This Passover and Easter are coming in the shadow of our government’s war in Iran, which recently became a month old. One month of running to shelters day and night, of dreading the next siren and having no idea when any of it will end. A month of nonstop brutality against Palestinians in the West Bank and more bombing of Gaza, and an escalating ground invasion of Lebanon in a war that has displaced more than a million people – many of whose homes our extremist defense minister has vowed to demolish “like in Rafah and Beit Hanoun.”
And to top it off, last night the Knesset passed a law imposing a death penalty on those convicted by Israeli military courts of lethal acts of terror – but only if they are Palestinian. The reality is that our government has not stopped trying to expand Jewish supremacy and its messianic vision for our land. Last month, 22 people were killed by Iranian missiles in Israel and the West Bank; thousands of Israelis have been wounded; small businesses are collapsing and homes that were damaged in the last war with Iran have not been rebuilt. And yet our government continues to expect us, the people, to pay this impossible price.
But we refuse to, and we’re mobilizing our society against this reality every week. Our protests are getting bigger and bigger because people understand that they cannot allow the extremism of our government to continue any longer. Polls show steadily decreasing support for the war among the public – and we’re not stopping our fight. Today we took to the streets in Jerusalem and Saturday we will gather across the country to say NO TO FOREVER WAR.
Ahead of the Passover holiday, we’re struck by the irony of this moment. While tomorrow Jewish families will recount the story of Exodus, of an escape from slavery to freedom in the holy land, all of us on this land right now are trapped by war. We are experiencing a different kind of immobility and restriction by our government, which wants to keep us living between bloodshed, suffering, and grief.
May this time of pain and constraint remind us of what true liberty is: safety, dignity, and independence for everyone who lives here.