Am Yisrael Chai - A Love Affair

In 1988, I made my first trip to Israel in the summer between my sophomore and junior year of college, preceding my study abroad program in Granada Spain the following year.

On this trip, I traveled with a friend as tourists. We spent most of our time on a kibbutz in the Galilee very close to Tiberias. It was a wonderful experience and it began my life long love affair with Israel. I determined that I would return after graduating college.

In 1990/1991, I spent the year in Israel on a program called Project Otzma. It was a volunteer program that provided me with a comprehensive overview of Israel, working again as a volunteer at another kibbutz this time in central Israel, as well as working on a youth village for underprivileged children, studying Hebrew in an Ulpan (immersion program), working in Boston's sister city of Herziliya teaching English to elementary school children, serving for 3 weeks in the Israel Defense Forces (non-combat of course), traveling around the country, visiting family, making new friends, and fully coming out of the closet, exploring as much of the gay life that Israel had to offer at the time. It was a year to remember and solidified my Zionist ideals.

It was during this year that the first Gulf War took place, with Saddam Hussein's scud missiles as the major existential threat at the time. When the war broke out, half of my group remained in Israel and half returned home to the US and Canada.

I was one of the group members who returned home deeply conflicted and feeling quite guilty about this decision. However, my mother was still alive and she begged me to come home. Adhering to the commandment of Honoring thy Mother and thy Father, I felt that I had no choice but to honor my mother's wishes and I did so for three weeks, after which time I chose to return to Israel to complete my year long journey. It was the best compromise I could find at the time. I also vowed at that time that I would never desert Israel in her time of need. I have lived up to this promise to this day.

I have returned to Israel dozens of times over the years, three times this year alone. I have done so during peace time and during war time. In fact, Jack and I led a mission of 20 fellow gay and lesbian Jews in 2006 during the Lebanon War, determined not to let terrorism prevent us from this long-planned trip.

(An interesting side note is that it was actually a couple of days before that trip that Jack and I transferred two embryos and it was upon our return home that we learned we were pregnant with Ethan.)

The promise I made in 1990 is a promise that I have maintained to this day traveling to Israel in the very best of times, as we did this past summer, as well as during the very worst of times which we are experiencing now in this moment.

And so, tonight I am flying to Israel to stand with her once again, shoulder to shoulder, in complete solidarity with my family, my people, my country. Yes, it is very emotional to leave my family for the next four days but in that time, I am compelled to bear witness to the devastating massacre of October 7th.

As part of a mission of 40 people from around the world with Sheba Medical Center, we will visit the kibbutz and the region where Hamas wreaked the worst devastation to befall the Jewish people since the Holocaust. We will work at Sheba Medical Center visiting with survivors of October 7th, preparing meals, and doing whatever is needed to bring love, compassion, and support to a society that has been traumatized by nothing less than terrorism and inhumanity. We will visit families of the hostages. We will meet with Israeli leaders to discuss the war effort and God willing, an eventual end to the endless cycle of violence for both Israelis and the Palestinians.

I know for some this may seem crazy but I am a Zionist through and through. I love Israel with all her warts and blemishes as well as with all her beauty and majesty.

Israel is my second home and tonight I travel home to do my small part in the war effort, to stand in complete solidarity with my family and the entire nation.

These are very difficult days and I simply can not sit on the sidelines and do nothing. It's just not who I am. It's not what I stand for. There are times in life where you must show up and be counted. Where you must stand up for what you believe in. These are values that I am committed to pass on to Ethan and Eliana.

I will share images and thoughts over the next few days.

Am Yisrael Chai!