To Israel, with Love

Reflections on the One-Year Anniversary of October 7

One year ago today, Hamas launched a terrorist attack that incited the Israel-Hamas War. Israel’s attempts to defend their country and put an end to Hamas are being framed as a genocide. I’m big on words and their meaning. One definition of genocide contains the word deliberate, and I do not see Israel’s actions as a deliberate attempt to kill Palestinian civilians. You don’t give a series of warnings to evacuate a place beforehand if you are trying to kill everyone. Yet, Israel extends that courtesy throughout this war, even when war is anything but courteous. What many may not know is that a Polish legal scholar coined the word genocide to describe the Holocaust. How’s that for an origin story?

When I think about it, Hamas’s October 7 attack is more fitting for the definition of genocide because it was a deliberate killing of the Jewish people to destroy the State of Israel. This is a fact that Hamas has personally confirmed and boasted about. It’s literally written into their charter with the word obliterate. And still, with all this concrete evidence, my views are considered controversial. I know many will not agree with my perspective on this war, and that’s okay. I am not looking to convince anyone of anything. I am sharing what I see, feel, think, and believe about a topic close to my heart. I trust my beliefs because I have tested them over time. I was invested in Israel well before October 7, 2023. I didn’t just hop on the social media bandwagon of virtue signaling for likes and shares. I took my previous knowledge and experiences of Israel and the Jewish people, reviewed trustworthy sources from both sides of the conflict for current information, and took a year to sort through my thoughts and feelings, carefully examining each one to see if a shift was wanted or needed. I wanted to ensure that my beliefs still aligned with my soul, and they do. I stand by my convictions, so I’m writing this essay.

This isn’t meant to be a political piece, though I know it starts that way. I have realized that I cannot discuss this topic without some element of politics, but I’m keeping it to a minimum. This essay is meant to be more of a love letter to Israel and the Jewish people.

I am mixed-race Italian and Black. No one in my family is Jewish — not by birth, marriage, or conversion. It caught my family off-guard when I told them about my interest in Judaism at 12 years old, especially on the heels of my (very late) First Communion that I made to appease my Italian grandmother (another story for a different time). As usual, my parents were incredibly supportive. They’ve always allowed me the space to find myself and feel fully expressed. They were curious about what drew me towards Judaism, though.

Middle school is arguably the most awkward time of a child’s life. Pre-teen years are hellish because it’s when bodies rapidly change, and girls learn the fine art of being mean. My middle school was predominately White, with smaller groupings of Black, Korean, and Indian. The Black girls thought I was weird because I ate Italian food and had a white mom. The Korean girls kept to themselves and rarely spoke English unless it was during classroom time. The Indian girls were friendly, but we didn’t have much in common then. My core group of White female friends had just ostracized me for admitting that I liked to kiss girls. I felt lonely and isolated at the start of 8th grade until I connected with a group of Jewish girls from Hollis Hills, Queens. I had classes with a few of them, and since I often cracked jokes, they enjoyed my sense of humor. It started with them inviting me to lunch in the cafeteria, which quickly evolved into after-school hangs, sleepovers, and Bat Mitzvah invitations. They were not confused by my having a white mom and a black dad; they didn’t care if I spoke all the same languages they did; they were unphased by the fact that I liked to kiss girls — they appreciated all of me, and that was a new experience. The Hollis Hills girls invited me into their world with no hesitation, and just like that, I had friends again.

With this invitation into their world came the option to learn about their culture. I had never experienced culture being shared so freely. I was used to gatekeeping, like when I asked the Korean girls to teach me how to play Gonggi (Korean Jacks) and they said no. It was different with the Hollis Hills girls; they treated me as a peer rather than an outsider. I learned about the Jewish people, their holidays, traditions, cuisine, and languages. They invited me to Shabbat dinners and Passover Seder, introducing me to family and friends who always made me feel welcomed and a part of the community.

