Dear Friends:
On Sunday morning we received the news that six Israeli hostages had been murdered by Hamas shortly before the IDF would have rescued them, and that their bodies had been recovered and brought back to Israel.
Among those murdered was Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who had both US and Israeli citizenship. Hersh was 23 years old and like many of those murdered on October 7, was an activist for peace and for Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation. He was born in Chicago, where his parents Jon and Rachel grew up. The family also spent time in Berkeley, CA, and Richmond, VA, before they made aliyah to Jerusalem when Hersh was eight.
For Jews it is usually not “Six Degrees of Separation” but one or two. While I do not know Jon and Rachel, many of my friends do. Rachel is a staff member at the Pardes Institute, which is the home of the “Machloket Matters” fellowship I had a couple of years ago.
I was not able to watch Hersh’s funeral as it was streaming live, since ironically enough my brother and I were visiting my Dad’s grave in Queens, NY, at the time. I watched it when we got back to my brother’s apartment in NJ and it moved me greatly. A video link is here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEq2Jo5N4ow. The eulogy by President Herzog is partly in Hebrew and partly in English; Hersh’s friends and sisters spoke in Hebrew but both of his parents spoke in English. His parents’ eulogies moved me greatly and frankly left me crying. I urge you take the time to watch it if you have not already done so.
This is an apt time to remind you about the talk we are sponsoring next Tuesday along with five other area Conservative synagogues. Yizhar Hess is Vice-President of the World Zionist Organization and a significant and thoughtful voice in Israeli society.
Yizhar’s talk is called “Between October 7 and 8.” He will be discussing the aftermath of October 7 and building the future of Israeli society. The talk will take place on Tuesday September 10 at Shaare Torah at 6 pm. While the talk had originally been scheduled for 7:30 pm, the rabbis of the sponsoring congregations decided to move it to 6 pm so that our congregants could attend the talk and be home in time to watch the presidential debate that same evening at 9 pm.
The link to register is here:
You may see that the link still says 7:30 pm but it is the right link and the lecture is at 6 pm. If Israel and its future is important to you, you’ll want to attend this talk.
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
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