This is a lot longer than usual. I believe that the topic of the 50th anniversary of the Liberation and Reunification of Jerusalem deserves extra ink. I ask us all to open up our hearts.

 I.                    

In the past week, I’ve seen two very different comments about Israelis, Americans and voting.

Rabbi Joshua Hammerman published an article in Times of Israel arguing that all Jews should be given the ability to vote in Israeli elections. While I find his argument wanting and I do not agree with him, he makes his case. It’s worth the read.

I propose that we create a class of Jewish “citizenship” that will reinvent the relationship between Diaspora Jewry and Israel, revitalize all streams of Judaism, minimize differences on conversion, strengthen Israeli democracy, boost pro-Israel pride on college campuses and possibly even put the Jewish state on the path to reconciliation with its neighbors.

I sense your eyes rolling, but hear me out.

Rabbi Hammerman proposes that the chok hash’vut, the Law of Return, which extends Israeli citizenship using broad definitions of Who is a Jew (not necessarily Halachic ones) to all Jews, whether they live in Israel or not. He proposes giving all potential beneficiaries of the Law of Return the right to vote in Israeli elections, so long as they demonstrate something tangibly pro-Israel that does not necessarily include Aliyah. He continues.

I would suggest a period of national service on behalf of the Jewish people. Each applicant would need to spend a certain amount of time in Israel, beginning, for many, with a Birthright trip, which would now have a more weighty function. Some basic Jewish literacy requirement might also be considered.

Israeli elections are highly personal. The issues of security pertain very personally to a civilian army that impacts most Israeli families, who have felt the pain of tragedy. A few months on a kibbutz or on a Birthright trip does not come close to that level. Many Diaspora Jews do not even feel the right to opine publicly on Israeli matters, because, we do not live there. Issues such as religious pluralism, the Peace Process and even economic policy do not impact us as they do Israeli citizens, the majority of whom live in the Jewish state. The privilege of voting on Israeli policy far outweighs the responsibility being asked for in this proposal. If Jews feel that Israeli policy may represent Jewish policy, it behooves them to move to the Jewish state, the miracle of our generation.

Within a few days of reading Rabbi Hammerman’s post, I read the following from Rabbi Shlomo Aviner regarding Israelis who are American citizens voting in American elections. He wrote:

People have also asked me: Should I vote in the US Presidential elections? I do not think so. We live here. Even though some people have US citizenship, who gives us permission to interfere with what is happening in America? When one comes to live in Israel it is similar to a divorce: even if the wife received alimony (i.e., social security), she should not interfere in the husband's life. It is true that we can decide which person will be a better President for the Jews, but it is not ethical because we live here and not in America.

These two articles, coupled with my personal obsession with anything Six Day war related, has gotten me thinking about the difference between a Diaspora version of Religious Zionism and that of an Israeli. The 50th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem and the miraculous Six Day War only makes this more relevant.

The second verse of this week’s parsha states:

"דבר אל בני ישראל ואמרת אלהם כי תבאו אל הארץ אשר אני נתן לכם ושבת הארץ שבת לה" (ויקרא כ"ה:ב)

“Speak to the people of Israel, and say to them, When you come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a Sabbath to the Lord” (Vayikra 25:2).

Rebbe Nachman of Breslov focuses on the tense of the verb “to give.” Shouldn’t the verse state the land “which I will give you i.e. future tense? Rabbi Nachman answers, only when one ascends to the land, does one taste her delicacies. Every day is sweeter than the next, and each day in the Land of Israel is new in his eyes, as if only that day God gave it to him. Each day is a new gift.

Rabbi Leibele Eiger (grandson of Rabbi Akiva Eiger - 1815-1888 Poland) almost presciently stated that even when the Land is acquired through stressful struggles and wars, no one will say, “I acquired this due to my strength.” Everyone will realize that the land would not be ours “without God’s beneficence, without obvious and concealed miracles… the greatest witness to our fidelity to the Almighty is observing the Sabbatical year.”

These interpretations of the verse helped me realize something about our relationship with Israel and Jerusalem. Paraphrasing the rabbinic phrase, eino domeh shmi’ah l’re’iyah, one can’t compare hearing with seeing; the relationship between the Jew and the Land of Israel is exponentially greater for those who live there than those who don’t. I love the Land and her people. Religious Zionism is a strong component of who I am. But that love for the Land is exponentially more intense with those who live in Israel. It’s a completely different relationship. This does not detract from one’s love from afar. But the two cannot be compared.

