PURIM MISSION of us who are not living in Israel must do more to help the soldiers and border police and show them we care. We are an eternal people, bound to each other through our Torah covenant with G-d, responsible to those who came before us to continue the holy work of ensuring that this sacred gift of the land of Israel will be there for those who come after us. MOUNT OF OLIVES CEMETERY One holy moment came during our visit to the 3,000-year-old Jewish cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount of Olives, which contains more than 200,000 graves, including those of prophets and revered rabbis. Without the protection of an armed guard, it has been dangerous for Jews to hold burials, visit graves, or even to travel the streets, through a heavily Arab area, leading to the cemetery. Today, thanks to the ZOA and the efforts of Jeff Daube, there are 147 monitored surveillance cameras and an extra police presence on nearby roads and in the cemetery. Standing among those graves, I felt Jewish history come alive. At the burial site of Prime Minister Menachem Begin and his wife, and looking over the countless white burial monuments 24 of our Jewish people, I realized even more strongly how connected we Jews are to one another, to Torah, and to the land of Israel. That was made more poignant when Howard Katzoff showed my sister and me the burial site of our great-grandmother, Sima, who immigrated to Israel around 1904 to escape pogroms in Poland and was buried on the Mount of Olives in 1914. For a brief moment, time stopped. My soul was part of hers and part of every soul buried there. Participants in the ZOA’s Purim Mission to Israel May Long with IDF soldier
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