For days, we’d prepared for a huge Simchas Torah for our local community, two communal foster homes with the staff and families who care for the children, and some American volunteers.
We rented out a small, but beautiful, hall, overlooking the ocean, and enjoyed a Friday night celebration filled with simcha. We wanted nothing more than to carry this joy to the next day. But instead, we started the morning on edge, with nearly one hundred rockets fired in the span of a few minutes.
My wife and I gathered our children in the bomb shelter, listened for the booms indicating the Iron Dome’s interception, and then waited ten minutes. Once we knew we were safe.
I ran to check on the foster children. It was supposed to be a quick walk, but between sirens and running for shelter, it took me triple the time. When I finally made it, the staff and I decided to take the kids over to Rav Moshe Peles’s Chabad house. It wasn’t too far, and doubled as a bomb shelter. We spent the rest of the hour hiding in stairwells, all while trying to keep the children calm and organized.
I knew my wife would be worried about me, so as soon as I could, I ran home. Minutes before reaching my front door, a strong gust of air pushed me from behind, making me stumble onto the grass. Suddenly, a rocket flew over me. I felt like I could see the streaks in the sky. I covered my head and waited for the crash before getting up.
When I finally got home, heart still pounding, I found the power cut, and my panicked family sitting in darkness.
“Let’s go to the preschool,” my wife said. “We’ll have Simchas Torah there!”
My son and I ran ahead, hoping to find the building lit up. Since it doubled as a bomb shelter, we figured it’d be occupied. A local rabbi was welcoming people in, and happily accepted my crew. The lights shone extra brightly, the only ones working for kilometers; I knew it was a gift from Hashem. My family and I spent the rest of chag enjoying hakafos, appreciating the light, and acknowledging the occasional siren from the safety of our shelter.
The next day, we quickly shipped the foster children off to Kfar Chabad and got to work servicing the rest of our community. We gathered food and supplies and anything else we could to help out soldiers.
