Waking Up To A Miracle - Again

Last night's extraordinary events happened once before

I don’t think that anyone in Israel will ever forget last night. To be in fear of attack is one thing; to actually know that hundreds of UAVs and missiles are already in the air, on their way over to you, is another. I doubt that anyone outside of Israel can fully grasp the surreal feeling of dread and helplessness that we experienced.

Almost nobody went to sleep. We readied our emergency rooms and obsessively checked the news as aircraft endlessly flew overhead. We all figured that today would be a day of chaos.

Somehow, despite all the booms and explosions, in the early morning eventually most of us fell asleep. And when we woke up, we found out that 99% of the UAVs and missiles had been intercepted! (The picture above shows a downed Iranian missile floating in the Dead Sea.) Nobody was killed, and only one young Bedouin girl was injured. Incredibly, not only did the US and the UK join the IDF in neutralizing the Iranian attack, but even Jordan helped!

And today is a relatively normal day. The airport is operating. I drove my eldest daughter to her train to her army base. My second daughter left at 6am to take her driving test (and passed!). There’s even a few visitors at the museum today, albeit not many.

A picture of my second daughter in her car. But not the one she took the test in this morning. (Note, by the way, the passenger in the back.)

Iran is crowing about their victory, the terrible blow that they inflicted against Israel. But they didn’t actually do anything! We had assassinated their top terrorists, a bold and successful blow in foreign territory. And all the hundreds of UAVs and missiles they sent in return did nothing other than prove how amazing Israel’s defenses are, and how contrary to the claims of some that Israel is alone, we have solid and strong allies.

A similar thing happened a while ago. 2,736 years ago, to be precise (less nine days). This was with Sennacherib’s siege of Jerusalem. According to Assyrian records of what happened, he successfully trapped King Chezkiyah in Jerusalem “like a caged bird” and then returned to Assyria with the Kingdom of Judah forced to pay tribute. Just like Iran today, he proclaimed victory.

But historians note that it’s rather odd that Sennacherib wouldn’t have gone into Jerusalem and destroyed it, as he did with so many other cities, such as Lachish. Is there something missing in the Assyrian account that was too embarrassing to mention? According to Tanach, there is. The reason why Sennacherib upped and left is that during the night, all his men had died!

"That night the angel of the Lord went out and put to death a hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies! So Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew." (2 Kings 19:35)

What does it mean that an angel killed them? Of course, this is the sort of thing about which rationalists and mystics will have different explanations. According to Rambam, any force of nature is described as an angel. Some scholars suggest that an epidemic broke out, perhaps bubonic plague. Whatever the explanation, we see that despite Assyrian claims of victory, it was actually the Jewish nation that woke up to a miraculous salvation, just as we did today.

“Thus said God, the Lord of Israel: I have heard the prayer you have offered to Me concerning King Sennacherib of Assyria. This is the word that God has spoken concerning him: Fair maiden Zion despises you, she scorns you; Fair Jerusalem tosses her head at you… And the survivors of the House of Judah that have escaped shall regenerate its stock below and produce boughs above. For a remnant shall come forth from Jerusalem, survivors from Mount Zion.”

It’s been a very, very hard and painful year. And there are likely many hard and painful times ahead. But if there’s one thing to learn from Sennacherib’s campaign, and from last night, it’s that you can never predict the future. We can, and should, prepare as best we can, but ultimately we never know what will happen. Hashem can turn things around overnight, either for the bad or for the good. Here’s a quote that I found helpful for all of us here who are struggling during this period:

“No amount of preparedness can control every outcome. Life always provides adversity for which we need flexibility and resilience. And life also provides pleasant rewards - joyful and peaceful moments that we can’t anticipate, along with the satisfaction of having lived a life full of meaning.”

May Hashem favor us with further miracles, and may we develop the resilience to deal with whatever happens. And may we appreciate the privilege and the miracle of living on a land where our ancestors lived thousands of years ago. Sennacherib destroyed Lachish, but now the Assyrians are gone, Lachish is now rebuilt and my third daughter is attending school there next year. Am Yisrael Chai!