Hamas ruined the wedding of an Israeli man with RI ties. How the groom responded.

Alec Burkin found a way to work for a Woonsocket-based pharmaceutical company and live in Israel at the same time.

He also fell in love with an Israeli woman.

And on the night of Oct. 6, the two of them happily anticipated their Oct. 12 wedding on the shores of the Dead Sea.

The event had already drawn guests to Israel from afar, including 15 relatives from Rhode Island.

Burkin's mother, Alice Braunstein of Narragansett, and his sister Liza Birch of Providence, were part of the dream-come-true setting.

But as Burkin puts it, "Hamas had other plans."

RI children in Tel Aviv take shelter from Hamas rockets

Identified by the U.S. government as a terrorist group, Hamas is a three-decades-old Palestinian organization that follows a policy of deliberately targeting and killing unarmed men, women and children.

As some of Burkin's guests adjusted to their new time zone on Oct. 7, Hamas killers and kidnappers broke out of the Gaza Strip. They crossed into southern Israel, took hostages and commenced a massacre. They burned some families alive, according to U.S. officials.

Some of the atrocities, which were preceded by a barrage of rocket attacks into Israel from Gaza, took place less than 45 miles from Tel Aviv neighborhoods where Burkin's wedding guests, including two Rhode Island families with children, were staying.

By the end of last week, all of the locals were safely home in New England.

Their accounts provide some on-the-ground observations, from a Rhode Island point of view, on impacts in Tel Aviv, which was subject to rocket attack, but otherwise insulated from the type of carnage seen in southern Israel.

These stories are also quite relevant to the experience of the American Israeli groom who remains in Israel.

Like his wedding guests, Burkin is not telling a harrowing tale of survival in the midst of the latest war between Israelis and Palestinians or seeking sympathy for what happened to his wedding ceremony.

His account is the experience of a Tel Aviv resident and former New Englander with no military training, who grapples with a major shift in history. The setting for his story is Israel, but it has a Rhode Island feel.

As the attacks continued on Oct. 8, the 31-year-old formally canceled the wedding ceremony. Then, he set out to make a difference, in his own small way, as he says, through fundraising.

Within days, the former Narragansett Lobster Company employee was channeling major publicity for his effort.

On Oct. 14, he talked over his personal situation – and fundraising for Israeli reservists – with Lindsey Reiser on MSNBC.

"I just wanted to first mention we lost our wedding but a lot of people across this land, on both sides, have lost their family members," Burkin told her.

Protesting Prime Minister Netanyahu; supporting the Israeli leader's prescription for Hamas

Fierce political polarization was a dominant feature of Israeli politics long before its emergence in the United States – and long before Burkin moved to Israel six years ago.

Many Israelis, for example, have long opposed Israeli settlement building in the West Bank. Such settlements, they have argued, violate international law. Some still hope that the establishment of a separate independent country for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza can resolve the conflict.

Many other Israelis disagree. And not all of them are settlers or extremists. They simply harbor deep doubts that such an arrangement would really end the bloody conflict.

Burkin has figured out some positions for himself. One nuance that's important to him involves Israelis who aren't Jewish – Arab-Israelis.

He and his partner, Danielle Haliva, recently bought a condo in a predominantly Arab-Israeli neighborhood in Tel Aviv.

Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is a titan of Israeli politics who has supported settlements and staunchly opposed past proposals for a Palestinian state. He's also been embroiled in a corruption scandal.

Burkin and Haliva have joined protesters opposed to Netanyahu's efforts to curtail the power of the country's Supreme Court.

However, since Oct. 7, Burkin has echoed Netanyahu's call for the destruction of Hamas.

"Hamas needs to be demolished," he said on MSNBC. "There is no other option."

Israel, he said, has "no future" and cannot survive as long as Hamas governs Gaza.

'No answer' for innocent Palestinians

Burkin told Reiser he fears many Palestinians will "suffer greatly" as Israel carries out military operations to eradicate Hamas.

He and many other Israelis, too, are deeply concerned about the plight of Gaza Strip residents who are not Hamas supporters, he said.

