During the last Jewish week in Leipzig Maria and I got to know more new Israelis and became friends with. Of courses we needed to visit them and also our family Stern.
The first days we visited our grandsons, Ron and our daughter Judith. Along with Judith we visited Karla Pilpel in Jerusalem, who had hosted this year already some visitors from Leipzig. She is blessed with a great vitality and a big heart in the age of 88 years. We were also happy to see Josef who was in a much better state of health. Our grandchildren settled in very quickly in the little Kibbutz by Latrun and enjoy the weather and nature. Amichai is going the elementary school in Neve Shalom – a Jewish-Arabic-Christian village. Together with Jewish and Arabic children he is learning there also the Arabic language. The life under the threat of rocket attacks isn’t easy. An Iranian rocket had landed on the Kibbutz (distance to Gaza 70 km), but didn’t cost any harm!
Later on we spent a day with our mum Ruth in Tivon. She showed as lovely places nearby and also her favourite café. Afterwards we stayed a few days at the home of our dear friends Avishay and Chava Golz in Haifa. We visited his old music teacher, whose grandparents from Berlin were killed in Sobibor. She really loves German composers. We were happy to meet Dan Chamitzer. Maria had helped him to organize an exhibition of the works of his grandfather Raffael and his father Immanuel in the city museum of Leipzig. He gave us a piece of work of his father, who was killed in the Independence war 1948. This was a great honour for us. We had a wonderful time with Alon and Shivi, Jona and Heleni, who had visited with us Auschwitz. Together with the children and grandchildren of Avishay and Chava we celebrated Shabbat. In the mountains of Galilea we met with Meni and Miri and their daughter Karen. The mother of Miri lived in the same building as Avishay’s mother and grandparents in Leipzig. We got to know them during the Jewish week in Leipzig. Their daughter Adi is studying singing in Leipzig! We had a special time with the children, grandchildren and greatgrandchildren of Steffi Seligmann in Kfar Blum. Steffi needs care and is limited by strokes. We had very profound conversations with Yiftach and his wife Pia. It is important to spend time with each other – the hearts are open to build relationships and to testify what the Jewish Messiah Yeshua has done in our lives! I was very touched when Avishay said that I am not his friend but his brother. As I thanked him and Chava for the contacts to all these people he said I should rather thank God.
As a new project we received Avishay’s autobiographical book and will be working on its translation from Hebrew into German in order to release it in Germany. Isn’t our God glorious?