Meeting the Moment: Even in War, We Build Peace שלום

This week I was in Washington, DC.

I spent several days at the J Street national convention. More than a thousand Jews gathered with Israelis, Palestinians, scholars, activists, rabbis, and community leaders to wrestle with the future of Israel and the region.

Then I went to Capitol Hill to lobby members of Congress against expanding the war with Iran.

Our Washington State J Street delegation met with both of our senators, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell.

Most of us in the room were Israeli Americans.

The senators and their staff were extremely serious. You could feel the weight of the moment in the room. These women have been around Washington for a long time. They have seen a lot. They understand what war means and how easily it can spiral.

The gray pallor on the faces of everyone involved was sobering.

There was no sense of theater. No grandstanding.

Just the heavy work of governing and trying to prevent something even worse.

These are heavy days.

War narrows the imagination. It makes us think the only voices that matter are generals and governments, missiles and military strategy. When violence escalates, it is easy to believe the only language left is force.

But walking through the halls of the convention center, I kept noticing something else.

Even in war, people are building peace.

One of the most powerful parts of the conference was simply walking through the hall of organizations working on Israeli democracy, shared society, and peace.

At a table for Hand in Hand Center for Jewish-Arab Education in Israel, there were photos of Jewish and Arab kids learning together in bilingual schools. Hebrew and Arabic in the same classroom. Jewish and Arab teachers teaching side by side. Kids learning each other’s language and story before fear gets a chance to take hold.

Peace there does not begin with diplomats.

It begins with second graders.

At another table, The Abraham Initiatives was sharing its work strengthening partnership between Jewish and Arab citizens of Israel. The focus is safety, civic participation, and building a society where everyone belongs.

Nearby was Friends of Givat Haviva, one of Israel’s oldest centers for Jewish-Arab dialogue and leadership.

That table stopped me for a moment.

Had both of my parents not died so young, they had planned to retire to Givat Haviva. This is where my children would have gone to visit them. That place, that vision of shared society, was part of our family’s imagination for the future.

Seeing that booth brought a quiet wave of memory.

Givat Haviva has spent decades building Jewish-Arab dialogue, leadership, and partnership. Their work reminds us that shared society does not happen automatically. It takes structure, programs, and years of patient effort.

Another booth belonged to Ir Amim, which focuses on the complicated reality of Jerusalem. Their research and advocacy push people to confront difficult truths about the city. Peace cannot grow where people refuse to look honestly at reality.

At the table of New Jewish Narrative, the message was printed on a brochure in three simple lines:

Peace

Justice

A Progressive Israel

People at these tables do not agree about everything. They debate strategy and policy. But they share something deeper. They believe Israel’s future has to include democracy, dignity, and security for everyone who lives there.

Some of the most moving voices came from people who have experienced the cost of this conflict in the most personal way.

At the table for the Parents Circle – Families Forum, Israelis and Palestinians who have lost family members to the conflict work together for reconciliation. Their grief could easily turn into bitterness. Instead they turn it into a commitment to stop the cycle of violence.

Nearby, Combatants for Peace brings together former Israeli soldiers and former Palestinian fighters who have laid down their weapons and chosen a different path. These are people who know what war actually looks like. They have seen it up close. And they are the ones insisting that another future is possible.

Another table belonged to T’ruah, a rabbinic human rights organization. One of their shirts said:

“Resisting tyrants since Pharaoh.”

That line always makes me smile. It also felt true.

Jewish history is full of struggle. Exile, survival, moral wrestling with power and responsibility. Our tradition keeps insisting that dignity matters, that justice matters, and that power must always be questioned.

This does not make the choices in front of us easy.

But it reminds us that Jewish strength has never only been military strength.

It has also been moral strength.

Sometimes in times of war people say that talking about peace is naïve.

I think the opposite is true.

The fact that Israeli and Jewish organizations are still building shared schools, promoting reconciliation, advocating for democracy, and imagining political solutions even in the middle of conflict is not weakness.

It is vitality.

It means Israeli society and the Jewish people are still alive with argument, conscience, and moral imagination.

It means we have not given up on the future.

Meeting the Moment

For American Jews, meeting this moment means holding several truths at the same time.

We care deeply about Israel’s safety and survival.

We feel the suffering of innocent people across the region.

And we understand that the future cannot be built by war alone.

Peace is slow work.

It happens in classrooms.

In community programs.

In civic institutions.

In hard conversations between people who disagree.

It happens when people refuse to give up on each other’s humanity.

Walking through that hall of organizations in Washington, I felt something that can be hard to hold onto right now.

Hope.

Not easy hope. Not simple hope.

The stubborn kind that grows when you see people doing the patient work of building bridges in a world that often prefers walls.

A Prayer for

Peace

Jewish tradition teaches something remarkable about peace.

The Mishnah teaches:

“The Holy One found no vessel that could hold blessing for Israel except peace.”

(Mishnah Uktzin 3:12)

The rabbis also taught:

“Great is peace, for the entire Torah was given in order to make peace in the world.”

(Sifrei Bamidbar 42; Vayikra Rabbah 9:9)

Another teaching says:

“The world stands on three things: justice, truth, and peace.”

(Pirkei Avot 1:18)

Justice alone cannot hold the world together.

Truth alone cannot hold the world together.

Without peace, the world itself cannot stand.

The Talmud even teaches that one of the names of God is Peace.

(Shabbat 10b)

Which means every time we seek peace, every time we build a bridge instead of a wall, every time we insist that human dignity matters even in times of war, we are doing something sacred.

This week in Washington I saw people doing exactly that.

Teachers building shared classrooms.

Bereaved families refusing to surrender to hatred.

Former fighters laying down their weapons.

Rabbis and activists speaking to power.

And Jews from across the political spectrum arguing fiercely because we care deeply about the future of Israel, the future of Palestinians, and the moral future of the Jewish people.

This is not weakness.

This is Jewish life.

This is what a living people looks like.

A people that refuses to give up on peace even when the world feels like it is spinning toward war.

So tonight, and in the days ahead, we pray.

We pray for the safety of Israel.

We pray for the safety of innocent people across the region.

We pray for wisdom for leaders and courage for peacemakers.

And we hold close the ancient words Jews have whispered for generations:

Oseh shalom bimromav, hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu v’al kol Yisrael v’al kol yoshvei tevel.

May the One who makes peace in the heavens bring peace to us, to all Israel, and to all who dwell on earth.

And let us say:

Amen.