Category: Thought

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The British, the Holocaust, and the Responsibility for Fighting for Your Own Freedom

On May 16th 1943, the Warsaw Ghetto lay in ruin. The uprising that lasted nearly a month was extinguished by German forces. 12,000 Jews who would not go quietly died ts the hands of their merciless enemies and yet, something about the uprising changed the energy in regards to the Jewish Nation.  

For centuries Jews had gone willingly to their deaths.  Exile in Europe and the Arabs lands had beaten down the Jewish soul, grinding it to become one of sheeplike submission. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising gave a new message: “We are not your slaves.  We will not go quietly.”

Whether or not the fighters in the ghetto knew it, their valiant effort to restore a certain amount of respect and humanity into the Jewish Nation injected a new spirit in their brothers and sisters fighting for freedom in Israel.

The Holocaust was designed to destroy the hope of the eternal nation.  Hitler was not content at wiping out European Jews.  He sought to destroy them everywhere, including Israel.  The British fought Germany in WW2, but when it came to Israel the Nazis and Brits colluded in attempting to stamp out the fledgling Jewish community in the Land of Israel.  The Nazis worked to destroy the Jews of Europe, the Brits ensured they could not get into Israel, and of course the Arab street in the Holy Land acted as their willing foot soldiers in their continued attempts to wipe out the Jewish presence in the land.

It is not clear that a Jewish State could have happened before 1948, but what is clear is that if the British had allowed open immigration, there would have never been a Holocaust.

The World has been nurtured on the myth of an Israel born from the Holocaust, but this myth has perpetuated the lie that the Jews are to be eternal victims.  The State of Israel came about, because the Jews decided not to be victims anymore.  The Jews of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa decided that it was time to actualize the promise that the Creator had given to them.  It is not clear that a Jewish State could have happened before 1948, but what is clear is that if the British had allowed open immigration, there would have never been a Holocaust.  

Most people bring up the demographic challenge in Israel in regards to the Arabs that live West of the Jordan River, but the same Europe that challenges Israel on this issue is the Europe and especially Britain that is responsible for the demographic challenges.  By colluding with Israel’s enemies, the British sought to do what they did in all of their colonies and that is underhandedly ensure that a violent population opposed to the legitimate indigenous people would in effect dictate the future of the colony.  

The tool for this policy was the White Paper, seen below.  The key sentences are bolded:

Section 1

“His Majesty’s Government believe that the framers of the Mandate in which the Balfour Declaration was embodied could not have intended that Palestine should be converted into a Jewish State against the will of the Arab population of the country. […] His Majesty’s Government therefore now declare unequivocally that it is not part of their policy that Palestine should become a Jewish State. They would indeed regard it as contrary to their obligations to the Arabs under the Mandate, as well as to the assurances which have been given to the Arab people in the past, that the Arab population of Palestine should be made the subjects of a Jewish State against their will.”

‘The objective of His Majesty’s Government is the establishment within 10 years of an independent Palestine State in such treaty relations with the United Kingdom as will provide satisfactorily for the commercial and strategic requirements of both countries in the future. [..] The independent State should be one in which Arabs and Jews share government in such a way as to ensure that the essential interests of each community are safeguarded.’

Section 2

‘His Majesty’s Government do not [..] find anything in the Mandate or in subsequent Statements of Policy to support the view that the establishment of a Jewish National Home in Palestine cannot be effected unless immigration is allowed to continue indefinitely. If immigration has an adverse effect on the economic position in the country, it should clearly be restricted; and equally, if it has a seriously damaging effect on the political position in the country, that is a factor that should not be ignored. Although it is not difficult to contend that the large number of Jewish immigrants who have been admitted so far have been absorbed economically, the fear of the Arabs that this influx will continue indefinitely until the Jewish population is in a position to dominate them has produced consequences which are extremely grave for Jews and Arabs alike and for the peace and prosperity of Palestine. The lamentable disturbances of the past three years are only the latest and most sustained manifestation of this intense Arab apprehension […] it cannot be denied that fear of indefinite Jewish immigration is widespread amongst the Arab population and that this fear has made possible disturbances which have given a serious setback to economic progress, depleted the Palestine exchequer, rendered life and property insecure, and produced a bitterness between the Arab and Jewish populations which is deplorable between citizens of the same country. If in these circumstances immigration is continued up to the economic absorptive capacity of the country, regardless of all other considerations, a fatal enmity between the two peoples will be perpetuated, and the situation in Palestine may become a permanent source of friction amongst all peoples in the Near and Middle East.’

