October 19, 2024
Author(s): Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz,
Sukkot III
Understanding the Death of Yahya Sinwar Through the Lens of Jewish Values
October 19, 2024 – 17 Tishrei 5785
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
How are we to understand the death of the leader of Hamas, and the mastermind and architect of October 7, Yahya Sinwar?
Does his death mean that an end to the war, and the beginning of the day after, is closer? Or should Israel’s military continue the fight? What will Sinwar’s death mean for our hostages? These questions are hugely important and above my pay grade.
Our question this morning is how do Jewish values help us interpret this moment?
In his column describing what it was like to be in Jerusalem on Yom Kippur, Danny Gordis pointed out that at the shul where he davens the community decided to do something very much not traditional. And it was so obvious that it should be done that no explanation was needed. Namely, usually when Yom Kippur falls on Shabbat, as it did last Shabbat, we do not say Aveinu Malkeinu. The reason is that Aveinu Malkeinu is a lengthy list of bakashot, of requests. God please give us this, please give us that. And on Shabbat, we are not to make such requests, but to accept the world as it is. This year this shul in Jerusalem, and Danny points out many shuls throughout Israel, recited Aveinu Malkeinu anyway because we needed to offer to God the following plea:
Our father, our King, nullify the plans of those who hate us.
Our father, our King, thwart the counsel of our enemies ….
Our father, our King, tear up the evil decree against us. …
Our father, our King, be gracious to use and answer us … and save us.
In other words, God, please defeat our enemies. God, please help us kill the leader of our enemies, Yahya Sinwar.
According to this read, the IDF’s killing of Yahya Sinwar is a prayer answered. If so, what is the emotion that this prayer answered might occasion? Might it occasion joy? Is it religiously valid to feel joy at the downfall of an enemy? Or is such joy unseemly?
We say two prayers every day that express unrestrained joy at the death of our enemies. One is the prayer known as the shira, the song or the poem that ensued after Pharaoh and his army drowned in the Sea of Reeds:
Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore of the sea…
Then Moses and the people Israel sang this song to Adonai:
I will sing to Adonai, mighty in majestic triumph!
Horse and driver God has hurled into the sea….
Pharaoh’s chariots and army God has cast into the sea;
Pharaoh’s choicest captains have drowned in the Sea of Reeds.
The depths covered them; they sank in the deep like a stone.
Similarly, in the prayer leading up to the Amidah, we again celebrate that our Egyptian enemies are dead:
The firstborn of the Egyptians were slain; Your firstborn were saved.
You split the waters of the sea. The faithful You rescued; the wicked
drowned. The waters engulfed Israel’s enemies; not one of the arrogant
remained alive. Then Your beloved sang hymns of acclamation, extolling
You with psalms of adoration.
If the siddur is a distillation of Jewish values, as I believe it is, then these daily prayers do indeed suggest that it is Jewishly appropriate to feel joy at the death of Yahya Sinwar, for two reasons.
One, he has so much Jewish blood on his hands. All the victims of the terrorism on October 7, the infinite pain of the families, the pain of the hostages, including the six whom he instructed be killed in late August, and their families, the pain of Israel’s soldiers who fell in combat and their families. He is evil. We rejoice in the downfall of evil.
But it is not only Jewish blood he has on his hands. October 7 and the war that ensued have resulted in the death of a very large number of Palestinians in Gaza, the destruction of much of Gaza into rubble, and massive suffering and dislocation of Gazan civilians. Indeed, as is well known, Yahya Sinwar was good with all this Gazan death, casting them as martyrs, shaheeds, thinking that if tens of thousands of civilians die, that will result in political pressure for the US to cease its support of Israel, with an eye towards its eventual destruction. Yahya Sinwar caused infinite pain for his own people. The Times interviewed a 22-year old Gazan named Mohammed who observed:
He humiliated us, started the war, scattered us and made us displaced,
without water, food or money. He is the one who made Israel do this.
Sinwar’s death is the best day of my life.
If it is Jewishly appropriate to rejoice at the defeat of our enemies, then surely the death of Yahya Sinwar, who has so much blood on his hands, is something to celebrate.
And yet, the obvious counter to the notion that we ought to celebrate Sinwar’s death is a well-known ritual and well-known text on which that ritual is based. At the Passover seder, during the 10 plagues, we diminish our cup of joy by spilling one droplet of wine for each plague. The text on which this practice is based is from the Talmud, tractate Megillah 10B, where God chastises the angels of heaven who were trying to sing a song of praise to God after the drowning of the Egyptians. God snaps at these angels:
My handiwork, my human creatures, are drowning in the sea, and you want to sing a song of praise?
According to this rationale, even the death of Pharaoh and the Egyptian army are not something to celebrate. It is a good thing that Pharaoh and the Egyptian army were overcome. It is a good thing that Yahyah Sinwar was killed by the IDF. But not something to celebrate because how sad that we live in a world where such violence and conflict are necessary.
How do we put all this together? Can the Song of the Sea, and the Talmudic critique of the Song of the Sea, both be valid? Can joy at the downfall of our enemy be reconciled with the view that such joy is unsavory?
I believe the answer to these questions is yes. The song of the sea is valid. And the critique of the song of the sea is also valid. Joy at Sinwar’s defeat is legitimate. And joy at his defeat is also unsavory. And here is how I think all these perspectives fit together in a coherent religious worldview.
What is our ultimate prayer? What do we pray for most?
Yes, we pray for the death of our enemies. That is why so many Israeli shuls said Aveinu Malkeinu on Yom Kippur last Shabbat. But that is not our ultimate prayer. That is a means to an end. We do not glorify death but life. And we pray for the death of our enemies so that we, and our neighbors, can live in peace. It is surely a good thing that Yahya Sinwar was killed by the IDF. But our deepest prayer now is not: God thank you for his death. Rather, God, can you inspire the leaders of all sides to build a lasting peace for all sides? How that happens, when that happens, the next steps, is above our paygrade. That is the job of political leadership. But there can be no doubt that our deepest prayer is not the death of our enemies but a world of peace for all. As Rabbi Shimon Ben Halafta taught:
See how desirable is peace! When the Holy One sought to bless Israel, God
found no term which included all the blessings God wished to bestow upon them—
except for peace. How do we know this? It is written: “May Adonai grant God’s
people strength; may Adonai bless God’s people with peace.”
Shabbat shalom and chag sameakh.