From Boca to Beit Shemesh: A New Oleh Confronts War on His Doorstep |
Rabbi Josh Broide made aliyah from Boca Raton several months ago. On day two of Iran’s assault, he drove to Beit Shemesh to witness the aftermath — and found himself searching for words.
Rabbi Josh Broide had been living in Israel for several months when the sirens began.
The veteran community leader, who spent 25 years building Jewish life in Boca Raton, Florida, had made aliyah a few months earlier with his wife Simone and two of their children, an 11-year-old and a teenager about to turn 16. He had been settling into his new country when Iran launched its ballistic missile assault on Israel, turning Shabbat in his adopted homeland into something none of them had prepared for.
On day two of the attack, Broide drove to Beit Shemesh to see with his own eyes what a ballistic missile does to an apartment building. What he saw there left him struggling to describe it.
“I thought maybe there would be a hole in a building,” he said, speaking from Israel. “You know — how big is the hole? Does it go through the roof? And then you get there and you realize: there is no building. The building is gone.”
He paused before continuing. “And it’s not just that building. The surrounding buildings are all damaged. Cars blown up. You can see the roof tiles shattered even down the block.”
Broide spoke with me on Sunday afternoon, as Israel entered its second day under Iranian attack — a conflict that had already killed multiple people and sent tens of thousands of reservists back to active duty. He had just returned from the devastated Beit Shemesh neighborhood, where he briefly spoke with one survivor who didn’t know enough English to say much. The man kept repeating a single word: boom, boom, boom.
A New Oleh in a Country at War
For Broide, the disorientation of new immigrant life has been compounded by crisis. He doesn’t yet know which neighborhood WhatsApp groups to check for updates. He didn’t realize that Purim megillah readings in his area had been reorganized block by block until all the small gatherings were already full. When air raid sirens sounded at the supermarket, he and his family stood in the aisle watching other shoppers sprint for shelter, and simply followed.
“What do you do with your groceries when there’s a siren?” he asked, only half joking. “Do you bring them into the safe room, or do you leave them? We just did what everyone else did.”
His household is processing the reality in different ways. His younger child treats it as frightening but manageable. His teenager is most worried about her upcoming 16th birthday. His wife has her own set of anxieties. And Broide himself — who for decades was the one standing at the front of a room, steadying others during crises — finds himself trying to get his bearings in a country he has only just begun to call home.
“The advice we got when we first landed,” he said, “was just take it day by day. Don’t have some grand master plan. Things change very quickly here.”
Purim in the Shadow of Amalek
Saturday was Shabbat Zachor — the Shabbat before Purim when Jews read the Torah portion commanding them to remember the nation of Amalek, the eternal enemy of Israel. Broide had attended the Torah reading not in a synagogue but in someone’s living room. And as the reader chanted the words “remember what Amalek did to you,” a siren began to wail outside.
“It was hard to avoid making the connection,” he said quietly. “Modern day Amalek. Modern day Persia. Modern day Iran.”
He noted that for weeks, commentators and rabbis had been drawing parallels between the Purim story — in which the Persian Empire threatened the Jewish people before a dramatic reversal — and Israel’s standoff with Iran. The timing of Israel’s military response, landing on the eve of Purim, only deepened the resonance.
“I teach the Purim story every year,” he said. “And you tell your students it’s hard to connect with — it happened 2,500 years ago. And then I think: we just got a very tangible refresher course.”
A Message to American Jews
Broide was careful not to lecture American Jewish communities. But he had something to say to them — gently, and from a place of someone who was one of them until very recently.
He is glad, he said, that synagogues across the United States are organizing emergency Tehillim sessions and prayers for Israel. He is grateful for the solidarity. But as Purim approaches and American Jews prepare their costumes and carnivals, he asked them to hold two realities at once.
“I’m not telling people not to celebrate,” he said. “You’re allowed. You should. But just remember — even when you see Israelis celebrating, even if it looks like we’re having fun, there is still the reality that a rocket could destroy someone’s building tonight. And there are a hundred thousand reservists who just got called up again.”
He described the resilience of Israeli daily life with a kind of amazed admiration. After a night of near-constant sirens, he expected to find the country shuttered the next morning. Instead, he found supermarkets open, pizza shops doing business, neighbors going about their lives. “You never feel more safe,” he said, “and yet the reality is completely the opposite of what that sentence should mean.”
Asked whether he has second thoughts about his aliyah — whether making the move during an already complicated period in Israel’s history gives him pause — Rabbi Josh Broide’s answer was immediate.
“We are so happy we made aliyah,” he said. “It only intensified things in some ways. But there is no turning back. We’re living in historic times. And we’re very fortunate to be here for them.”
As the conversation ended, his daughter’s 16th birthday was still a week away. Purim was one day away. And somewhere above Beit Shemesh, the night sky was quiet — for now.
Over the years, I have seen firsthand how the people of Israel are resilient like no other. It does not matter whether you just stepped off the plane or have lived in Israel your entire life — you push forward. You dream big. You build families, drive innovation, and celebrate your holidays with joy, even when the sirens have only just gone quiet.
Because that is what the Jewish people do. It is written into our history and woven into our DNA. No matter how hard the road, we survive. We thrive. We show the world, again and again, that we are proud to be Jewish — and we say it out loud, without apology.