Waiting for the Purim Miracle
Never have I felt so personally part of the Purim story as missiles are intercepted across roaring skies. When I first wrote this article, Operation Roaring Lion had not yet begun. Today, a dramatically different Middle East is already taking shape as the Purim miracle unfolds in real time. I will never forget how former Member of Knesset Yehuda Glick called out to me during the Knesset reception of the Jerusalem Prayer Breakfast (JPB):
“Albert, please don’t forget to invite me to the Jerusalem Prayer Breakfast in Tehran!”
He said it with a smile, but beneath the humor was a deep longing for a different Middle East—one no longer overshadowed by a hostile, death-driven Iranian regime. When we gathered at President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago in January, that longing felt less like a distant dream and more like a tangible possibility.
Once again, it was Glick who stepped onto the stage and announced that President Trump had halted negotiations with Iran, declaring, “The help is on the way.”
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Then something shifted. What was once wishful thinking began to feel like movement. At JPB Mar-a-Lago, it seemed events had been set in motion, and we began to glimpse how a new Middle East might unfold before our eyes.
Later, during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the Knesset, when India was mentioned in connection with the Book of Esther, the ancient narrative suddenly felt strikingly contemporary.
Now, as we approach Purim, the same story of political drama, existential threats, hidden courage, and sudden reversals continues to unfold before us. In the Persian Empire of old, Haman rose to prominence with a singular obsession: the destruction of the Jewish people. Cloaked in political authority, he weaponized law, propaganda, and power in pursuit of annihilation. Yet history turned—not through armies, but through the moral courage of one woman willing to risk everything.
Today, many see unsettling parallels in the rhetoric and policies of Ali Khamenei, whose repeated chants of “Death to Israel, Death to America,” voiced in parliament and public squares, are broadcast around the world. That language of elimination and erasure is not metaphorical; it is ideological, religious, and intentional, as we have seen. Now, Khamenei and more than 40 of his generals and leaders are no longer around to threaten us with annihilation. The same God who delivered Israel in the days of Esther has not changed.
Over recent years, images of young demonstrators in Iran, many of them women, have circled the globe—students raising their voices for dignity, freedom, and accountability; young people refusing to surrender their future to fear. Their protests are not framed in biblical terms, yet their courage feels familiar. Like Esther, they stand within the system they challenge.
Still, history does not repeat itself in perfect symmetry. Iranian students are not insiders in a royal court; they are citizens demanding reform. Their struggle is complex, fraught, and uncertain. Yet what makes the Purim narrative timeless is not its political structure; it is the revelation that courage can emerge from unexpected places.
Is there anyone within today’s corridors of power in Iran willing to choose a different path—one that could spare the region from devastating conflict? Purim shows us that redemption can appear in unexpected ways, as brave individuals make costly choices at decisive moments.
As we wait for a modern Purim miracle, we must pray. The deeper question may not be whether we will witness a dramatic downfall, but whether enough voices, inside and outside Iran, will rise in time to bring about a reversal.
Ultimately, Purim is about a last-minute transformation: desperate prayer turning a decree of destruction into a day of deliverance. History has not ended. The story is still being written. And while the Book of Esther closes with joy, it begins with pain and vulnerability.
Here is where we stand today: in urgent need of prayer, poised between decree and deliverance, between threat and hope.