“Jewish immigration during the next five years will be at a rate which, if economic absorptive capacity permits, will bring the Jewish population up to approximately one third of the total population of the country. Taking into account the expected natural increase of the Arab and Jewish populations, and the number of illegal Jewish immigrants now in the country, this would allow of the admission, as from the beginning of April this year, of some 75,000 immigrants over the next four years. These immigrants would, subject to the criterion of economic absorptive capacity, be admitted as follows: For each of the next five years a quota of 10,000 Jewish immigrants will be allowed on the understanding that a shortage one year may be added to the quotas for subsequent years, within the five-year period, if economic absorptive capacity permits. In addition, as a contribution towards the solution of the Jewish refugee problem, 25,000 refugees will be admitted as soon as the High Commissioner is satisfied that adequate provision for their maintenance is ensured, special consideration being given to refugee children and dependents. The existing machinery for ascertaining economic absorptive capacity will be retained, and the High Commissioner will have the ultimate responsibility for deciding the limits of economic capacity. Before each periodic decision is taken, Jewish and Arab representatives will be consulted. After the period of five years, no further Jewish immigration will be permitted unless the Arabs of Palestine are prepared to acquiesce in it.”

Section 3

“The Reports of several expert Commissions have indicated that, owing to the natural growth of the Arab population and the steady sale in recent years of Arab land to Jews, there is now in certain areas no room for further transfers of Arab land, whilst in some other areas such transfers of land must be restricted if Arab cultivators are to maintain their existing standard of life and a considerable landless Arab population is not soon to be created. In these circumstances, the High Commissioner will be given general powers to prohibit and regulate transfers of land.‘

 

The Revolt and Never Again

The White Paper was built to create a Jewish dependent within the Land of Israel.  The British knew the Jews had no hope of surviving under a majority Arab rule, which they created by allowing open Arab immigration while restricting Jewish immigration.

Each section can be summed up in the following way: “We British have no interest in a sovereign Jewish State and will ensure this by preventing Jews from moving to their ancestral homeland and restricting land sales to Jews.”  

The White Paper was the British way of creating another Warsaw Ghetto The Jews of Israel began a Revolt in February of 1944, less than a year after their brothers and sisters in Europe rose up to fight instead of being gassed like passive sheep.

The revolt led by the Irgun of Menachem Begin and the Lehi of Shamir, Eldad, and Mor succeeded in taking the spirit of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising to the front lines of the war for Hebrew freedom in the Land of Israel.  This war lasted until the the British left, licking their wounds on what is now Israel Independence Day.

 

Holocaust Remembrance Day is more than remembering the fallen Jews of the Holocaust, it is about understanding that it is up to us to ensure a prevention of profaning the name of G-d, which occurs when his children are wantonly destroyed.  We may lose or win, but the fight is necessary to preserve the name of the Creator in the World. Blessings are eternal, but they can only be actualized by action.  

Driving the British out and defeating five British trained Arab armies from destroying the Jewish state, restored the Name of G-d to its rightful place. The action which began this reversal was the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Never Again, does not mean we always win.  It means from now on the Jewish Nation will not allow the name of G-d to be tarnished by our passivity.  Never Again!

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Telling the Truth About Humanitarian Israel

In December 2015, the British Daily Mail reported that Israel had saved more than 2,000 Syrians since 2013, at a cost of 50 million shekels ($13 million). Many of those saved were Islamic militants and sworn enemies of Israel, while only around 20 percent were civilians, according to the report.

These humanitarian rescue missions are very controversial. Why should Israel risk its soldiers and spend money to rescue Salafists who have a burning wish to destroy Israel? But it does, and this attests yet again to the under-reporting of facts about Israel in the international media. Compared to Israel’s size and the magnitude of Israel’s own security issues in the region, it is remarkable how Israel manages to be there for so many people in need around the world. When detractors whine about Israel not carrying its share of humanitarian outreach in the region, they are of course conveniently overlooking the fact that Israel is carrying infinitely more than what should be expected of a nation of Israel’s size, especially when that nation is actually treating and caring for its own enemies.

