Pesach, the holiday of spring, will be rainy and cold this year, accompanied by desert dust storms—an accurate reflection of our collective mood. Pesach, also known as the Festival of Freedom—the holiday that above all, commemorates our becoming a people, a sovereign nation emerging from Egyptian bondage into freedom—will be marked instead by confinement in shelters, threatened by ballistic missiles from three fronts: Iran, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Houthis in Yemen.
The walking trails of our beautiful land, its national parks and seashores that at this time each year overflow with families and visitors, will stand deserted. Neither spring nor freedom will characterize Pesach 2026.
Israel’s children carry trauma in their young hearts. For them, war has long ceased to be a concept in their imagination. Guns and missiles are no longer water toys for the pool but real, existential threats. Bad people who want to kill them exist not in stories but in reality, and they are profoundly afraid.
Shai, our 4-year-old granddaughter, slept at our house a few days ago. Despite her age, despite sleeping in our home-based shelter, she chose to sleep in a baby crib with bars and asked for an especially large blanket so that, in her words, she could hide beneath it when the bad Iranian terrorist comes to harm us. Just like that, with childlike innocence, while preparing for bed at the end of a day punctuated by sirens, she unwittingly gave voice to the tangible existential fear with which she grapples.
Our grandson, Nir, Shai’s cousin of the same age, built a house from magnetic blocks. He explained that he had constructed the home shelter with especially thick walls, but even so, the Iranian missile succeeded in penetrating it. Again, during play, with the innocence of a child building with toys, he expressed his fear that his own home shelter wouldn’t withstand the force of missiles.
Two stories from recent days within my own family. Two examples of the terror in which we’ve been living for over a month now. The emergency routine I’ve already written about doesn’t fade with time; we don’t grow accustomed to it. One cannot grow accustomed to ballistic missiles with cluster warheads that split into dozens of bombs, designed for a single mission: to kill.
After the events of October 7, Sergeant Moshe Yitzchak Hacohen Katz, born in New Haven, Connecticut, felt his heart belonged in Israel. He knew he needed to be here, to contribute his part to the war against those who rise up to destroy us. Like so many others—”lone soldiers” who choose to leave behind the comfort of home, the security of familiar surroundings, a clear path toward studies and career—Moshe immigrated to Israel and enlisted in the army. He followed his sister, Adina, who had paved the way before him, joining the Paratroopers’ 890th Battalion.
Moshe fell in Lebanon, killed by Hezbollah missiles on Friday night, in an attack that wounded three other soldiers.
Moshe’s family had arrived in Israel just three weeks earlier to attend his beret completion ceremony. With tremendous pride and hearts overflowing with joy, they awaited him at the end of that gruelling journey, unaware that only a few short weeks would pass before they would accompany him once more—this time on his final journey. “An indescribable tragedy,” his father Mendy shared. “My oldest son, with such zest for life and laughter… my heart is shattered. The wound is real.”
Thousands attended Moshe’s funeral. The term “lone soldier”—used to describe those born abroad who chose to immigrate and serve in the Israeli army—could not be further from the truth. Moshe was anything but alone. He was laid to rest in the soil of his beloved homeland, embraced by those who honored him, thanking him one last time for the ultimate sacrifice he knew might be the price of his choice.
This Wednesday evening, millions of Jews around the world will gather at festively set Pesach Seder tables. In Russia and Ukraine, Jews will mark their fifth Seder under ongoing war—a war to which the world may have grown accustomed, though they certainly have not.
In various corners of the world, Jews will hesitate to display signs of the holiday publicly, concealing their Judaism out of fear of antisemitic violence. Here in Israel, once again—as last year, as two years ago—many Seder tables will sit incomplete. In the best cases, a family member is stranded abroad, unable to return home for the holiday. In countless other homes, tables will be missing fathers and partners serving in the reserves far from home—a scenario so frequent that their families have lost count of how many times they’ve been called up. And, heartbreakingly, for far too many at tables across this land, an empty chair will wait for those who—like Moshe—will never return, victims of an evil that refuses to release us from its grip.
As I write these lines, news has been released that another soldier fell to Hezbollah fire in Lebanon. Liran Ben Tzion, merely 19 years old, has joined the angels above—far too soon. And so, at yet one more Pesach table, a chair will remain empty, marking a void that will never heal.
Among the songs of the Pesach Haggadah, this verse, sadly, will be so relevant: “In every generation they rise against us to destroy us.” We will hold tight to Shai, to Nir, to all of Israel’s children who carry fear of the threat and destruction. We will promise them, with hopeful hearts, that “the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand.” And then, loud and proud, Jews in every corner of the world will sing “L’Shanah ha’baah b’Yerushalyim | Next year in Jerusalem,” praying we merit real and long-lasting freedom that stands at the very foundation of this holiday.
Despite everything, spring is already here. Birds sing; flowers bloom in brilliant color between the raindrops and the desert dust. And a remarkable people continue reaching toward peace, refusing to surrender to despair—despite the difficulty, despite the unbearable price—forever and always.
Chag sameach.
Leah Garber is a senior vice president of JCC Association of North America and director of its Center for Israel Engagement in Jerusalem.