I see it with my holy friends who have uprooted themselves to live Jewish history and make Aliyah. I dedicate these words to them. I believe that the lessons we must take from the Six Day War prove this fact. We need not go further than the chapter in psalms where King David’s words almost predict the war and her aftermath.

"שיר המעלות לדוד. שמחתי באמרים לי בית ה' נלך. עמדות היו רגלינו בשעריך ירושלם. ירושלם הבנויה כעיר שחברה לה יחדו. ששם עלו שבטים, שבטי קה, עדות לישראל להודות לשם ה'. כי שמה ישבו כסאות למשפט, כסאות לבית דוד. שאלו שלום ירושלם ישליו אהביך. יהי שלום בחילך שלוה בארמנותיך. למען אחי ורעי אדברה נא שלום בך. למען בית ה' אלקנו אבקשה טוב לך" (תהלים קכ"ב:א-ט)

“A song of Ascents by David. Once I had the joy that they said to me, ‘Let us go to the House of the Lord.’ Our feet stood still within your gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem that is built like a city which is linked to itself together. For there, tribes went up, tribes of the Lord, up to the testimony for Israel to render homage to the Name of the Lord. For there stood chairs for the judgment, chairs for the House of David. Inquire after the peace of Jerusalem; those who love you view the future unafraid. Peace be within your precincts, serenity within your palaces. For the sake of my brethren and companions I will wish that peace be yours. For the sake of the House of the Lord, our God, I will pray for your good” (Psalms 122:1-9).

II.                 

The late Elie Wiesel said, “One does not go to Jerusalem; one returns to it.” When the “Dreamers” 55th paratrooper brigade breached the gates of Jerusalem, having battled at Ammunition Hill and Mount Scopus, they returned home carrying the weight of millennia of Jews who never merited witnessing this in their lifetimes. They reunified a city.

We’ve seen the famous photographs of the tank stuck in the Lion’s Gate with the troops scooting around it to “return home.” They had no maps how to arrive at the Kotel or the Temple Mount; no one expected the war would take such a turn. Menachem Begin, the opposition leader who was brought into the pantheon of leadership due to the military crisis, powerfully argued for the soldiers to fulfil their historical destiny. Moshe Dayan reluctantly agreed. Dayan sent in paratroopers to liberate the capital because he feared that armored divisions and planes could damage holy sites (of the three world religions) which would not end well for Israel.

I once heard master Israeli tour guide Rabbi Simcha Hochbaum note, while standing in front of that very gate, that all the gates have names for specific reasons. Why was this gate named for lions? Were there lions in Jerusalem? (Some say it refers to images of leopards, mistaken for lions, etched onto the sides of the gate by Suleiman the Magnificent in 1517 to celebrate the defeat of the Mamluks.) Rabbi Hochbaum declared that that gate was so named because it would wait for centuries for an Israeli military hero named Gur (Lion Cub) to return Jewish sovereignty to the city. Indeed, it was paratrooper commander Mordechai “Motta” Gur, who declared for posterity har habayit be’yadeinu, “The Temple Mount is in our Hands.”

Interviews with the paratroopers confirm that they were stunned and felt a rush of Jewish history take over their bodies. Rabbi Yoel Bin-Nun, a prominent Bible scholar who fought with the 55th Brigade in ’67 recalls that his fellow soldiers were asking him, a yarmulke wearing Yeshiva student, how to get to the Kotel, the Wailing wall. He had no idea, but only wanted to be on the Temple Mount, the locus of spirituality and Divine glory, not the Kotel, which was the substitute for the Temple mount during centuries of exile. He remembers thinking about his religious studies teacher back in high school in Haifa who declared that the Jews inability to access Jerusalem and the other holy sites after 1948 was a punishment for Zionism. He was wondering what that Rebbe was thinking that bright Wednesday morning? He was pondering that 2,000 years of exile, in his mind, had just ended.

After the war, when the IDF was conducting its post mortem, a commander turned to one of his paratroopers and asked if he was the one who planted the Israeli flag on the Temple Mount. He responded in the affirmative. The commander asked, “Where did you get a flag?”

