As the anniversary of Rachel's death approaches, many people present her as a figure of eternal tears and sorrow. Some try to see her as a model of passivity and submission in the face of the forces of evil ("Rachel listens to voices different from her own" in the language of the progressives). In some places this year, the image of our Mother Rachel was recruited for a campaign of a hostage deal at any cost ("return the children to their borders", a paraphrasing of Jeremiah's words in which G-d promises Rachel He will do so).
Rachel indeed suffered greatly in her life, but she never gave up. When necessary – like this war's Rachel of Ofakim – she dealt with the difficulty in an active, sophisticated and resolute manner; as in her demand to Yaakov, "Give me children" and the theft of Lavan's "household idols"; Lavan, her deceitful father, who bullied her and her family "ten times over". Our Sages explain that by taking the idols she exposed the falsehood and weakness of idol worship to all.
Each generation has its own false idols that Rachel's sons cry over and thereby expose their weakness: whether it's the false idols in the media who tell us that the IDF cannot win; if it's false polls that tell of a "close race" and a "victory" for progressives in the United States; or the flagrant lies against an elected government that represents the majority of the people.
Rachel's descendants do not remain silent. They fight against these dishonest phenomena; and know that eventually, she can listen to G-d's words telling her "restrain your voice from weeping and your children will return to their borders".