Two Years Beyond Oct. 7, 2023

I am writing this on Oct. 6, 2025, just a day shy of Oct. 7 — a date that carries tremendous emotional weight for me, as I’m sure it does for many. I place it among the two most devastating moments in my life: the untimely death of my father at 54, one day after I turned 24, and the shocking and unexpected death of my younger sister, Susie, on a Wisconsin road. In each case, the world fell away beneath my feet. I was transported to a new reality, one that required a slow and painful adjustment to whatever it held in store. So it was with Oct. 7.

My wife and I had been staying in Brooklyn at the time, celebrating the birth and bris of our newest grandson, born to my son Isaac and his wife. It was a time of unbounded joy — its own kind of new reality, one that expanded my sense of the world and of myself. The closest thing I can compare it to was pulling back the lens of a camera to reveal not a new scene, but the same one—suddenly, and unimaginably, more vast. It contained more possibilities, more understanding, a clearer sense of priorities, and mostly, I think, a deeper gratitude for all I had been blessed with.

Such was my mood that Saturday morning, a Shabbat that fell on Simchat Torah — the most joyous of all the Jewish holidays. I slept in and woke with that same sense of gratitude. As I walked down the stairs, I saw my wife. For those who have been married a long time, knowing the mood of one’s spouse becomes an instantaneous, visceral knowledge. There was no guesswork, only the certainty that something terrible had occurred. Not an inconvenience, not a broken pipe or a bill that needed to be paid — this was far beyond that.

“Something happened in Israel,” she said. “I don’t know exactly what, but there’s been a terrorist attack. A lot of people have been killed, and many have been kidnapped and taken into Gaza. That’s all I know right now.”

So, why, you might ask, would this news—and the staggering details that came afterward—be on par with the deaths of my father and sister? I’ve thought a great deal about that over these two years since Hamas’ pogrom. The question becomes more refined: what place does Israel hold for me, a Minnesotan-born Jew? What is it that is so compelling about this tiny strip of land?

Oftentimes it’s something as simple as a scent that brings me back to an answer. Some say that our sense of smell — perhaps because it warns of danger or decay — roots itself more deeply in memory than any other sense. I know that’s true. There are moments when I’ll catch something familiar — a whiff of blue spruce or night-blooming jasmine. I’ll stop what I’m doing and be carried back to Israel, to the sense-memories of my childhood: the first time I traveled there with my parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. I was eight years old then. It was June of 1968, exactly one year after the Six-Day War. I didn’t understand the import of that brief, epoch-changing war, but I did intuit something about peoplehood, about family, about tribe — about belonging.

It was there that our family, who had gone West before the Shoah, met another branch who had survived and gone East, to Israel — to the only place on earth that would accept them. To the only place on earth that would embrace them. And so, I, too, was embraced — showered with love from people I had never met. This feeling — not the holy places, not the sea, not the roar of jets with blue Magen David stars on their wings — spoke of acceptance and protection. It was people. It was love. It was the sensation, exquisite and heretofore uncommon, of being part of something beautifully mine. There was one more aspect, one I could not fathom, only feel, which is the centrality of the land of Israel; something universal, something cosmic.

Think for a moment about history, ancient and recent, and about the present. Think about the role this seemingly insignificant piece of real estate has had in world consciousness. Consider how for millennia, countless wars have been fought over it; consider how often it has played on the news, in poetry, and in song. One answer to these questions, which has intrigued me for decades, is this: in Solomon’s temple, the Beit HaMikdash, which stood some 3,000 years ago in the place where the Al Aqsa mosque stands now, there was a space called the Holy of Holies. It was there that the High Priest of the Jewish people would enter once a year on Yom Kippur, to relate directly to God. It was said to be the “interface” between the temporal world and the spiritual. It’s doubtful any rational person would take this seriously. But then again, no rational person can fully explain the magnetic pull the land of Israel has in the human imagination.

When I think about Israel today, and in the days since Oct. 7, I am not thinking about the government, politics, or infrastructure. I am thinking about brothers and sisters. But how is it possible to mourn, to fear for, to love and support people you’ve never met? This is not a psychological question, but a spiritual one.

In my view, every person is a Tzelem Elokim — created in the image of God. Each is sacred. None are to be reviled based on color or creed. To do so is to commit a kind of moral insanity. Each person, whether they know it or not, belongs to a past, a peoplehood—even if that past or peoplehood has been lost. I know, beyond a doubt, that I am part of Am Yisrael, the family of Israel. Oct. 7 saw Hamas acting out its own distorted sense of peoplehood. It led them to commit the greatest acts of evil. For many, the word “evil” feels anachronistic, something from a distant or irrelevant history. To the contrary, evil always lives among us.

I recall a psychologist friend of mine, an older man who has since died, who wouldn’t use the word even for those who committed the worst crimes. “Bad brains,” he would say — at least until I pressed him. He was a man steeped in the latest scientific theories. One day, as he told me about his early years as a therapist, he mentioned that while earning his degree, he’d gotten into conflict with a professor over his unwillingness to work with certain people. My friend refused to treat sex offenders, particularly those who had harmed young children. “I just couldn’t do it, nor can I now,” he said. I pushed back. “What if they simply needed your help?” He paused. “Even so, I find them evil and disgusting.”

This is to say that no matter how we’ve been educated or acculturated, we all know that evil exists—and that it must be confronted. Oct. 7 was our horrific reminder.

Allow me to jump to the present. Many of the world’s leaders are widely reviled. Some of my readers have written to me saying that certain political figures are themselves evil, that they should be destroyed or erased. Indeed, people have strong emotions.

There’s an old moral hypothetical you may have heard: knowing what you now know, would you have killed Hitler while he was still a baby? The tension is obvious — you would commit the murder of a child to prevent the murder of millions.

But let me invert the question: if all the hostages were released, and peace — not merely a ceasefire, but real peace — were to break out across the Middle East, would we still despise the figures who helped bring it about, even if we once found them unbearable?

And what if the peace we long for had to come through brutal and tragic means? Could we — at least, those of us who have not been directly traumatized by serious injury or by the loss of loved ones — accept that some things must pass through darkness before arriving at light? Would we be willing to see that, at times, the instruments of redemption may not resemble the ones we would have chosen?

Now, after many years, I’ve come to see that my father’s death led to circumstances I could never have imagined — to experiences so beautiful they once lay beyond my comprehension. To be fair, I haven’t been able to do that with my sister’s passing. And yet with enough time, I know it’s possible. Would I have preferred that my father not die? Of course. And for my sister as well.

But here we are — with scars that will never heal, but might, with time, soften. With the scents of pine and jasmine. With a sky above us that has remained, and will forever remain, untouched by war. With oceans and rivers unconcerned with the machinations of humankind. With love, now freer to express itself. With things of importance taking precedence over things of lesser consequence. And with a faith that, though battered and bruised, still carries each of us forward.

May we seek peace. May we find it, even through the fog of our well-founded doubts. These are days of revelations and wonders. Just as we do, they too, long to be noticed and embraced.

Peter Himmelman is a Grammy and Emmy nominated performer, songwriter, film composer, visual artist and award-winning author.