I felt lit up by Judaism, and it wasn’t just the sense of belonging that kept me engaged. I genuinely resonated with the ideas I was absorbing. Tikkun Olam is a Jewish concept that the world's been broken into pieces, and it’s everybody’s job to find them and put them back together. When I first heard that, it awoke a deep sense of purpose because it described how I had always felt about the world through my lens as a mixed-race person. These were the beginnings of my interest in Jewish culture.

When I feel aligned with something, I immerse in it deeply. I became very close with one of the Hollis Hills girls who got into the same performing arts high school as me, and down the line, she also became my first girlfriend. Her family was unconditionally supportive of my interest in Judaism, and they unofficially adopted me as their fourth child. They were reformed Jews who loved teaching me about their customs. I even learned part of my friend’s Haftorah for her Bat Mitzvah by listening to her study and practicing it over a year. Amid my immersive study, I discovered that while my friend’s family were Ashkenazi Jews of European ancestry, there were also plenty of Jews who looked like me. There were Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews of all different shades from Spain and countries throughout North Africa and the Middle East. I had no idea! Not only did I find a religion that made sense to me and aligned with my budding values, but I also learned that this religion, the culture, and the people were of diverse backgrounds. I felt like I hit the jackpot. This was a mixed-race teen’s dream!

I knew I had to go to Israel and experience this for myself. The Hollis Hills girls suggested I join them for a Birthright trip, but I didn’t want to lie about being Jewish. I respected that those trips were for Jewish people to experience the Holy Land, and I knew I would eventually find my way there. In college, I declared a Jewish Studies minor to further my education in Jewish culture, religion, and history. I took two semesters of Hebrew with an Israeli teacher. She was impressed by my commitment, especially since I was the only student who had to learn a new alphabet (everyone else in class already knew it from their religious background). I took a course called “Bible: Myth and History,” where I wrote a dope paper noting the religious themes throughout The Matrix Trilogy. I wanted to complete the credits for my minor while studying abroad in Israel, a request that my college denied during my junior year because “Israel is a high-conflict country, and they cannot approve student attendance there at this time.” I was disappointed but nowhere near ready to give up. I reapplied during my senior year with a strong case for why my safety was not in question, using the protocols of the university I’d be attending as proof that I would be in capable hands when navigating conflict. I set a meeting with the associate dean of international programs to state my case, and she approved my request. I was Israel-bound to study at Haifa University’s International School. I received a scholarship through Haifa that covered part of my semester and the addition of a summer Ulpan (Hebrew language program), extending my trip to six months of living in Israel. It was all coming together.

There were waves of culture shock when I first arrived, like getting on the bus and seeing soldiers stationed with guns in a relaxed but alert position. It helped to have other American students to digest these new experiences with. I also wanted to make Israeli friends and was happy when I moved from the American dorms after Ulpan into an integrated living situation for my fall semester. I didn’t know how to cook then, and my Israeli roommates offered to teach me. I got pretty good at making Shakshuka, a popular Middle Eastern egg dish. I also got creative with all the different ways to use humus, which genuinely tastes better in Israel. I immediately fell in love with the diverse population. Israel is a multicultural tapestry, regardless of what people may choose to believe. I have seen it with my own eyes. There were Israeli women who looked like me, Arab women who looked like me, and African women who looked like me; some were Jewish, others were Muslim or Christian, many spoke Hebrew or Arabic, and some spoke languages I couldn’t recognize. Race has a different meaning in Israel, and people identify more with their ethnicity or nationality than their skin color. That was a welcomed breath of fresh air for me, as someone who identifies as Italian-American and African American more than black or white. In America, there is pressure to pick a side to identify with if you are mixed-race. In Israel, you are who you are, and that is not determined solely by your skin color. There is no one-drop rule in Israel. This is also why I disagree with arguments about Israel being a White country looking to colonize people of color. It’s just not true. We cannot apply our American history to every situation, expecting it to be a perfect fit. We will miss opportunities for nuance and growth if we continue to do that collectively.

