The Hamas attack on Israel has deeply wounded Israel, where people remain stunned by an unexpected situation with consequences that are difficult to measure. According to information shared by the Israeli government on Tuesday, more than 900 of its citizens have been killed and over 3,000 wounded. Dozens of Israelis have been kidnapped and taken to Gaza by the terrorist group. Israel has declared war, with the full mobilisation of its army.

Today we talk to two Christians living in the Israeli Mediterranean city of Tel Aviv.

Adolfo Díaz: “No one is able to explain what has happened”

Adolfo Díaz has lived in Tel Aviv for fourteen years. When we connect with him, the conversation is interrupted by the sound of sirens warning of rockets in the area where he lives. After a few minutes, we get back on the line. “We have been experiencing this since Saturday, when the first alarms sounded at 6.30am”, he says.

Two of his daughters are now in the Israeli army. He, his wife and their 13-year-old son are still sheltered at home.

Question. How did you experience Saturday’s events?

Adolfo. We still have many questions about what happened. We are talking about more than 500 dead, by a group that broke through the border with Gaza. That is something that nobody is able to explain.

As we have seen on social media, there was a party near the border, with at least 1,500 people there. The terrorists come in with paragliders, with motorbikes, with vans, and they find all these people. Then they go to the nearest villages, they take many women and children. There are still no exact figures on how many people are hostages. It’s a very different situation from anything that has happened before in Israel.

Question. In the evangelical community you are part of, how are you experiencing it?

Adolfo. In Tel Aviv the configuration of the evangelical community is quite complex, there is great diversity. Where I teach, we are a small community. We are connected through a social media group. This weekend almost everyone was travelling because it was the celebration of Sukkot. We usually meet on Mondays, but this week we will meet on YouTube because right now it is very complicated to go out.

Question. How can we pray for the situation?

Adolfo. Almost everybody agrees to say: “Let’s pray for Israel”. And it is difficult to understand what happened. It is as if the United States were attacked by a small South American country and defeated: the question is “why?” Here in Israel, in the last few months, we are experiencing a situation of many demonstrations.

The day of Yom Kippur, last week, is the day of repentance. It is a day when the country comes to a standstill, in absolute recollection, and they usually have a gathering in the street to show repentance. And this year that gathering was not allowed, that is, the Jews themselves saying “we don’t want the Torah”. These are things that are not normal.

The feast that was celebrated in the desert on Saturday at dawn, coincided with the Sikhat Torah, which is the celebration of the day that Moses received the law. On the same day this feast was being celebrated in the desert in front of the statue of Buddha. If you look at the Bible, you see that this has already happened: when people reject their God, there are consequences.

Nobody can explain what happened, it is not normal, but for me, from a biblical point of view, it is God abandoning his people. That’s why the prayer we are praying is for this people to come to repentance. The political situation is bad, but the spiritual situation is very, very bad.

This is the God in whom we trust. The consequences of not being with God are also seen in episodes like the Sabbath. It is something we all need to look at. God loves us deeply, but He is a God who cannot be mocked.

Question. How do you think the situation may develop in the coming days?

Adolfo. You can look at it from different points of view. I can see it from the point of view of news and current affairs, the war will be tough. Right now, it is surprising that Israel has not yet entered Gaza. And they are not defending themselves, they are still sending missiles. They are probably ready to receive Israel’s army.

On top of that, there are now around 150 Israelis in Gaza: children, women, old people... Israel can’t go in and bomb, it has to do something else. Hamas have already started to say that they are going to use these hostages. A few years ago, an Israeli soldier was negotiated with Hamas in exchange for a thousand prisoners. So this is a very complicated situation. The tanks were in Lebanon because you could expect a war, but from Syria or from Lebanon. Nobody thought that Gaza was going to do such destruction. It is inconceivable. But those in the north are waiting.

We have a country that is absolutely divided internally, weak on its borders from what we have seen, and the enemies have been waiting for years for this opportunity.

