Purim 2026/5786 is emphatically unusual in the memory of several generations. It is literally Purim, with a repeated history of getting rid of criminal tyrants in the very place when the events of the historic Purim had happened almost two and a half millennia before. This kind of repetition of historical events does not happen in human history often. And it brings a tangible feeling of history on one’s hand, literally. 

But this Purim that we are living in both dimensions of the time: the past and the present at the same time. We also are experiencing a highly reflective holiday which we knew as the funniest one. And this is for the first time in decades. 

I cannot stop thinking of all those innocent civilian victims in Beit Shemesh just before Purim from the vicious attacks by the darkest regime’s missiles. Many of our friends are living in Beit Shemesh and we know the place and its people well. It feels close in general, but in moments like that, it feels close in particular.

I just cannot stop to think about all those tragic deaths in Beit Shemesh and the funerals on the erev Purim. 

Mother and daughter, with daughter’s child being left now without both mom and granny. 

Mother and son, with the son being exceptionally devoted to his mother. 

Father of four children, all young teenagers. 

Father, who was eulogised by his just 13-year old son, on the son’s birthday, literally, and instead of his bar-Mitzvah, with mother laying in the hospital.

 16-year old youth whose father was a donor of the synagogue that was hit directly. All life was ahead of him, no longer. 

And those three siblings of the Biton remarkable family, aged 13, 15 and 16, two sisters and their brother.

I just cannot imagine what their parents must be feeling since the tragedy. 

And they, all of them, the parents and grandmother of the murdered kids, did show us just incredible strength in their bearing and standing.

Yes, we know that our people are unbreakable. We have been seeing it all over yesterday night, the Purim night, on all the videos from the celebrations in the shelters and even at the military positions. 

We are lovingly proud of our people who did show, without any showing off, such incredible, and only possible, resilience and sense of humor, without which a life is unlivable as a food is uneatable without salt. Plus, humor is the main Jewish vitamin, as it comes all the way throughout our history and way of life. Thank Heaven we have it. 

But again and again, my thoughts return this Purim 2026/5786 to all those victims in Beit Shemesh and their families, and the victims in the other places in Israel as well. 

It is such an ultimate sacrifice. It is such an ultimate price in the fight with evil. It is such a terrible loss of innocent lives.

If this Purim 2026/5785 taught me something new with regard to the miraculous saving of our brethren two and half millennia ago at the very place where today we are fighting the reincarnations of Amalek again, it is that even solely joyful milestone in our history has a price. And this price is truly high. Ultimately so.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)