The soldier related that the night before the reunification of the City, the soldiers took shelter in a Jerusalem neighborhood along with the citizens of the Holy City who were hunkering down in bunkers, fearing the future. He saw an old lady make her way towards them. She said, “Tomorrow you will go to the Old City and you will go to the Kotel.” This of course, was not the plan. It had never been discussed. The soldier politely informed her that she was incorrect. The old lady would not budge. “No, you will go” she stated, affirming her position. The soldier was not going to argue with a delusional grandmother.

But she continued. She reached into her bag and removed an Israeli flag. “Please take this flag and hang it from the Temple Mount tomorrow.”

The Soldier again informed the woman that he was not going to be on the Temple Mount. He told her it was against regulations to carry it. She begged him to do her the favor. Not wanting to bicker during a serious crisis, the soldier accepted the flag. That flag hung from the Temple Mount the next day, until Defense Minister Dayan demanded that it be removed before creating an international incident.

The commanding officer asked the paratrooper, “What were you thinking when you hoisted that flag?”

The soldier said, "I was thinking that this was the answer to 2,000 years of Jewish suffering."

Yitzchak Rabin, the IDF Chief of Staff, who had the weight of the survival of the nation on his shoulders, recalled the moment as well. Remember that Rabin was raised in a purely secular environment: “I felt truly shaken and stood their murmuring a prayer for peace. Motta Gur’s paratroopers were struggling to reach the Wall. We stood among a tangle of battle-weary men who were unable to believe their eyes or restrain their emotions. Their eyes were moist with tears, their speech was incoherent, their overwhelming desire was to cling to the Wall to hold on to that great moment for as long as possible.”

The IDF’s Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, who is seen front and center in so many of the iconic photos, brought his Shofar with him and blew it. But no sound emerged. He was unable to blow it. He was literally speechless. He gave the shofar to a soldier who succeeded in bringing forth sound.

No one – NO ONE – could have possibly thought this would be the outcome of the war. There was a sense of doom hovering over the young Jewish nation for weeks. Israel’s army amounted to 264,000 troops, 75% of whom were reservists, husbands and fathers. They were called to their units and waited and waited until the government decided that it had no other course of action. The Arab armies had 540,000 troops. The Israelis were outnumbered 3:1 in heavy weaponry and aircraft. The diplomatic front was futile. Abba Eban was told by General DE Gaulle that France would cut off all military sales to Israel were they to pre-empt. The British were unsupportive. Finally, after some pleading, when US President Johnston saw that the Soviets may be getting involved, he uttered the other three-word formula that changed the war: “Turn it around!” (the naval fleet in the Mediterranean); send it back to the theatre to block the Soviets. This was Israel’s first smell of support from abroad.

The Israeli government finally voted to authorize execution of what was Israel’s doomsday plan – a “hail Mary” attempt to take out Egypt’s air power. Israeli intelligence told them that the Egyptian pilots returned from their morning sorties between 7:30 am and 8:00 am. The raid was  planned for 7:45 am. General Motti Hod, commander of Israel’s Air Force admitted, “It was the longest 45 minutes of my life - 200 aircraft flying in radio silence on the ground” (i.e. at very low altitude to evade enemy radar).  The IAF destroyed 419 aircraft on the ground, 90% of the Egyptian air force. “We hoped it would be a surprise and it would take them half an hour to realize what had happened, so we could return home.” It actually took 6 hours for Syria, Jordan and Egypt to realize the extent of the damage. By 2:30 pm, the IAF had destroyed the Jordanian and Syrian air forces as well, who, due to their proximity to major civilian areas, posed an imminent threat in the air.  The war practically ended at that point. Israel took the next 5 days, until internationally arranged cease fires went into effect with Egypt, Jordan, and finally with Syria, after which Israel had tripled its size, reunited with its Biblical lands of Judea and Samaria, and conquered the Sinai and the Golan Heights, as buffers to protect her citizens.

The tension prior to the war was tangible. The Israelis, fearing mass casualties, removed the playground equipment from Israeli parks, to prepare for 80,000-90,000 graves. Rabbi Yehudah Unterman, Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi, took out full-page ads in Israeli papers pleading for the readers to place their faith in God in Heaven. Since the entire male work-force were called up to their units, the infrastructure of the country came to a halt.