In just one development, Israel saved a 5-year old girl after she was seriously wounded in a firefight between rival militias in Syria. But that was not all. Israel is now also saving her from the cancer Israeli doctors discovered she was suffering while she was hospitalized in Haifa’s Rambam Hospital.

The story reads like something out of a thriller that could only take place in Israel: The hospital refused to release the girl after doctors discovered that she had cancer and security officials agreed. A bone marrow donor had to be found, and was — a relative living in an unnamed country that is an enemy of Israel’s, rendering it impossible for the relative to travel openly to Israel. Instead, a secret operation by Israel’s security services was launched to smuggle the relative out of that country and into Israel. The relative arrived on Monday and is now quarantined at the hospital with the girl, awaiting for the first round of treatment.

All the characteristics of the typical Israeli approach to life make up the ingredients of this story: the feeling of extreme responsibility of the doctors, refusing to let the girl go after saving her life once, and the almost unbelievable willingness of the security forces to risk their own soldiers to save her. This is Israel at its best and it is not a rare occurrence in this country, even if this particular example is of course extraordinary.

This is the ethos of Judaism and it is the ethos of Israel. But the world will never acknowledge this, because it refuses to see and hear the truth about Israel with a savage stubbornness that is reserved only for Israel. Appreciating that Israel values life above all else — all life, not just Jewish life — would make the anti-Israeli hatred, the anti-Jewish tropes and caricatures, the howls of “apartheid” and “injustice” melt away in an instant.

In an age where facts have long ceased to matter, however, all that the haters, especially those in the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, have to do is ignore those facts. The world is overflowing with naked emperors prancing about, peddling their lies and delusions to uncritical and impressionable audiences, who are much too willing to subscribe to them.

Thankfully, however, those lies and delusions are not having much of an impact on Israel itself. They are, however, having a detrimental effect on especially Diaspora Jewry around the world, notably on young Jewish students on college and university campuses in the West, where the anti-Israeli narratives are strong and thriving, not only in the BDS movement, but even among college and university staff to whom these narratives are almost as natural as breathing.

It is only persistence and proud stubbornness that will ultimately make the truth about Israel prevail in those dark corners, where the prejudiced hatred against Israel is allowed to fester. It is a supreme irony, of course, that Western universities have become feeding grounds for this hatred, considering that they are the rightful inheritors of the tradition of Enlightenment. This irony, however, is lost on most college students today, but it ought not to be lost on those who still believe in the value of truth and getting that truth out there. The story of Israel’s rescue of Syrians would be a good place to start.

(Originally published on Israel Hayom)

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The Holiness of the Land of Israel

“The land became contaminated and I recalled its iniquity upon it; and the land disgorged its inhabitants.” (VAYIKRA 18:25)

The Ramban expounds on this verse by teaching that HaShem (G-d) has placed angelic forces to rule over virtually the entire world. Nearly every country has a designated angel acting as an intermediary between that nation and the Kadosh Barukh Hu (G-d). In fact, only in the Land of Israel – where HaShem’s Divine Providence is direct – are there no spiritual liaisons between Him and man. As a result, the Hebrew Nation can only engage in a pure Divine service, without any foreign barriers or impurities, when situated within the borders of our country. This is how the Ramban explains the Talmud’s harsh declaration that “All who live in Eretz Yisrael resemble one who has a G-D, and all who live outside of Eretz Yisrael (Land of Israel) resemble one who has no G-D” (Ketubot 110b).

In the Diaspora, a Jew’s service to HaShem actually moves through these intermediary forces and works to increase their spiritual power, leading them to then strengthen the countries over which they preside. The Ramban’s explanation is supported by the fact that throughout the long exile of the Jewish people from our land, many of the countries in which we wandered had become great powers on the world stage. Their cultures, economies and diplomatic standings flourished while Jews were practicing mitzvot (commandments) within their borders. But often as a nation would mistreat us, however, we would be forced to relocate and the country left behind would begin its historic decline. This remarkable pattern was relatively common during the centuries of our exile.

Simply by living Torah lives in foreign lands, Jews actually strengthen the celestial powers of those nations. The Ramban teaches that Israel’s inadvertent bolstering of these intermediary spiritual forces is actually a form of idolatry, as pure Divine service can only take place within the Land of Israel. While HaShem is equally present and supreme over the entire universe, there is a distinction in our ability to connect with Him and actualize His Ideal based on our own physical location.

