This time last year it’s early in the morning and I am suddenly roused from sleep.
Could it be…? Is this a siren? We are usually warned about red alert sirens, indicating that we are being shot at by missiles, but this morning it came unexpectedly. No sign at all.
Through my confusion, I dragged myself out of bed. “Now stay calm, “ I said to myself. “Wake her up gently and calmly,” and sure enough, my daughter still lay fast asleep in her bed. I was anything but calm when I pulled her groggy body out of bed, and we ran to the bomb shelter which we shared with our neighbours downstairs.
The rest was surreal as about ten of us waited uncertainly, rubbing our tired eyes, shaking off sleep, talking quietly. A short time later, we went rushing down to the shelter again. This time, as two households stood waiting in the tiny, sealed room on a Shabbat and Simchat Torah morning, some were tallit-bound and praying from their siddurim, while my neighbour, journalist Inbar Twizer, had her phone to her ear as she spoke with people at the news
station.
A small room of men with kippot whispering the morning prayers, with Inbar on the phone a metre away. A meeting of the observant and non-observant. It was uncanny and captivating, and this is the image that remains ingrained in my mind from that day.
