You are listening to an art media podcast.

There's a famous story where Yaakov is supposedly has a moment where he's wrestling with,

we're not sure what, it's either an angel, it's a man of God.

He says to this entity, I will not let you go

until you bless me. And what that really reminds me of is my sweet friend Sarit Zussman,

whose son Ben Zussman was a friend of Hershes, a friend of Aner's, Ben was killed in Gaza

fighting to try to get our hostages back. He was killed

in December of 2023. His mother at his funeral, Sarit said, our story will have a good ending.

And it reminds me of Jacob saying, I will not let you go until you bless me. And I think that there is such power

in that. And we are at a moment in the Jewish story, in history, in Israel's story, in our own

personal stories, that we are in a crisis moment. The modern Hebrew word for crisis is mash bear.

But the biblical word mashbear means birthing pains, because when you

are in that moment of crisis, where you feel that you cannot take it, that's you're being broken.

Sometimes that's the labor pain. And just ahead is the rebirth and the light.

And we must go toward that light.

We have no other option.

It's 11 a.m. on Sunday, September 14th here in New York City. It's 6 p.m. on Sunday, September 14th in Israel,

as Israelis wind down their day and also begin a new week. Over the past day, following warning leaflets dropped by the IDF, tens of thousands of Palestinians have evacuated Gaza City, bringing the total number of those who left Gaza City

to approximately 280,000, according to IDF estimates. More than 700,000 are believed to still remain in Gaza City. Shortly after issuing

the warning, the IDF bombed a high-rise tower in the area, continuing its recent pattern of

leveling tall buildings in Gaza City, which the IDF says are used by Hamas for surveillance

as sniper posts and to store weapons.

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