It takes less than ten minutes to walk from my home in the center of Jerusalem to City Hall but the world can — and did — change in that short stretch of time. My first appointment to interview Mayor Nir Barkat was set for 10:40 last Tuesday morning. I was crossing Rechov Haneviim headed toward Safra Square via the Russian Compound when I was forced to dodge police cars and Hatzolah ambulances sirens blaring speeding down the street. It was moments after an Arab terrorist had plowed into Rabbi Yeshaya Krishevsky Hy”d at a bus stop on Malchei Yisrael Street and a simultaneous knifing and shooting attack on a bus that ended the lives of two more Jews in Jerusalem’s Armon Hanetziv neighborhood. My cell phone rang but with my heart beating fast it virtually jumped out of my shirt pocket by itself. Without looking at the screen I knew who was calling and why. Interview canceled rescheduled for Thursday. That’s what life in Jerusalem has become since a wave of terror engulfed us beginning Succos time. Expect the unexpected and the unscheduled. Have eyes in the back of your head. Daven for your own personal safety and that of Klal Yisrael. Remember that life can be fleeting. Make sure every conversation especially with loved ones ends on a positive note before taking leave. The wave of terror is taking its toll on Mayor Barkat as well. He’s blinking a bit nervously before this his last scheduled interview of the day which follows immediately after the BBC. Barkat 56 a retired self-made high-tech entrepreneur switched careers to politics and first won the mayor’s seat in a 2008 election. He’s always self-assured but like everyone else these days he’s visibly strained. Just two days earlier in addition to the three Jews killed 18 more were injured in a day of terror that spared no neighborhood north or south secular or religious. Eleven terrorist attacks were recorded in Jerusalem last week alone. In 2001 during the height of the second intifada the Jerusalem Municipality reported 50 attacks that entire year. On Thursday morning one of the busiest shopping days of the week shoppers were scarce and subdued in the Machaneh Yehuda shuk in central Jerusalem. On Erev Shabbos on Malchei Yisrael and Meah Shearim Streets foot traffic was so light you could actually walk without bumping into people every few feet. Activity seemed to return to normal on Shabbos. Police and border patrols were strategically stationed at all crossings and entrances to the Old City. The regular pedestrians were visible again walking back and forth to the Kosel. By Motzaei Shabbos many of the sidewalk caf?s in the center of town were beginning to fill up. That’s the way Mayor Barkat says he would like to see things: Carry on with your routine but keep especially alert at all times. And carry a gun — like he does — if you own one. Since Israel’s police force is a national police force what sort of input do you have as mayor in how security forces are allocated? “The police have their professional views and they’re very open to cooperation with the municipality. As a matter of fact I don’t remember such positive cooperation like we have with them now. They listen. Also in many ways we’ve had to cooperate to create one front. There is a mutual dependency. Part of the way they work is dependent on the services we give them. And we of course depend on them. So I give a very high mark to the cooperation we have with the police.”  

To read the rest of this story please buy this issue of Mishpacha or sign up for a weekly subscription