It Were but a Dream   

Someday we will all be together,
Someday we’ll be sheltered and warm
Never will we have to express any fear,
Our scars and our wounds
will disappear

(Mordechai Ben David, “Someday We Will All Be Together,” JEP 4, 1979)

When the Geulah comes, all we endured throughout our long years of exile will feel as though

It Were but a Dream

Here, three portraits of galus
Three experiences that will evaporate when we emerge
into the dawn of redemption.

Birth Pangs

Esther Mandel

In the bomb shelter’s stifling heat, amid blood and fear, I saw an inverted reality

Nothing prepared me for giving birth during war.

When I went into labor during the Israel-Iran War, my husband and I packed up, arranged care for our other kids, and drove to Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital. The hospital is a 40-minute drive from Beit Shemesh, through the most breathtakingly beautiful wooded mountains of Nes Harim. In war parlance, it’s a “shetach patuach,” land that hasn’t been built up, which means that if a missile was heading into the hills, the army wouldn’t try to intercept it.

We drove in silence along the winding dark mountain roads, switching from radio station to radio station to avoid any news updates, while I labored in the car, and we tried to stay calm.