PURELY COMMENTARY 4 | SEPTEMBER 19 • 2024 J N opinion Why ‘Slichah’ — ‘Sorry’ — Has Become a Ubiquitous Catchword Among Anguished Israelis F or many Israelis and their sup- porters, “sorry” seems to be the right word for the hardest times. At a vigil in Jerusalem remembering Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg- Polin and five other Israel hostages whose bodies were recovered the day before, mourners wrote slichah — “sorry” in Hebrew — on placards. At the funeral that day of Eden Yerushalmi, one of those killed, a family member held a sign saying “Slichah Eden” next to her body. At a vigil in New York’s Columbus Circle that night, another sign: “Slichah. I’m so sorry that the world failed you.” And at Goldberg-Polin’s funer- al, Israeli President Isaac Herzog apol- ogized for Israel’s failure to free the captives held by Hamas. “ As a father and as the president of the State of Israel, I want to say how sorry I am, how sorry I am that we didn’t protect Hersh on that dark day, how sorry I am that we failed to bring him home,” he said, in English, after first speaking in Hebrew. In those Hebrew remarks, Herzog used the word “slichah,” which in recent days has become another familiar phrase in a nearly yearlong crisis that already has spawned its own vocabulary. The word, like its English coun- terpart, can convey a range of mean- ings — from a casual “excuse me” to a profound request for forgiveness. Appearing numerous times in the Hebrew Bible, the s-l-ch root is related to personal forgiveness. In Elul, the Hebrew month is seen as a spiritual run-up to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, wor- shippers begin adding “selichot” — penitential prayers — to their daily prayers. Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie of New York’s Lab/Shul congregation saw and heard the phrase “slichah” repeatedly when he attended a mass demonstra- tion in Tel Aviv calling on the Israeli government to reach a hostage deal. “The impulse for personal remorse and repair is built into the infra- structure” of Jewish tradition and culture, he said, citing the communal prayers for forgiveness said during the High Holidays. “We feel a collective responsibility for problems and solutions.” Lau-Lavie said his current trip to Israel inspired him to launch throughout Elul a “public account- ability project” in which individuals preparing for the High Holidays can ask themselves, “How are we part of the bigger problem?” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used the word “slichah” in an apology delivered to the parents of one of the six slain hostages, Alex Lobanov. “I would like to tell you how much I regret and ask forgive- ness [in Hebrew, mevakesh slichah] for not succeeding in bringing Sasha back alive,” Netanyahu told Lobanov’s parents, according to a readout from his office, using their son’s nickname. Many noted it was the first time Netanyahu had apologized to a hos- tage family. What makes “slichah” unusual in the case of the hostage vigils is that it is being said by members of the public who seemingly have no direct respon- sibility for the prosecution of the war, or for the military and diplomatic efforts to free the hostages. Michal Kravel-Tovi, an associate professor of socio-cultural anthropol- ogy at Tel Aviv University, says the impulse to apologize may be in part an expression of survivor’s guilt by Israelis who are able to go about their daily lives while others fight in Gaza, mourn their dead or have family and friends still held hostage. “I think it is increasingly linked with the hostage crisis: how we get used to it, continue with our life … while others are dying there. People apologize for being privileged to not be a (hostage) family member,” she said. Kravel-Tovi is the co-editor of a forthcoming book on phrases that came into wide circulation since Oct. 7, including ein milim (there are no words [to convey our grief]) and beyachad nenatzeach, or “together we will win.” She also suggests that mourners and protesters are saying “slichah” out of frustration with a government that hasn’t done enough to bring home the hostages or didn’t protect its citizens on Oct. 7. Under these conditions, she said, it is civilians who “are the ones to be the moral voice and pragmatic actor instead of the state, are the ones to say sorry — sorry for not doing enough or being unable to sufficiently succeed.” Lau-Lavie, who grew up in Israel, noted that the current expressions of “slichah” are largely coming from an ostensibly secular segment of the Israeli public and not from the reli- gious Zionist movement or the haredi, or ultra-Orthodox, community. “I was talking with a moderately right-wing taxi driver who told me the protests show ‘weakness,’” said Lau-Lavie. According to the driver, Israelis need to apologize because “we are not strong enough.” Netanyahu’s critics, meanwhile, insist he hasn’t taken responsibility either for the security lapses of Oct. 7 or the lack of a ceasefire deal that Andrew Silow-Carroll JTA.org CHAIM GOLDBERG/FLASH90 YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90 ABOVE: Images of slain hostages and a sign reading “sorry” in Hebrew are seen at a rally near the prime minister’s official residence in Jerusalem, Sept. 3, 2024. RIGHT: The hand of a protester at a rally calling for the release of Israelis held kidnapped by Hamas in Gaza outside the prime minister’s office in Jerusalem, Sept. 1, 2024.