Let the evil in London rekindle our individual and collective goodness! |
I was supposed to be cleaning out my kitchen fridge first thing this morning for the upcoming Pesach holiday. However, I have decided to place that activity on hold as I am overwhelmed by a deep sadness and profound anxiety about the alarming news coming out of Golders Green, London – the suburb in which I grew up and spent my formative years. Simply put, I can’t focus on anything else right now as I feel compelled to put pen to paper in the hope that it will simultaneously bring some vestige of comfort to me and give food for thought to others who may read this.
Three hooded men wearing black outfits set fire to 4 Hatzolah ambulances which were parked next to one of the shuls in Golders Green which my parents frequented – Machzike Hadat – around 1:40am this morning. This chilling antisemitic action has attained an additional level of ‘horrifying’ in my mind as one of those ambulances – I believe it was Ambulance Number 5 – was the one in which my late father was transported to hospital in November 2021 when he was first diagnosed with COVID from which he died a few weeks later.
I have often walked along the street where this crime was perpetrated on my trips to England, and specifically recall walking past the shul and the ambulances a few months after my father passed away. I remember standing for a few moments, taking stock and looking at those ambulances with a mixture of gratitude, sadness and fondness as one of them had had the privilege of having my beloved father travel inside it. And I even recollect being a little envious of the ambulance bed, seats and walls as they had carried such precious cargo. I had, unfortunately, not been able to accompany him on this anxiety-provoking Friday night trip as I lived too far away in the U.S.
Learning of the torching of those Hatzalah ambulances was horrifying, and simultaneously also reignited my personal pain at the memories of those days of suffering for my father and our extended family as he entered the final weeks of his life. Because those ambulances – and one in particular – had all performed such sacred work – ensuring that Daddy reached the hospital and received medical treatment as soon as possible; and now they had all been brutally attacked and murdered which meant that their life-saving treatment would no longer be available to others in need. Although an ambulance is an inanimate object, each one is imbued, in my mind, with a human-like quality; each one is a life-saver with a big heart accompanied by a sick individual and medics ministering to them with knowledge, compassion and empathy – operating ‘in the image of G-d’ as Jews have always been encouraged to do at the very beginning of Bereishit.
Judaism is a religion which attaches immense significance to the individual and regards each one as a universe. As someone who has, over the course of decades, interacted with people from all walks of Life, I have found myself repeatedly being struck by the fact that each one of us is an entire universe of thoughts, feelings and behaviors, and thus consequently unique and irreplaceable. It has always been truly fascinating for me to see the diversity of the personalities G-d created – particularly when contemplating that the Torah states ‘Betzelem Elokim Bara Otam.’
Many years ago, when I had asked my father about the meaning of this phrase – because of the deep disparities I had noted between people – he carefully explained that this means that each and every one of us has the ability to emulate the qualities and characteristics of Hashem and that we should attempt to devote our lives to walking in His ways. Net, net the messaging is that we should always strive to evolve and refine our characters so that we can become the best we can be and, in so doing, sincerely emulate G-d’s goodness. I found this explanation meaningful and relevant then and still do now, and recall sharing it will each of our children.
So how do human beings who are apparently all created in the image of G-d wittingly conduct such heinous acts and commit themselves to the dissemination of death and destruction? An age-old question with no appropriate answers, yet the intensity of the antisemitism and profound hatred we are currently witnessing in the country of my birth and elsewhere across the globe feels especially frightening to this granddaughter of 4 people who fled from Hitler in the 1930s. Dare I say it, but it feels potentially even worse than that we confronted all those decades ago as social media has enabled these tentacles of hatred, evil and mendacity spread even more quickly and unrestrainedly across the globe. The disparity between truth and fabrication of lies, stories and unchecked facts is mind-blowing and anxiety-provoking. The posts I have seen on media websites since this outrageous crime was committed early this morning speak to a world where facts no longer count, where hatred, narrow-mindedness, contempt, hostility, and inhumanity reign supreme. In 2026, the milk of human kindness appears to be an alien concept; compassion and empathy are in short supply and rational analysis of facts on the ground apparently an impossibility as the world delights, once again, in hounding Jews wherever they and their institutions and values are to be found.
The world is, clearly, at a very unpleasant crossroads.
The battle raging is about the values of the Western World versus that of the Islamic fundamentalists who have been fomenting dissent in our world for decades. It is about the fight for goodness, truth, decency, humanity and respect for Life versus the appetite for disdain, contempt, raging hatred for those that have different beliefs and customs and the glorification of death and destruction. The battle is about whether we can choose to extend a hand to others and create bridges versus destroy each other and what we each hold dear.
The battle is about whether we actually want to live in a world where death, destruction, and hatred triumph and where depression and anxiety consequently run rampant; whether we want to leave such a shattered, sickening world to those who come after us or whether we can actually – individually, nationally and globally – pull ourselves together and restore the world to a place of harmony, peace and beauty. Where ‘live and let live’ is the mantra versus ‘It must be one-size-fits-all.’
But back to the destruction of the Hatzala ambulances in Golders Green.
The word ‘ambulance’ originated in 1798 from the French and was first referred to as a ‘walking hospital.’ (un hôpital ambulant) The origin of the word ambulance was the Latin verb ‘ambulare’ – to walk/go about. The first ambulance was a moveable hospital, constructed in a way which allowed it to be dismantled and carried from place to place, according to the movements of the army. It served as a receptacle in which the sick and wounded were received and tended to. And in the early twentieth century, it was extended to vehicles to transport civilians who were sick or wounded.
When all is said and done, an ambulance is an object which represents our desire to ‘walk’ with one another and assist one another in an hour of need. An ambulance represents our shared vulnerability and capacity to help one another and, as such, is a vehicle which literally characterizes the best of what humanity has to offer. It is a vehicle dedicated to the creation of a kind, caring, empathic, peace-loving society. Medics show up to tend to those who are sick or wounded whether they know them or not. They just know that they wish to help another human being out of a bad situation. The care they offer is universal and does not discriminate between individuals’ religions, age, color, gender, social status or career.
The torching of ambulances is a physical manifestation of the breakdown of the values of our Western Society and serves as a chilling warning of what may come next if this type of inhumane, dangerous behavior is not reined in immediately across the world. This event also reminds me of the words of the nineteenth century German Romantic journalist, poet and essayist, Heinrich Heine who said in German ‘Dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menschen. This is often translated as: ‘Wherever books are burned, men in the end will also burn.’
Book burning is an act of cultural desecration. And the idea of attempting to destroy an ambulance is just as barbaric as using matches and a can of gas to destroy books. The world has repeatedly seen how slippery a slope hatred can be. Destroying ambulances is a way in which to attempt to prevent people from receiving life-saving aid and thus potentially hasten their demise. Clearly, the perpetrators of this crime aimed to prevent Jewish people from receiving this help, although these ambulances are also used to administer help to non-Jewish people.
Now is the time to put an end to the fueling of hatred and the torching of ambulances which obviously represent a desire to spread death. Let us recall that, in Judaism, we are encouraged to adhere to a heartwarming mantra: Olam Chessed Yibaneh – a world of kindness should be built.
It is time to start to inject love, goodness, compassion and empathy into the world. Let the evil, chilling, hate-filled Hatzala ambulance torching in Golders Green be the fuel which now ignites an effort – on an individual, national and global level – to reclaim our humanity, moral integrity, decency, honesty and kindness.