Nefesh B'Nefesh opened its 2026 summer aliyah season with 650 families. This week's parsha is Shelach — and Caleb is still the minority.

The Torah gives explicit instructions to sound the trumpet on your joyful occasions. This week, 650 families in New Jersey and Toronto answered that call.

"After the death" is the name of half of this week's Torah portion. "Be holy" is the other half. The Jewish calendar moved the same way this week. No pause. Just the next thing.

Four cups of wine mark four promises of liberation. The fifth cup — Elijah's — sits untouched, poured for a promise not yet fulfilled. Some of us are still mid-journey.

Israelis chose "homeward" as their word of the year. Moses named his son "stranger in a foreign land." The parsha that starts Exodus moves in one direction.

We drove the group to the airport, returned the rental car, and got on a train to Jerusalem. Some journeys end when you leave. Some end when you decide to stay.

Twelve scouts saw the same land. Ten saw giants. Two saw grapes. The difference wasn't what they found — it was how they looked.