Since there is so much attention being paid to Jews and Israel  and so much misinformation, I would like to share my own reflections regarding the Jewish message to the world, in the present day, that is personified in the Passover story. I am relying on my experience and education as a Jew, born in Europe after the Shoa/Holocaust. I grew up from the age of five years in Canada, and lived in Israel as a student at the Hebrew University, many years ago and then in the US. More recently over the last year, I have been living in Israel while studying at a Women’s Jewish studies program called Shviti  in the Holy city, of Jerusalem.

The Jewish calendar is an education in itself: And living in Israel one gets to experience it as a living thing. So our school is on recess for the month of Nissan, the month of Passover to allow both students and teachers to fulfill the obligations of Passover towards, self, family and community. And this goes on in the whole country. As preparation for Pesach, some people seek to examine their personal state of servitude, their personal slavery, and explore how to be released from it. But as much as Pesach can be a personal stocktaking, it is also very much a communal  endeavor. From the beginning of the month of Nissan, the month of the Passover/Pesach, every Jewish person and Jewish community begins preparations for the holiday, by  1. cleaning and getting rid of leavened bread and leavened bread products from every personal habitation – home workplace community center, and 2. by studying the story of the exodus from Egypt and preparing for the seder night by studying the Torah portions pertaining to the exodus story and also reviewing the mitzvot/obigations i.e. What to do and what not to do during this period – in order to be able to have a fulfilling and “kosher” Passover/Pesach with family and friends. During this month we greet each other with the Hebrew words, “hag kasher vesameach” – May you have a kosher and joyous hag.

My own family history is intimately connected to the Exodus story – a going out from slavery to freedom. When I was three years old and my dear sister Anita, was only one year old, in 1949, my mother and her brother Tibi, set out  on the last night of Passover, after having set the holiday table – so that no suspicions would be aroused – at the family home  in Tokay, Hungary: They left the house to cross the border by foot during the night from Hungary into Czechoslovakia, and from there secretly to Vienna, Austria, gateway to the free world of the West at the time. They succeeded with the Grace of G-d, and that is why I am here today to tell the tale. This is my story, but it is also the story of all of the Jewish people as it says in the Haggada – the prescribed book which details all of the story and traditions practiced at  the seder table on the Eve of Peasach – and which begins the story as follows:

• “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and the L-rd, our G‑d, took us out from there with a strong hand and with an outstretched arm. If the Holy One, blessed be He, had not taken our fathers out of Egypt, then we, our children and our children’s children would have remained enslaved to Pharaoh in Egypt.”

The Voice of the Hagadda continues: “This is the bread of affliction that our fathers ate in the land of Egypt. Whoever is hungry, let him come and eat; whoever is in need, let him come and conduct the Seder of Passover.”