On Saturday Oct. 7, Israel was viciously attacked by terrorists belonging to Hamas, a Palestinian military organization that believes Israel has no right to exist.
The onslaught, which began in the Gaza strip on Saturday left more than 1200 Israelis dead and thousands more injured. Many call this attack a surprise, but some like Reena Judd, Quinnipiac University’s Rabbi, expected it.
“It’s a bad situation. Was I surprised? No. It’s a very volatile situation over there,” Rabbi Judd said. “I wouldn’t say I’ve been waiting for something of this magnitude to happen but I wasn’t surprised.”
Jewish people around the world are mourning the deaths caused by the devastating assault.
Leah Trachtenberg, a first year at the rabbinical school at Hebrew Union College is attending school in Jerusalem for a year and explained the effects of the attack.
“Many people are mourning. More names of those who have died are being released,” Trachtenberg said. “Next week, all of the Israeli students, regardless of what year they are, will be trained to perform funerals… there is a sense of unity.”
Stability in the Middle East has been an issue for decades and the situation for Israel is complicated due to its geographical location.
Judd, who lived in Israel for some time and served in the Israeli army, experienced these issues first hand.
“On both sides, on all sides, Israel is squished in between people who challenge its existence,” Rabbi Judd said.
What Jewish people say they want is peace, and some like Rabbi Judd fear that a lot more suffering is to come before that can be achieved.
“Young people that should be in love and having families and working [are] dying,” Rabbi Judd said. “You’re gonna have a lot of young men that are gonna be murdered and killed, and dying in mud alone. And I don’t think that when God listens to dying young men, God notices the difference of an accent,”
On Tuesday Oct. 10, Quinnipiac held a community gathering in the piazza on the Mount Carmel campus to offer support for Israel and reflect upon the loss of life from these attacks.
Some students were happy to see Quinnipiac make an effort to raise awareness for the issues Israel faces.
The event hosted several prominent religious speakers from Quinnipiac and students from various different beliefs attended.
