Let’s Be Clear About Hamas

What follows is my sermon from the Shabbat services following Hamas’ October 7th massacre. At our celebration of Shabbat we raised our voices in prayer and song despite the threats that we should not. We refuse to be terrorized.

I hope and pray these words help us find a measure of clarity amidst this past week’s pain, heartbreak and the extraordinary loss of life.

The other day a friend said to me, “It’s terrible what happened in Israel.” And I said, “Yes. It is devastating. I am deeply pained and saddened.” He then added “I guess they have been fighting and killing each other since the beginning of time.” I looked away in bewilderment. I did not have the strength to confront him, but I wish I said, “Actually what has been happening since the beginning of time is that antisemites keep trying to kill us. And sometimes, they succeed in murdering us.” In every generation, in every land, we been forced to confront this sad, but inescapable truth.

Rarely have I felt so alone as in that moment or during this past week.

Hamas celebrates the murder of Jews. They do not want to make peace with Israel. Saturday’s massacre did not happen because Israel is occupying the Gaza Strip. It is not. Israel withdrew its soldiers and settlers from Gaza in 2005. Hamas’ quarrel is not with a controversial settlement built on a West Bank hilltop made sacred to some because of its mention in the Bible. Kibbutz Beeri, the community that lost ten percent of its members—100 were murdered out of a community of 1000—was founded in October 1946. It sits within the boundaries of Israel’s internationally recognized borders.

Hamas’ aim is the destruction of the State of Israel and the murder of Jews. I cannot fathom why this is so difficult for people to understand and comprehend. I cannot come to grips with the fact that people are still defending these murderers. Supporting Palestinian rights should actually mean opposing Hamas.

Last Saturday our people were intended to celebrate our beloved Simhat Torah, the day of our great rejoicing. All we wanted to do last week was sing and celebrate and dance. And that is the most important reason why I am here on this Shabbat. I will not allow the terrorists to rob me, and us, of our Shabbat joy. What I wish I had said to that friend was, “Yes. No one seems to want to let Jews live in peace.” To be honest, it might be better to say more simply, “To let us live.”

Then again, I was heartened by President Biden’s words of support. He said, “This attack has brought to the surface painful memories and the scars left by millennia of antisemitism and genocide of the Jewish people. So, in this moment, we must be crystal clear: We stand with Israel. And we will make sure Israel has what it needs to take care of its citizens, defend itself, and respond to this attack. There is no justification for terrorism. There is no excuse.” I am buoyed by the United States government’s efforts to lend military aid to Israel.

I have other friends of course and many of them called me and texted me offering support. Most are not Jewish. They remain equally horrified by what they read and saw and so wanted to lend a comforting shoulder to the friend they know has deep connections to Israel. I sense their love and concern. And it helps. Their words briefly temper my feelings of abandonment.

There has also been a significant outpouring of support from world leaders. And yet, these words so often seem tempered. I don’t recall, for example, when the UN secretary general offered support and condolences to the United States after the terrorist attacks of 9-11, in the next sentence added a warning about the need for the US to exercise restraint when going after those responsible for the attacks.

My teacher, Yossi Klein Halevi, writes: “Israelis will tell you: We don’t need the world’s sympathy only when the violated bodies of our family and friends are being displayed to cheering mobs in Gaza. We need that sympathy most when we attack those who have carried out these atrocities. If you can’t distinguish between an army that tries to avoid civilian casualties and a terrorist group that seeks to inflict them, then spare us the condolences.”

And I would add don’t say that Israel does not intentionally target civilians. Say instead Israel’s goal is not the murder of as many Palestinians as possible. Its armed forces seek not so much the destruction of the enemy, but the defense of this simple idea, let us live our lives. Of course, we should be saddened by the deaths of innocent Palestinians and the destruction of homes and the upending of Gaza and the further impoverishment of its residents. Israel will make mistakes in its prosecution of this war, but its actions are justified, its intentions pure.

Hamas is largely to blame for these events. The IDF seeks not the destruction of Gaza but the preservation of Israel. And that in a nutshell sums up the conflict. Make no mistake about this terrible fact. If Hamas could, they would murder all seven million Israeli Jews, as well as those two million Israeli Arabs who have built lives for themselves in Israel. They would murder every Jew throughout the world if they could. That is their stated goal. Saturday’s massacre should wash away any doubts about Hamas’ intentions.

In our hour of grief, we acknowledge, our people were murdered. We say our people are being attacked. Our people are now traumatized and terrorized. This is not the moment for disagreements, or even debates about what went wrong. This moment calls most of all for solidarity and unity.

We will carry this grief with us. Next year’s Simhat Torah will still be tinged by memories of this year’s massacre. Every celebration will be colored by a measure of these deaths. The Psalmist sings, “You turn my mourning into dancing.” Even though that appears now upended, the joyful dancing of Simhat Torah is now our grief, one day I am confident, because as much as I have studied our tragedies, I have also come to know our triumphs, our dancing will be restored. I have faith that our hope will triumph.

We are the people of hope, who against all odds and expectations, returned to the land that once exiled us. That of course is the meaning of Israel’s national anthem, Hatikvah. “Od lo avdah tikvateinu—our hope is not yet lost.” Not in 1945 and not in 2023!

“L’hiyot am chofshi b’artzeinu—to be a free people in our own land.” We are the people who know how to hang on to hope. Don’t ever forget that. And don’t ever forget that now we must also hang on to the unity of the Jewish people.

We will triumph. We will live. And we will once again dance