Wall of names in the Israeli Army’s Armoured Corps memorial site in Latroun, central Israel
From remembrance to independence: One minute tells you a lot about Israel
By Tomer Udi
For the past six years, I have accompanied students from abroad, who are exchange students at the University of Haifa, to the ceremony of The Day of Remembrance for the Fallen Soldiers of Israel and Victims of Terrorism (Yom Hazikaron). This ceremony is the only one in Israel being conducted in English and held by the Jewish Agency.
Six years I watched their amazed and confused eyes – eyes unable to digest the difficulty of grief and usually incapable of understanding the Israeli culture that has taken root in our country. I try to explain and often I cannot find the right words. I see the students laying flowers on a wall of names, names that they do not know and whose stories are strange and bizarre to them.
How do you explain to a brilliant student from Indonesia (yes … the world’s largest Muslim country), a PhD candidate from South Korea, or students from the United States and Europe, Jews and non-Jews, the remarkable contrast between the time 19:59 to 20:00 o’clock, on the eve of our Independence Day (Yom Ha’atzmaut). The time which we pass from sorrow to joy in one minute, only one minute. Not a day, not a week – one minute.
They stand with me against the silent fortress full of tanks in the square of Latrun Salient. Some of them confused, some of them do not know where they are and some of them run to the renewed and polished tanks turret to take pictures. But all of them waiting for me to speak. At this moment I always wonder what is my influence on them, what is my contribution to their education and narratives, what they will take home with them? Will those tanks become a mute testimony to a militaristic society forced by circumstances, or to a great heroism, a memory of troops who rushed into the inferno without hesitation in order to save their homes, with one hand on the trigger and the second hand extended in peace?
I try to remember the values I inherited, the instruction of my father and the teaching of my mother. Values that encouraged us to ask, ‘Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?’ as Joshua did when he first approached to the walls of Jericho (Joshua 5: 13). I explain to the students about the man inside the tank, the person who operates the tank chains as well- the one who turns the wheels of history. He is the one who starts a war and he will prevail and end it. Tanks do not win wars rather the “Man inside the tank”. This motto by Major General Israel Tal become an idiom of Israel’s obstacles and victories against all odds, a reflection of our human capital and our ability to flourish in an isolated desert country. The man who operates the tank will make peace and strive to make the world a better place. He is the one who lives the fantasy, who does fantastic things, as former President Shimon Peres once said.
We as a nation have asked repeatedly our opponents what their intentions are. We have asked them with the establishment of the State of Israel, 68 years ago, by the acceptance of the partition plan (UN Resolution 181); we have asked them with the Oslo Accords; we have asked them with the Sinai Interim Agreement (which later on extended to a fragile peace agreement with Egypt); with the withdrawal from the security belt in southern Lebanon and with the disengagement from Gaza. Unfortunately, the answer was usually some sort of the Three No’s from Khartoum Resolution: “no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with it…”
Israeli soldiers form a Star of David at a Yom Ha’atzmaut torch lighting
Nevertheless, we continue to ask and while doing so we built a state, despite the race for survival. We did not have the privilege to stop for a while and take a breath, to figure out where we want to go, what we want to do and how we want to do it. This Israeli experience taught us to improvise and want everything right now, right away. It enhanced our desire to bypass and to achieve quick results. We can be restless and inpatient in a world of immediacy, reality shows and imminent threat. We already operate automatically as a nation who knows how to make something from nothing. A country built from anything, roads in the desert, agriculture without water, high-tech industries from knowledge newly invented, and all of this in a violent environment with only our human capital and the will to survive. I guess this is what characterizes a nation that needs to justify its existence daily and fight against delegitimisation.
I tour the museum with a diverse group of students from about ten different countries, standing against a wall of names, and I do my best to explain the unique two weeks in Israel which culminate at this one minute between 19:59 to 20:00, with the national ceremony at Mount Herzl Plaza. Two weeks that started with the Wandering Jew, beaten and humiliated in the memory of the Holocaust and continues with the new Jew – the Sabra – the Israeli who fights back and knows how to stand against those who are trying to eliminate him. Two weeks which embody the revival of a proud nation, marching ahead with a flag of western democracy and innovation. We are not perfect, our young democracy is still developing. Our social and economic systems need some fine-tuning, and we constantly need to remember to ask ‘Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?’
It seems that the world has forgotten to ask this of themselves, and has instead fixated on Israel’s efforts to protect itself. Despite all this, students from all over the world arrive to Israel to witness its remarkable development, to learn from it, and to experience it. If just one short minute can inspire such range of thoughts and awareness, think of what someone can learn from spending some time in this country. One minute tells you a lot about Israel but this someone stills wants more.
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Tomer Udi is the Admissions Director for International Graduate Programs at the University of Haifa; Fellow at the Israel Leadership Institute; Member at the Ambassadors Online group; Member of the Education and Jewish Identity Committee at the CJP’s Boston-Haifa Connection; Former Co-chair of the CJP’s Haifa Young Leadership Committee
