atonement: restoration of friendly relations between persons who have been at variance

We were surprised to find the wall mostly empty but for some Christians and foreigners. We handed out a few flyers; placed some between the holy books and Torahs on the shelf. We left the plaza and began flyering mailboxes on a narrow enclosed street of stone in the Jewish quarter. The street was off; half the mailboxes were broken and we couldn’t see in any windows or doors. An older woman was coming out of a door as I put a flyer in her mailbox; she asked me what it was. “It’s about Yom Kippur” I told her. Her English seemed limited, but I couldn’t place her accent. What kind of Jews were these, what kind of Israelis? Rosi called to me and I left the woman on her doorstep. Moments later she called to us.

“You shouldn’t be doing this,” she said, approaching us. “Today is a very holy day and you shouldn’t be doing this.” She was holding our flyer, shaking it at us slightly. She looked deeply hurt and I feared she was about to cry. The fanatic anger of the men we encountered next was far easier to deal with than this woman who looked like we’d hurt her soul.

“We know it’s the holy day,” we told her. “We’re Jewish.”

“This is not what we do. This is not part of our hashgacha,” I think I hear her say, using the same word that refers to Kosher symbols on packaged foods. “How did you even get here today? Did you walk?”
I nod my head solemnly.
“Are you fasting?”
We nod.
“Well, then,” she says, looking temporarily confounded by our unexpected affirmations. She’d been hoping to discredit us easily. “God help you.”

We continued. I was about to head towards a row of empty mailboxes when Rosi gestured at me discreetly. “Let’s walk” she said. “They’re following us.”
And they were, two large men with beards and tallises, neither more than five years older than we. I worried about our physical safety. Do you think they’ll try to hurt us? I whispered. We stopped to talk to them in a plaza overlooking a playground full of children and families. Instinctive principles of self-defense had kicked in. Open areas full of people are safer. But I realized later, thinking of settlers and stories I’ve heard, that had we been in danger, those families might not have stood to help us. We might have been in danger from them.

The one that came up to us spoke no English. “What are you doing?” he asked in Hebrew. We responded in English with a short sentence about our action. His face was reddening from the inability to communicate his anger. His companion came to the rescue. “Don’t do this here,” he said. “Don’t do this today. People are getting pissed off. Do you know what B’tselem is?” he asked, pointing to the paper where we'd listed the organization as a good place for further information. “It is Arab-loving crap; you are self-hating Jews! You need to leave," he continued. "I’m polite, but others might not be. Do you want me to call 300 people over here? This is a holy day. Get out.”

“This is my holy city too, I have a right to be here” Rosi stood up to him.

“No. This is not your holy city. Ramallah is your holy city. Go to Ramallah.”

He will spend the rest of his day in muttering, babbling glory and fervor, 'repenting for his sins,' I thought. He will rock back and forth pounding his fist into his chest, tears for God in his eyes. Will he remember the young, defenseless girls he threatened and brought to tears? They reek of a fanaticism I despise; I am afraid at the lack of humanity in their eyes. Jared might tell me to respect their day and respect their religion, but I feel like I have a responsibility to disrespect them. It would be wrong to let them continue to live this hypocritical nonsense.
We took our aggressor's advice and went back to Ramallah, where we broke our Yom Kippur fast gloriously, in the privacy of our apartment out of respect for Ramadan.
These two men whose very memory angers me were threatening and disgusting, but what I resented them for most was the robbery of my own Yom Kippur repentance, for I spent the remainder of the day feeling self-righteous.