Andrés: “Our pastor has already been called up, it’s hard”

We also spoke to Andrés Martín, a Spanish civil engineer who has been living in Tel Aviv for two and a half years with his wife Angélica, and they are currently expecting a child. Andrés and Angélica meet with a messianic community - Jews who accept Jesus as the promised messiah. He tells us, in shock, that his pastor and other members of the community have already been called up to join the army for the next military operations.

Question. How have you experienced these days?

Andrés. At Passover last year, we experienced a peak of violence with lone wolves committing attacks. It was complicated, but what happened these days is unprecedented. Even our friends in the Messianic Jewish community, who have been here all their lives, tell us that it is similar to what happened 50 years ago during the Yom Kippur War.

Question. How is the faith community of which you are a part reacting?

Andrés. With absolute surprise. They are Israelis for all intents and purposes, and so they can be called up, as it has been with our pastor. It’s quite hard.

Question. What explanation can be given for the attack that took place?

Andrés. There will be different points of view here, but what is 100% certain is that nobody expected it. The confidence of this country was in its capability and technological superiority in the region. Israel is the most powerful army in the Middle East, the most technically advanced in terms of geopolitics and with sufficient means to avoid a situation of insecurity that would permeate society. People did not imagine that something like this could happen on Israeli soil.

Question. How are you personally experiencing this?

Andrés. The reaction is sadness, grief, but it is irremediable not to think of God and how He may be guiding these events. This is a country that in recent times has been very divided, with different coalitions of parties governing. There were a series of elections that had to be repeated, and now parties have entered government that tend towards orthodox Judaism with more conservative ideas. We live in the centre of Tel Aviv and every Saturday we have seen this division, how the intensity of demonstrations has been increasing, for forty weeks. We have reached this point with a huge division in the country.

Question. Are you in contact with people in Spain these days?

Andrés. Yes, we have felt the spiritual “blanket” and the warmth of the brothers.

Question. Do they also ask you about how you see the situation?

Andrés. Of course, we know that there is a lot of information but also disinformation. We know the facts and that cannot be denied, but often what we receive through the mainstream media is biased information. What we receive in the West is very different from what we experience here, and that is something we have seen over time. This is a very complex scenario, the more you know, the less you dare to give your opinion, because the more you know, the less you actually know.

Question. In the face of such an unexpected situation, I imagine that having faith becomes important.

Andrés. Yes, it does. It also provides you with a "backpack" of knowledge that helps you understand this people and this region. The Bible tells a lot about how history has developed, and it's a perspective that is not the same as someone from our century who doesn't know as much about history. Not only the history of the 20th century, since the establishment of the State of Israel, but the whole biblical history, since the fathers of the faith.

Question. What are your expectations for the coming days?

Andrés. We depend on the authorities at all times. As Spanish citizens, we are waiting for what they tell us in the embassy here, and we are attentive to that. There is great uncertainty, nobody knows how it will evolve. As Ecclesiastes says, tomorrow, who knows what will happen? This is the basis on which we will be guided. We are also attentive to the objective information we can find.

Question. How can we pray for you from outside Israel?

Andrés. I share several things. First, let us pray for the families who have suffered a loss.

Second, let us pray for the families who have a family member kidnapped and are waiting for them to return home. This must be unbearable pain. It breaks one’s heart to think that a family member could be in that place.

Thirdly, pray for the innocent people on both sides of the fence. The wickedness of man leads to these situations. We pray that God will eradicate evil. I am not here to determine justly, but we do know that there are innocent people who have suffered on this side and on the other side. It is all the fruit of the evil of the human heart.

Finally, for the Lord’s church in Israel. There are Israelis, Messianic Jews, who can best reach out to their countrymen and be a light at this time. The closing prayer is that the name of Jesus will be lifted up in this situation. That name, Yeshua, that many Jews still reject, the slain lamb that nullifies any sacrifice and brings us to God directly, by his promises.