Periods in history seem to repeat themselves over and over.

Sunday was on the Jewish calendar, the 9th day of the month of Av. It is the saddest day of the Jewish calendar. Both temples in Jerusalem were destroyed on that day, one by Nebuchadnezzar and 500 years later by Titus and his Roman Legion. Many tragedies befell the Jewish people on this day, and other horrific events are tied to it. A group of distinguished rabbis in the early 1950s came to the top rabbinic authority in Israel to suggest a new fast day for the six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust. He said to include it in the litany of horrible events of Jewish history remembered on the 9th day of Av.

The day is a 24-hour fast, and most people who can do so don’t go to work. Besides the services that include many special prayers about the destruction of the temples and the Jewish homeland, there is plenty of time to think about disasters, from the destruction of the temples long ago to the pogrom on the 7th of October nearly two years ago. There are many parallels in the stories from southern Israel to similar events during the holocaust and the Roman conquest. A rabbi once related that the Nazis captured a cousin of his who lived in Vilnius. He and his wife were dragged behind a car until they were dead; he noted stories of Jews being killed by Romans riding horses and dragging them along until they were lifeless. We have all seen pictures of nearly dead Jews being dragged along by Hamas terrorists as they made their way back to Gaza on motorcycles. The more things change….

During the day, I watched a documentary about the Einsatzgruppen, the mobile SS forces that killed Jews........

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