By Shirin Yadegar
Out of the most devastating event of our lifetime, we have not been broken. We have become stronger. As a people, we have risen from unimaginable pain with a renewed sense of purpose and unity. Across the globe, the Jewish community has shown resilience in the face of hatred.
On college campuses, more students are finding their home at Chabad and Hillel, seeking strength in each other and in tradition. Jews who once considered themselves non-observant are turning to Jewish studies, longing to understand the depth of our 4,000-year-old heritage built on values, ethics, and the unshakable belief that light can outshine darkness.
As Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks so beautifully said:
“The Jewish people did not survive by building walls, but by building schools. We became the people who valued study, who taught our children, who built communities of learning and love.”
This is the power of Judaism. It is why we have endured, and it is why we will continue to thrive. Our survival has never depended on forgetting the past, but on teaching the next generation who they are, where they come from, and the values that bind us together: truth, justice, compassion, and an unwavering commitment to life.
It has now been 730 days since October 7, 2023, the darkest day of our generation. On that morning, 1,400 souls were brutally taken. Babies were burned alive. Women and men were raped in front of their children. And 251 innocent people were dragged from their homes and the Nova Festival as hostages.
Two years later, 48 hostages remain in captivity. (Hopefully, by the time you read this the peace deal will be signed and the hostages reunited with their families. Their families live every single day in torment, not knowing if their loved ones are safe, fed, or even alive.
This horror did not happen in a vacuum. It happened because, for generations, terrorists have chosen to raise their children on hatred instead of love. They are taught that torturing and killing Jews is a holy act, that it makes them martyrs.
But we, the Jewish people, have always chosen the opposite path. We raise our children to love, to build, to create, to choose compassion and kindness. Since October 7, Jewish children and young adults across the world have carried that torch with extraordinary courage. They have spoken up, risking their safety for justice and truth.
My daughter, Eden, was one of the first. As the war in Israel spilled over into an international war against Jews, students on college campuses were harassed, bullied, and silenced. Eden endured death threats, ostracism from peers, and ridicule online. But she refused to back down. She kept fighting for justice because that is what it means to be Jewish. And one day, she will teach her children to do the same.
We must all do the same. We must teach our children never to be silent in the face of evil. Because silence is complicity. And in a world that often feels dystopian, our calling is to be the light.
As we enter year three of this war, (which I pray will be over when you read this) let us remember the lives stolen, pray for the hostages still in captivity, and stand arm in arm as a community. Let us commit to raising the next generation with courage, conviction, and love so that our children, and their children after them, will always know who they are and why they must never, ever stay silent.
Shirin Yadegar is a mom of 4 and the creator and CEO of http://www.lamommagazine.com and host of the talk show Moms Matter.