Sheryl Abbey

After two years of writing A Sense of Israel, I have decided to draw it to a close. This iteration of the Israel-Hamas War ostensibly is over. The last living hostages have come home. Hamas is returning the remains of the dead, though we still await those of six former hostages. Among those recently returned was Amiram Cooper, whom I wrote about in June 2024.

Jerusalem is in a frenzy. New buildings are rising, trendy cafes are opening, and the light rail is stretching in every direction. After two years of war, our stifled desires and drive for progress finally have been shaken loose. While exciting, many of the latest developments feel rash or erratic. Traffic is bonkers. We seem to be careening into a new era when we should be tiptoeing, barreling ahead for short-term gain instead of planning for steady, long-term growth.

Few analogies can be drawn to help us come to terms with the hostage crisis that overshadowed the last two years and remains unresolved (as of this writing, the bodies of 13 hostages are still being held in Gaza). But whenever I force myself to face the horror of the situation, my family history provides one frame of reference. From April 22, 1943, to May 5, 1945, my mother and grandparents hid from the Nazis in the attic of a tiny Dutch farmhouse.