Earlier this week, taking advantage of the mild weather after a typical hot summer and before the cold weather really sets in, we took the hour drive to Hebron, the Cave of the Patriarchs. We’ve been there several times, most recently during COVID, but this time we made a formal visit to the historic hospital Beit Hadassah.
Beit Hadassah has come up in my thoughts over the last two years because of the similarity to the horrors of October 7. The building complex name will sound familiar to anyone who is familiar with the famous Hadassah university medical centers in Jerusalem. It dates back to 1893, funded by Jewish communities from North Africa, and was a medical care center that provided free medical treatment for the residents of Hebron, Jews and Arabs alike.
In 1929, a year in which a large number of Jewish residents in what was then called Palestine were the victims of bloody rampages, the hospital and the neighboring vicinity was viciously attacked by Arab rioters where 67 Jewish residents were brutally murdered in the same brand of savagery (including chopping body parts with axes) witnessed in the October 7 footage. An additional 70 Jews were injured.
Another similarity to October 7 can be seen by the fact that many residents of the kibbutzim near the Gaza border regularly provided transportation to Gazan families who came to Israel to receive cancer treatment. The goodwill and kindheartedness extended by the Jewish kibbutz members did not deter the recipient Gazan families from providing information to the terrorists to maximize the death tally. The Arab attackers of 1929 failed to consider that their free medical treatments by the Jewish doctors and nurses would be permanently suspended after such an attack.
For the sake of fairness, I will note that there were also cases (at least one that was cited), of a Hebron Arab family hiding Jews in their home and protecting them from the villains. I have not heard of any similar case of a Gazan protecting Jews or hostages, or of reporting the whereabouts of hostages during the periods where they were held in the homes of civilians.
The massacre in Hebron in 1929 was referred to as the Black Shabbat. I had not remembered that, but it is the same name given by many to October 7, 2023.
THE MOST absurd consequence of the Hebron massacre was the decision of the governing party, the British via their British Mandate. Instead of holding the murderers accountable for their heinous crimes, they immediately ruled that all the remaining Jewish residents must be expelled from Hebron. That fact, too, resembles the decisions of the UK and other European countries to recognize a Palestinian state following October 7. We can see that awarding the aggressor has historic precedents in Western Europe.
The surviving Jews left Hebron in accordance with the British decision, and for many decades, Jews were banned from the first real estate purchased by Abraham, the father of monotheism. Because Hebron is so central to the Jewish story – because it is the resting place of the three Jewish patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as the matriarchs Sarah, Rebecca, and Leah – the desire to return to the holy site was repeatedly sparked.
After the creation of the State of Israel, under the partition plan, Hebron was under Jordanian occupation and off limits to Jews. And though Hebron was liberated in 1967 during the Six Day War, after which Jews were allowed to pray at the cave, it took many years and the efforts of idealists and visionary Jews to gain access to the small area surrounding this ancestral monument, Beit Hadassah. Arabs continue to have access to the patriarchal cave as they also pray at the resting place of Abraham, who was father to Ishmael, their claimed ancestor.
The vast majority of Hebron is inhabited by Arabs. In 1997, as a continuation of the Oslo process between Israel and the Palestinians, Jews were relegated to only 3% of the city’s territory. We met many IDF soldiers, God bless them, tasked with protecting Jewish residents and visitors, as we walked around the surrounding area. Also, inside the Jewish vicinity, we saw Arab residents walking around after passing securing checks. Of course, Jews (even Israeli Arabs) are strictly forbidden from entering Area A in the Palestinian Authority. In this neighborhood, an innocent mis-turn can result in a horrifying and untimely end – and unfortunately has.
Chayei Sarah: When Jews across Israel flock to Hebron
THIS COMING Shabbat, when we read the Torah portion of Chayei Sarah, in which Abraham purchases the cave to bury his wife Sarah, large numbers of Jews from all over Israel will visit Hebron. It will be a celebration of tradition and the fact that we once again have the privilege to pray at the tomb of our forebears.
When Jews pray at burial sites, some mistakenly believe that the dead can achieve the object of our pleading. In fact, God alone has that power, but our prayers may gain traction resulting from our uplifted spiritual level, while contemplating the piety and greatness of our predecessors. On the other hand, Rachel – the one foremother not buried at the cave, but in the Bethlehem area – is said to be buried there because it’s the site from where the Jews would later be exiled from the Land of Israel, and she could beseech God for our return to the land.
One can’t help wondering how the spirit of our father Abraham can view the current phase in history. After nearly two millennia of abandonment and complete desolation, Jews from surrounding countries are inspired to return to the Promised Land. But another group of his descendants, those emanating from Ishmael, are determined to fight them relentlessly – and the world favors the latter group, in the 1920’s and again today.
Perhaps one day, the descendants of Ishmael will embrace the values of their forefather Abraham. Maybe in the merit of Abraham, who sought to teach the world to abandon the murderous and licentious idol worship they practiced and embrace the one true God, his descendants from Ishmael will one day also abandon the murderous practices of worship, which most of the world has left behind in ancient times.
The writer, a longtime resident of Rehovot, is a religious mother of five and worked in the hi-tech defense industry for decades.