By: Jonathan Feldstein
Numbness. Fear. Inability to focus. Loss of control.
My son called yesterday to let me know that the army would be taking away his phone soon, that he and his unit were going into Gaza. It’s something for which he and hundreds of reservists with him had trained for and anticipated since they were called up on that horrible day, 10/7.
He called me, then he called my wife. Then he called his wife of four months.
He’s the fourth child. I knew that no matter how old they get, no matter that they may marry and start their own families, I knew that parenting doesn’t ever end. It’s a full-time job, from day one until the end. But this was a page of the parenting playbook for which I remained unprepared. Not during his mandatory service and not since 10/7, even if I knew it was inevitable.
We raised him to be a proud Jew, and Israeli. A combat soldier. Nevertheless its something for which I don’t know I could have prepared.
When he was six, Yosef Goodman, the eldest brother of a friend of his died in a parachuting accident. After Yosef’s funeral, he came to us and declared, “Don’t worry Ima and Abba. When I am in the army, I won’t jump out of planes.” Then he became a paratrooper. We lined the side of the road to witness his first jump, albeit a milestone in completion of his basic training more than any military practicality. But paratroopers are really infantry units. Now, he’s going to do what he’s really been trained for.
He called me first, maybe because it was easier for him, not to deal with fear and tears that might be inevitable with his mother, his wife, his siblings, the rest of our family.
Maybe he called me first for me to be prepared for the phone call(s) from them to try to be a stable anchor of the family even if my tears are not visible, and even if my fear is no less. Maybe not showing fear was what he needed. Maybe because Abba begins with A, aleph. Then again so does Ima. Maybe none of this matters and today we are just parents of a soldier in Gaza. Defending our people. Losing sleep.
Yes, there’s fear, but there’s pride. I wish we didn’t have to defend ourselves this way. I wish he were beginning his university in his first home with his new wife. Instead, he’s in Gaza. I am grateful that we brought him and his siblings to Israel almost 20 years ago. Words of his sisters the week he received his military call up papers also echo in my mind. I suggested that he should go into an intelligence unit because he’s analytical (like my father for whom he’s named) and it would be a great start to his career.
Not missing a beat, the siblings who often bicker came to their younger brother’s defense, criticizing me with the simple message, “We don’t serve the country to get something out of it,” and “He’s going to be a great combat soldier like our friends are.” They’re right.
My father lived through Israel’s war of independence as a child but never was “in” a war.
The last time anyone in my family was “in” a war was WWII, but not as fighters. Rather as victims. My great grandparents and numerous uncles, aunts, cousins who my father never knew were all massacred by the Nazis and their willing Polish neighbors and accomplices.
Today we have our own army and can defend ourselves, even at a huge price. And it has been huge. There’ve been nearly 30,000 victims of war and terror since my father was a child. In the initial War of Independence (which I believe we are still fighting) from 1947-1949, Israel lost a full one percent of its population. Even 30,000 out of nearly 10 million today is a huge loss.
I have taken solace to the idea that while God promised to restore us to the Land, and He has, He never promised it was going to be easy. I am sure that in all the battles we fought that are chronicled Biblically, in none of them were Jews not afraid, for themselves, and their families. That’s human. We are today as well. But we have the resolve to win, no matter the cost. We must.
Golda Meir once said we have a secret weapon, we have nowhere else to go. She was right.
But Golda was wrong when she said that we can forgive the Arabs for killing our children but not for making our children kill their children. I do not and will not forgive the Arabs (Islamists) for killing our children. I fear for my son and his safety. I fear that he may likely have to do what he is trained for, to kill others. Our cause is righteous. There is no ambiguity. None. Anyone who doubts that is an immoral, misinformed, antisemite. Sorry, that’s the truth. Jewish blood cannot ever be spilled freely. But I also fear for my son taking another life. Not because he can’t or shouldn’t. Just because that’s something that no matter how correct it is in the context of battle, it’s not something I want him to have to live with.
I lose sleep about my son going into Gaza. I lose sleep, imagining the suffering of the hostages and their families. I lose sleep over the grief of the families who lost loved ones in the most unspeakable ways on 10/7, and who have not been able to grieve properly because their nation is at war. I lose sleep for the young women home alone with children, some too young to understand, and some who understand too well, about where their fathers are and if and when they will come back. Too many haven’t.
And now I’m losing sleep over the intense pressure on Israel for a ceasefire, as if the West is opening another invisible front in the war, but no less deadly. Pressuring Israel into a cease-fire, while separating out and keeping the Israeli and Jewish hostages in Gaza indefinitely is immoral. Israel cannot and must not accept that. It also will be a sure recipe to increase loss of life, not diminish it. The only place pressure must be put is on Hamas and all their cohort of evil Islamist terrorists starting in Iran. The West’s failure to grasp and deal with this will lead to their own peril.
The hostages must be ALL be released, together. Hamas must not be allowed to divide the West into those who are concerned for the well-being of a few of their own nationals, at the expense of the Jews.
And Israel must not have its hands tied in order to complete the goal of decimating Hamas and freeing the hostages, because negotiation with Hamas to free some will mean giving them a lifeline to kidnap and kill more in the future. Please sign the petition to help Israel resist this pressure, so the world powers doing so will back down, and let Israel finish the job, even at a terrible cost.
Oh, and about my son. It seems that because of pressure, Israel is not increasing the military campaign against Hamas that he was to be part of. He went back to base, for now, safely. But I am still losing sleep.