We may LOOK like we're moving on. But many of us are still frozen in place.

Our PM is trying to sell us on an endless war as the new normal. He's already campaigning. Will we have elections before this war ends?

Random thoughts swirling around my head today. Please forgive the occasional incoherence.

This morning feels a lot like people are getting ready to move on.

Universities are starting up again soon.

Malls are filling up with lines of people buying donuts.

Neighbors are having Hanuka parties in their gardens.

Some people are advertising new businesses, new ventures, new book releases.

Meanwhile, the IDF is rescuing bodies of hostages, NOT live hostages, from Gaza. BODIES. We are now at a stage where rescuing bodies of hostages is considered a victory....

And we continue to scan the almost daily list of names of soldiers killed overnight. Our new morning routine.

*******

Israel continues to ignore the calls from around the world to negotiate a cease fire. Some perhaps well-meaning people label those calls as "anti-Semitic", instead of asking whether they have any merit. Whether the admission by the IDF spokesman last week that Israel aims for no more than two innocent people killed for every terrorist killed, whether perhaps there is something deeply twisted in that strategy.

This week, even Bibi's bestie Biden has said that this cannot continue. And even suggested that Bibi remove the radical religious extremists from the government. FINALLY!!!

Is Biden also ready to move on? Perhaps in a different way....

Not that Bibi is listening or cares. Defying America gives him the macho turkey-stance with his base. The more he withstands American pressure, the more it reinforces his core victimhood strategy of "They all hate us anyway so we should just do whatever we want..." And apparently the mass of people supporting that idea is growing....

Rumors on social media are that Bibi has no plans to end the war, ever. The ramatkal is still waiting for detailed war objectives, the US is still waiting for timelines and deadlines, and Bibi refuses to commit. As long as the war goes on, he can keep his seat. "He is already campaigning", many are saying.

We will likely have elections before the war is over.

*******

And while all this is happening, while the war becomes normal life and we are encouraged to fall into a routine about it, and there is no sense of anyone in the Israeli government trying to end it and Bibi is using it all as leverage to win the next election -- what is going on with the hostages?

Yeah, the hostages.

The ones sitting in dark, wet tunnels with no food and no running water and nowhere to move or to lie down or speak? Not to mention the sexual assault that many are experiencing.... What is happening to them while Bibi lets all this drag out?

Endless torment. That's what it is.

The hostage families are living in their own particular hell, as the prime minister talks about "sacrifices" and spokespeople says that there is no chance for any negotiations to resume for at least a few weeks...

Are the hostages anywhere on this government's agenda? It does not seem so. They never have been. "Sacrifices," that's how Bibi described them.

******

Only one of the hostage families seems to be okay with this. Tzvika Mor from a settlement near Hebron whose son Eitan is a hostage, has gone on israeli television calling for continuing the war until Hamas is destroyed, no matter the cost to the captives. “If I have to choose between the love of my son and the love of the nation, I choose the love of the nation.”

Yeah, he said that.

Just be glad he isn't YOUR father, I suppose. Imagine knowing that if you were held captive, your father wouldn't necessarily call to rescue us..... Ideology before child? Nation before family? I can't even....

But that is the kind of language Bibi is counting on. That is where we are headed if he continues campaigning. That might even be his new campaign slogan. This father will be his Minister of PR.

*****

And what about the reservists, who have given up their lives to fight a war with no clear objectives or timelines? Some of whom haven't been home in ages? And over 100 of whom who have already died on this altar?

Families of reservists are also living in their own hell. Wives who have no idea if or when their husbands will show up. Mothers who haven't slept in two months.

It feels like this has become such a "norm" in Israel, that it's expected for people to be willing to sacrifice everything -- EVERYTHING -- for the army. Bibi is certainly taking that for granted. That he has this supply of bodies for his war, even if we haven't all agreed to this. I don't remember agreeing to this..... Agreeing to send my family members off to do this kind of thing for however long he chooses without having any kind of say about any of it.... When did we agree to this?

*****
And what about the people of Gaza??? Can we talk about this too? Can I mention this here without being labeled a self-hating Jew? Or being told by some orthodox rabbi in New Jersey that I don't understand what's going on in Israel? That I don't understand "Self-defense" or whatever? Can I talk about the fact that there are actual human beings in Gaza whose lives have been destroyed -- by US? Yes, by US....

Some 17,000 Gazans have already lost their lives, in some cases entire families, including some 5000 children if not more. More who have lost their homes and are struggling with scarcity, hunger, homelessness, mourning, disease. How much longer are we going to ignore their humanity, and our own role in destroying it?

How long are we, the Jewish people, going to be able to sustain the idea that in order to save OUR lives, we can do whatever we want to OTHER PEOPLE's lives? That OUR lives matter more? How long are we going to be able to live in that way? And pretend that it's the word of God, as if God only created us and not other human beings, too? How much longer are we going to be pushing that agenda onto the entire world and think that it can work?

****

So life moves on. The sun rises, the rain falls, the holiday season comes and goes, and our leaders seem to have made a decision that this is okay, that the hostages are some kind of "sacrifice", that the Gazans are getting what they deserve, or that it's their own fault or that it's all someone else's fault....

Another day like this... Another day in which all this is happening and we're all trying to grapple with it...

The truth is, for many of us, it only LOOKS like moving on. It isn't really. Many people are in mourning and are dealing with that mourning in their own ways. Many people whose kids or spouses are in Gaza are also in this half-frozen state. Not breathing. Not sleeping. The daily functioning is just a cover.

Some of us look like we're in some kind of normal just to get through the day, but in reality are not exactly moving on. We're barely coping.

I would probably describe myself that way. I need to function, for sure. To take care of my family and my home. But more than that, I need to be fully PRESENT with all this. NOT to look away. NOT to move on. And to NOT go back to "routine" or whatever.

Because to "move on" or to look away is to desensitize ourselves to it or dehumanize the other. And every day that we do this, we are also losing touch with our own humanity. We are shutting off our own hearts and our own souls. And I'm not sure if we will ever be able to come back from that.

So, yeah, for me, life goes on in certain ways, but is mostly frozen, and I choose that frozen-ness. Because I refuse to give up on humanity -- theirs and mine.

###