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‘You don’t know yet, do you?’ How Jews offline for a 2-day holiday found out about the attack on Israel
(JTA) —When Rabbi James Proops arrived at his Modern Orthodox synagogue in Livingston, New Jersey, on Saturday morning, he found three people waiting to meet him: two members of the security committee and a non-Jewish guard.
“As I approached, they looked at me … you know, I could see there was something wrong with the look,” Proops recalled on Monday. “And they said, ‘Rabbi, You don’t know yet, do you?’ And I said, ‘Don’t know what?’”
That was how Proops learned about the horrors unfolding in Israel — an attack by Hamas that would leave more than 900 Israelis dead, wounded and taken captive in brutal fashion.
It would fall to him to pass the grim news along: Because Proops’ synagogue, Suburban Torah, is Orthodox, most congregants refrain from using electronic devices on Shabbat or on the following day, which was the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah. That meant, he said, “The vast majority of people that were coming to synagogue came that morning [had] no clue what was going on.”
Proops chose the moment in the service when Jewish communities recite a prayer for those in need of healing to share that, in fact, many Jews were hurt. He offered numbers that were staggering — yet far smaller than what would become known.
“The whole sanctuary was in absolute silence as I began to relay what was going on in Israel,” he said. “And I could see in the faces, just shock and bewilderment.”
It was a scene that would unfold countless times over the weekend. There was no question about how Israelis who observe Shabbat and holidays found out about the attack on their country on Saturday morning, as sirens announced incoming rockets, phone alerts sounded and soldiers were called to duty. They got more details on Saturday night when the Simchat Torah and Shemini Atzeret holiday ended in Israel and they turned their phones back on.
But in the rest of the world, where the two holidays are celebrated over consecutive days, the process of finding out was slower and more drawn out. Orthodox Jews often found themselves relying on non-Jews to feed them details about the catastrophe unfolding in the country where they have many friends and family.
Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt was on her way to teach a Torah class for bat mitzvah-aged girls when a member of her synagogue approached her.
“You don’t know what’s happening in the world. It’s really bad,” the woman told her.
“I didn’t understand what I was even hearing from her,” recalled Chizhik-Goldschmidt, a longtime journalist who has contributed to the New York Times and The Atlantic and now leads The Altneu synagogue in New York City with her husband. But when she returned to the main sanctuary from the class, she saw that something had changed.
“There were people hanging off the rafters, it was so packed with Jews,” she recalled. “And I just saw on their faces that they had seen something very traumatizing. And they didn’t know how to process it. I just saw the look on their faces.”
Throughout the morning, Chizhik-Goldschmidt said several people came up to her in a repeat of her first encounter — telling her that she did not know what was happening.
“I understood in that moment that this was not another rocket exchange,” she said. “It’s a very strange experience to be an observer, and you’re sort of in this almost hermetically sealed bubble in time and space.”
But living in New York City, Chizhik-Goldschmidt explained, meant having access to plenty of people who did know what was happening and who had seen the news. She began walking into different bodegas to ask for information. She spoke to her doorman. At the synagogue’s kiddush, she spoke to the wait staff, asking them in Spanish how many people had died.
“It felt like from another era, when there are rumors, and you don’t know what is true,” Chizhik-Goldschmidt said. “I heard there was a pogrom. I heard there was a pogrom in another city. I heard there were Jews. I heard there were rapes. I heard, I heard, I heard. It was a total mess. … Unfortunately, all of them were true, but it was just so impossible to comprehend at the time that all those things could happen.”
Avi Rovinsky, who attended an Orthodox synagogue in Cleveland, learned about the attack when the rabbi informed the congregation in the middle of the morning prayer service on Saturday. The congregation paused their prayers to recite three chapters of Psalms — a traditional Jewish response to tragedy. “Whenever the rabbi spoke it was about the joy of the holiday while still having your heart ripped out,” Rovinsky said.
Rabbi Aaron Finkelstein of Anshe Sholom B’nai Israel in Chicago found out from an Israel congregant who was waiting for him at the synagogue with a flask. Finkelstein said he cracked a joke about it being too early to drink before being told about what was happening in Israel. He then relayed the news to his congregation during services, just before the Yizkor prayer of mourning recited four times a year, including on Saturday.
“It was certainly a holy burden to be able to kind of share that in real time,” he said.
Proops said he got details over the course of the holiday from Debbie, the former police officer his synagogue had hired to provide security over the weekend, in keeping with the practice of many American synagogues.
As a police officer, Debbie had gone on an exchange trip to learn from law enforcement in Israel and had stayed with a police officer’s family. She learned early on, Proops said, that her host had been killed in the attack on Saturday.
“The woman who’s outside protecting us is feeling it just like we are — that was actually a very moving and painful moment,” he said.
Another moment was also a source of pain and anxiety, he said: 7:15 p.m. on Sunday evening, when the two-day holiday ended.
“I dreaded turning my phone on, I’ll be honest with you. Because you know, 36 hours had gone by since the initial outbreak of attacks. And I had no idea what I was going to find from relatives, friends, colleagues,” Proops said. “And so with trepidation, we finished the services last night with some extra Psalms. And then we had to kind of connect with the real world, so to speak.”
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The post ‘You don’t know yet, do you?’ How Jews offline for a 2-day holiday found out about the attack on Israel appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says
Atomic symbol and USA and Iranian flags are seen in this illustration taken, September 8, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
Iran and the United States agreed on Saturday to task experts to start drawing up a framework for a potential nuclear deal, Iran’s foreign minister said, after a second round of talks following President Donald Trump’s threat of military action.
