Sukkot reflection: Operation Escape Desert Storm

Some Reflections on Sukkot in Israel by our member Sarah Friedman!


Sukkot reflection: Operation Escape Desert Storm

In my first attempt at serious physical activity since being kicked by a kibbutz horse
named Loco, I went on what turned into an epic four-hour hike through the desert’s
extreme weather patterns. The weather here has been odd for the last few days – humid,
cloudy, dusty, even a surprising off-season rain. On Saturday night the kibbutz and the
area as far as we could see blacked out for about 15 minutes. Yesterday, Erev Sukkot, we
expected more of the same slight weirdness but thought nothing of going on a desert hike
behind the kibbutz.

A friend and I hiked through a wadi, scrambled up a vertical rock wall, walked over
a pebbly mountaintop over a oil pipeline road, and goat-walked over a sand dune
streaked with green copper into Crystal Canyon, a huge wadi full of strange layered rock
formations. The enormous canyon ended in a 150-200 meter vertical wall, and the view
from that end back through the wadi and over the mountains was awe-inspiring. As we
sat talking on the rocks, we felt a few light raindrops, and moments later the sky turned
dark orange and we were in the middle of a sandstorm. The rain quickened and we heard
thunderclaps, and my friend helpfully said that there could be a flash flood. (Flashback to
the horror stories my NFTY counselors told of hikers killed in desert flash floods, stories
impossible to fathom as we trekked through the dry, sandy supposed flood zones in the
July heat. But it does happen: as incongruous as desert flooding seems, sand and rock
don’t absorb water so heavy rains cause flash floods.) We ran and scrambled to get out
of the wadi as soon as possible, and I noticed how terrifying and beautiful the sky looked
but was too anxious to stop for a photo. We slid down the sand dunes instead of carefully
hedging our steps as we had on the way in.

At that point, between our position on rocky flats and the rain’s stabilization, my friend
declared we were no longer in danger. My fear evaporated once we arrived on the
pipeline road again, and then it was just exciting to observe and be caught in the sheer
power of natural forces around us. Besides the constant expansive beauty of the desert
and mountains, there was the powerful, disorienting sandy wind and an eerily dusty sky
whose light’s origin we couldn’t discern – the end of the sun or the full moon already
risen? After an hour of carefully climbing down, as we hiked the flat land between the
mountains and the kibbutz, we saw vivid flashes of orange emanating from horizontal
lightning bolts over Jordan.

The dramatic lightning storm continued as I recovered from this epic natural journey,
causing excitement among kibbutzniks accustomed to normal desert weather and several
brief power outages during the festive Sukkot meal. Comfortably feasting at a table in a
solidly constructed sukkah just hours after I was hurdling over rocks to avoid becoming
the next warning story, I reflected on how far removed we truly are from the time
Sukkot calls us back to. We eat in booths for seven days to commemorate the exodus our
ancestors made from Egypt, but we can’t know what it was like to live for forty years in
a state of transience. For forty years, everywhere they lived and everything they did was
temporary. They were on the move, at the mercy of nature and dependent on themselves

and their leader. My encounter with the raw, harsh forces of nature this climate supports
ended when I made it back to what the kibbutz calls my “caravan” – a trailer technically,
but a solid dwelling with a shower, air conditioning, refrigeration, countless amenities the
Israelites obviously did not have. Their caravan consisted of themselves and their journey
ended only when they arrived in Israel. We try to connect with their story by building
sukkot, but it’s difficult to truly inhabit their mindset.

There is one way, however, in which we are closer to true observance of Sukkot than
we have been in centuries: once again a Jewish homeland thrives in the Land of Israel.
Sukkot is a pilgrimage holiday, and although most of us are no longer attuned to the
agricultural calendar on which the holiday is based, we can travel to Israel any time
during the year. Being here connects us to our ancestors more than anything else.