Every mitzvah (commandment) is like a faucet that, when opened, releases Divine blessing into our world and elevates it to a level beyond where it previously existed. These faucets, however, must be connected to the correct plumbing in order for this blessing to successfully flow through them. The Torah, which was given to Israel to be performed specifically in our homeland, is connected to the plumbing of Eretz Yisrael. A person who performs mitzvot outside the Land of Israel is essentially turning on a faucet without a pipe. No blessing flows through. The physical act was completed but not according to the Torah’s instruction. A Jew practicing mitzvot in the exile may be performing the ritual precepts but he is not enhancing Creation on any spiritual plane. There are no pipes behind his actions because the full expression of HaShem’s Torah is only realized when performed inside the Land of Israel (as nearly the entire Book of DEVARIM instructs).

HaShem divided the world between peoples and gave each one a particular territory appropriate for its specific historic role. He fashioned Am Yisrael and set us in the center of His blueprint – within the borders exclusively suited to our unique inner kedusha and national mission. Like the Nation of Israel, the Land of Israel enjoys a special relationship with HaShem. Eretz Yisrael is the point of intersection between our physical world and the Divine. Nefesh HaḤaim (4:11) explains that “G-D, Israel and the Torah are One.” HaShem manifests His greatness in our world through Divinely designated receptacles of kedusha. Just as the Torah serves as the Kadosh Barukh Hu’s written expression, the Nation of Israel is His national representation in human form. Similarly, the Almighty’s manifestation of kedusha in geographic form appears as the Land of Israel. Therefore, a Divine Providence graces Eretz Yisrael to the exclusion of all other places and it is only within our homeland that the Jewish people can truly realize the fulfillment of our national mission.

Only once HaShem’s representatives in this world are able to function according to our full potential can the ultimate expression of His Ideal be revealed. Only when the entire Hebrew Nation is situated in and sovereign over all of Eretz Yisrael – while living a national life expressing the full grandeur of Torah – can the goal of human history at long last be achieved.

It is impossible for a Jew to actualize his full potential outside his homeland, no matter how many mikvah baths, kosher restaurants oryeshivot his community boasts. Eretz Yisrael is not simply a better place to perform mitzvot but actually the only place to perform mitzvot. Rashi (quoting our Sages in his commentary to DEVARIM11:18) teaches that Jews must continue to observe Torah commandments even in the Diaspora to ensure these commandments remain familiar to us for when we eventually return home to our borders. Ramban, in his commentary to VAYIKRA 18:25, further elaborates on this concept by explaining that the Torah is meant to be observed specifically in Eretz Yisrael. The mitzvot only fulfill their true Divine function when performed within the borders of our country. And only by actualizing the Torah’s full expression can Israel bring humanity to universal redemption.

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Blame the Jews, Not the Terrorists?

A disturbingly clear pattern has emerged in the wake of the increase in terrorism around the world, especially in the West. Whenever there is a terrorist attack, the parents, friends and families of the perpetrators are always in “deep shock.” They cannot fathom from where their terrorist offspring, who had always been so “normal and good,” got their inspiration. The parents have absolutely “no idea” what could possibly have prompted the attacks.

It is conspicuous — and pathetic — how uniform these parents of Muslim radicals are in their frantic denial of knowledge and responsibility for raising monsters that go out and commit such atrocities. But the politically correct mainstream international press never probes deeper and lets the parents off the hook easily. After all, the international mainstream media pushes and encourages the very victimhood narratives that the parents’ denials and feigned “shock” feed into in order to escape further scrutiny. It is astounding that no one in the media seriously questions these uniform denials.

Among all these stories of feigned shock and surprise, that of the parents of the Hamas terrorist who bombed the Jerusalem bus recently (wounding 20 people and killing himself) takes the prize. Not only do the parents insist they had “no idea” their son had been involved with the Hamas, they feel no remorse for his actions and astoundingly blame Israel and the Jews for his actions: “You Jews have to understand something: Abed al-Hamid did not come from a poor family; he came from an affluent one. He had his own car. A family with property and money … a cultured household — with manners, respect, education — which opposes violence. You Israelis have to ask yourselves what causes a boy like ours to want to do such a thing. And I am telling you: Israel is responsible. Israel caused this generation to act this way. This generation has no future. No work. You pressure them and hurt them and create a hopeless situation for them. You are turning the young generation into what it is. The next generation, the young children, will be even more dangerous.”

