Almost a decade ago, the British classical singer Mark Glanville wrote in Mosaic about visiting Berlin, the city where his mother was born and from which she had fled, about the love of Schubert that she had bequeathed to him, and his Schubert-inspired Jewish-themed song narrative Yiddish Winterreise. In a recent essay, Glanville explains how a vocal injury earlier in his career prompted his turn to creating and performing Jewish music.

I hit a rock singing Iago in Verdi’s Otello for Haddo House Opera, a role I inhabited at the cost of excessive vocal stress, leading to a hemorrhage of the cords and a polyp on my larynx that had to be surgically removed. I had to abandon all future work and learn to sing again.

Judaism became a refuge. I began singing in Westminster Synagogue, first as a member of the congregation, picking up the liturgical melodies along with the Hebrew until, identified as a singer, I was called to sing as hazan from the bimah, accompanied on organ by Harold Lester. Singing the Ne’ilah [closing service] music on Yom Kippur was like discovering Schubert for the first time. I felt deeply connected to the ancient melodies that evoked the history of my people’s suffering (and joy) like nothing else. In Jewish prayer I was able to express the deepest essence of myself. Song had, once again, become art.

“Make no mistake,” said President Biden after the news broke of the murder of six hostages in Gaza, “Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes.” While this sentiment is correct, especially given that an American citizen was among the dead, the White House has thus far shown little inclination to act upon it. The editors of National Review remark:

Hamas’s execution of [Hersh Goldberg-Polin] should not be treated as merely an issue of concern for Israel but as a brazen act against the United States. It would send a terrible signal if the response from the Biden-Harris administration were to move closer to Hamas’s position in cease-fire negotiations. Instead, Biden must follow through on his declaration that Hamas will pay.

Richard Goldberg lays out ten steps the U.S. can take, none of which involve military action. Among them:

The Department of Justice should move forward with indictments of known individuals and groups in the United States providing material support to Hamas and those associated with Hamas, domestically and abroad. The Departments of the Treasury and State should also target Hamas’s support network of terrorist entities in and out of the Gaza Strip. . . . Palestinian organizations that provide material support to Hamas and coordinate attacks with them should be held accountable for their actions. Hamas networks in foreign countries, including South Africa, should be targeted with sanctions as well.

Pressure on Qatar should include threats to remove Qatar’s status as a major non-NATO ally; move Al Udeid air-base assets; impose sanctions on Qatari officials, instrumentalities, and assets; and impose sanctions on Qatar’s Al-Jazeera media network. Qatar should be compelled to close all Hamas offices and operations, freeze and turn over to the United States all Hamas-connected assets, and turn over to the United States or Israel all Hamas officials who remain in the country.