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Some have called it the day the music died, referring to the Nova Music Festival, where so many young Israelis were massacred by terrorists. But Am Yisrael Chai – the nation of Israel not only lives but has had fresh life, determination, courage and unity revived in it.

Barbara and I have just come back from October 7 commemorations in Canberra – one year on from the massacre of about 1200 Israelis and others by Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Gazan civilians and UNRWA staff. It is the anniversary of the worst massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust.

Our hearts go out to the Jewish people at this painful time, especially the families who lost loved ones on October 7 or during the war and who are worried about loved ones still captive in Gaza. We add our voice to the “Bring Them Home” cry. Our hearts also go out to any innocent Gazans who are casualties of a war Hamas started.

Tony Abbott and Ps Norman Miller at NAIN rally, Canberra, October 7 2024

On October 7, we were privileged to attend the Never Again is Now rally on the lawns of Parliament House, Canberra and the special commemoration at the Israel Embassy in Canberra to the sad lyrics of October Rain sung by Eden Golan at Eurovision. We were all able to light candles.

Boomerang presented to Israeli Ambassador.

On October 8, I presented a two-metre boomerang I made and painted with Am Yisrael Chai in English and Hebrew on it – “The people and nation of Israel live.” We then joined the ACT Jewish community and ANU Jewish students in an event marking October 7 at Parliament House, Canberra with Jewish MPs from both sides of politics.

Barbara lighting candle, October 7, Canberra Embassy

Bittersweet

However, that is the Western calendar. On the Jewish calendar and Biblical calendar, the anniversary falls on Simchat Torah, the day after Sukkot or the Feast of Tabernacles. The cruel irony of the massacre, rape, torture and kidnapping is that it was on one of the most joyful days of the Jewish calendar when Jews take out their Torah scrolls in places of worship and dance with them. I remember dancing in the streets of Jerusalem years ago with Jewish men on Simchat Torah.

So, it is a bittersweet time of remembrance this year which Jewish people will have to face again on Wednesday from nightfall to Thursday nightfall, October 23-24, Tishrei 22, 5785.

The massacre was exactly 50 years from the attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, October 6-7 in 1973, also a surprise attack. It was by Arab armies led by Egypt and Syria. Israel has a pattern of being attacked by Arabs and gaining territory, e.g. 1948, and in 1967, gaining Jerusalem, etc. We may find the pattern repeated in the October 7/Simchat Torah war of 2023.

Simchat Torah marks the end of the cycle of reading the Torah and the beginning of the next cycle. So, I see it as a new beginning for the Jewish people where they will be rid of the many terrorists who want to kill them and remove Israel off the map, a genocidal endeavour. It signals a new chapter, a new era, a rebirth.

At the government meeting commemorating the anniversary of the October 7 massacre, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for changing the name of the War from “Swords of Iron” to “The War of Rebirth”.

Is Netanyahu seeing an opportunity for the rebirth of Israel from the Holocaust-like event of October 7, just as we saw the rebirth of Israel in 1948 from the ashes of the Holocaust?

Victory

I would like to read 2 verses of the Torah portion for Simchat Torah, the blessing of Moses over Israel before he died:

So, Israel will live in safety; Jacob will dwell secure in a land of grain and new wine, where the heavens drop dew. Blessed are you, Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the LORD? He is your shield and helper and your glorious sword. ~ Deuteronomy 33:28-29

Israel will prevail over this evil onslaught from the hydra serpent-like water monster with nine heads. We know that the heads of Hezbollah and Hamas have been symbolically cut off in Lebanon and Gaza, and as the next head pops up, it is dealt with.

The evil Iranian colonial power in the Middle East has also been likened to an octopus which has 8 arms (some say tentacles, but arms is more accurate.) Iran is the real head supplying the terrorists and training them. It rules or feeds:

1. Gaza – Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad
2. Lebanon – Hezbollah
3. Yemen – Houthis
4. West Bank or Judea and Samaria – Fatah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)
5. Iraq – militias
6. Syria – militias

We also have ISIS in Sinai and Al-Qaeda in North and West Africa, with Al-Qaeda praising October 7. While all are not Shiite and some are Sunni, the jihad or fight is for world Islamic domination. It is a civilisational struggle, an existential struggle with Israel at the forefront, and the West is next.

Barbara and I, and our Centre for International Reconciliation and Peace, hosted a conference in Sydney at the Opera House in 2006. We actually held it in a large tent or sukkah on the foreshore beside the Opera House that we erected. It was during the time of the Israel-Lebanese war, and we had Lebanese demonstrators outside our tent with their flags while we had Israel flags inside.

Because of our close relations with the Israel Consul General, Effie Ben-Matityahu, we were able to secure an invitation to take our whole conference to the Great Synagogue for a service in honour of Gilad Shalit, an Israeli who was taken prisoner. You can imagine the security issues.

We also took our whole conference to the Sydney Jewish Museum in 2 halves.

The Israeli government puts so much store on life as opposed to the death cult of Hamas that it released 1,000 prisoners in exchange for the release of Gilad Shalit. One of these was the mastermind of October 7, Yahya Sinwar, killed a few days ago by the IDF.

Sinwar was known as the “butcher of Khan Younis” because he killed Palestinians suspected of being pro-Israel, and he set up a special police force to kill them.

Sinwar was in an Israeli prison for murder, and his life was saved by the Israelis, who removed a deadly abscess from his brain. Also, his family living in Beer Sheva has received medical help from Israel. However, he bit the hand that saved his life, unmercifully.

He is not a hero who died fighting, as claimed on the streets of Australia. Most of the time since October 7, he hid in tunnels built with Australia’s taxpayer dollars, and that of other nations, given to UNRWA for humanitarian aid. He did not shelter his people but used them as human shields to win the propaganda war against Israel. He said the more blood of his people spilled, the better, as it would fuel the fight.

We have had a number of tyrants and murderers who have attacked the Jewish people over the years, and their names start with H. Herod, Haman, Hitler, Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthis. The last 3 will come to nothing as the first 3 have. We know Hamas in Hebrew means violence.

God’s Promises

I will end with a favourite scripture of mine which has been used by Netanyahu:

Amos 9:11 and 15 —

¹¹ “In that day
I will restore David’s fallen shelter—(tabernacle or sukkah)
I will repair its broken walls
and restore its ruins—
and will rebuild it as it used to be,

¹⁵ I will plant Israel in their own land,
never again to be uprooted
from the land I have given them,”

Though it speaks of a future time, I will add Joel 3:4, 16-17, as it speaks of Tyre and Sidon, which are in Lebanon, and Philistia, where Gaza is.

⁴ “Indeed, what have you to do with Me,
O Tyre and Sidon, and all the coasts of Philistia?
Will you retaliate against Me?
But if you retaliate against Me,
Swiftly and speedily I will return your retaliation upon your own head.

¹⁶ The Lord also will roar from Zion,
And utter His voice from Jerusalem;
The heavens and earth will shake;
But the Lord will be a shelter for His people,
And the strength of the children of Israel.

¹⁷ “So, you shall know that I am the Lord your God,
Dwelling in Zion My holy mountain.
Then Jerusalem shall be holy,
And no aliens shall ever pass through her again.”

___

Image courtesy of Adobe.