Tehilla R. Goldberg

I couldn’t hide my Jewishness, if I tried. I mean — my name is Tehilla Goldberg! Plus, apparently I dress the part of feminine Jewish religious. Many times in my life when I’d be in a neutral setting, I was referred to or approached with the assumption that I was Jewish, and sometimes even Orthodox Jewish. For me, it was always a point of pride. I lived and breathed Judaism. In my own way, I strongly viewed myself as an ambassador of the Jewish people.

It was another perfect spring Jerusalem day, just the right temperature that I like before the weather gives way to the sweltering Middle East summer when you feel yourself baking in the sun. It was the kind of a day that touched you with a gentle breeze, and the day was rich with the gold warmth of the sun — the kind of heat you can meander in for hours.

For me, the upcoming holiday of Shavuot has always arrived with a certain gentleness. Not only because there is the literal countdown to the holiday, and it brings with it a sense of accomplishment (that is, if you managed not to mess up the Omer count!) and a sense of special arrival.

I found myself bristling as I read some of the news coming out of Israel these past couple of days. Of course, the security situation and navigating it in all of its complexity is at the forefront. But a few news stories caught my eye that were truly so upsetting. Among them, a nun was knocked to the ground. As appalling and wrong as that is, I knew it was an outlier, an aberration.

In Mount Herzl, Israel’s national cemetery, located in Jerusalem, adjacent to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, there is a dedicated plot where the prime ministers of modern day Israel are buried. All, but one. Menachem Begin. Here’s a little slice of history that sheds light on the reason.