So while their terrorist son had everything he could wish for in material wealth and came from a “cultured household,” he still had “no future” because of the Jews. What else is new?

But perhaps his parents were not so innocent. As his mother says, in what is difficult to characterize as anything other than a defense of her son’s actions, “It was an act of self-defense. As an enlightened person, I would find it hard to do something like [blowing up a bus]. Perhaps I would have done things differently, maybe through writing. But everyone has his own way of [taking part in] resistance.”

Her son was merely taking part in the “resistance” in his “own way.” Perhaps his mother’s “peaceful” idealization of the “resistance” (against what exactly? This is never clarified — the “resistance” according to Abbas and Hamas is very simply the resistance against the existence of every last Jew on Israeli soil) gave her son an idea or two.

The hatred emanating from the words of these affluent, “cultured” parents and their unremorseful threats against Israeli society of a future, even more dangerous, generation, speak for themselves.

However, they are right about their son’s generation. It is indeed dangerous, because it is steeped in unmitigated hatred, not only at home but at every turn it takes: in kindergarten, in school, on TV, in the mosques and on the streets — in all these places, this generation is taught that killing Jews is a good thing. As their son watched one terrorist after another celebrated as a martyr of Allah, having streets and squares named after them and their families richly rewarded by the PA, this son of “cultured” parents drew the logical conclusions of what he had been taught to worship and revere all his life, and went out and killed Jews. Who — least of all his parents — could possibly be surprised about that?

Ironically, the parents inadvertently made a big propaganda mistake by emphasizing that the terrorist had come from a financially comfortable, “cultured” household — putting to rest, finally, the idea that terrorists become terrorists out of grievances, for lack of jobs, poverty and so on.

The answer to the question of what causes “a boy like ours to want to do such a thing” is not difficult: It is unadulterated hatred of the Jews, as taught to and inculcated in children all over the Muslim world, along with the accompanying refusal to accept a Jewish state in Israel. It is about the Islamic injunction to perform jihad against infidels and the ethics stemming from that injunction. When Arabs massacred Jews in the Hebron pogrom in 1929 there was no “occupation” to “resist.” There were just Jews to hate. Nothing has changed, apart from the rhetoric.

(Originally published in Israel Hayom)

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Passover – The Story of the Exodus Continues

Between Israel’s slavery in Egypt and the final redemption in Jerusalem, the story of the Exodus continues throughout time. In every generation we find challenges and heroes in our unbroken struggle for complete liberation as we inch ever closer towards history’s ultimate goal.

The festival of Pesaḥ (Passover) is the holiday of Israel’s initial emancipation, marking the birth of the Hebrew Nation and HaShem’s great love for us. It was on this day that the Kadosh Barukh Hu (God) took Israel out from Egyptian slavery in order that we become His human representative in this world. We were brought from subjugation to freedom in order that we establish the kingdom meant to express His Divine Ideal and bless humanity with the light of His Truth – a light that can only be illuminated through Israel experiencing complete independence in our entire historic homeland. It is therefore precisely on Pesaḥ – on the birthday of the Hebrew Nation – that we must educate ourselves to the true value of freedom.

Rashi teaches that the miracles of the Exodus began on the tenth of Nisan, a few days preceding the festival. It was on this date that Israel overcame our fears and psychologically freed ourselves from our chains of bondage. Each household prepared to slaughter a lamb, one of Egypt’s most prominent national deities, and displayed it defiantly for our oppressors to see. Although the Egyptians would naturally seek to punish their Hebrew slaves for such an offense, the Children of Israel remained miraculously unharmed. This was therefore the day on which the miracles of redemption truly began and when Hebrew courage was first demonstrated after so many years of persecution.