"I don't have the answer," he acknowledged.

"We need to do everything in our power obviously to provide support in these days," he added.

"I am extremely empathetic to Gazans ... that have nothing to do with Hamas," he said. "Their lack of choice. Their lack of opportunity. The indoctrination of children into fighting for Hamas. Having grown up in Boston with nothing but opportunity, this is obviously a very different reality."

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Publicity for Israeli causes

The 31-year-old said he was 26 when he settled in Israel. Due to his age, he said, he was not recruited into the Israel Defense Forces.

Unlike many other Israeli men, Burkin has no military background. However, the Syracuse alum has significant experience raising money for the Gift of Life Bone Marrow Foundation and generating various types of support for nonprofits and business ventures. He once recruited Rob Gronkowski for an awareness campaign.

Burkin is also brand manager for MycoClinic, a pharmaceutical company focused on pain relief and owned by Woonsocket-based Aidance Scientific, which hired him in 2017.

On MSNBC, he downplayed his wedding situation – and played up fundraising support for newly mobilized Israeli reservists, lauding the myriad ways Israelis have come forward to assist them.

"People are packaging all types of different materials whether it's socks (or) food," he said. "Baking the soldiers cakes. Doing whatever they can to play their small role."

"This is the way that I can play my small role," he said.

"I feel like it's my responsibility and my opportunity," Burkin said, "to really play this connecting role between the amazing support we've received from folks all over the world and obviously the immediate need here on the ground."

On Sunday, he told The Journal, his fundraising effort had generated $31,000 in proceeds.

Some of those contributions will buy sleeping pads for a group of Israeli paratroopers that Burkin has been in contact with.

Other contributions, he said, are flowing to other causes, including the Israeli Children's Fund, which supports children whose parents have been killed or taken hostage by terrorists, and Rish Lakish Community Food For Israel, a food initiative.

Learning the realities of war: Rhode Island children shelter in 'safe room'

Burkin and Haliva remain devoted to each other and while the wedding ceremony was scuttled, the wedding is by no means canceled. They had much different expectations for October, of course, when the Rhode Island relatives flew in.

Both Burkin's cousin, Simon Braunstein of Cumberland, and Burkin's uncle, Marc Braunstein of Newport, brought their wives and four children, including a toddler.

The three oldest children in the group, ranging in age from about 6 to 8, now have a clear sense of what Israelis do when Hamas fires rockets at them. They know what a safe room is.

"My kids were on edge," Simon Braunstein said. On one occasion, he said, the family took shelter in an alley. Another time, they were in a parking garage, he said.

Burkin's mother had arrived on Oct. 1 and spent the next week making preparations for the upcoming festivities.

On the morning of Oct. 7, she and her husband, Brian Dever, headed out of Tel Aviv on a pre-planned trip to northern Israel.

They were aware of the Hamas attacks at that point, and they knew the situation was serious, but the info they had was scant. This changed over the next few days.

By Oct. 10, all of the wedding guests were among a flood of travelers trying to navigate their way out of Israel.

Braunstein traveled back south to Tel Aviv where Hamas rockets remained a threat. They had a flight out of Ben Gurion Airport to Athens on Oct. 11.

She's emotional as she recalls the scene in the airport.

She wanted to stay in Israel with her son. It was, in part, a mother's guardian instinct.

"I wanted to do what I could to help," she adds.

At one point, sirens warning of another rocket attack sounded in the airport.

She recalls thousands of people trying to find cover. People around her hit the ground. Her husband pulled her down. Then, she looked up: To her dismay, much of the roof above her was glass.

She also noticed fear in the faces of people around her, which was disturbing.

She had gone to Israel to see her son get married. Instead, she was leaving with a sense of dread that would remind her of a certain phrase, "Never Again."

Like her son, she expresses concern for people on all sides of the conflict.

She says she worries about the hostages and about antisemitic rhetoric and dangerous misinformation.

"I'm scared," said the groom's mother. "Scared for this world. Scared for Israel. Scared for the children."

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Hamas wrecks former New Englander's wedding; fuels groom's fundraising