As sirens wailed across Israel for what felt like the hundredth time in two weeks, I found myself once again in a painful situation.

Still recovering from lower abdominal surgery, I could barely move without wincing, yet here I was, standing in the protected room in our apartment, our “bomb shelter,” unable to sit or lie down. I was surrounded by my wife, two children, and our three restless dogs.

“Abba, how long do we need to stay here this time?” my youngest asked, eyes wide with a mixture of frustration that no child should have to experience. Outside, somewhere in the skies above Jerusalem, Iran’s ballistic missiles aimed at causing as much harm as possible to Israel’s population centers were being intercepted. Some weren’t.

The physical pain from my surgery was palpable, but it paled in comparison to watching my family endure this trauma. My wife, who has struggled with anxiety ever since her recovery from breast cancer, which she contracted right after the coronavirus pandemic died down in 2022, was trying her best to remain calm. My children alternated between nervous questions, silence, and their own stoic resilience, which has grown and become ingrained since the rocket and missile barrages started in our area on October 7th, 2023. Yet amid this chaos, I found myself filled with a type of serenity, it is the same serenity that I often feel in times of distress, which not only baffles my wife but often frustrates her as well. It is a serenity of faith.

When a Canadian news reporter from CTV contacted me about sharing my experience as an expat living in a war zone, I spoke to him from my recovery bed between shelter runs. “How are you coping with the fear?” he asked, seemingly surprised by my composure.

“There is fear,” I admitted, “but there is also faith.”

I don’t have blind optimism or live in denial of danger. I’m a medical first responder, and I’ve seen firsthand what can happen when disaster strikes. I know the danger posed by the rockets that Hamas fired at Israel for years, and how much more danger there is from the barrage of ballistic missiles fired at Israel by the Houthis in Yemen and from Iran. Rather, I possess a deep understanding, anchored in my faith in God’s providence. This same faith has anchored Jewish families through millennia of persecution and uncertainty: our lives rest in God’s hands, not our own. The missiles falling around us weren’t random events but part of a larger plan that has sustained our people since Abraham.

My work as a first responder has only ever strengthened this faith. At any given medical emergency that I respond to, whether it be traumatic in origin or strictly medical, there is only so much that human intervention can accomplish; we can work miracles, but we recognize that those miracles will only come if God wills it. We can only do so much; the rest lies in the hands of the almighty.

“Hashem protects us, and our soldiers protect us,” I told my children each time we huddled in that cramped shelter. Not as a hollow promise that no harm would come, but as a reminder that whatever happened, safety or struggle, pain or a return to routine, we were never truly alone or helpless.

In Jewish tradition, we’re taught that even in our darkest moments, we have agency through prayer and the fulfillment of God’s commandments (Mitzvot). While I couldn’t physically defend my family or stop the missiles, I could recite prayers with my children, out loud or even silently. We could pray for the soldiers defending us and for peace to prevail. We could support each other.

My son once asked why I wasn’t afraid. I explained that fear comes from feeling powerless and isolated. “But we are never powerless because we can always pray,” I told him. “And we are never alone because (God) Hashem is always with us, and we have each other.”

These weren’t just comforting words; they were essential truths that psychiatrists recognize as crucial for preventing trauma. As part of my work as a first responder, I am a member of the Psychotrauma and Crisis Response team which is trained to provide psychological first aid at the scenes of acute medical emergencies. One of the first lessons that we are taught is that acute stress reactions, which can develop into post-traumatic stress disorder, occur largely when people feel utterly helpless and completely alone. Faith directly counteracts both feelings.

During one particularly long shelter stay, my son noticed I was struggling to remain standing through the pain. “Abba, (Father), how are you feeling?” he asked innocently.

I thought carefully before answering. “There are people facing much harder challenges right now. Our soldiers, families who’ve lost loved ones. I know that I am in pain, but I know that others are in more pain. Sorrow will not help my spirit, but gratitude might.”

The message to my son wasn’t about suppressing feelings, but rather contextualizing our suffering and being thankful for what we have. We have each other. We have our pets, who also provide solace and comfort. We have a great community that helped us through the ordeal, as many of our neighbors brought us meals during my recovery period, even amid the war, and neighbors offered their homes with backyards and trampolines for our children to play on between air raid alerts. There was a lot to be thankful for, and focusing on that helps get one through traumatic moments. In the past, I’ve helped others; now it was my turn to be on the receiving end for a bit, and people came through to help.

Jews have always found meaning in hardship by way of the community supporting one another. Each Passover, we gather in families and groups to recount our ancestors’ slavery not just to remember suffering, but to celebrate redemption. Each Tisha B’Av, we mourn the destruction of our Temples while affirming our enduring covenant.

In those moments in the shelter, I saw my children absorbing these lessons. We played games, read books, played with the dogs, and yes, they watched some videos as well. We weren’t focused on just surviving; we were together and finding purpose through being with others.

Now that a ceasefire has gone into effect, I believe my children will be stronger, I believe my family, and many other families, have emerged from this conflict stronger. My children, who are both younger than 10, have lived through the COVID pandemic, a parent having and surviving cancer, and now an elongated war that has gone on for almost two years. This is not the childhood I had, nor one that I would ever dream of for my children. But I count my blessings, of which there are many. God has protected us throughout, we are safe, and I am very excited to see just how strong and resilient my children grow up to be. If this is what the world has thrown at us, before they are 10 years old, I can only imagine the strength that they are gleaning from this. I believe that we are developing a resilience that transcends this war, a spiritual fortitude rooted in millennia of Jewish wisdom, and I hope to help entrench that resilience in my children. I believe that this is why, in spite of the war, Israel is one of the happiest countries on earth.

As we navigate these uncertain days, I’m reminded of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov’s timeless words: “The whole world is a very narrow bridge, and the main thing is not to fear at all.”

Faith doesn’t eliminate the narrow bridge of danger and uncertainty. It gives us the courage to cross it together, one step at a time, even when those steps are painful. And in teaching our children to walk this bridge with faith rather than fear, we give them a gift more valuable than physical safety alone; we give them the spiritual resilience that has sustained our people through every trial and tribulation.

Raphael Poch is the Director of PR and Communications for Aish, a Jewish Educational Institute that works to share Jewish Wisdom to help people live more fulfilled lives. He is also a volunteer EMT with United Hatzalah of Israel and serves as a member of the organization’s Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit and has been dispatched to several disaster zones around the world. He lives in Efrat with his family. 

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