Editor's Note
April 18, 2008
A Sderot Seder
Phil Jacobs
Executive Editor
There’s still a ton to do.
Your chicken soup needs just a pinch more salt.
You’re panicky because last night you found a Cheerio in between your car’s back seat and the wall separating it from the trunk area.
How on earth are you going to sit Aunt Bessie even in the same room with Uncle Steve?
The store’s out of kosher-for- Passover pancake mix. It’s all your son will eat.
Why isn’t your rabbi returning your phones call about the blemish you found on the horseradish? He stopped calling after your 27th try. That’s not like him.
What has happened to Passover?
Jews participate in the Passover seder more than any other form of festivity or observance.
As soon as Purim ends, and that aisle in the grocery store gets stocked with matzot and gefilte fish, the hair begins to stand on end on the back of our necks.
The right food.
The right Hagaddah.
The right tablecloth.
The right invitation list.
Passover is about coming to the table and looking inside of oneself. The Haggadah is a self-help manual for those of us who need to shed free the Mitzraim (Egyptian slavery) that we now face.
For some, Egypt is drug or alcohol abuse or an eating disorder.
For others, it’s financial woes.
Some need a time-out from their computers, Internet connections and Blackberries to take a deep, cleansing breath, look around the Passover table and lock on to the needs of one’s family.
Many look at this time as a jumping- off point, a time to move on from where they are stuck in their lives.
To everyone in our community, I want to personally wish that you come to the table not wanting to get this “over with in a hurry,” but with an energy that suggests family bonding, a commitment to one another, and a suggestion of follow-up for whatever comes from the table.
Helping other Jews, other people.
That’s what I look forward to this year.
I know many have never heard of the name Sderot, or for that matter Ashkelon. Sderot is a development town in Israel next to Gaza. For seven years it has become the target of the death squads we call terrorists. I believe the words “terrorists” or “militants” or “insurgents” are public relations words. These are soldiers. They fire machine guns. They fire artillery. When the Luftwaffe bombed London, we didn’t call them terrorists, even though they caused terror.
At a seder in Sderot this year, it is very possible that a Code Red alarm will go off more than once. Hamas has strategically fired its rockets during the time Israelis watch prime-time TV since they know families will be together in their living rooms. It’s no accident that rockets are also fired when mothers drive their children to school in car pools.
I am asking you at this year’s seder to at least mention the name Sderot. I’m asking you to pledge money to any number of charities you can find on the Internet for Sderot. When a small child says the Four Questions at the Sderot dinner table, “Why is this night different than any other night?” hopefully part of the answer will be that on this night, no rockets fell near his house.
Please remember the Jews of Sderot and Ashkelon during your seder this year. Have them in your thoughts, your prayers and your actions.
An afikomen prize could have something to do with a donation to these two cities.
Or if you know someone who lives in Israel already, ask them somewhere along the line to drive to Sderot and purchase their week’s groceries at a store there or eat at one of the area restaurants there.
Sderot is no different in this sense than London was during World War II. The world was turned to the news every day of the heroism of the British people who lived their lives dreading sirens and spending time in bomb shelters.
Here we are in 2008, and we have a small city under siege.
For Sderot, this year’s seder and its message of freedom is so real, so hard.
Please, please, keep these Jewish brothers and sisters in your thoughts –– in your seders.