Our group trips to the Baháʼí Gardens in Haifa and the Western Wall in Jerusalem were breathtaking. These sacred sites moved me to tears as I took in the beauty of Baháʼí’s hanging gardens and found an empty crevasse to store my prayer note in the Kotel. I understand at a visceral level why it’s also called the “Wailing Wall” because I felt overcome with tears as soon as I approached it. I placed my hands on the magic stone that somehow felt cool to the touch in 98-degree heat, and I felt the generations of pain wash through me, both within my lineage and the mourning of the Jewish people. It was an experience that words can’t fully describe, even 14 years later.

If I try to include every morsel of beauty from my trip, this essay will be entirely too long. Instead, I will highlight a few standout moments that solidified my appreciation for Israel and then consider writing a Part 2 with more details and insights. Two classes I took at Haifa University stuck with me, and one shifted my life trajectory.

The class “Terrorism & Responses” was taught by a former high-ranking general of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and it pulled no punches while examining the horror of war. One of the first things I learned is that war is a zero-sum game but that there’s a way to play that game with tact. The professor was a large man with a booming voice and a commanding presence. He was very passionate about protecting the State of Israel, and that’s likely why it felt disorienting to see him teach this information with so much compassion. He did not hide the heartbreak he felt around the situation in the Middle East or what he witnessed in times of war. One day, he had to end our class an hour early when he received an emergency alert about incoming missiles from a neighboring country. He was calm and collected as he left, pointing us to the nearest bomb shelter on campus, “should the situation escalate.”  He had an unexpected softness, the opposite of what I pictured when I thought of a war official. In America, my context for war is to go in and change something that’s “wrong” with brute force. In Israel, my context for war was to keep the peace and respond to potential threats. That is what I experienced while on the ground there during a period of general peace, and that is what I see echoed in today’s situation, too. I have no Israeli friends calling for the death of all Palestinians, even as the war unfolds at their doorstep.

The class that changed the trajectory of my life was “Ethics and International Relations,” specifically the section that focused on the plight of Middle Eastern women. We learned about “honor killings,” where women and girls are murdered by male relatives for bringing dishonor to the family, and female genital mutilation as a means of controlling female sexuality to promote premarital virginity and marital fidelity. These topics kept me up at night. I couldn’t stop thinking about the atrocities going on in the larger world outside of my American bubble, and I couldn’t help but feel an odd mix of guilt and gratitude for how good we have it here. When I flew back to the States, I told my program advisor I wanted to declare a Women's Studies major. She looked at me like I was crazy because I was supposed to graduate in four months and was on track to do so with a 3.8 GPA. Until then, my degree was in Journalism with a concentration in Public Relations. I declared it because I had to pick something, and I liked writing. Plus, I heard PR was where the money is for a communications major. Regardless, I was already clear I wasn’t going to use it. I wanted to study something that my soul felt invested in, like finding ways to support communities in need and creating more harmony in our world. My advisor quickly yielded and signed the paperwork to approve my fifth year, or what I prefer to call my victory lap. The Women’s Studies major sent me down a long, winding path that would lead me to help others while liberating myself. It’s hard to believe it all started with following the call to explore Israel and the Jewish culture.

There are many things to mourn today: the October 7th massacre, the hostages still being held and the ones who are no longer with us, the civilian lives lost in Gaza and Lebanon, the fallen soldiers of the IDF, the vilification of Israel for defending their nation and its people, and the fact that this war is continuing to intensify as terrorist organizations join forces to wipe Israel and the Jewish people off the face of the earth. There are also things to celebrate, though, like the Jewish New Year that just passed, the hostages who have been freed and reunited with their families, the resilience of the Jewish people, the commitment of Israel to bring their people home and end the terrorist organizations that want to destroy our liberties, and last but certainly not least, the Hollis Hills girls who taught me what it really means to be Jewish. As someone who grew up feeling like I belonged nowhere, I felt accepted and celebrated by my Jewish sisters. That is something I’ve never forgotten and never will. Am Yisrael Chai.