"If they were here now they would have gone all out, truly spreading the holiday's light," said Yaacov Leiter, Rivka's brother in law. "They can't be here, so we have come to continue in their way."

All of the center's menorot were destroyed in the murderous rampage. The 15 feet menorah used now was commissioned just recently, as a replacement.

"The house is still in shambles, those damn terrorists practically tore it apart," said Leiter. "It's hard, seeing all their things around the house. The magnitude of this disaster is just sinking in."

 According to reports, the three 15-year-old girls went for a walk after the Shabbat dinner last Friday, and passed through a haredi neighborhood. At some point they noticed that they were being followed by several men. A Few minutes later the men entered one of the buildings and then came back outside accompanied by dozens of people who then stormed the girls.

 They kicked them until they fell on the ground, and started hitting them and throwing eggs at them while shouting, "Nazis, get out of here."

 Two of the girls managed to escape, while the third got away only after a passerby protested the attack and drew the attention of the crowd. A haredi woman from one of the nearby buildings hid the girl at her apartment and later helped her sneak outside covered in a long haredi-style robe.

 The police were called to the place only after the incident had already been over and the attackers long gone.  

Efforts to reestablish coexistence  

 "They kept shouting that girls and boys walking together is promiscuity that spoils their children, but the girls were no way near any boys and the three of them were modestly dressed," he claimed.

 Meanwhile the members of the Haredi Community stream in Beit Shemesh present a different version for the state of affairs in town. Moshe, a haredi resident, said that young religious boys and girls often pass through the haredi neighborhood together, and that on occasion yeshiva students have to "drive them away by force."

"Boys and girls laughing together is forbidden. This shouldn't happen in a secular neighborhood, let alone an ultra-Orthodox one," Moshe stated.

 Following the recent weeks' events, members of the Zionist religious community have approached the mayor and their local council representatives and have also filed a complaint with the police. Meanwhile, negotiations have also been ongoing between members of both publics in an effort to reach an understanding that would enable coexistence in the mixed town

After waiting three days, the aunt picks up the courage to call the new grandma to inquire what's holding things back. "Is the baby okay? Does he have jaundice?" everything is fine, the grandmother replies, but the couple has decided not to circumcise the baby.  

This gives the cue for the onslaught to begin. The cousin who's a med student sends the parents a pile of studies claiming that uncircumcised babies are exposed to various, terrible illnesses; the aunt warns the new mom that the child would suffer embarrassment at the nursery's toilet and at the communal shower in the army.   

But the new parents insist: Yes to a party, but no to a brit.  

Honestly? It's about time. Just like any other Jewish act – namely a mitzvah, and what’s more a mitzvah that involves inflicting pain on a helpless eight-day-old baby - the brit milah has also arrived at a crossroads. And against all criticism and warnings, the decision to give it a pass is becoming increasingly trendy in Israel.   

Circumcision for all the wrong reasons

"I've managed to stand up to the religious, overbearing establishment," is an old, familiar motto. Only this time, instead of getting married in Cyprus or holding a non-religious funeral at a kibbutz, we've decided to keep the boy in one piece, without performing "barbaric" incisions in his body. What's wrong with that? We have here caring, well-informed parents who are unwilling to swallow every nonsensical argument that an over-zealous circumciser tries to shove down their throat at the neonatal ward.  

And even I, a mitzvah observing person, don't have a problem with the ever-rising number of uncircumcised Israelis. It is beyond my powers to try and explain to people how much this ritual is imbued with meaning and speak poetically about its spiritual virtues. I don't see myself preaching against the dangerous decline of Jewish values over the Knesset podium, like many religious MKs.  

Unfortunately the bottom line is that it doesn't matter whether the boy was circumcised due to health concerns or because his parents wanted to make sure he'd fit in with the other kids in kindergarten. The moment that the brit has been taken out of its religious context and became a social act that declares one's belonging to a group, instead of a covenant between God and his children, it has lost its true and appropriate role – at least in my view.  

I am much more concerned by the fact that many in Israel feel that their Jewishness is an unwelcomed burden - a redundant, meaningless piece of information. Just a trick of the universe that has landed them in the bosom of an ancient, long-suffering nation. They therefore choose to have the brit without ceremony, or blessings or a minyan. Just make the cut and get it over with, much like the many who choose not to circumcise their sons at all. And it is indeed a circumcision, but certainly not a brit – a covenant.  

Choosing not to perform the brit ceremony (with or without circumcision) is a natural symptom for the alienation from the ritual's true purpose. From this standpoint it becomes very easy to decide to give the thing up entirely, because "there is no covenant between me and anyone up there." Sadly, no shiny party with a buffet, jamboree and a famous circumciser could stitch together this spiritual cut.

And if you ask me, this is the cut that hurts the most.