LIVINGSTON, NJ — After recently returning from a 40-hour fact-finding mission to the Israel and Gaza border with a group of area educators, legislators and community leaders, Livingston Public Schools (LPS) Superintendent Dr. Matthew Block shared a personal reflection on his journey and lessons from the experience that he will bring back to LPS.
Acknowledging that there were “different opinions” shared among community members about his decision to take the trip and that “in some ways, it caused conflict,” Block emphasized “the benefit of seeing things firsthand” and reiterated that he “went with a hope that [he] would find some connection [and] bring back messages that could potentially bring people together.”
Major takeaways that Block shared in his reflection—including takeaways from his visits to various areas of devastation and his firsthand observations of the impact that the ongoing conflict has had on the people of both Israel and Gaza—are summarized below.
Reason for Attending and the Significance of Primary-Source Research
Block explained that he spent about 40 hours on the ground in Israel along with a group of seven school district administrators, six members of the New Jersey State Assembly, nine civic and community leaders and two facilitators from the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest New Jersey, which orchestrated the trip.
As a former history teacher with a strong belief in the necessity of primary-source research, Block emphasized that when he received the invitation, he saw it as “a really educational learning opportunity” and “an opportunity to seek understanding of a situation that clearly impacted [the Livingston] community.”
“I was a history teacher, a social studies teacher and was a history major in college, and I’ve always believed that if given the opportunity, the benefit of seeing things firsthand is extraordinarily valuable since you can process information yourself and not through the eyes and ears of others. That primary-source research is really the best and only kind of research.
“I also went with a hope that I would find some connection and find some ways to bring back messages that could potentially bring people together…A sad part of my trip was that I know that there were different opinions on it, different thoughts on it and that in some ways, it caused conflict. But the important thing to me in sharing this with you is why I went, what I learned, and what I saw is that there’s so much that connects us and brings us together, and that’s what I chose to focus on on the trip.”
Takeaways from Visit to the Hand in Hand Center for Jewish-Arab Education
With a Muslim woman in charge of community relations at the Hand in Hand School in Jerusalem serving as their tour guide, Block and his group visited “a school where Arab Israelis and Jewish Israelis learn together” and where “two sets of traumatized people” continue to come together every day as war rages on nearby.
“The biggest hope for the future is the Hand in Hand School,” said Block. “We visited a school in Jerusalem that was founded in 1998. It started as one school, and there are now six schools and there are 650 students just in Jerusalem. They find it hard to keep up with demand. They admit as many kids as they can, but there is more demand than there is space.
“We asked [our tour guide] how many families dropped out of the school after the attacks on Oct. 7 and the resulting war, and she told us they did not lose one family as a result. We asked how she kept the community together, and she said it was the parents. They came together right away and made a decision as a group that they would not allow whatever was happening—and happening right in their backyards and to people that they are related to and care about—that they wouldn’t allow that to stop what they believe in so fervently for the Hand in Hand School.
“The school teaches both Arabic and Hebrew, and every homeroom has one Jewish and Muslim teacher. I asked how the teachers figured out how to do this, and they said there are counselors who guide new teachers.
“Our tour guide said, ‘It’s all about strengthening the muscle.’ She said, ‘Our new teachers who come in aren’t necessarily good at it, but they are trained, and we help them, and we support them. Over time, they become good at it, but it’s not easy’…I think that’s important for me to say for us as well.”
Block also shared that there is currently a major focus on mental health at the Hand in Hand School, where the tour guide told Block’s group that there “are not enough therapists in the country of Israel for what the kids and families are going through.”
Despite the hard times, however, Block said it was powerful “to stand there at the Hand in Hand School, where kids of very different backgrounds played together while there is a war raging only a few miles away.”
“We asked her if they are actually friends or if they only play together in school, and I’ll give you the honest answer,” said Block. “She said there are many integrated playdates, and they do fade over time, but the kids at the elementary school tend to play together. Boys tend to hang in there more because Muslim and Jewish boys will continue to play sports together. They said they’re working on it, but that the girls tend to culturally separate over time.”
Ultimately, the students who go through the Hand in Hand School “build amazing listening skills,” according to Block’s tour guide.
“Somebody in the group asked what was a key activity that they did that they felt was powerful, and they have something that’s called the ‘Grandparent Project,’ where every Jewish student at the school has to go to the home of a Muslim grandparent and interview the grandparent, and every Muslim student has to go to a Jewish grandparent’s home and interview the grandparent,” he said. “I just thought it was amazingly interesting that it was about grandparents because that’s really how you get the culture and the history.”
Takeaways from Visit to Destroyed or Abandoned Kibbutzim* Near Gaza Border
In sharing his experience of the first part of his journey, which was a trip to the border with Gaza in the south of Israel, Block emphasized that the devastation in both Gaza and Israel was evident to his entire group even without being able to step foot in Gaza.
“To negate the fact that there’s pain felt everywhere in that region is disingenuous, and I saw with my own eyes,” said Block.
As he drove through one of the kibbutzim* destroyed on Oct. 7, Block described it as “a place that was frozen in time” with “bicycles and toys out on lawns that were overgrown” and sukkahs—or temporary huts constructed during a week-long Jewish holiday called Sukkot—still standing from the autumn harvest festival celebrated months earlier.
“People were simply driven from their homes, and it was silent,” said Block. “We also got to stand at this first kibbutz at a lookout with binoculars because we were literally less than a mile from Gaza and Gaza City. So we were able to see Gaza City, and we saw a city that has been destroyed by war.
