Twenty of Anava Marcus’ relatives were scheduled to fly to Israel from Australia and South Africa last week to celebrate her bat mitzvah during Passover, which begins on Wednesday (April 1).
But instead, Anava will celebrate her 12th birthday — a Jewish milestone — with only her immediate family and some friends in central Israel, where they live, amid Israeli safety restrictions due to the war with Iran. Her relatives’ flights were all canceled.
“We had been planning the bat mitzvah for a year,” Dara Marcus, Anava’s mother, told RNS. “Anava was going to lead the Passover Seder for the entire family. We created a special Haggadah that tells the story of the Jewish people and our own family’s story. It includes Anava’s thoughts and commentaries.”
While Anava said she understands why relatives can’t be by her side on her big day, “I’m disappointed,” she admitted. “This was an opportunity for everyone in our family to be together for the first time in many years. All of my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins live abroad.”
The war, which began Feb. 28, has upended life in Israel. Residents are running to bomb shelters multiple times a day. Homes have been damaged or destroyed, and in much of the country, schools are closed, and no more than 50 people are permitted to gather in any one location — including houses of worship — due to fears of a mass-casualty event.
Airline travel
Non-Israeli airlines have cancelled their flights to and from Israel, and the Israeli government has limited the number of passengers on outbound flights amid threats from Iran.
Although thousands of tourists, volunteers and foreign students have managed to depart, thousands more are scrambling to find a place to spend Passover in Israel either because they can’t leave the country or have decided it was less risky to stay.
“It’s an incredibly difficult situation,” said Mark Feldman, director of the Diesenhaus travel agency in Jerusalem.
While intrepid travelers have left via Jordan and Egypt despite Israeli travel warnings, “a lot of our clientele are elderly, and they don’t want to make the long journey to Egypt and spend the night there,” he said. “We understand the security risk.”
Israelis are also planning their Passover seders around the location of the nearest bomb shelter and how many people it can fit. Families that had planned to be together within the country are weighing whether it is safe to drive even a short distance, given the missile fragments that have landed on highways.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Michele Chabin and originally published by Religion News Service.
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