It’s crit­i­cal to under­stand his­to­ry not just through the books that will be writ­ten lat­er, but also through the first-hand tes­ti­monies and real-time account­ing of events as they occur. At Jew­ish Book Coun­cil, we under­stand the val­ue of these writ­ten tes­ti­mo­ni­als and of shar­ing these indi­vid­ual expe­ri­ences. It’s more impor­tant now than ever to give space to these voic­es and narratives. 

Over the com­ing days and weeks ahead, we will be shar­ing the accounts of Israeli authors and authors in Israel. We will also be shar­ing read­ing lists and oth­er mate­ri­als to help under­stand this crit­i­cal moment.

We hold close our net­work of authors and trans­la­tors in Israel, along with their fam­i­lies and dear ones. Their well-being is of para­mount impor­tance to us, and we stand with them and our glob­al Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty in sup­port­ing Israel. As a Jew­ish orga­ni­za­tion, while there are no words suf­fi­cient to com­mu­ni­cate the pain and hor­ror we feel watch­ing these events unfold, we also rec­og­nize the absolute­ly crit­i­cal impor­tance of uplift­ing and ampli­fy­ing first-hand accounts and reflec­tions of wit­ness­es – our authors on the front lines. Their tes­ti­mo­ni­als must be giv­en space, now and mov­ing for­ward, as our mem­o­ry-keep­ers and record-keep­ers – our trans­mit­ters of truth. They are our edu­ca­tors who will give us at least some of the tools we need to process, learn, and act.

At Jew­ish Book Coun­cil, we wish to unequiv­o­cal­ly express our sol­i­dar­i­ty with Israel as it endures the trag­ic acts of ter­ror­ism com­mit­ted by Hamas. Our prayers are for the swift and safe return of the hostages to their loved ones, and we mourn those who have lost their lives and safe­ty at this time of unprece­dent­ed hor­ror for the Jew­ish state.

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