Progressive rabbis hold havdalah service in solidarity with hostages and Gazan civilians

Those attending the service included Rabbi Charley Baginsky and Rabbi Josh Levy, co-leads of Progressive Judaism, Shulamit Ambalu, chair of Assembly of Reform Rabbis and Cantors, Jackie Tabick, Britain’s convenor for the European Union of Progressive Judaism’s Rabbinic Court and Alexandra Wright, president of Liberal Judaism.

The ceremony, which included words said in English, Hebrew and Arabic, was only attended by clergy, who were asked to wear black and not display any badges or flags “for solemnity”.

At the event, the rabbis called on clergy from all faiths to “to join them in using their moral power and their pulpits to speak out as allies”.

Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner, former Senior Rabbi Reform Judaism, told the JC they had decided to hold the havdalah vigil “as we see there needs to be a ceasefire. It’s urgent. As rabbis, we are looking at the situation from a humanitarian point of view. There is clearly not enough aid getting in safely and securely, and this is damaging both the hostages and the Gazan people.”

She added: “I was listening to the hostages speaking in the videos which were released, and it just made me feel sick what they are experiencing, but the destiny of Israelis, the hostages and the Gazan people are completely intertwined. Everyone is made in the image of God, and it concerns me that many of us are bringing our empathy to the hostages and not the Gazans. We need to be able to empathise with more people than just our own.”

While condemning Hamas for the stealing of food, Rabbi Janner-Klausner criticised the current aid system being run by Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), saying that she had friends in Gaza who “are afraid to go to food stations as they are scared of being shot”.

The UN's human rights office (OCHR) said that since May 27, at least 1,373 Palestinians have been killed while trying to get food aid in Gaza, with at least 859 of the deaths occurring in the vicinity of one of the four GHF distribution centres.

GHF says it uses "limited, non-violent crowd control measures when necessary to prevent chaos and protect civilians".

Rabbi Janner-Klausner said she had observed a change in the views among the British Jewish community. “British Jews are extremely wonderful and decent communities. There has definitely been a change in the narrative because people are saying that if basic aid isn’t reaching Gazans, when baby formula isn’t getting in, something is wrong. We are Jews. We need to do something. We need to speak out.”

Rabbi Janner-Klausner said that Havdalah was about “going from the past to the future, and the future has to be different for the hostages and the Gazans. To say the situation is ‘urgent’ doesn’t even begin to express it.”