To My Friends in Israel

Please accept my apology for doubting you

Good morning,

Dana and I have been trying to find the right words to write to you after the massacre in Israel last weekend, but it has proven even more challenging than expected. I (Natalya) spent much of last summer with my family in Israel.

It was my husband and daughters’ first trip, though I have been there many times since childhood. I have cousins near Jerusalem - we spent time with them, the children getting to know each other. We toasted to more frequent reunions (I hadn’t been back since 2005 and my cousins have not been abroad).

My family traversed the country, north to south, and I was so impressed at how much technological and architectural (and agricultural- the food! the wine!) growth the country has managed over the past eighteen years. Fast trains connecting Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Beautiful hi-rise developments on the beaches of Rishon LeTsion. Thriving downtown areas in Tel Aviv that rival NYC and London.

And, of course the welcoming, globally diverse population that we encountered everywhere we went- both at a kibbutz in the north, near the Jordan River to the beachgoers in the south.

“But the stores laid up within would have excited still more amazement… For here had been stored a mass of corn, amply sufficient to last for years, abundance of wine and oil, besides every variety of pulse and piles of dates” - Josephus Flavius

But the most meaningful place we visited - by far- was the hilltop fortress Masada, which overlooks the Dead Sea. It was my second visit- the first was was nearly twenty years ago. I remember that this was where I felt deep kinship with ancient Jews, a profound sense of pride and astonishment of the resilience of our people through centuries of persecution and exile, slavery and genocides.

Being there helped reassure me of the continuity of the Jewish people, the resourcefulness, especially in the most difficult times. We saw a group of boys praying and stopped to listen. We read about the fortitude of the Jews who resisted Roman siege in 73 CE, ultimately committing mass suicide in order to not be captured and imprisoned, leaving incredibly preserved artifacts of their sophisticated water system, agricultural storage, and superior living conditions behind for generations to visit and absorb.

The ancient Jews had resolved to be “Born Free, Die Free,” and this is still very much the spirit of the Jewish people in their one Jewish homeland, which was established seventy-five years ago, shortly after six and a half million of us were slaughtered in the Holocaust.

The attack on Israel was an attack on every aspect of freedom we hold dear and especially the freedom from torture. The brutality with which ordinary civilians, and especially women, children and the elderly, were treated defies humanity- and sentience.

I remember learning about the Holocaust as a young child- and the big question was always How Can People Treat Each Other This Way? How Can One Human Commit These Acts Upon Another? I believe dehumanization is to blame. Not only Israelis but Jews, have been dehumanized in the Arab world paving this unspeakable violence.

The past few days have been very difficult. The support of friends has been essential. The open letter you are about to read is from my good friend Dr. Carol Vidal, who was a driving force on Urgency of Normal, our mission to restore children after school shutdowns and ensuing mandates. Also if you would like to support Israel in her time of need, consider donating to Friends of the IDF HERE.

Here’s Carol:

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I made some of the strongest connections of my life with Israeli young people when I was in a Kibbutz near the Gaza border in my twenties.

The words Kibbutz, Gaza, Ashkelon, Israeli and others, bring many memories. All of them used to be good.

They were memories of my friends showing me the lights of Gaza at night, taking me to Ashkelon to visit their future university, talking to me about how my newly shaved head (a haircut by an English fellow volunteer in our dorm room, a dare), meant different things for Arabs and Israelis. They are memories of their worry when other volunteers and I took a bus to visit Jerusalem the weekend there was a bombing downtown.

Since Saturday, those words have a very different meaning for me.

They have become words of horror.

During my time at the Kibbutz, the friends I made tolerated me when I would defend Palestinians and questioned the need for an Israeli army. They would patiently explain the need to be prepared for a potential threat, and that I needed to understand how they were perceived by Israel’s neighbors. They knew because they could understand what the foreign press was saying. For a twenty-one-year-old European who did not speak Hebrew or Arabic, it sounded like unfounded fear, so I would just smile.

I have also, many times, thought my friends here in the U.S. exaggerated when they worried about antisemitism.

I would just nod my head.

I am writing now because I want them to know I apologize for not believing them.

The level of dehumanization of the Jewish community I have seen over the past three days, the deafening silence and the slow response from institutions when videos of young people being abducted were distributed on social media, has been difficult to witness.

The days until President Biden spoke in support of Israel have been long. The people in Israel are going through the same thing as the people from Ukraine; but somehow many found it okay to justify the actions of a terrorist group when Israelis are still digging out bodies of family members from the ground or waiting to find out if Hamas killed or left their loved ones alive.

Some of those people were quick to add the Ukraine flag on their Facebook profile the first day of the conflict, but did not add the Israeli flag after the attacks.

Why was that so different? Aren't we all just innocent people trying to live our lives?

When I have expressed my confusion for their silence to some of my Jewish friends, I have found out that they are simply afraid.

Many are Jewish people who don't feel safe identifying as Jewish in America.

The implications of that are devastating.

We are talking about the same group of people who less than 100 years ago endured the Holocaust and found themselves homeless. Our grandparents and parents remember.

How did we forget so quickly?

There is no doubt I have lost a little bit of faith in humanity these last few days. Not only after seeing what radical religious terrorists can do. We have seen that level of fanaticism in the past, in London, Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, in NYC on 9/11, and in many Arabic countries.

But my disappointment and hurt is compounded by the cold response many Americans and Europeans have had towards today’s tragedy.

The view toward the Dead Sea & Jordan

I cannot imagine how a Jewish person must feel. 

I hope we can all eventually forgive each other for not believing, or for dehumanizing others, or even for the attacks. It seems unthinkable now. But more urgently, I hope we can all think about how bipartisanism in the U.S. and beyond is clouding our judgement to the point that we can't see fellow human beings as people deserving of the same rights because we are drowning in our own ideologies.

I could talk about how I equally hate the idea of innocent kids dying in Gaza, but these last three days were about Israel and somehow, many felt they needed to blame Israel as the bad actor, no matter the level of victimization her people have endured.

I decided to not be the person who blindly follows the crowd a few years ago when I realized things are much more complex than they seem in my preferred news outlets.

I am renewing my commitment to that goal.

I think it's a good goal.

The alternative is lazily continuing to live in a bubble. That may help you pass time when bored, but it is really no fun and not a good way to live a good life.

Carol Vidal M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H.is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University. She is double-board in general and child and adolescent psychiatry and assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Medicine. She completed an M.D. and PhD at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and an MPH at Drexel University in Philadelphia. She works clinically in a School-based mental health program located in Baltimore City Schools where she evaluates and treats adolescents with behavioral and depressive disorders. Her research focuses on cannabis and suicide in adolescents. Lately, she has been spending her time between work and her car, driving her children to sports. She lives in an immigrant limbo between Barcelona and Baltimore, with family, friends and favorite places in both cities.

Follow Carol on Twitter HERE.