Sunday was Mother’s Day in the US and I was supposed to have landed in New York to spend the day with my only daughter who is temporarily living in the US.  What a great way to spend Mother’s Day, I thought, with a real mother-daughter day enjoying the New York City spring.  Then yesterday morning I was supposed to get on a plane to Little Rock, Arkansas, where I was scheduled to meet with friends and supporters of CFOIC Heartland, do an interview on Christian television with a dear pastor friend and then speak at evening church and private meetings.  My trip would then have taken me to Texas and finally to Florida for a very busy 10 days of meetings and speaking engagements.  All of that was cancelled.

Since early March, we have all experienced various levels of lockdown and social distancing.  But for us at CFOIC Heartland, the most difficult part of all of this was the total cessation of flights to and from Israel.  We are no longer able to come to you and you are no longer able to come to us.  And no one knows how much longer this will last. And even after they loosen up restrictions on air travel and tourism, will we there be a renewed upsurge of the pandemic and further closures?