Rabbi’s Update 6/20/2025

Dear Friends:

The war between Israel and Iran continues with Iran continuing to fire missiles at Israel. The pace of missiles seems slower than it was a week ago, based on the reduced number and frequency of missile warnings interrupting the music on the Israeli radio station “Reshet Gimmel” which I usually have playing in the background on Friday mornings.

In the last week 24 Israelis have been killed by missile strikes, including 4 in the Israeli Arab town of Tamra (a town within pre-1967 Israel whose residents are Israeli citizens). Soroka Hospital in Beersheba, one of Israel’s largest hospitals with almost 1200 beds, was hit by a missile yesterday with some injuries and a lot of damage but no deaths since patients had already been moved to underground levels of the hospital..Forty five labs at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot were also destroyed, taking with them years of research which could have saved untold lives all over the world.

Iran is several hundred miles from Israel and so there is a lot of time between when a missile is fired and when it arrives, which allows for a longer warning time.  While there is a longer warning time, however, as an Israeli friend of mine wrote me yesterday: “unlike the launches from Gaza, it is hard to pinpoint the destination of missiles from Iran, so when they are airborne, warnings go out through much or most of the country.”

For the last few months we have been reading on Shabbat morning the Prayer for Peace contained in Siddur Sim Shalom, which is based on a prayer written by the Hasidic master Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (1772 - 1810). I say “based on” because like many of the translations in our siddur, it is more a paraphrase. Below is a more exact translation by Rabbi Deborah Silver of Ikar in Los Angeles:

May it be Your will,

Holy One, our God, our ancestors’ God,

that you erase war and bloodshed from the world

and in its place draw down

a great and glorious peace

so that nation shall not lift up sword against nation

neither shall they learn war any more.

Rather, may all the inhabitants of the earth

recognize and deeply know

this great truth:

that we have not come into this world

for strife and division

nor for hatred and rage, 

nor provocation and bloodshed.

We have come here only

to encounter You,

eternally blessed One.

And so,

we ask your compassion upon us;

raise up, by us, what is written:

I shall place peace upon the earth

and you shall lie down safe and undisturbed

and I shall banish evil beasts from the earth

and the sword shall not pass through your land.

but let justice come in waves like water

and righteousness flow like a river,

for the earth shall be full

of the knowledge of the Holy One

as the waters cover the sea.

So may it be.

And we say:

Amen.

My Israeli friend wrote about the damage wrought by the Iranian missiles:

“The scenes of destruction are horrendous, and they resemble what we see of Gaza. 

We all hope for a speedy conclusion of both wars we are fighting now.”

Amen!

As a reminder, I am having drop-in hours on Thursday afternoons from 2 to 4 at the shul. For my drop-in hours, you do not need to make an appointment -- that would negate the whole point of drop-in hours -- but I’d urge you to check and make sure I am there regardless as sometimes there are unavoidable pastoral or other emergencies which might take me away from the building.

As always, if I can do anything for you or you need to talk, please contact me at rabbi@kehilatshalom.org or 301-977-0768 rather than through the synagogue office. I am happy to meet you at the synagogue by appointment; if you want to speak with me it’s best to make an appointment rather than assuming I will be there when you stop by. 

Additionally, if you know of a Kehilat Shalom congregant or another member of our Jewish community who could use a phone call, please let me know.

L’shalom,

Rabbi Charles L. Arian