Who Is Like you, People of Israel?

This week we have faced the culmination of a darkness that we could not imagine.

In the cruelty of the of the Bibas boys being kill*d with bare hands around their little throats, mutilated bodies to gaslight the world.

Not sending Shiri home where she belonged alongside her sons, playing games with her precious body.

Torturing hostages still held by forcing them to watch others be set free with fizzling hope on the horizon.

Bringing babies and children to celebrate the murders of other babies. Smiling faces. Cheers for the rankest evil the world has to offer.

Attempting to blow up busses that would have killed hundreds, if not thousands of people.

All of us living on balance between catastrophe and miracle.

We watch, horror caught in our throats, most of us barely able to speak for the moans of grief and distress churning in our bellies.

There were several days where I couldn't write anything, say anything, feel anything but shock and revulsion. Fear and rage.

Sometimes I soothe myself with stories that I tell in my mind, about alternate realities or timelines- I say- God must have saved them from this suffering- he must have numbed them, hid them, softened them, saved their souls while their bodies, both alive and dead, rot in darkness and violence.

Must it be?

Because the reality is too much for our human minds to bear- how can we get up in the morning and go to work and send our kids to school and put food in our mouths, and call our mothers if this is the world we live in?

And if all this suffering is real, how can we face our hostages- how can we face the dead and living, and witness what has been done to them?

For a people that is always striving for the light- for love- what is it like for us to come face to face with the ultimate evil?

I look no further than the hostages who have come out of Gaz*a- many of whom walked out with their heads held high on their emaciated bodies.

I look at the young women who came out holding each other- holding us- stories of their heroism, the beginnings of legends.

I look at the young men who came home this weekend- whose smiles were bright on their faces, who leapt out of that hell hole and burst out like sunshine- faith-filled and overflowing with love for their families, their people, and their land.

It is easy to ask the former question about darkness- when we witness this level of pain.

But what happens when those who are drenched in it, lived through it, dressed in their enemy's clothes - come out determined to live, to heal, to love?

Who is like you, people of Israel?

Who is as resilient, as hopeful, as loving, as wise?

Who is as committed to living as you?