January 2026. You're in Caracas. It's just after midnight on a cold night, and the entire block has gone black. It's quiet, almost too quiet. The TV has gone black and silent, the rattling from the heater is gone, and even the buzz from the overhead lights is gone. It's so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

But you're not focused on that, no, you're just trying your best to keep warm through the night, with hopes the power comes back on before morning. You find yourself dozing off to sleep under a mountain of blankets when the entire building begins to vibrate and shake with the sound of thunder booming through the air. You look at the window, there must be a bad storm, but the ground is dry.

Instead, you see the entire sky light up with what almost looks like a shooting star. It's getting closer, and closer, and closer, until you hear a loud explosion in the city, you look away for just a second, and then everything goes black.

As it turns out, it wasn't a storm, or a shooting star, it was an air strike. A bomb the U.S. military hand delivered straight to you.

Enas Ikhlawi is a young Palestinian journalist committed to documenting and reporting about settlers' attacks against Palestinian villagers. Her goal is to inform the public, hold settlers and IDF attacks to account, and ensure that underrepresented voices of Palestinian villagers are heard. She also led a women's program in Hebron.

Sadly, that came abruptly to an end yesterday Monday January 5, when heavily armed IDF soldiers stormed her home in the town of Idana, west of Hebron in the occupied West Bank. According to her brother Raafat Ikhlawi, "After breaking down the doors and arresting my sister Enas in a brutal manner, she was dragged away violently without a hijab or warm clothing. After significant pressure, we were allowed to give her a coat. So far, we do not know her whereabouts or the reason for her arrest."

While activists link it to efforts silencing coverage of settler attacks, the arrest fits a pattern of over 21,000 detentions since October 2023 in Gaza and the West Bank, many without trial amid rising tensions and no immediate comment from Israeli forces.

We do not believe democratic societies are defined by perfection, moral purity, or the absence of abuse.

We believe they are defined by their capacity to detect error, correct abuse, and restore trust through evidence.

History shows that when power—whether governmental, institutional, or private—operates without transparency and independent verification, abuse becomes not only possible but predictable. This is not a claim about motives or ideology. It is a structural reality observed across time and systems.

1. Skepticism is not cynicism.
   Asking for evidence is not an accusation. It is a democratic responsibility.

2. Transparency is not exposure.
   Protecting privacy and civil rights is compatible with public verification of outcomes.

Monday, January 5, 2026, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
Ohio Statehouse, 1 Capitol Square, Columbus in the Rotunda

Share a reading or song.  Let’s change priorities in 2026. 

Moral Mondays are recurring demonstrations, often led by the Ohio Poor People's Campaign, calling for an end to "policy violence" through prayer, advocacy, and protest, focusing on issues like poverty, healthcare access, and social justice, with events held in the Capitol Rotunda. These events, part of a larger national movement, gather faith leaders and impacted individuals to demand action from lawmakers