“Clearly, there were people that lived in those buildings that we saw blown out; clearly, there were people that had lives there whose lives were destroyed; and the pain and the suffering kind of entered you as you looked through the binoculars. We didn’t get to go into Gaza, [but] we saw it, and there is no doubt that there are people suffering in Gaza. We saw that with our own eyes.”
Block also spoke about his visit to another kibbutz, where the group witnessed “total destruction.”
“The first one was just abandoned, the second one was destroyed,” he said. “The faces of the people—many of whom were asleep in their beds that morning—were hung outside the doors of their houses that were burnt out and destroyed.
“The tragedy and the emotion that we looked at from a distance, and the tragedy of the emotion that we looked at up close, will be something that I carry with me forever and affect me still today.”
(Editor’s note: *Kibbutzim (or kibbutzes) is the plural of the Hebrew term “kibbutz,” which is a community unique to Israel, typically in an agricultural area.)
Takeaways from Visit to Gaza-Israel Checkpoint
Reflecting further on the devastation he encountered during his trip, Block spoke about what he learned during a visit to a Gaza-to-Israel checkpoint that was destroyed on Oct. 7 as part of the attacks.
“What was striking to me, and what you don’t hear on the news, was that that checkpoint had just been built up,” he said. “You could see where they had just built brand-new bus stations for people who crossed over from Gaza who would then come and go to work. It didn’t occur to me, and I didn’t know, that nearly 30,000 people crossed every day from Gaza into Israel, got on buses and went to work.
“When you’re standing in the Kiba and on a kibbutz, how close that is to Gaza, you’re talking about less than a mile away. These people were neighbors. People crossed into the area on a daily basis, and the checkpoints were being built up to be able to accommodate the people that were crossing in.”
Although he didn’t have an opportunity to visit the West Bank checkpoints, Block learned about their recent closing and how that has affected the local economy that has since “come to a halt.”
“Sadly, there were 80,000 people who crossed into Israel to go to work from West Bank checkpoints on a daily basis,” he said. “They’ve now shut down the checkpoints to the West Bank for security purposes, so you’re talking about 110,000 people, approximately, who have lost their livelihood and their ability to support their families.
“You’re talking about people who lived in the communities, in the kibbutzes, that have not gone home, that are living in hotel rooms with two, three, four children or their neighbors and their friends….So there’s a lot that’s happening to everyone in that region.”
In speaking with those who lived on the kibbutz near the checkpoint, Block was told that they “never felt any sort of danger living there.”
“They knew they could see Gaza from their backyards, and they knew that the checkpoint was nearby, and it was never an issue,” said Block, who shared a story about a local mayor residing near the checkpoint who was regularly collaborating with a group of Gazans to improve relations as well as their ability to cross into Israel for work. “Sadly, that mayor was killed on Oct. 7. We asked the question, were any of the people in his group responsible? And we were told ‘absolutely not.’ As a matter of fact, they made sure to reach out to express their condolences to the mayor who was killed.”
More Takeaways About the Impact on Muslim Israelis
Block elaborated on the war’s impact on Muslim Israelis and their heroism during the Oct. 7 attacks as follows:
“What you may not know is that 1.8 million Israeli citizens are Muslim,” said Block. “That’s about 20% of the population. Although no matter who you talk to, you will hear that there is a lot of separation—the schools are separate, the neighborhoods are separate, while Muslims tend to speak Hebrew, Jewish Israelis tend not to speak Arabic, so there’s a language barrier—but Muslim citizens vote, they have access to municipal services, health care jobs, and some even serve in the army. There are Muslim surgeons, professors, judges and elected officials.
“Palestinian Muslims in Israel were also victims of the terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, and some of their pictures are being hung in Hostage Square. There are also stories of heroism of Muslim Israelis who saved lives, tended to wounded people and drove people out of the terrorist areas on Oct. 7.
“One was a bus driver, who I read about, who drove a group of young people to the music festival that was attacked. When the attack started, they called the bus driver, who happened to be a Muslim Israeli, and the bus driver turned around and drove into the line of fire to save the lives of as many people as he could.”
Relating the Trip Back to Livingston Public Schools
Block concluded his presentation with another story from his visit to the Hand in Hand School that he said was “the most powerful part of [his] trip” and taught a substantial lesson that he could bring home to LPS.
“When we were driving to the Hand in Hand School, our tour guide got a call that 23 IDF soldiers were killed the night before in Gaza,” said Block. “One of those soldiers was a recent alumnus of the Hand in Hand School. We were scheduled to tour the elementary, the middle school and the high school. We were told we would not be able to get into the high school because this particular soldier still had family attending the high school and the entire school was in mourning.
“I thought that said a lot. I was looking for stories about being united. I was looking for different stories about how people have come together.
“My feeling is that if the Hand in Hand School in Jerusalem and the surrounding area can figure out a way to live together while the unthinkable is going on, maybe we can take some lessons from that.”
Block shared this reflection during a recent Livingston Board of Education meeting that hundreds of community members attended to share their thoughts about a registration-only event featuring a panel of Oct. 7 survivors that was offered to Livingston High School (LHS) students and their parents in conjunction with the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ the following night. A follow-up article about how the community has reacted to Block’s reflection on his trip to Israel, to the turnout and comments made at the recent LBOE meeting, and to the subsequent LPS-sponsored event will be shared in the coming days.