On Pesaḥ of 5707 (1947), the last year of British rule over our country, an important seder took place in the Jerusalem central prison. A few days before their scheduled executions by the foreign regime, six young men were conducting the Pesaḥ seder with Rabbi Yaakov Goldman. They were Dov Gruner, Mordekhai Alkaḥi, Yeḥiel Drezner, Eliezer Kashani and Meir Feinstein from the Irgun Zvai Leumi(National Military Organization) and Moshe Barazani from the Loḥamei Ḥerut Yisrael (Fighters for the Freedom of Israel). Dressed in their red death row jumpsuits, these boys were provided with haggadot and food so that they could sit together and celebrate the holiday of their people’s freedom for the last time.

The young men eventually arrived at the part of the haggadah which relates Rabbi Akiva and other Sages discussing the Exodus from Egypt all night in B’nei Brak. When dawn broke, their students came to inform them that it was time to say “Shema Yisrael.”

The prisoners sitting around the table discussed where these rabbis might have been that they could not see the light of day in order to know the time. It is well known that these Sages had supported the Bar Kokhba Revolt against the Roman Empire and that Rabbi Akiva had even served as Bar Kokhba’s personal arms bearer. Acting as the spiritual leader of the insurrection, Rabbi Akiva had gone so far as to proclaim Bar Kokhba the Messiah. These rabbis must have been hiding in caves from where they were organizing the revolt against Rome. They were discussing the Exodus – the importance of freedom – all night long and when dawn broke, their students came to tell them that it was time for “Shema Yisrael” – time to sanctify G-D’s Name through liberating the Land of Israel from foreign rule.

Nearly two thousand years later, these six boys – Jewish freedom fighters captured and sentenced to death – were reading the story of the rabbis in B’nei Brak. Dov Gruner said to the others, “It is a shame that our political leaders do not learn what Rabbi Akiva said, that if the Egyptians had not received fifty makot (plagues/strikes) and another two hundred and fifty makot at the sea, they would never have granted the Hebrews their freedom. If Rabbi Akiva understood that in order to become free, there had to be makot, then why is it so difficult for Israel to understand now that we must give makot to the British in order to win our freedom?”

Dov Gruner – ready to be executed by the British administration – internalized the teachings of Rabbi Akiva, who had himself been brutally executed by Rome. Now, after nearly two thousand years of terrible degradation, the students of Rabbi Akiva had at long last arrived. The students that history had been waiting for had come to proclaim that dawn was finally braking. The students – all dressed in red and eating a prison seder only days before their executions by a modern incarnation of Rome – had arrived to reestablish a sovereign Hebrew state – even if at the expense of their lives. These were men who walked in the path of Rabbi Akiva, knowing that it was their final Pesaḥ seder before singing HaTikvah and mounting the British gallows. And without fear or regret, they questioned why the official Jewish leadership of their generation had not understood the eternal teachings of redemption.

Prior to his execution, Dov Gruner wrote a farewell letter to his commander, Menaḥem Begin:

Sir,

From the bottom of my heart I thank you for the encouragement that you have given me during these fateful days. Be assured that whatever happens I shall not forget the principles of dignity, generosity and resolve. I shall know how to uphold my honor, the honor of a Jewish soldier and fighter.

I could have written in high-sounding phrases something like the old Roman ‘Duce est pro patria mor.’ But words are cheap, and skeptics can say ‘after all, he had no choice.’ And they might even be right. Of course I want to live. Who doesn’t? But what pains me, now that the end is so near, is mainly the awareness that I have not succeeded in achieving enough. I too could have said ‘let the future take care of the future’ while enjoying life and being content with the job I was promised upon my demobilization. I could even have left the country altogether for a safer life in America. But this would not have satisfied me, neither as a Jew nor as a Zionist.

There are many schools of thought as to how a Jew should choose his way of life. One way is that of the assimilationists who have renounced their Jewishness. There is also another way, the way of those who call themselves Zionists – the way of negotiation and compromise, as if the existence of a nation were but another transaction. They are not prepared to make any sacrifice and are therefore forced to make concessions and accept compromise. Perhaps this is a means of delaying the end but, in the final analysis, it leads to the ghetto. And let us not forget that in the ghetto of Warsaw alone there were five hundred thousand Jews.

