mile away. 18 others were taken. First, here is a photo of the idyllic community from Chaya Leah’s visit there in June:
If you’ve never been to a Kibbutz, it’s a hippy-ish style commune where people rarely wear shoes or lock their doors. Many of the residents who were murdered were involved in the peace movement - if it’s driving Palestinians from Gaza to hospitals in Israel for treatment, or flying kites near the border as a symbolic gesture of peace to their neighbors. It’s a little slice of nature and peace of mind, which over the course of a few hours turned into a blood soaked battlefield. You can see the bullet holes everywhere, as well as the markings by the IDF signifying bodies and human remains found in the homes. Some of the homes were so badly burnt that archeologists where called in to help identify the bodies. You can also see Gaza in the distance from inside the Kibbutz, a short walk away.
Palette cleanser:
And as promised, my sisters chulent:
I look forward to hearing about the LA event!
My mom is off to Israel on Friday - Amsterdam first. I wanted to say I LOVE Einat Wolff. I've read her articles in Sapir. About Poland, My mom grew up in Poland after the wat, and they made aliyah when my mom was around 12. . She has a love-hate relationship with Poland. Loves it because that's where her childhood was, hates it because of how anti-semitic it was. Doesn't trust the country. She didn't really speak Polish to us because no one in the family was there. But we took a trip there, and for me it was very strange. Like, hearing Polish soothed me, as it was the language my mom spoke to my grandmother in. But I didn't feel connected to the land itself like I do in Israel. Nor its people. But it did feel very different from when I've been to, like, Italy. And it didn't feel like home, not like NY or Israel does. Maybe it's like going to NJ - home-ish?