A Day for Thanksgiving in Israel and Gaza

There are moments when what we are called to do is, simply, to thank God. This is one of those moments. It is an answer to prayer.

Today, two years and two days after the October 7^th attack by Hamas on Israel and the subsequent two years of war which has left Gaza devastated, a ceasefire has begun. According to reports, spokespeople for Israel and Hamas have reached an agreement the substance of which is that both sides will observe a ceasefire, Israel will partially withdraw troops, and on Monday or Tuesday Hamas will return the remaining Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.

(Left) Palestinians celebrate in Deir al-Balah after news of the ceasefire agreement on October 9, 2025. (Right) People and families of hostages gather in celebration at Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 9, 2025. Photograph on left by UPI / Alamy Stock. Photograph on right by Lionel Urman/ABACAPRESS.COM / Alamy Stock.

We do not know what will happen. But at least at this moment, it appears that the horrors that began with Hamas’s frenzy of murder, followed by the heartbreaking deaths of thousands in the resulting war, including a tragic number of children, may at last be coming to an end. This ceasefire points, however imperfectly, toward the peace that Jesus promises to bring to fulfilment in the age to come. Scripture teaches that the Messiah, when he returns, “shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Isa. 2:4).

We know that in the present age, where death and hatred still rage, any peace is provisional and easily broken. We mourn the many who have died, and grieve with their loved ones. But we also know that any cessation of violence after the calamities of war should remind us that Christ, the Messiah, is at work in the world.

After Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness, he returned to his people and, in the synagogue, read from the appointed text for that day, from the scroll of Isaiah.

The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

We cannot foretell what will happen next. But we can recognize in today’s ceasefire a sign of “the Lord’s favor”: the laying down of arms, the safety of children in a war zone, the freeing of captives to return to their homes and families. Then the deeper work of peacemaking can begin. Jesus tells us what such peacemaking involves for any of us, and will need to involve here, by the mercy of God: repentance for sin, forgiveness of the sinner, and a reconciliation that secures a lasting peace for the peoples of Israel and Gaza. This will take a miracle. But isn’t today already a miracle – the result, I believe, of the prayers of millions around the world for an end to the bloodshed?

As a pastor of the Bruderhof, a peace church for over a century, what I can say now is this: Thank God. Thank God. And may this be a peace that lasts.