Le Deutéronome 31:18 Commentaire : Da'at Zekenim, Ibn Ezra, Sforno & Or HaChaim

ואנכי הסתר אסתיר, “and I will hide Myself even further;” our sages derive from this line that the Purim story i.e. the scroll of Esther and Mordechai are of Biblical authority [Esther’s real name having been Hadass, Ed.] i.e. that even during periods of exile when we do not feel the presence of G–d around us, He nonetheless watches over us and intervenes in our fates decisively when we are under attack. [Although His name does not even appear in that scroll, Haman did not succeed in killing a single Jew. Ed.]

I shall utterly conceal In the sense that if they call Me, I will not answer. The analogy is to a man who cannot be seen, so no one knows what he is going to do. The Hebrew language repeats a verb to express emphasis or intensification, as the grammarians well know.

ואנכי הסתר אסתיר פני מהם, not as they thought that I was no longer in their midst; wherever they are My presence is with them, as our sages said in Megillah 29 “wherever the Jewish people have been exiled G’d’s presence accompanies them. However, it does not manifest itself by saving them from their oppressor.”