In this context, Rabbi Chanan Porat z’l, another member of the 55th Brigade, who later became one of the leaders of the Gush Emunim movement, offered this riveting account:

 “To us, the young men who were fighting, and I think to most everyone at the time, the war began with the shadow of the Holocaust etched in our minds. There was the sense in the air, this resolve, that there would not be another Holocaust. If 20 years before we were taken as sheep to the slaughter, it would not happen again. As the war progressed, however, something special occurred, and in response, our perspective began to change. At some point this change in perspective took place, and suddenly, we’re not fighting a war of survival, but rather, a war of redemption. We entered the war trying to protect ourselves and make out with as few casualties as possible. It was a feeling I really cannot describe in words, a sense of being part of history in the making. No, even more than that. It was a sense that we were in the middle of writing a new chapter in the Bible. As we reached the Kotel, the paratrooper next to me had grown up in an ultra-secular kibbutz. He too leaned against the Kotel and was sobbing. With a voice choked with tears he turned to me and cried, “Chanan, what should I say?” I cried back, “Say a prayer.” “But I don’t know how to pray” he cried. “So say the Shma” I called back. “But I don’t know how” he screamed. “So say it with me” I said. Fighting back tears, I began, “Shma.” And he at the top of his lungs repeated “Shma.” “Yisrael” and he cried, “Yisrael.” Hashem”; “Hashem.” “Elokeinu,” Elokeinu.” “Hashem,” “Hashem” “Echad,” “Echad.”

Rabbi Mordechai Willig, Rosh Yeshiva and Rosh Kollel at RIETS, spent his post High School year at Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh in 1967. He recalls that after the war ended, the Israeli government announced that it would open the Old City and the Kotel to the citizenship at dawn on Shavuot morning, less than a week after the ceasefires went into effect. Rabbi Willig joined his yeshiva in Jerusalem for that Shavuot. They studied and prayed at Heichal Shlomo on King George St, the seat of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate. As was customary, they remained awake all night studying Torah and prayed at the crack of dawn. They planned to pray the additional Mussaf service at the Kotel. Rabbi Willig recalls that he assumed while it was so early, there would be nary a pedestrian on the streets leading up to the Old City. He was wrong. The street was packed. They were singing and dancing, as they got through the barricades and Israeli security. He recalls standing next to Israelis with cameras on that day of Yom Tov, dressed for the beach, and RebAreleh chassidim, wearing their angelic white and gold robes, white socks and streimels, all dancing together.

III.

King David taught us that Jerusalem is a city that is tied together. Its parts are unified. The Talmud famously declares that the upper Jerusalem unities with the lower Jerusalem.

The simple meaning may refer to the upper city of Mt. Zion and the lower city of Silwan, referencing the two Biblical allusions to the city, Hashem Yira’eh and Shalem. When contracting these two names, we arrive at the name Yerushalayim. The name of the city is itself the union of two parts. Our sages (Taanis 5a) find more esoteric meaning to it. “God promises not to reside in the heavenly Jerusalem before He enters the lower Jerusalem.” The rabbis also note that Jerusalem was not divided among the tribes. It became a city belonging to the entirety of the people. Yerushalalyim is a place where Jewish unity reigns.

The unity ushered in after the Six Day War, the cosmic power of reuniting the city, had enormous ramifications. Levels of unity among the peoplehood of Israel bordered on the miraculous. The very fact that Menachem Begin joined the Cabinet, to create a unity government during crisis, was highly significant. He was loathed by Israel’s leftist leadership. Natan Sharansky has said that while behind the Iron Curtain, Soviet Jews thought little of Judaism and hated themselves because that was the view of their comrades. When tiny Israel defeated its enemies wo massively outnumbered them, demonstrating its strategic fortitude, the Soviets actually gained respect for the Jewish nation. This caused a metamorphosis among the USSR’s Jewish minority. Sharansky said, “We started to find value in Judaism because the Soviets showed some respect for the Jewish state.” An awakening of Hebrew and Judaism reverberated among Russia’s Jews, which led them to defy the Soviet leadership. The same can certainly be said about the Ba’al Teshuvah movement worldwide, which truly began after Israel’s six day victory. Yossi Klein Halevi argues that Israel became a religious country overnight, with newly found access to the Kotlel, the tomb of the Patriarchs in Hevron, the tomb of Joseph in Sh’chem and Rachel’s tomb in Bethlehem. The politics of the nation changed. Religion took a much more serious seat at the table.

