Families picnicking, playing, munching cookies and quiche at an outdoor café in the Judean hills. Carefree, joyful expressions in Hebrew and English. A seeming impossible scenario – especially for foreigners who think of Israel as mostly tempests. Looking closer, one notices the dads wearing holstered pistols frolicking with kids. Reminders of ever-present danger.

A few miles away, a serene community built around a vineyard. A lunch celebrating the end of Shabbat hosted by Nissim, an entrepreneur who discourses about Israel as a meritocracy of opportunity regardless of race or background. Where capitalism flourishes in a socialist system. But also where taxes and other mounting costs of daily life are magnified by war and costs of social welfare for the Haredim – Israel’s fast-growing ultra-orthodox Jewish community. And where parents worry and are challenged about guiding children through social media distractions and looming, life-altering commitments to military service.

Further along, Tel Aviv’s economic prowess, Mediterranean beachy, café vibe, incoming missile terrors, Hostage Square remembrance of the damaged and lost. And Noa, a groundbreaking, politically correct journalist, sharing family stories of racial inequity and of feminist influences on Israeli journalism, police brutality, gender harmony.