Rav Yosef Zvi Rimon Urges Diaspora Rabbis to Keep Purim Celebrations, Add Tehillim and Special Prayers for Soldiers Amid Ongoing War

Rav Yosef Zvi Rimon circulated a message to community rabbis in the U.S. and across the Diaspora urging them to keep Purim celebrations and parades on this year, but to open them with a few minutes of Tehillim and a Mi Sheberach for Am Yisrael, the wounded, and the soldiers.

He frames this Purim as a tension between pain and historic gratitude: citing Rambam on the obligation to cry out and respond spiritually in times of communal crisis, while also arguing the Jewish people are living through “days that will be etched” into national memory.

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Practical takeaway in his wording: on Ta’anit Esther, the fast and prayers should be explicitly for the war effort and every member of Am Yisrael; on Purim itself, celebrate with real joy, while consciously holding both the losses and what he describes as present-day “miracles” in mind, tying it into Shabbat Zachor and the Amalek theme.