This week’s Torah reading begins with the story of Noah and the flood, and ends with a sort of footnote introducing Abraham. We are told here that Terah had three sons—Abraham, Nahor, and Haran—and that Haran “died in the lifetime of his father in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans,” while Terah and the rest of the family left Ur for the land of Canaan. Shlomo Riskin notes a commonality between Noah and Haran as they are portrayed by the medieval commentator Rashi, who draws on midrashic literature to fill in the blanks of their stories:

The Bible states that Noah, along with his sons, his wife, and the sons’ wives, went into the ark “because of the waters of the flood” (Genesis 7:7). From this verse, Rashi concludes that “Noah had little faith; he believed and he didn’t believe that the flood would arrive” . . . until the water literally pushed him in. . . .

When it comes to Haran, Rashi explains the seemingly irrelevant detail about his death by citing a midrash in which the king of Ur threatens to throw Abraham into a furnace if he does not recant his repudiation of the local pagan gods. While Abraham prefers to die rather than blaspheme, his brother Haran opts to wait and see. Abraham miraculously emerges from the flames unharmed, so Haran immediately proclaims that he, too, is a monotheist—at which point he is thrown into the furnace and consumed. Thus, Riskin notes, a striking contrast can be found between the two doubters, Noah and Haran:

Noah was a man of little faith, and yet not only does he survive the flood, he becomes one of the central figures of human history. He is even termed “righteous” by the Bible.
In contrast, Haran . . . hovers on the edge of obscurity, and is even punished with death for his lack of faith. Why is Haran’s skepticism considered so much worse than Noah’s? . . .

Noah, despite his doubts, nevertheless builds the ark, pounding away, [the midrash tells us], for 120 years, even suffering abuse from a world ridiculing his eccentric persistence. Noah may not have entered the ark until the rains began—but he did not wait for the flood before obeying the divine command to build an ark!

Noah may think like a skeptic, but he acts like a believer. Haran, on the other hand, dies because he waits for someone else to test the fires. In refusing to act for God during Abraham’s trial, he acted against God. In effect, his indecision is very much a decision.

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.