WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

Good morning. Today: Israel and Hamas reach deal to bring medicine to hostages, two hostages reportedly killed in captivity, and new details of Gaza tunnel system.

ISRAEL AT WAR

A wadi in the Sinai desert, Egypt. (iStock)

Opinion | Oct. 7 upended my sense of safety. Studying the Exodus story is helping me reclaim it: “When intense anxiety strikes — raging antisemitism, murderous terrorism and seemingly indefinite war — I tend to hyper-consume content,” writes Sruli Fruchter, a rabbinical student who recently moved to Israel. But instead of scrolling through the latest headlines, he’s turned to the story of Pharaoh’s persecution of the Jewish people — a reminder that Jews have long thrived, despite suffering. “When I turn to the Jewish tradition and peer into the Torah’s eternal window,” he writes, “I viscerally sense that in the throes of our pain, our story is not ending.”Read his essay ➤

Bernie Sanders has led a small group of senators arguing for increased oversight of assistance to Israel. (Screenshot)

Latest from the war …

The U.S. Senate voted against considering a resolution, introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders, to freeze U.S. aid to Israel unless the State Department produces a report investigating whether Israel has committed human rights abuses during its war with Hamas.

Israel and Hamas reached a deal, brokered by Qatar and France, to allow for medication to be delivered to Israeli hostages who remain in Gaza in return for the delivery of more medicine and aid to Palestinian civilians in the strip.

Two Israeli hostages, Yossi Sharabi and Itay Svirsky, have been killed in captivity, their home of Kibbutz Be’eri announced. Sharabi, 53, is survived by his wife and three daughters; Svirsky, 38, by his sister and grandmother.

A freed hostage told The Associated Press that she and her family were kept in a Gazan hospital during their captivity. Sharon Alony Cunio described psychologically torturous conditions that once led her husband, David Cunio, to beat himself until his mouth bled. She and her 3-year-old daughters were released in November; her husband remains a hostage.

Israel released more details of the Hamas tunnels it has found under Gaza. Israel intelligence currently believes the network to be between 350 and 450 miles long, a significant increase over the estimate of 250 miles issued in December.

The board of Ben & Jerry’s called for “a permanent and immediate ceasefire” in Gaza. The ice cream brand has clashed with its parent company, Unilever, over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since announcing its intention to stop sales in the West Bank in protest of the Israeli occupation in 2021.

A Tuesday attack by Iran in Pakistan and a new series of strikes by the U.S against Houthi targets in Yemen contributed to growing fears that the Israel-Hamas war might lead to a broader regional conflict in the Middle East. Separately, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly told local authorities of communities near the Gaza border that he anticipates the war continuing into 2025.

An Israeli professional soccer player who played for a Turkish team was detained by authorities on Sunday after commemorating the 100-day anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack during a game. Sagiv Jehezkel, 28, has since been released from his contract and returned to Israel.

White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Top Biden aide: Israel must focus on a postwar plan. “The pieces are there to be put together to achieve this outcome — and not years down the road, but in the near term,” White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday of a peaceful two-state solution. But Sullivan, speaking during the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, emphasized that Israel must clarify its vision for the outcome of its war with Hamas to move toward that future, calling it “the only path that provides peace and security for all.” Read the story ➤

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ALSO IN THE FORWARD

Archie Rand’s 915 collages represent each of the 31 verses of the Book of Proverbs. (Courtesy of Archie Rand.)

He made 613 paintings of commandments and 915 collages of proverbs — but who’s got room to show them all?Archie Rand, 74, has found prolific artistic inspiration in religious texts — a calling he described, in part, as prompted by the feeling that “Judaism needs an enormous amount of iconography to fill itself in.” The Brooklyn-based artist has found himself sometimes surprised by the meaning he’s found in his biblical projects. While crafting his biblical collages, he said, “‘You know, if I put this pelican next to this jar of peanut butter, something happens.’ I don’t know what happens but it’s weird.”

What I learned reading my great-grandfather’s last will and testament. Last week, as editor-in-chief Jodi Rudoren moved her mother into a senior community while cleaning out the home where her parents lived for 36 years, she came across her great-grandfather’s will — 235 words in Yiddish, expressing gratitude for a full life, a wish for a proper Jewish burial, and repentance for any wrong done to his loved ones. Jodi is named after that great-grandfather, and, in the middle of an enormous life change, the document symbolized something of the beauty of preserving pieces of personal history. It “feels important, somehow, to tell the story buried in these boxes,” Jodi writes. “Not because it is a particularly significant or special story, but precisely because it’s not.”

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

The World Economic Forum in Davos has so far featured a major focus on the Israel-Hamas war. (Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

✡️ Second gentleman Doug Emhoff will discuss antisemitism at the World Economic Forum; he is scheduled to arrive in Davos today. The Israel-Hamas war and its reverberations across the globe have been a major subject at the conference so far, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterating Jake Sullivan’s message in a speech this morning calling for a “pathway to a Palestinian state.” (Associated Press, Haaretz)

🇩🇪 The German far-right party Alternative for Germany cut ties with a top aide after he went to a meeting where neo-Nazis discussed a “master plan” to deport migrants and “unassimilated citizens.” Roland Hartwig, a close advisor to party leader Alice Weidel and a former member of the Bundestag, was one of several politicians at the November meeting. Some politicians from the party have expressed public support for the plan since its existence was revealed last week, leading to several days of massive protests. (Politico, Guardian)

⚖️ Separately, a German court sentenced a Turkish man who attempted to burn down a synagogue to nearly three years in prison. The 47-year-old staged an unsuccessful arson attack on a synagogue in Ulm in 2021. (AFP)

🎭 Harmony, Barry Manilow’s musical about a popular German singing group decimated by the Nazis, will close on Broadway. “When the musical ventures beyond the story of the Harmonists into a larger commentary on politics or antisemitism, it tends to falter,” the Forward’s critic wrote. (New York Times, Forward)

🖼️ Paintings by Marc Chagall and Pablo Picasso stolen from Tel Aviv in 2010 were found in Antwerp. The two paintings are estimated to be worth $900,000. (Reuters)

🗳️ Jon Bramnick, the self-declared “funniest lawyer in New Jersey,” announced his intent to enter the gubernatorial race. Bramnick, a Jewish Republican, supports abortion rights and gun control. (Gothamist)

Shiva call ➤Bernie Steinberg, a longtime director of Harvard’s Hillel, died at 78.

What else we’re reading ➤“Two Jewish writers, a bottle of whiskey, and a post–October 7 reality” … “Louise Glück: The art of poetry” … “Why star of Amy Winehouse biopic had to train ‘like an athlete.’”

PHOTO OF THE DAY

(JALAA MAREY/AFP via Getty Images)

A Haredi man brought a gun to the Monday funeral of a mother and son who were killed in Kfar Yuval, near the Lebanese border, in a missile strike stemming from Lebanon.

Thanks to Benyamin Cohen for contributing to this newsletter, and to Beth Harpaz for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at editorial@forward.com.

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