RUTHFULLY YOURS

El Al Airlines, the flagship carrier of the State of Israel, is the only commercial airline in the world that equips its fleet with anti-missile-defense systems. At times, that might have seemed excessive. But in 2024, no one is questioning that necessity as El Al 787s take off and land at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, just an hour away by car from the Gaza Strip.

Security considerations have forced El Al to become arguably the world’s most modern and technologically advanced airline. It may also be the world’s most traditional. Passengers flying on El Al have access to a host of Western movies and TV shows, but many choose instead to spend their time 30,000 feet in the air watching or listening to one of El Al’s many Torah-study videos and podcasts. As I listened to one while above the Atlantic last week, I couldn’t help but notice the contrast: the ancient words of the Torah alongside the modern flourishes of the 787 aircraft. In many ways, it’s that tension, between the truly ancient and the decidedly modern, that defines the Jewish state.

After I exited the plane in Tel Aviv, I passed through the arrivals hallway in Ben Gurion Airport, which I had walked through many times as a child. This time, the hallway looked different. From beginning to end, it was lined with posters of Israeli hostages still held by Hamas — the Jewish state ensures that no visitor who arrives at Ben Gurion leaves the airport unaware of the ordeal the country now faces.

My face transformed from frown to smile as my gaze shifted from the hostage posters to my two cousins, both members of the IDF, who had come to pick me up. This was a tearful reunion, for my family had narrowly escaped the tragedy faced by so many other Jewish families in Israel since October 7. On that day, when my younger cousin was home for the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah, his unit was manning a base in southern Israel near the Gaza Strip. When Hamas invaded, they murdered one of his best friends. In the weeks and months that followed, my older cousin was one of the heroes tasked with fighting Hamas in Gaza. He told me of the horror he felt as he accidentally stepped on a land mine, likely one of the many booby traps the Hamas savages had placed for soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces. When he stepped off the mine, however, something miraculous happened: It didn’t explode. As I walked with my cousins past the airport’s large statue of David Ben-Gurion, I thanked God for the chance to see them again, and I remembered the words of Israel’s first prime minister: “In Israel, in order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles.”

We exited the airport and boarded Israel’s new high-speed train from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. What was once an hour drive has become, since 2019, a 15-minute trip by rail. Once again, I was struck by the contrast between the ancient and the modern. Here we were on a newly constructed railway, traveling 100 miles an hour, on our way into the ancient city of Jerusalem. Our tickets were written in the Hebrew language that is even more ancient. Even the wonderfully idealistic founder of modern Zionism, Theodor Herzl, considered such a contrast — a train ticket written in Hebrew — ridiculous. As he wrote in The Jewish State: “Who amongst us has a sufficient acquaintance with Hebrew to ask for a railway ticket in that language? Such a thing cannot be done.” Herzl was merely being sensible. In his time, the Hebrew language was on life support. But given a state in 1948, the Jewish people would not abandon their holy language. In this instance, Herzl was a realist, but he was not a Jewish realist — he did not believe in miracles.

Later during my visit, on Shabbat, we celebrated the bar mitzvah of another of my cousins. He read from the Torah as the Orthodox Jewish community danced in celebration. The ancient words rang in the air alongside the machine guns of several off-duty IDF fighters. As the day went on, the celebrations increased: Because we were abstaining from using our phones on Shabbat, we learned belatedly of the daring rescue of four Israeli hostages from Hamas’s grip. Reports, delivered only by mouth, were that the operation had been a remarkable success. As we observed the end of Shabbat with the same traditions that our ancient ancestors observed, we were once again astonished by the modern marvel of the Israeli Defense Forces.

To end our time together, my entire family drove toward the north of Israel to observe the holiday of Shavuot, in which Jews celebrate the anniversary of our receiving the Torah at Mount Sinai. We were still slightly south of the border areas that had been evacuated following Hezbollah’s aggression from Lebanon, but it so happened that our visit coincided with the first time since October 7 that the terrorist group had fired rockets deeper into Israel, near Tiberias, where we were staying. Our plans to swim in the Sea of Galilee were foiled — there are no rocket shelters in the water — but we were otherwise safe. We celebrated Shavuot protected by Israeli bomb shelters and the Iron Dome. One of the most advanced air-defense systems in human history shielded us as we renewed our dedication to the Torah given to our ancestors.

I left Israel on the following Saturday night, hours before my cousins would return to their army bases — one next to Gaza and the other near the Lebanese border. As I bid a tearful farewell to my family, I was aware more than ever of what is at stake in the Jewish state’s seemingly perpetual war for survival. Israel typifies the tension between the ancient and the modern at the very heart of the Western tradition. As its people are forced to rely on the most cutting-edge technology to defend themselves, they remain dedicated to their families and communities, more so than people in any other developed nation. Israel is the only advanced country in the world with a birth rate above replacement level. The Jewish people living there understand that their eternal future will unfold in the same place — the Land of Israel — as their millennia-old past. They believe that, with God’s help, Israel will continue to advance technologically beyond all of its enemies, as its people continue to observe the ancient Jewish traditions of their ancestors, in the land that the Jews once again call home.