I first visited Washington in 1985, on a high school trip. Aside from a crazy story about a kid from another class, a White House tour, and some ‘bang snaps’ (a tiny novelty firework that sounds like gunfire), it was fun and very cool for a teenage boy.

Already at that age, I was particularly interested in US history, and military history in general. Visiting the monuments, buildings and museums was way more interesting for me than for many of my schoolmates, and though many of them were well known - the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, the Smithsonian - the Vietnam War Memorial had opened only two and a half years earlier, on this day, November 13, 1982.

I was deeply moved by both elements of the memorial; the statuary, with three combat soldiers holding each other up after a battle, and the seemingly unending wall of remembrance with the names of all of the fallen. I had never seen a veteran mourning the loss of comrades before, and it made a big impression on me.

This week we observed Veterans Day, and I grew up commemorating Remembrance Day. I have never taken the sacrifices of those who fought for our freedoms for granted, and as I grew up in a Jewish and Zionist home, I learned as well, in great detail, about the fallen in Israel’s wars and before. One of the first books I can remember having on my bookshelf was Halperin and Kreinik’s Mickey Marcus: The Story of Colonel David Marcus children’s book about Israel’s first General, killed by friendly fire just after lifting the siege of Jerusalem.

And of course we have the stories of the heroes of the last three years of war, from 10/7 and on. May all of them be remembered and may their names be a blessing for us.

All of this said, in my study of warfare I also came to understand that wars are not only won on the battlefield. They are won in the factories, at the draughting tables, by those who step up when others cannot, those who support the war effort at home, at work, by buying war bonds or supporting the wounded and displaced. They are won by a resolute and resilient populace, by those who love and lose and mourn and stand up again. They are won by articulate leaders and by silent sentinels, by spiritual inspiration and material support.

More than three years ago, I ended a speech to an audience of thousands by saying “We are all in the reserves now. Our call up has come.” We are still fighting that war. The battlegrounds are now not only on Israel’s borders, they are at our own doorsteps. Our very identity and existence right here in America is being questioned and delegitimized.

Make no mistake: the person or group accusing you of perpetrating or supporting a ‘genocide’ is doing so with one intention, the only possible intention. To legitimize your eradication. How can one leave a ‘genocider’ alone, or alive? It would be a moral outrage to do so. Perhaps some are useful tools in the hands of the hateful, intent on our harm and worse. But they put all of us on a war footing nonetheless.

Our battles are not always in the street, or the press, or the statehouse. Sometimes they are in our work, in who and what we support. Sometimes they are in what we read to our kids at night. Sometimes, they are in the proud Jewish identity and life experiences we share with our families, the mitzvot we do or take on, and the kindnesses we show to the stranger, the needy, or the vulnerable. A victory in each of these is a triumph of the collective resilience and positivity of the Jewish people, and in doing them you will have played your part, and we will prevail.