A double sixtieth

Yom Ha’atzmaut launched a year of celebrations marking 60 years of the State of Israel.

Every Jewish festival has a focus on food, and Israel Independence Day is no exception. Few families didn’t enjoy a celebratory barbeque in one of the many parks, creating a cloud of smoke over the country.

But as the people of Israel were eating their burgers and sausages, I was on a plane flying back to London.

Although exiting Israel doesn’t seem like a Zionist thing to, especially on a day like this, I had good reason. My father shares his birthday with the State, both having reached 60 years last Thursday.

Not wanting to be out of Israel on the country’s special day – but equally wanting to be with my dad on his – I settled on being in both places by returning to England in the afternoon.

My visit was brief, but worthwhile. One of the highlights of my short trip was to see my younger brother, Aron, play in the final for his football team, the Hendon Hawks.

During the game, at the Wingate and Finchley football ground, Aron scored his team’s only goal of the match, as well as a crucial penalty in the shoot-out that followed. Although it wasn’t enough to lead them to victory, it was enough to make me proud!

Football is on the minds of Israelis, too, this week with many fans taking to the Kotel to pray for their team to achieve an historic double. Not Manchester United, but Betar Jerusalem, who, after a dramatic penalty shoot-out in the State Cup final are in touching distance of clinching their first ever league and cup double.

This meeting of religion and sport highlights that nothing that takes place in the Jewish State is ever too far from our faith.

May it be a year of real celebration for football fans everywhere, and for the entire State of Israel.

Shabbat Shalom.

A country of miracles

“Only in Israel can a Jew speak the Jewish language, see a Jewish landscape, live by the Jewish calendar, walk where our ancestors walked and continue the story they began.”

These words, spoken by Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks on his incredible new double-CD, ‘Israel – Home of Hope’, sum up perfectly how I feel about living in Israel.

This compilation of stirring songs integrated into the Chief Rabbi’s inspiring narrative of the story of Israel has accompanied me on the various journeys I have taken across the country over the past few weeks.

I have been able to drive through Tzefat while listening to Yedid Nefesh, a poem usually said on Friday night, composed by the Tzefat mystic, Rabbi Eliezer Azikri.

I have been able to drive down Rechov Frumkin in Petach Tikva, now knowing a little bit more about the city’s founder after whom that street is named, Rabbi Aryeh Leib Frumkin.

I have been able to drive into Netanya, and pass the Park Hotel, while listening to a moving song written by Stephen Levey in memory of those killed in the suicide bomb there on Pesach 2002.

I have been able to drive around Jerusalem, not forgetting just how lucky I am to be living in the Holy City, and listen to four versions of Psalm 137, “If I forget you, O Jerusalem”.

Some of the songs on the album were performed by the singing sensation, Shimon Craimer, who was back in the UK this week to take part in the community’s Yom Ha’atzmaut celebrations. My favourite song is his version of “When You Believe”, originally composed for the DreamWorks animated feature, The Prince of Egypt.

Israel is a country that was built on strong beliefs. On Israel’s 60th birthday, we can look back at six decades of vast achievements, and recognise that there can be miracles when you believe.

Shabbat Shalom.

Kosher beggars

Jerusalem is filled with many wonderful sights and scenery. Sadly, many of the streets are also filled with poor people struggling to collect some shekels to sustain themselves.

One of those streets is named after Queen Helene, a convert to Judaism who lived in the Second Temple period. She was praised for her generosity to the poor. Today there are many people who, like Queen Helene, realise that it is their Jewish responsibility to be charitable in order to benefit those less fortunate.

Outside my office – next to Jerusalem’s Great Synagogue – there is a man who spends much of his time collecting money from passers by. He is grateful of money, but also asks for food from people going to one of the local restaurants.

This week I witnessed something remarkable. Someone gave him some freshly-made hot food. Before he ate it, he asked where it was from, and when he heard, he rejected the gift, explaining that the restaurant in question, although kosher, didn’t meet the high standards of kashrut that he adheres to. It seems that in Israel, beggars can be choosers!

The Western Wall is another part of Jerusalem popular with the poor. It is impossible to approach the Kotel without being accosted for a donation. On one of my recent visits to the area, a needy man who had been collecting money was then himself approached by another beggar. Although he was in a dire situation, he didn’t relinquish the opportunity to do a mitzvah, and he handed over a couple of shekels.

The Talmud teaches us that a person who gives even one small coin to a beggar is deemed worthy of being admitted to behold the Divine presence. The beggars I have met here have inspired me by upholding their own religious beliefs, and reminded me of the principle to help all people, regardless of one’s own situation.

Shabbat Shalom.

Modern pioneers

The word ‘Hachshara’ will stir fond memories for many readers who spent a year of their life learning agricultural skills and being trained as farming experts.

Bnei Akiva – like many other Zionist youth movements – has been running Hachshara programmes for 80 years, although they didn’t always take place in Israel.

In the years immediately before the war, Arieh Handler, the founder of British Bnei Akiva, set up Hachshara activities on a farm in Thaxted, Essex, and in numerous other areas across Britain.

‘Hachshara’ means ‘preparation’, and the idea was to prepare people for ultimately living in Israel. At the time agricultural training was the necessity. Israel’s early pioneers – the chalutzim – would cultivate the land, build farms and establish kibbutzim.

Today, Bnei Akiva has redefined ‘pioneering’. It is still a forward-thinking movement, but there is little need for draining swamps and training to be farmers.

