There are few things more natural than fear on the battlefield.

A soldier facing an enemy knows what is at stake. The next few minutes may determine whether he lives or dies, and it would be unnatural for him not to feel fear.

And yet, in this week's Parsha of Shoftim, the Torah commands precisely the opposite.

"When you go out to war against your enemy, and you see horse and chariot, a people more numerous than you, you shall not be afraid of them, for the Lord your G-d is with you, Who brought you up from the land of Egypt" (Deuteronomy 20:1).

The Torah does not minimize the danger. It acknowledges that Israel may face a more powerful force yet still insists: Do not be afraid.

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For the Jews of Karachi, Pakistan, Friday evenings once followed a familiar rhythm. A century ago, as the sun descended over the Arabian Sea, families would make their way to the Magain Shalome Synagogue to welcome the Sabbath.

Women had already lit Shabbat candles before leaving home. Men greeted one another at the entrance while children settled beside parents and grandparents. Soon the sanctuary filled with the sounds of Hebrew prayer, recited in the distinctive cadence of the Bene Israel Jews whose families had come to Karachi from western India.

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At 3:14 a.m. on June 9, 1944, two torpedoes from a British submarine struck the German-requisitioned steamship Tánaïs north of Crete.

Packed into its hold were Italian prisoners of war, Greek resistance fighters and 262 Jews, the remnant of a community rooted on the island for nearly 2,500 years. The vessel sank rapidly, with no known survivors.

In a matter of minutes, one of the oldest continuous Jewish cultures in the Mediterranean was extinguished.

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In the days leading up to Tisha B'Av, and as the anniversary of the 2005 Gaza withdrawal draws near, Israel once again stands at a historic crossroads. We can continue down the path of hesitation and half-measures, or we can finally do what history and security demand: restore Jewish communities in Gaza.

This is not a radical notion. It is the necessary response to the horrors of Oct. 7. Gaza is part of the Land of Israel, and rebuilding Jewish life there is the only way to force Hamas to pay a concrete and lasting price for its crimes.

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Long before oil transformed the Arabian Gulf, skyscrapers rose over Manama, and the Abraham Accords brought Israel and Bahrain into open diplomatic partnership, Jews were already part of the region's story.

Their presence in Bahrain reaches back well over a millennium, to a time when the Gulf was a crossroads of trade, travel and faith. Indeed, to understand the importance of Bahrain's Jewish community, one must first remember that the term "Bahrain" once referred not only to the modern island kingdom, but to a broader region along the eastern coast of Arabia.

Jewish sources, Arabic accounts and medieval travel literature all point to a Jewish presence in that wider Gulf area long before Islam.

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