At their second indirect meeting in a week, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi negotiated for almost four hours in Rome with Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, through an Omani official who shuttled messages between them.
Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers during his first term in 2018, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Iran, which says its nuclear program is peaceful, says it is willing to discuss limited curbs to its atomic work in return for lifting international sanctions.
Speaking on state TV after the talks, Araqchi described them as useful and conducted in a constructive atmosphere.
“We were able to make some progress on a number of principles and goals, and ultimately reached a better understanding,” he said.
“It was agreed that negotiations will continue and move into the next phase, in which expert-level meetings will begin on Wednesday in Oman. The experts will have the opportunity to start designing a framework for an agreement.”
The top negotiators would meet again in Oman next Saturday to “review the experts’ work and assess how closely it aligns with the principles of a potential agreement,” he added.
Echoing cautious comments last week from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, he added: “We cannot say for certain that we are optimistic. We are acting very cautiously. There is no reason either to be overly pessimistic.”
There was no immediate comment from the US side following the talks. Trump told reporters on Friday: “I’m for stopping Iran, very simply, from having a nuclear weapon. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific.”
Washington’s ally Israel, which opposed the 2015 agreement with Iran that Trump abandoned in 2018, has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months, according to an Israeli official and two other people familiar with the matter.
Since 2019, Iran has breached and far surpassed the 2015 deal’s limits on its uranium enrichment, producing stocks far above what the West says is necessary for a civilian energy program.
A senior Iranian official, who described Iran’s negotiating position on condition of anonymity on Friday, listed its red lines as never agreeing to dismantle its uranium enriching centrifuges, halt enrichment altogether or reduce its enriched uranium stockpile below levels agreed in the 2015 deal.
The post Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike
Varda Ben Baruch, the grandmother of Edan Alexander, 19, an Israeli army volunteer kidnapped by Hamas, attends a special Kabbalat Shabbat ceremony with families of other hostages, in Herzliya, Israel October 27, 2023 REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Hamas said on Saturday the fate of an Israeli dual national soldier believed to be the last US citizen held alive in Gaza was unknown, after the body of one of the guards who had been holding him was found killed by an Israeli strike.
A month after Israel abandoned the ceasefire with the resumption of intensive strikes across the breadth of Gaza, Israel was intensifying its attacks.
President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said in March that freeing Edan Alexander, a 21-year-old New Jersey native who was serving in the Israeli army when he was captured during the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks that precipitated the war, was a “top priority.” His release was at the center of talks held between Hamas leaders and US negotiator Adam Boehler last month.
Hamas had said on Tuesday that it had lost contact with the militants holding Alexander after their location was hit in an Israeli attack. On Saturday it said the body of one of the guards had been recovered.
“The fate of the prisoner and the rest of the captors remains unknown,” said Hamas armed wing Al-Qassam Brigades’ spokesperson Abu Ubaida.
“We are trying to protect all the hostages and preserve their lives … but their lives are in danger because of the criminal bombings by the enemy’s army,” Abu Ubaida said.
The Israeli military did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Hamas released 38 hostages under the ceasefire that began on January 19. Fifty-nine are still believed to be held in Gaza, fewer than half of them still alive.
Israel put Gaza under a total blockade in March and restarted its assault on March 18 after talks failed to extend the ceasefire. Hamas says it will free remaining hostages only under an agreement that permanently ends the war; Israel says it will agree only to a temporary pause.
On Friday, the Israeli military said it hit about 40 targets across the enclave over the past day. The military on Saturday announced that a 35-year-old soldier had died in combat in Gaza.
NETANYAHU STATEMENT
Late on Thursday Khalil Al-Hayya, Hamas’ Gaza chief, said the movement was willing to swap all remaining 59 hostages for Palestinians jailed in Israel in return for an end to the war and reconstruction of Gaza.
He dismissed an Israeli offer, which includes a demand that Hamas lay down its arms, as imposing “impossible conditions.”
Israel has not responded formally to Al-Hayya’s comments, but ministers have said repeatedly that Hamas must be disarmed completely and can play no role in the future governance of Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to give a statement later on Saturday.
Hamas on Saturday also released an undated and edited video of Israeli hostage Elkana Bohbot. Hamas has released several videos over the course of the war of hostages begging to be released. Israeli officials have dismissed past videos as propaganda.
After the video was released, Bohbot’s family said in a statement that they were “deeply shocked and devastated,” and expressed concern for his mental and physical condition.
“How much longer will he be expected to wait and ‘stay strong’?” the family asked, urging for all of the 59 hostages who are still held in Gaza to be brought home.
The post Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks
FILE PHOTO: Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said gives a speech after being sworn in before the royal family council in Muscat, Oman January 11, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Sultan Al Hasani/File Photo
Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said is set to visit Moscow on Monday, days after the start of a round of Muscat-mediated nuclear talks between the US and Iran.
The sultan will hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.
Iran and the US started a new round of nuclear talks in Rome on Saturday to resolve their decades-long standoff over Tehran’s atomic aims, under the shadow of President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash military action if diplomacy fails.
Ahead of Saturday’s talks, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi met his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow. Following the meeting, Lavrov said Russia was “ready to assist, mediate and play any role that will be beneficial to Iran and the USA.”
Moscow has played a role in Iran’s nuclear negotiations in the past as a veto-wielding U.N. Security Council member and signatory to an earlier deal that Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.
The sultan’s meetings in Moscow visit will focus on cooperation on regional and global issues, the Omani state news agency and the Kremlin said, without providing further detail.
The two leaders are also expected to discuss trade and economic ties, the Kremlin added.
The post Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.