Now that we have passed Pesach and entered the zone of Sefirat HaOmer, a sequence of special calendar dates will soon be upon us. In a piece written some years ago for the Destiny Foundation, Rabbi Wein explains.
These few weeks are crowded with special days of memory here
in Israel. Yom HaShoah, Yom HaZikaron L’Chalellei Tzahal, and Yom HaAtzma’ut
come upon us in swift succession. They are really the framework for the Israeli
psyche—both political and national—that governs our national mood and policies.
The rest of the world does not, and perhaps cannot, understand where we are
coming from.
The world wants us to get over the Holocaust while at the
same time creating a scenario that constantly reminds us of the Holocaust.
People who are bitten by large dogs do not walk on the same side of the street
where rottweilers are present.
The Jewish people have paid a heavy price for maintaining
our little state. Tens of thousands of Jews have been killed and continue to
die for its preservation. The Arab world has basically never come to terms with
the reality of the existence of the State of Israel. Constant war, mindless
terrorism, unceasing incitement, never-ending accusations, fabrications and
biased UN resolutions have been the daily fare of the State of Israel since its
inception.
We can never, God forbid, lose a war—but we are never
allowed to win one either. So Yom HaZikaron L’Chalellei Tzahal becomes
tragically a regular occurrence in our lives. Golda Meir may have famously expressed
her regrets over the deaths of the Arabs in their struggles against our
existence. But the Arabs have never expressed such sentiments.
The Ayatollahs of Iran have said that they were willing to
lose fifteen million(!) Iranians in order to eradicate the State of Israel. It
is hard to see how one can come to an accommodation with such bloodthirsty and uncaring
fanatics who value human life, theirs and certainly ours, so cheaply. So Yom HaZikaron
comes to remind us of the real world and of the heartbreaking cost that Israel
paid and pays to survive in that world.
Again, pious platitudes about peace do not change the
reality of murderous intent on the ground. We have been down that road too many
times in the past to be seduced to go there again.
The miracle of the past century was and remains the
reestablishment of Jewish sovereignty over the Land of Israel. Yom HaAtzma’ut
has to be viewed in that light. The tragedy is that this miracle, unlike
Chanukah and Purim, had no religious leadership that could have cloaked it with
the necessary ritual that would have made the day so meaningful to all sections
of Israeli and Jewish society. Having a barbecue in the park hardly makes it a
memorable day, a tradition of observance that can be passed on to later
generations.
Those of us who were alive when the State came into being
and experienced all the pangs of its establishment are a fast-disappearing
breed. The deniers amongst us, and certainly in the non-Jewish world, already
distort and falsify the story. The victim has become the oppressor and Goliath
struts around the world stage as David. Yom HaAtzma’ut should come to remind us
of the real story, of God’s grace unto us in a dismal century, of Jewish
heroism and purpose and of triumph against all odds and powerful enemies.
It should also remind the world that even though it is
popular and oh-so-politically correct and progressively noble to damn Israel,
in the long run it is highly counterproductive to do so. So let us take these
days to heart and stand tall for our God and land.
