A peaceful stretch of road on a quiet summer’s night; a young couple with a four month old baby in an infant seat is driving home; nothing out if the ordinary. Except that they were driving up from Beer Sheva. As an IDF officer in the Paratrooper reserves, our son-in-law Eliel might be called up at any moment. And it seemed prudent for Maayan, our daughter, in the midst of her medical school finals, not to have to negotiate the air raid sirens alone. As such, they were driving up from Beer Sheva with our grandson Amitai to stay with us. more

Parshat Pinchas contains the maftir readings for all of the Biblical holidays. Every holiday had a specific set of korbanot (offerings) that were brought in its honor. A similarity running across all of the holidays is a single goat which was brought as a chatat (sin offering) to atone for the sins of the people. more

The heat was unbearable, but no one was thinking about the heat that day; there were 150,000 people who had gathered to pay their last respects. more

The story of Balak and Bilaam is fascinating because it is indicative of an obsession that hasn’t waned in the history of mankind since the time of Avraham our forefather. more

We will do our best to hand our enemies a great defeat, by becoming even more united. Three boys. Three worlds. Three families. Three mothers broken. Three empty chairs. So many dreams lost. Forever. There are simply no words to describe the depths of our pain and sense of loss. more

In the beginning of Chapter 21, the Torah tells how an encounter with the Canaanites of the Negev concluded with the capture of a single captive – who Rashi identifies as a maidservant. more

Ask any Israeli soldier who served in the armored corps what part of his army service he hated the most, and he will answer unequivocally “tipul shvui,” the weekly tank inspection. more

Kozhnitzer Maggid was known to be a pursuer of peace. It happened that a terrible fight broke out amongst the Jews living in a city close to Kozhnitz, which caused some kind of “breakaway” in the community. more

This has been a difficult week. Three of our sons, Yaakov, Gilad and Eyal have been missing since Thursday night and despite the best efforts of the Israeli army, the police, the intelligence community, and rescue units, we seem no nearer to learning their whereabouts. more

They were a small group of pioneers with a mission. The year was 1940, and Jews by the tens of thousands were being herded into the ghettos of Nazi-occupied Europe. And while the Nazi hierarchy was meeting to determine the “final solution to the Jewish problem,” this small group was preparing the groundwork for what they believed would be the influx of refugees who would need a home and a place to call their own. more