Where kibbutz was once the focus of a year in Israel, Hachshara now has just two weeks of volunteering on kibbutz. (The main parts of the year are now spent at Yeshiva or Sem, or volunteering with Magen David Adom, the Israeli Army, and in development towns.)

A fortnight before Pesach, 25 members of British Bnei Akiva, who are in Israel for the year, headed to Kibbutz Lavi, to experience communal life there.

Those who were looking forward to the traditional kibbutz lifestyle would have been disappointed. Most of this year’s Hachshara were volunteering in the Lavi Hotel.

Working as bell-boys, or in the housekeeping department, some of the group were lucky enough to receive tips if they offered a particularly helpful service. Others enjoyed breakfast in the hotel’s dining room, as a welcome break to a morning’s hard work.

The group gained an important insight into modern-day pioneering. As Israel enters its 60th year, those preparing for a future here can be assured that running a hotel in 2008 is just as important to the economy as milking a cow was in 1948.

Shabbat Shalom.

Looking back to look forward

There is one number that is given more prominence than any other on Seder night. There are four questions, four sons, and four cups of wine.

These four cups correspond to four expressions of redemption: “I will take you out”, “I will save you”, “I will redeem you”, and “I will take you to be a people to me”.

These expressions are comprised of two sets of two. The first two place an emphasis on where we’re coming from, leaving Egypt. The next two focus on where we’re going to – redemption and becoming Hashem’s people.

Pesach is not only about leaving Egypt, but about becoming a nation and heading towards redemption, receiving the Torah and a land of our own.

This Pesach for me has added significance, as I will be celebrating the festival of our freedom just a week after returning from a visit to Poland. I was able to see the places of the Jewish people’s modern day slavery, before returning to the Land of Israel, our homeland whose statehood was declared a mere three years after the Holocaust.

In Israel today, we can look not only where we came from, but look ahead to where we are going – the country we want to build, the example we want to set for the nations, the bright future we want to build together.

May the coming year be the year when we experience the completion of the additional expression of redemption, relating to the extra cup of wine poured for Elijah the Prophet, “I will bring you to the land”.

Next year in Jerusalem!

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach.

The legacy lives on

The Hebrew term for cemetery is “Beit Hachayim”, or House of Life. It may sound like a euphemism, but this week I understood the reason behind the irony.

If one wants to see what life there was, visit the cemeteries, and meet the people who made the community.

I am in Poland, and have been visiting what were the major centres of Jewish life here before the Holocaust.

In Warsaw, I met some of the 250,000 people who are buried in the Jewish cemetery there. I met Esther Rachel Kaminska, and actress and the founder of Yiddish theatre. I met Ludwik Zamenhof, the creator of Esperanto. I met Rabbi Chayim Soloveitchik and Rabbi Naftali Zvi Berlin, two of the greatest Jewish leaders. Together with many others, they made up the rich community life in Warsaw.

Over in Lublin, I met one of the most famous Chassidic leaders – Rabbi Yaakov Yitzchak, known as the Visionary of Lublin. One of the most beloved figures in the Chassidic world, he merited the title of “Visionary” due to his great intuitive powers. On the day he died, he prophesied that, 100 years from that day, the Russians would lose their reign over Poland. And so it was to the date that the Austrians conquered Lublin.

Another important Lublin personality was Rabbi Yehuda Meir Shapira, the head of Yeshivat Chochmei Lublin, a leading centre of Torah study. In 1923, he initiated Daf Yomi, the daily study of a page of Talmud as part of a seven-year cycle. Daf Yomi is now learned by tens of thousands of people every day across every continent.

When the Nazis took Lublin during World War II, they publicly burned the Yeshiva’s vast library. We should take great comfort knowing that following the Nazis’ attempt to destroy the Torah community, thousands are keeping it alive every day, and many more are playing their part in creating vibrant Jewish communities all over the world.

Shabbat Shalom.

Israelis on the run

In Israel, things aren’t done by halves… except when it comes to the marathon.

Yes, this week saw the 16th Annual Jerusalem Half Marathon, in which over 3000 people ran 21.1 kilometres. After a lap around the stadium at Givat Ram, the participants continued across the city, snatching brief views of the Mount of Olives, the Botanical Gardens, the Jerusalem Forest and the Biblical Zoo.

The runners were able to stretch their minds as well as their legs, thanks to these wonderful sites connected to ancient and modern Judaism that they passed.

Like the London Marathon, and other similar races around the world, it provided an opportunity for people to do something worthwhile at the same time as keeping fit. Many charities benefited from the race. Hazon Yeshaya soup kitchens and the residents of Sderot were two of the good causes that were being supported by friends of mine in the marathon.

One of them told me that he was motivated to run because, “The people of Sderot need to know that we are behind them, and they need our support. Running this half marathon and raising money is how I’m showing my support.”

Towards the end of the race, I went along to cheer on my friends who were taking part. The event meant that many of the surrounding roads were closed, so I had to park my car a fair distance from the finishing line. As I trekked from the car to the stadium it became clear to me how out of shape I am. As I caught up with the rest of the competitors, I had already broken a sweat and was out of breath. Maybe I should have asked for sponsorship for the one kilometre I ran!

It was a really special day out and a memorable occasion for everyone who took part. Perhaps next year I’ll even put on my running shoes.

Shabbat Shalom.