This week, the world blinked.
In a region hardened by war and skepticism, the news landed like a thunderclap: Trump brokers ceasefire between Israel and Iran.
After months of spiraling violence, Iranian drones crossing redlines, and Israeli cities bracing for sirens and then battered by missiles, the chaos has momentarily paused. Donald Trump, with signature bravado and disregard for diplomatic nuance, has declared himself once again the “dealmaker.”
Whether this latest pact is substantive or performative remains to be seen. But here in Israel, something more haunting persists beneath the silence: the war isn’t over. Not really. Because for 50 families, and, in truth, for all of us, the hostages are still not home.
And most devastatingly, we now must accept the terrible truth that most of the 50 remaining hostages in Gaza are no longer alive. We don’t speak this unfortunate fact aloud that often.
It’s too unbearable. But their absence has become a national presence. Their silence is deafening. And in a profound and disturbing sense, our entire country is being held hostage by the dead. We are between a rock and a hard space.
Parallels in the weekly Torah portion
This week’s Torah reading, Korach, arrives like a parable tailored for our fractured moment.
Korach, a cousin of Moses, rises in rebellion. Cloaked in piety, he appeals to the masses: “You’ve gone too far! All the people are holy!” (Numbers 16:3). It sounds egalitarian. Democratic, even. But beneath the rhetoric lies ego, envy, and a dangerous craving for control. Korach uses sacred language to conceal profane ambition.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, of blessed memory, wrote that “Korach represents the eternal politics of protest, not because he has a better vision, but because he sees an opportunity to destroy without building.” His rebellion is the archetype of cynicism in religious clothing. The danger was not in questioning authority; Judaism has never feared questions. The danger was in doing so to burn the house down.
What does this have to do with Iran or the hostages?
Everything.
IN TODAY’S Israel, we are navigating our own version of Korach’s test. We’re surrounded by geopolitical actors draped in false righteousness, from Iran’s “resistance axis” to Western so-called leaders moralizing from safe distances. And, internally, we are asking agonizing questions about justice, leadership, and the price of life.
The Trump-brokered ceasefire may offer temporary relief. It might buy us time. Yet what does “peace” mean when 50 Israeli citizens, men, women, children, remain trapped in Gaza, unseen for many months? When we cannot confirm if they are alive or buried under rubble, or worse, kept breathing only to leverage our morality against us?
And what is the price that is too great to pay?
Because the brutal truth is this: the entire State of Israel is being held hostage by the idea of the hostages. Every military decision, every diplomatic overture, every cabinet vote is filtered through their ghostly presence.
Their families, brave and broken, stand in front of the Knesset and whisper truth to power: “Don’t forget.” And they are right. We must not forget.
But here lies the unbearable tension: the demand to bring them home, and the fear of what we must pay to do so.
Some demand a prisoner release that could include hundreds of unrepentant terrorists.
Others warn that such a move would ensure future kidnappings, that it would reward barbarism. Some argue we have no choice; others say we have no right. Our national conscience is knotted.
French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre once wrote, “Once freedom lights its beacon in a man’s heart, the gods are powerless against him.”
Israel’s freedom, carved from desert and war, has always burned bright. But now we are faced with the opposite question: Can that same freedom survive the paralysis of grief? Are we still a nation of moral clarity, or are we frozen, frightened, held hostage by memory and responsibility?
The dilemma of the hostages held in Hamas captivity
THE DILEMMA of the hostages has become our national midrash. Each side of the debate quotes verses, ethics, history. We cry, we argue, we fall silent.
And in this silence, Korach returns.
Because when politics disguises itself as piety, and when the language of holiness becomes a tool of emotional blackmail, we begin to lose the very thing we claim to protect: our morality.
Korach’s story doesn’t end with argument. It ends with the earth itself opening, a terrifying image of divine intervention against human arrogance. But even then, the people remain confused.
A plague breaks out. Chaos spreads. And only Aaron, in quiet courage, steps between life and death, offering incense to stop the devastation. “He stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was halted.” (Numbers 17:13)
That is where we are now: standing between the dead and the living.
We are told that some hostages may be alive, and we owe them everything. We are told that some may not be, and yet their memory is now part of the fabric of our national soul, and we always promised to leave no one behind. Either way, we must stand between them and prevent the plague of division, of paralysis, of moral exhaustion from tearing us apart.
The ceasefire may give us a geopolitical reprieve. But it must not become a moral excuse.
It must not become a reason to forget.
And above all, it must not become an alibi for inaction.
If Trump can coax Iran back from the brink, surely we, the people who once wandered the wilderness in search of justice, can walk the tighter path between vengeance and compassion, strength and surrender, life and loss.
“The real challenge of leadership is not holding power but holding people together,” Rabbi Sacks warned. That is our task now: not to fall into Korach’s trap, not to divide ourselves into camps of righteousness, each wielding truth as a weapon, but to remember that every soul matters, even those we can no longer save.
Let us hope that this ceasefire is more than a pause. Let it be a moment of reflection, of renewal, of reckoning. Let it bring not only strategic calm, but moral clarity.
And let us bring home who and what we can, not only the living and the dead, but the truth that Jewish life is precious, and unity is not an aspiration but a lifeline.
It’s not over until every hostage is accounted for.
It’s over when no one is held in Gaza, and when the agonizing guilt subsides.
The writer is a rabbi and physician who lives in Ramat Poleg, Netanya. He is a co-founder of Techelet-Inspiring Judaism.