I heard Rabbi Moshe Taragin tell a story in the name of the aforementioned Rabbi Yoel Bin Nun. Rabbi Bin Nun’s commander was a secular Israel named Giora. When his troops happened upon an Arab hotel on the Mount of Olives, he demanded that no looting take place. He did not want anyone saying that the war was fought for jewelry, but rather to save the Jewish people. Giora fell in battle the next day on the Mountain of Olives. Many years later, the soliders of the 55th decided to dedicate a Yeshiva at the spot where Giora fell. It is called Beit Orot. At the dedication ceremony, Giora’s widow, who was reluctant to even speak, paused and in an aside, said somewhat jokingly, “I’m not at all religious. My husband was not religious. But I think one of my grandchildren will learn in this yeshiva.” A few years later, a grandchild indeed left the kibbutz, became religiously observant and enrolled in Beit Orot.

In an interview after the war, General Rabin was asked what they would call the war. There were a few options. He chose “The Six Day War” because it evoked God’s creation of the universe. This avowed Kibbutznik put the war in Biblical proportions.

This is the aftermath of the war to reunify Jerusalem.

IV.

The miracles that took place during the war and its lead-up are too numerous to recount. Whether the Egyptian pilots staying up late the night before the war to drink, which impacted their readiness the next morning; Nasser’s general demanding that no Egyptian anti-aircraft batteries fire until he gives the word since he was traveling; the Jordanian and Egyptian militaries agreeing that ‘grapes’ would be the code word for an Israeli invasion. Somehow the Egyptians changed the password and Jordan’s warning of the impending Israeli air attack was never delivered. These are miracles of Biblical proportions. Read the books and study the history. Our generation was chosen to merit having access to these holy places and experiencing Jewish sovereignty (military if not political) over our holiest of places.

Rabbi Shlomo Aviner was a young soldier during the 1967 war. He reports that at his first opportunity to visit his teacher, Rabbi Tzvi Yehudah Kook, he went and asked what did our generation do to merit such miracles?. Rav Kook responded, “Merit?” We did not merit this. This is a gift. We owe the Almighty a great debt of gratitude because He gave us a gift which we did not deserve.”

This coming Wednesday, on the 28th of Iyar, I will join my Jewish and Israeli brethren and thank God for the miracles He performed for us 50 years ago that continue to bless several generations. I will swell with pride. I will fly the Israel flag outside my Diaspora home. I will probably shed tears of joy and inspiration.

I am a Zionist. But my Zionism, as much as it defines me, is wanting. I have not taken advantage of the Zionist dream and uprooted myself and my family to Israel, to the dream of thousands of years.

My heroic Anglo-Israeli friends don’t just love Israel. They don’t just live in Israel. They long for Israel. They want to be there when they find themselves abroad. They can’t live without it.

My absolute favorite song about Jerusalem, written by the legendary Abie Rottenberg, ends with the following words:

Travel the land, the mountains and valleys

There is a story behind each stone

But when you return, your heart will rejoice

As bruchim habaim appears, and you know you're home.

One of my dearest friends, who moved his family to Israel, travels a lot abroad. Whenever he returns home, he shares a photo of himself kissing an oversized mezuzah in Ben Gurion airport. He takes the photo anew each time.

He is home. We are not. Not yet.

I remember Jerusalem. My right hand has not withered; my tongue has not clung to my palate. I heard that King David used the imagery of one’s hand and tongue because those are the instruments of taking an oath of allegiance. But my oath differs from that of our brothers and sisters who live there, who have immersed themselves in the Zionist enterprise, not remembering or praying from afar.

To fully participate in the Zionist enterprise; to fully engage in God’s love for the Jewish people, one must be in Israel. One can be a very ardent and strong Zionist outside. But not fully.

I believe that answers Rabbi Hammerman and explains Rabbi Aviner.

May we see peace in Jerusalem; may we all merit to join our brothers and sisters who have already fulfilled the dreams of millenia.