by well-known educator Rabbi Yoni Lavi, translated by Hillel Fendel.
Time to say it clearly: Israel does not exist because Jews are poor and helpless, but because history and ethics demand it.
It's standard procedure in the Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel: Every foreign diplomat or head of state who lands in the country is whisked away for short visit to Yad Vashem. Only after he directly experiences just a taste of what the accursed Nazis did to the Jewish nation will he begin to get down to business and be shown what else Israel has to offer.
Even the Jewish calendar has been recruited for this purpose, in that Holocaust Remembrance Day precedes Israel Independence Day by just one week.
What is, in fact, the connection between these two dates and these two events?
For most people, the answer is clear: The Holocaust is the justification and reason for the existence of the State of Israel. The terrible calamity in which a third of the Jewish People was cruelly and systematically annihilated made clear before the entire world why our people requires a safe haven and a country it can call its own.
This approach is totally and essentially mistaken, and harms very practically our standing in the world.
For one thing, though the Shoah did in fact happen – it did not have to. The establishment of the State of Israel, on the other hand, is something that is entirely a historical necessity. Mankind and history waited breathlessly for nearly 2,000 years for Israel to arise, even if they didn't even realize it. It would have happened with or without the Holocaust, even if it would have taken a few more decades or even centuries.
The Jewish view of history, as seen in the Torah, is that the exile of the Jewish People over the course of nearly 2,000 years was a historic glitch. That is, it was purposefully executed by G-d (as we recite in our prayers: "Because of our sins we were exiled from our land"), but it lasted longer than we expected. The ultimate Divine plan, however, regarding the Chosen Nation [i.e., chosen for its mission] never changed: "This nation I created for Me, it will recount My praise" (Yeshayahu 43,21). We have a mission and a destiny, which can be fulfilled only via a sovereign Jewish kingdom living a Torah life as an exemplary society serving as a prototype of life of truth and morality for the entire world. This is of course the "light unto the nations" (Isaiah 49,6) of which the Prophet spoke.
On the practical level, the attempt to use the Holocaust as a justification for our national political existence is not smart. To play on the world's conscience and cry that "you owe us a state because of what you did to us" cannot be a successful approach. Simply put: It's no longer the Jews who are viewed as victims, but rather the so-called Palestinians.
They have become professionals in the field, awarded the ultimate global gold medal in "victimhood" time after time. What's more, they don't hesitate to lie and manipulate in every possible way to portray their misery and wretchedness. The fascinating question, "Could it be that they themselves are to blame for their misery?" doesn't exactly interest the world. For us to try to remind the international court of opinion (and all the more so, of "Justice") that we have no place to go and that we face daily threats of extermination is an exercise in pointlessness.
What we must do is revolutionize our own thought process about the underpinnings of the State of Israel, and this will lead to an overhaul in the way we present it to the world. It is time that we realize, and declare to the world, that we are not here because we are poor victims – but rather because integrity dictates it. Our position is historically correct and just.
We don't need the world to have pity on us and throw us a bone of Middle East real estate. We stand proudly to demand the fundamental right to actualize our historic rights, as first exercised by our forefathers. We did not conquer this land; we simply returned home.
How can one be considered an occupier of his own home?
After nearly 2,000 years of being forced to wander the world, we have finally begun to return to ourselves, to our land, to our home – and the heart of the world has begun to beat anew.
And in this vein, I would like to offer a word of advice to our Foreign Ministry: How about, instead of dragging the foreign diplomats to Yad Vashem, taking them for an inspirational visit to the Machpelah Cave? How about showing them the places that our forefather Abraham walked, that Isaac lived, that Jacob dreamt – accompanied by the repeated Divine promise they each heard, "to your descendants I have given this Land"?
Any chance we will gather up the fortitude to say this truth aloud? If so, the world might even begin to listen!