No vacations for us this Pesach

This Pesach started out like so many others ... beautiful sunny weather, lots of tourists, families gearing up for Seder and Chol haMoed vacations together in all the fun places in Israel with water.

Life events in Israel are strong and fast. Weddings are tremendous events, with hundreds of guests. When I attended my first wedding in Israel I was astonished at the number of guests ... something like 600 ... ("who is paying for this?" I thought to myself) also the attire, so many in jeans and sandals! No chairs at the chuppah, dancing after each of the seven brachot with trumpets and clarinets, people jumping up and down, not to mention everything starting an hour late. Now the dancing ... so much of it, from the Chupah to the hall, with so many circles of dancers around the bride, and around the groom on his side (this was a religious wedding); the photographers seemed to float on top of the dancing crowd on their high shakey ladders. Everything was so dramatic and larger than life. How many friends did the couple possibly have? There were so many young people ... who can have this many friends? ... Maybe this wedding was exceptional?

But time and time again, at each wedding, the atmosphere has been much the same. This heightened joy, the extravagance in numbers, the largeness of it all. It makes you fall in love with Israel and Our People.

Funerals are sadly just as "impressive." Brimming over with grief in such large numbers. The sights - people lining the streets, crowding at the cemetery.

The sounds - singing, everyone all together as a choir. Young and Old, but so many young.

The faces, the bodies, everyone clinging and supporting one another, while singing, full of tears.

It is very powerful.

Sunday after Shabbat was the funeral for the two Dee sisters. They were buried together, one on top of the other. The father asked, "what am I going to tell their mother?" She was in a coma at the time.

Two days later the mother succumbed to her wounds and joined her daughters in heaven. The family and the community of Efrat prepared for a second Dee funeral.

My friends visiting from the States wanted us to visit them in Jerusalem where they had spent Pesach, but who can "just visit" at a time like this? Doesn't everyone feel this pain?

Families here are being ripped apart for no reason. Arab hate is not a "reason" it is not acceptable. But that is how it seems. We do not have the luxury of living anywhere else. We cannot "go back to Europe" as the Arabs demand. Why should we? Israel is our home. We need to protect it and build up the Jewish presence because this is the only country we've got. And we cannot give in to terror.

I often refer to our area as the Wild West. Now it is truly feels that way. We are all told to carry our weapons, loaded, at all times. We make plans before we travel by car - "if we crash, get out as fast as you can, do not stay in the car even if you are hurt," I tell the kids. "If we are hit from behind (an Arab driver tried to run a Jewish car off the road on Friday) take the wheel, I will shoot out the window," I instruct my son next to me.

April 7th - late morning, around 10:45

Rescuers Without Borders medic, Dvir, happened to be traveling up north on Friday, and arrived at the Dee attack minutes after it happened. He thought it was a regular accident, but soon learned otherwise. He stopped and helped and was able to evacuate the mother by helicopter to the hospital. Dvir who is from Efrat and knows the girls and the mother did what anyone would do in that situation - he turned his car around and told his family what happened. They headed home quietly, sadly. No vacation for them.

No vacation for any of us, really, this Pesach.