I have been struggling with how to begin this article.

And let’s be honest: I’ve been struggling this week — and I know I’m not alone.

Not in the vague way people say it when life feels “a bit heavy,” but in the real way that comes from trying to make sense of something that cannot be made sense of. Trying to find words when words feel inadequate. Trying to keep going when everything has shifted.

What can I add—what can I say—that hasn’t already been said about the tragedy that unfolded in Bondi last Sunday evening, at Chanukah by the Sea?

The honest answer is: nothing new. And yet, I feel compelled to write, because silence does not sit easily right now.

I can only speak about how I feel. And I suspect many in our community feel the same.

I am trying to process something that, in truth, cannot be processed.

What happened is almost impossible to comprehend. Not because it was unimaginable—many of us knew, deep down, that something like this was coming—but because the leap from the hypothetical, to the possible, to the probable, and then to what actually occurred, is devastating in a way words struggle to capture.

For over two years, we have spoken about risk. We warned about escalation. We watched the lines move—again and again—each time being told that what we were seeing was not what it clearly was. And then, suddenly, the abstract became real. Names replaced numbers. Funerals replaced warnings. Vigils replaced briefings.

That is where grief begins. And where anger follows close behind.

I am angry at the whitewashing of what occurred.

This was a terror attack. Jews were targeted. That fact should not be........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)