How can Jewish communities around the world commemorate the Oct. 7 terror attacks? When should they commemorate them — on Oct. 7? on Tisha B’Av? around Simchat Torah? What are some historical precedents to guide us? And what are some potentially fraught areas to avoid? To answer these questions, eJewishPhilanthropy Managing Editor Judah Ari Gross spoke with Naama Klar, director of the Koret International School for Jewish Peoplehood at ANU – Museum of the Jewish people, in the latest installment of “Get Your Phil.” Klar recently oversaw a discussion of experts from around the world on the topic; the museum has published a four-page collection of insights from the conversation.

On the need for shared commemoration: “It’s memory — not history — that gives us the reasoning, that gives us the values, and that’s the central piece. So this moment in time, if we can tell it as a shared Jewish moment, it wouldn’t only give us the ability to live through these difficult times that can last years, it will also create a shared day after, which we desperately need. So intentionally, building a shared Jewish memory was a huge task we identified. And quickly, we realized it’s an empty room. It’s a vacuum. There’s no leadership sitting together from both of the two big communities, Israel and the U.S. — but also other communities — and asking what’s happening to us, together. And how can we commemorate it? Because we’re compelled. The yahrtzeit is come. We’re compelled to say something. And if we say the right thing, it can be powerful. It can even be healing or give you some sort of comfort. But if no one is asking the questions, we will ask the questions.”

When to do it?: “There was a consensus that the shared memory needs a shared date. And there is a consensus that it’s extremely difficult to craft a shared date… The problem is that Oct. 7 — the name of this period — that will be used widely by American Jewry this year… in the next five years, Oct. 7 is [often] on an ‘irrelevant’ date [when it would be difficult to hold commemoration ceremonies] , and that will be a problem. One time it’s on Yom Kippur, one time it’s Rosh Hashanah… we don’t know what date should be the date. We know it has to be shared. Unfortunately, today, we don’t even have the leadership platform to have those conversations.”

On opportunities presented by commemorations: “I think a lot of the old institutions has gone to new tracks. They can’t even host this kind of a conversation anymore. So maybe we have to go back and build the platforms in order for us to survive this crisis, to make sure we create the day after together. And then once this crisis will end, and it will end eventually, we can build on the new capacities we’ve created in order to endure this crisis and build the next chapter of our people.”

Dual traumas: “I want to acknowledge that there are two big traumas that we have to deal with when we’re talking about the memory. The first one is trust… lack of trust in institutions, that they do not loyally provide what they’re supposed to, that there is a hidden agenda, that there are puppet masters, and it’s from all sides of the political… Secondly, the trauma of Oct. 7 is basically, ‘Nobody’s coming’… For a couple of hours, we had this vacuum that nobody came. And it’s very true for so many people who lost their lives. They were waiting for rescue to come, and they died alone in the safe room. But this trauma is now everyone’s trauma… We have to be prepared because we have to save ourselves for maybe a couple of hours, maybe just a couple of weeks. But we have to make sure we’re protecting our children, because maybe nobody will be coming for some time. And also, I think, outside of Israel, all those friendships, those relationships, those investment in places who were supposed to respond, who were supposed to help and didn’t. What is often referred as the silence of our friends is that nobody’s coming, and we are all alone. And now we have to help ourselves.”

Nobody came, but we did: “The Jewish people and here in Israel… we’re coming for each other, and we’re there for each other. And that’s also the story of Oct. 7, the civic heroism, the people who got out of their houses and helped even without being [asked]. Gali, a child of 15 who directs IDF forces in [Kibbbutz] Kfar Aza for them to rescue people. This is also the story. Even when nobody’s coming, our mutual responsibility, arevut hadadit, which served us so well for thousands of years without sovereignty, also served us now.”

Some practical recommendations: “Shared melodies are such a powerful thing. I think we have the song of the time, which is Acheinu, a prayer to redeem the captives of old times, which were, even then, a Jewish peoplehood moment. And it has a great melody by Abie Rottenberg. It can become a global thing that can be used by every community.”

Is there room to recognize Palestinian suffering?: “I would recommend to [Jewish leaders], if you are going to incorporate something about the Palestinian pain in commemorating Oct. 7, do it extremely, extremely wisely, because it’s explosive. Also, I just want to mention that on Oct. 7, no solider was inside Gaza. We only started the [ground] war three weeks after. So it’s not the same date to commemorate the pain and the loss… It occurs to me that a lot of the tensions can be solved if we decide that in this first year, we’re focusing on Oct. 7, the day, not the [whole period it launched], just the first day. It was a pogrom. It was a tragedy, pure tragedy. And we can just focus on that and leave future problems to future us.”

Watch the full recording below.