Independence Day

 I’m sure that all of you have heard by now about the fires set by the enemy’s arsonists here in Israel. It is not uncommon for these individuals to attack us in this way when we have hot, dry, and windy days. They especially love to target the forests around Jerusalem. 

We mark three special days in Israel shortly after Pesach (the latter being the original birth of the nation).  The first is Holocaust Day, in memory of the 6,000,000 Jewish lives who perished during the Second World War. A week later, we remember all those who have sacrificed their lives, making it possible for this country and State to exist, and along with them we also recall all the many terror victims whose lives were snuffed since the very beginning of the Jewish Aliya (returning to the land), starting in the 19^th century. It is only when this foundation is laid that on the subsequent day we celebrate our independence, on the date, Iyyar 5^th, that our first Prime Minister, David Ben Gurion, declared the establishment of the State. However, many of Independence Day's events were canceled because of the spread of the fires on Memorial Day. Our enemies within and without celebrated another victory, as they honor all those who gave their lives to destroy this country so that it will be just a memory in Jewish history. (And just as a reminder, the sirens woke us up again at 5:30 this morning, with a ballistic rocket from Yemen.)

Thus, typical of life in Israel, we did succeed in honoring the Day of Independence despite the fires, the evacuations from many places, and other situations, as the weather became very comfortable and most of the fires were contained. Independence Day is fraught with many official and State events and ceremonies, some of which occur at the President’s residence, while others also include members of world Jewry. The public celebrates mostly outdoors, with music in the evening and with picnics and barbeques during the day. This year, many of the parks surrounding Jerusalem could not be used for this purpose. So life goes on – amid the ongoing war we mourn our dead (past and present), we grieve with their families, we remember, we celebrate, we eat, we sing, we dance…. and as things stand now, sometimes in the midst of it all we run to the bomb shelter (and hopefully many of us to YHVH’s hiding place).

A couple of weeks ago, after reading Parashat Shmini (Lev 9-11), the two fires that played such an opposing role in the described scene loomed large in relationship to our situation here in the land. It seems that we are placed between two choices – either lifting a “holy sacrifice, acceptable to Elohim” (ref. Romans 1:12), or lighting up a “foreign fire which He had not commanded” (Lev. 10:1) by kindling flames of defiance, rebellion, anger and retaliation, something which has been all too frequent here among us. Then came the fires, especially in the vicinity of Jerusalem, which brought to bear the above thought all the more.

As we drove home from our private celebration with many friends, local and visiting, we discussed and wondered if our brothers from the Christian Zionist camp, as well as the Ephraimite camp, celebrated with us and with the Jewish communities out in the nations.  Hopefully none of us forgot that the gathering of the first stick/nation of Judah came about by a divine decree, which means that the same prophecy heralds the ingathering of the second stick of Joseph in the hand of Ephraim (see Ezekiel 37:19).  “Drawing closer” to one another, as it says in the Hebrew original, means celebrating and honoring the Almighty for this national day of Israel’s (re)birthday - a nation that was born in a day. "Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Can a land be born in one day? Can a nation be brought forth all at once? As soon as Zion travailed, she also brought forth her sons” (Isaiah 66:8).  Is Israel’s Independence Day a time to celebrate the hope of one day being united as one nation in the hand of YHVH?  'Thus says Adonai YHVH, ‘Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel, his companions; and I will put them with it, with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they will be one in My hand"' (Ezekiel 37:19).