As the Jewish world prepares to welcome Rosh Hashanah, the New Year 5786 on the Hebrew calendar, we are all reflecting on a year marked by profound grief, enduring resilience, and an unshakable hope for peace.

In synagogues and homes across Israel and the Diaspora, the moving sound of the shofar will soon echo the ancient call to spiritual awakening, a stirring reminder of our shared desire for renewal. This year, that desire feels more urgent, more visceral. The Israel-Gaza war, which began in October 2023, continues to shape daily life with heartbreak and uncertainty, touching nearly every corner of the Jewish world.

Rosh Hashanah, beginning at sundown on Monday, September 22, marks the start of the High Holy Days period of introspection, prayer, and reconciliation. It is a time when Jewish tradition calls for accounting of the soul (cheshbon hanefesh), urging individuals and communities to examine their actions and seek a better path forward.

For many in Israel and beyond, this year’s soul-searching carries a weight unlike any in recent memory. There is mourning for the thousands of lives lost, for the families shattered, for the communities displaced. There is trauma etched into the faces of children, woven into the routines of daily life, echoed in sirens and silences. And yet there is also resilience. It is found in the neighbors helping neighbors, in the volunteers rebuilding homes, in the students returning to school despite the fear, in the quiet prayers whispered in bomb shelters. It is in the reunions of families once separated by violence and in the determination to keep living fully, even in the shadow of grief.

Many of my friends in Israel approach this new year with a heavy heart. And yet Rosh Hashanah serves as a reminder that renewal is always possible even in the darkest times. It insists that beginnings matter. We are not defined solely by what has happened to us, but by how we choose to respond.

The war, now heading into its second year, has claimed tens of thousands of lives on both sides. While intermittent ceasefires have brought brief moments of stillness, a permanent resolution remains just beyond reach. Still, in the past weeks there have been tentative signs of movement, quiet diplomacy, new channels of dialogue, subtle shifts in tone. Maybe the turning of the calendar can become more than symbolic. Perhaps it can offer a space, however fragile, for renewed efforts toward peace.

Across Jewish communities around the world, this Rosh Hashanah holds added weight. It is a moment to pray not only for personal renewal, but also for collective healing. For the return of hostages, for the restoration of dignity, for the rebirth of hope. For the rebuilding of homes, of trust, of shared futures. 

As we dip apples in honey and share the familiar greeting of Shanah Tovah, a good year, many may ask, what could a “good year” look like?

A year of safety.

A year of justice.

A year of healing.

A year where we rebuild not only our communities, but our sense of shared humanity.

Whether or not those prayers will be answered remains uncertain. But Rosh Hashanah, with its deep call to begin again, offers a spiritual framework for imagining that change is possible, that peace is not beyond reach, and that even amid pain, the seeds of renewal can take root.

In the words we say during the holiday, hayom harat olam, today the world is born anew. Let us work together to bring a world shaped by compassion, courage, connection, and the will to begin again.

Shanah Tovah U’mevurechet!