Haaretz:

Here destruction is met with a resolve to do good. Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai is able to look past the tragedy. He seeks to rebuild his broken world on hesed, loving kindness, as it teaches in the book of Psalms. His words of comfort lay out a vision for the future.

By Rabbi Micah Peltz

On the morning of September 11, 2001, I sat learning in a yeshiva on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Minyan had just finished and we were settling into our studies. Tentatively, one of the administrators walked out of his office and said, “something happened downtown. A plane crashed into the World Trade Center.” We looked around, unsure of how to respond. And then, befitting a yeshiva, an argument broke out.

“Let’s go outside and see what’s going on,” someone said. Remember, this is before smartphones and there was no television in the yeshiva – so we had no way of knowing what exactly was happening. Read more