This uncomfortable piece describes the coach tours that visit the site of the October 7th massacre in Israel. Already. The vast majority are from the US. It is “diaspora homeland tourism,” and it’s huge, “an employee of the Israeli Tourism Ministry telling Ynet, ‘There’s never been wartime tourism on this scale.'” The sights Maya Rosen describe are truly chilling—but so is the whole operation. Prepare to be disturbed.
Hundreds of people milled around the site. I counted a dozen coach-sized buses in the parking lot; all but one had carried Jewish groups from abroad, including two from the Dallas Jewish Federation, one from the Minneapolis Jewish Federation, and one from the US-based Sephardic Community Alliance. People wandered around wearing “Beis Knesses North Woodmere Israel Mission” zip-ups and “White Plains Stands with Israel” baseball hats. I heard one man murmur that it felt like being in New York after 9/11, while another responded that it was more like being in the killing fields of Poland. A group of American Jews stood in a circle with a guitar singing religious songs. Chabad had set up a truck for men to come and put on tefillin.
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