Our son surprised us. At 10 o’clock in the morning, I heard someone call his name, and before I could think, I screamed. It wasn’t a conscious scream—it came from somewhere deep inside, a place that had held all the fear, all the waiting, all the prayers, and finally broke open with joy. I ran out, and there he was—Amee, our gentle giant, home.
I held him tightly, and then Vered joined me. Together, we wrapped ourselves around him as if holding on tightly enough could make him stay forever. He had been pulled out of Gaza as part of the ceasefire deal—home for only a few days. We knew it wouldn’t last, but in that moment, all that mattered was that he was here.
He looked exhausted. He hadn’t showered in two and a half weeks, hadn’t changed his clothes. “Ima,” he said, “I don’t really have much for you to do.” Vered smiled at him, that knowing, motherly smile, because every mother of a soldier knows the first thing you say is, “Give me your laundry.” It’s not just a task; it’s a gesture of love, a sacred act. Washing your son’s uniform, folding it neatly, preparing it for his return to the field—there’s a quiet pride in it, even in the sadness.
But this time, there wasn’t much to do. “I’ve worn the same uniform the whole time,” he said. The smell of it, the dirt of it—it clung to him. To anyone else, it might have been unbearable. To us, it was precious. It was the smell of survival, the proof that he had come back to us, even for this brief moment.
I watched Vered take that uniform, handling it like something sacred. What does it mean to wash a uniform worn for two and a half weeks in the middle of a war? To scrub away the dust of Gaza while knowing your son may carry more of it back with him when he leaves again? It’s a small, simple act, but it carries the weight of everything. It’s her way of loving him, of protecting him, even if it’s just by folding that uniform with care.
Having him home feels like exhaling for the first time in weeks. It means being able to sleep at night, knowing he’s under our roof. It means knowing he’ll sleep in a bed, take a shower, eat something hot. It means hearing his laugh again, the same laugh that filled our house when he was just a boy. It means seeing him for a moment as he once was—not a soldier, not a fighter, but our son.
This weeks parsha
As I watch Vered take his uniform, still heavy with the dust of Gaza, I think of this week’s Parsha. God promises the Israelites: “V’heveiti Etchem”—“And I will bring you.” It is the final promise of redemption—not just to be freed but to be brought home, into a place of belonging.
For a brief moment, it felt like V’heveiti Etchem. Amee, our gentle giant, had been brought back to us—not completely, not forever, but enough to remind us what it means to hold him, to love him, to know he is safe. It’s not the end of the story, just as the promise in Vaera was not the end for the Israelites, but it’s a glimpse—a reminder that even in the waiting, there are moments of return.
And still, the reality of it lingers. He asked me, “Aba, can I call Uncle Moish? Can I go to his place by the beach and take a few friends for an overnight?” I didn’t hesitate. “Call him,” I said. “I’m sure he’ll be delighted.” And of course, Moish was. He always is.
My brother considers it an honour to host them—our boys, our soldiers. He’s done it for each of my sons. “It’s an honour to serve one of our heroes,” he said. That’s how he sees them: heroes. Which other country speaks of its twenty-year-olds this way? Twenty years old, carrying the weight of a nation on their shoulders. Twenty years old, with the courage to stand where so many others would falter.
We wrote them off, this generation. We called them soft, distracted by screens, disconnected from purpose. How wrong we were. They are the ones who stand now, who shoulder the burden of a people’s history and a land’s survival.
Amee is twenty. Just twenty. And yet, he has already lived through more than many do in a lifetime. He has carried a rifle through streets thick with danger, watched for threats we can’t even imagine, and fought in battles he’ll never speak of. But now, for a fleeting moment, he is home.
I think about what it means to carry so much on your shoulders at twenty years old—the weight of history, the prayers whispered across generations, the unrelenting demand of a land that has never stopped asking for sacrifice. And I wonder if he feels it, if he knows that his presence—his laugh, his smile—grounds us in ways we can’t begin to explain. But I also know that he can’t lay it down, not entirely, not even here.
Because the man he has become cannot walk away from the weight he carries. His quiet strength, his unspoken resolve—it lingers on him like the dust of Gaza, like the weight of all that has been endured. I think about the distance he has travelled—not just the miles between Gaza and here but the unmeasurable distance between who he was and who he is now. He carries it all, and somehow he stands. Somehow, he comes home. And when he smiles, it is not because the burden is gone—it is because he carries it with a grace that leaves me breathless.
I look at him and see the boy who once held my hand crossing the street, the boy who used to climb into our bed at night before we’d carry him to his own, the boy with his particular nosh—who loves his crisps but hates his fruit and veg. And yet, I see the man too. The soldier. The gentle giant who has grown into a kind of strength I can’t begin to describe.
For now, we hold onto him. We hold onto these days, knowing how brief they are. We hold onto the sound of his voice, the sight of him sitting at our table, the simple joy of knowing he is safe.
And when he leaves again, as we know he will, we will hold onto this moment. This exhale. This glimpse of normality in a world that feels anything but normal.
Because that is what it means to be a parent of a soldier. It is pride and fear, joy and sorrow, holding on and letting go. It is knowing that your child carries the weight of the world, and somehow finding the strength to carry them.
Yesterday, our gentle giant came home. And for now, he is ours again.