A little late, but . . .

[Richard D]

The liturgy for the Ninth of Ab, the day of fasting which marks the destruction of the First and Second Temples as well as other tragedies in Jewish history, laments the fate of Jerusalem, “The mournful, wasted, degraded, and desolate city.” Every year the Israeli rabbinate is asked if one must still say these words, if indeed it is not now blasphemous to say them at all. And every year the rabbinate furnishes its rabbinical answers. From my window in Jeruslaem, where I often spend the summer, I view the frenetic activity of the Ramot Eshkol shopping center, the bands of tourists and children scurrying across Ammunition Hill, the luxurious homes on Givat Hamivtar, and it takes more inner vision than I can muster to see a wasted and desolate city.

https://www.commentary.org/articles/frank-talmage/on-the-ninth-of-ab/