The only way that seems, to my mind, to be right, is the way of theIrgun Zvai Leumi, the way of courage and daring without renouncing a single inch of our homeland. When political negations prove futile, one must be prepared to fight for our country and our freedom. Without them the very existence of our nation is jeopardized, so fight we must with all possible means. This is the only way left to our people in our hour of decision: to stand on our rights, to be ready to fight, even if for some of us this way leads to the gallows. For it is a law of history that only with blood shall a country be redeemed. I am writing this while awaiting the hangman. This is not a moment at which I can lie, and I swear that if I had to begin my life anew I would have chosen the same path, regardless of the consequences.

Your faithful soldier,

Dov

Dov Gruner embodied the teachings of Rabbi Akiva and understood the struggle for freedom in Eretz Yisrael as the highest and truest service to HaShem. After receiving Gruner’s letter, Menaḥem Begin wrote:

“Great is the courage in Israel at a time of destruction and in this time of resurrection. We will be proud of them all and in all of them we will recognize holiness. But in the ladder of Jewish heroism, there is one level that is supreme. And from that level arises those who areHarugei Malkhut (martyrs of the kingdom). They were fighters whose fighting was not passive. It was active. They were revolutionaries whose revolution was not without choice but initiated. They went to the gallows and their heroism was not once. It is eternal. From their bleeding hearts, a song of freedom was sung. The song that sang how there is no purpose in being slaves anymore and that freedom would win and justice would arrive. And now, G-D of Israel, I tell You: Because You have given Israel such children as these, I say ‘Yitgadal V’Yitkadash Sh’mei Rabbah.’”

Begin declares “Yitgadal V’Yitkadash Sh’mei Rabbah” – “May His Great Name be exalted and sanctified.” The evidence that G-D’s Name is exalted and sanctified is that Israel has sons who are prepared to give their lives – boys ready to sacrifice themselves on the alter of Israel’s freedom so that the next generation would see a Hebrew flag over Jerusalem.

The legendary tzadik of Jerusalem, Rabbi Aryeh Levine, came to see Yeḥiel Drezner before he was taken to the gallows. When Drezner asked the pious sage for help with the confessional prayer before death, Rabbi Levine began to cry. He told the young fighter not to worry about death and that the confessional prayer is not necessary for martyrs.

And dawn broke. The British retreated from Eretz Yisrael shortly after the execution of these courageous boys. A Hebrew flag signifying renewed Jewish independence once again soared over portions of our homeland, initiating the first flowering of Israel’s redemption.

The Talmud (Brakhot 20a) asks why Israel experienced less open miracles in Talmudic times than in Biblical times. The Sages question if it might be because the Jewish people in Talmudic times were less immersed in the study of Torah. But the Talmud dismisses this and answers that it can be proven that there were Biblical generations that studied less Torah yet still experienced greater miracles. The Talmud continues by revealing that the difference is not due to a distinction in scholarship but rather to a distinction in self-sacrifice for the Hebrew mission. Israelis in Biblical times were more willing to give their lives for the sanctification of G-D’s Name. The Talmud therefore concludes that miracles are a result of courage and selfless devotion. When Israel is ready to meet HaShem half way, we are rewarded with assistance and great Divine kindness.

So dawn breaks not when Rabbi Akiva has students who merely study the Torah but rather when he has students who actually live the Torah and are willing to give their lives for the advancement of Jewish history. The young death row inmates understood what the haggadahmeans when it proclaims that next year the Jewish people will be free. In blood and fire Hebrew sovereignty fell and in blood and fire it would again rise. The haggadah is not simply a book that teaches us what took place once upon a time in Egypt. Nor is it merely an instruction manual for properly conducting the rituals of a seder. The haggadahin every generation is meant to teach Israel how to liberate our people and to understand the basic values of our freedom. The heroic martyrs of the pre-state Jewish underground were not simply fighters. They were educators – educators for a generation who did not yet understand the true meaning of freedom. And when the Jewish people will understand the true significance and value of Hebrew liberation, there will no longer be any necessity for such martyrs.

The lesson is clear. Freedom is a miracle and miracles require valor. History demands that Israel establish a kingdom that will manifest the Divine Ideal in all spheres of national life in order to liberate humanity from profane cultures and false dogmas. But in order to accomplish this lofty mission we must first psychologically free ourselves, as did our ancestors in Egypt on the tenth of Nisan. The sooner we believe in ourselves and in our ability to stand proud as a strong moral force among nations, the closer we will come to expressing the full grandeur of HaShem’s Ideal for this world and ushering in an era of total blessing for humankind.