Independence Hall, Tel
Aviv
I leaned back in my chair as the old man continued to speak.
The recording crackled as he spoke words I didn’t know in a language I couldn’t
speak; but I didn’t need to understand Hebrew to feel the heaviness of words
that still held their weight from when they were first spoken in 1948.
Sixty-six years ago in this room, Prime Minister David
Ben-Gurion stood behind that blue and white podium in front of me and read words off a scroll that had been written and finished only hours before. Only
sixty-six years ago the world listened via radio as one people group, once
scattered to the ends of the earth, now came together to defy all odds and the
advice of the UN and the United States to declare its unified stand to claim
the ground on which they stood as Eretz
Yisrael, the land of Israel.
As Independence Hall continued to resound with the steady
sound of Ben-Gurion’s unwavering voice laying the foundation of this new state,
my mind began to wander. I was whisked back in time to a familiar land across
the sea, to another Independence Hall where another group of white-haired men
poured over a document that could make or break their stand for freedom. A
common theme of independence and freedom was clear and prevalent in both the
American and the Israeli declarations, and the similarities between the two
quickly dawned on me. But the American bid for independence occurred over two
hundred years ago; Israel had only made their move within the last century. And
as my American sense of superiority swelled up in me again, I had another
epiphany.
Israel
didn’t come to this land on boats from across an ocean; they didn’t secede from
another overbearing country—this is their
home country, and has been for three thousand years, back to the days when
Abraham and his sons walked the land. Israel had been Israel for a long time before this this fateful day in 1948; and now after being dispersed among the nations, they had returned to
make Israel a nation once again. The declaration of statehood that currently
rang in my ears is just as monumental, if not more so, as the uprising of young
America in the 1770s. As much as I would have loved to hear the voices of my
founding fathers and witness the birth of my own country, I realized how much
more significant this time and place is for a people who were once scattered
around the world and severely persecuted only a few years before in the
previous world war. To be united on home soil would be more than a dream come
true.
As I mentally returned to my seat after straddling the
formation of two nations, I finally began to grasp the miracle of the history
before me. I now understood the relief in Ben-Gurion’s voice as he concluded the words "The State of Israel is established!" and the joy that
overflowed from the recording as the room burst
into the singing of Hatikvah, the
current national anthem.
The tour guide clicked off the recording and returned to the
center of the room to conclude this momentous occasion. The following day five
nations rose up against young Israel, forcing her to defend herself with what
little weapons and strength she had—thus beginning of the 1948 War of Independence. The room
was suspended in silence as the guide concluded the tour.
“We must do the utmost to survive,” she said, speaking for far more than herself. “The land and
the country is beautiful, yes—but it is not an easy one. If we want to survive,
we must fight back.”
