The miracle merely changes colors.
In 1948 the miracle was a ragtag band of Holocaust survivors, led by a small but determined cohort of Zionist dreamers, who fought off six invading Arab armies.
In 1956, this same admixture of culturally unintegrated Jews, bolstered by still more culturally distant Jews from Arab countries, took on the largest Arab country, Egypt, in order to put a stop to terrorists who regularly infiltrated. This miracle took on an iconic symbol: Moshe Dayan’s eye patch.
In 1967 came the Six Day War, fought to guarantee free shipping at Israel’s ports, not to mention to put an end to the Arab’s demonic desire to see Israel destroyed. This miracle launched freedom of religion for Jews at the site of the ancient Holy Temple for the first time in millennia —Israeli sovereignty over the Western Wall and the Old City of Jerusalem.
In between came small miracles: growing farms, cities, exports and natural beauty as the empty lands of Palestine, desolate for nearly 1,900 years, began to turn green.
In 1973, Israel fought off Arab armies once again, this time so thoroughly defeating and demoralizing them that the leader of one of them, Egypt’s Anwar Sadat, sued for peace. The miracle this time was the end of the massive deaths of young soldiers on both sides of the Israel-Egypt border.
Then came the miracle that is still with us: the stubborn refusal of the Israeli people to bow before the unending terrorism in all its ugly forms — missiles from the north, rockets from the south, with all manner of evil in between: bus stop bombings, bus bombings, cafe bombings, Passover seder bombings, knife stabbings, car rammings, drive-by shootings, kidnappings cum murder. Instead of demoralization or defeat, Israel has responded with astonishing economic and technological growth. The miracle of Start-Up Nation.
Thus we find ourselves, 69 years into the beginnings of the “Third House,” the Bayit Shelishi, the reborn Jewish community on the land of our ancestors and of our collective future: responding to those who in every generation would destroy us with . . . miracles. They change in form but not in frequency. They confound our enemies and inspire our friends. As for us, we take them in stride, and sometimes take them for granted. But on the long view, there is no doubt that this sliver of earth at the east end of the Mediterranean Sea is indeed the land watched over by the eyes of the Alm-ghty.
The miracles will need to continue because the challenges before the State of Israel and the Jewish people worldwide remain huge and multifaceted: the absence of peace, the threats from Iran, from Hezbollah and from Hamas, the internal divisions among the Jews in Israel, the recrudescence of anti-Semitism worldwide, the great poverty in Israel (its economic power notwithstanding), the distancing between Israel and the Diaspora.
For one day, however, on Israel Independence Day, one is allowed to sit back and appreciate what has been given and what has been achieved. As Jews, to be alive at this time, to see what our ancestors could only pray for and never expected to see, is its own miracle. As we gaze upon Israel, warts and all, let us never lose sight of the big picture. Resplendent. Shimmering. Poignant. Holy. Miraculous.
Copyright © 2017 by the Intermountain Jewish News
