In the name of love

Uniting women affected by terrorism.

By NICOLE BAUKE
Expelling darkness: (from left) OneFamily office manager Dina Keat and CEO Chantal Belzberg with speakers Rabbanit Yemima Mizrachi and journalist Sivan Rahav Meir. (photo credit: MEIR PAWLOWSKY)
Expelling darkness: (from left) OneFamily office manager Dina Keat and CEO Chantal Belzberg with speakers Rabbanit Yemima Mizrachi and journalist Sivan Rahav Meir.
(photo credit: MEIR PAWLOWSKY)
Baseless love – could it be the answer to our problems, the antidote to baseless hatred? OneFamily certainly believes so, having made “baseless love” the theme of its conference for women held on July 26 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Jerusalem.
The conference was held days before Tisha Be’av, the holiday that remembers the tragedies of Jewish history, mainly the destruction of the two holy Temples. It is said in the Talmud that baseless hatred is what destroyed the Second Temple.
OneFamily, a nonprofit organization that helps rehabilitate, reintegrate and rebuild the lives of Israel’s victims of terrorism and their families, held the conference to empower and unite women who have been affected by terrorism.
Almost 600 women from across the country came together: widows, mothers, sisters, orphans and those physically wounded.
“There were religious women and secular women, younger women and older women, left-wingers and right-wingers, Ashkenazi and Sephardi,” wrote OneFamily CEO Chantal Belzberg in an email. “Some lost loved ones to terrorism 15 years ago. Others had recently suffered the trauma of terrorism.”
The organization even provided buses for women traveling from out of town, so that everyone who wanted to could participate.
“We wanted to create a day of unity for women who have been hit by terrorism, and we wanted to be as inclusive as possible,” said Belzberg. “It’s not often that people come together to hear religious speakers and secular speakers on the same stage.”
One of the speakers, Rabbanit Yemima Mizrachi, spoke about the importance of visualizing how we want the world to be, and who we want to be within it. On the surface level, the world may appear difficult or unfair, but the truth exists on a deeper level.
“Good people have terrible things happen to them,” she noted to the room of terrorist victims.
Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked praised the optimism and resilience of the State of Israel.
“Our struggle is a struggle of a life-affirming nation against the emissaries of bloodthirsty terrorism. But in this struggle it is given that light will eventually win and expel darkness,” Shaked said to the crowd.
Journalists Sivan Rahav Meir and Lihi Lapid, wife of Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, also spoke. Renana Meir, whose mother, Dafna, was killed in 2016 in her own home defending her children, was the master of ceremonies.
The conference took place days after the gruesome terrorist attack on the Salomon family of Halamish (Neveh Tzuf), which killed three. Rahav Meir spoke about Chaya Salomon, who taught second grade and just weeks before had given her pupils special “report cards” that focused on nontraditional subjects: friendship, compassion, understanding, love, kindness, responsibility, gratitude and modesty.
“The feeling of togetherness was as inspiring as the speeches,” said Cheryl Mandel, whose son Daniel was killed in 2003 in an antiterrorist operation in Nablus. “The generosity of spirit among the women was tangible. Everyone wanted to show their love for another.”