Rabbi Daniel Siegel – Head of Jewish Life

Our students shared their reflections and selected readings in our High School Yahrseit Assembly for Yitzhak Rabin. Below are some excerpts from the moving ceremony.

The song we heard, Mi ha’ish, speaks of a person who always aspires to see goodness and justice around him, and acts to do so. It also makes mention of the way that this person acts and the way that he speaks – these things influence his world because they influence the actions and thoughts of the people around him.

In our Rabin Commemoration this morning, our theme was ‘Words’. We heard readings, songs and prayers which speak about words – their power, their influence, how Rabin used them and were used against him, and how we too can use them.

Our words have the power to heal and to hurt, to make change. Let us keep that in our minds as we reflect on violence and expressing our perspectives.

In his final speech Rabin said:

“Violence is undermining the very foundations of Israeli democracy. It must be condemned, denounced, and isolated. This is not the way of the State of Israel. Controversies may arise in a democracy, but the decision must be reached through democratic elections and words.

Democracy is the principle of making decisions and changes with the input of all that they affect. To murder a democratically elected Prime Minister is to disregard democracy and embrace violence rather than dialogue – to disregard humanity and embrace extremism.”

The following is taken from the document ‘Remarks by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, On the Occasion of the Signing of the Israeli-Palestinian Declaration of Principles’ in Washington, September 1993′

Let me say to you, the Palestinians: “We are destined to live together on the same soil, in the same land… We say to you today in a loud and clear voice: Enough of blood and tears. Enough. We have no desire for revenge… We, like you, are people who want to build a home, to plant a tree, to love, to live side by side with you in dignity, in empathy, as human beings.”

Our inner strength, our high moral values, have been derived for thousands of years from the Book of Books, in one of which, Kohelet, we read:

“To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven:

A time to be born, and a time to die;

A time to kill, and a time to heal;

A time to weep and a time to laugh;

A time to love, and a time to hate;

A time of war, and a time of peace.”

Rabin was radical in that he sat with the Palestinian people, spoke with them and heard them. Words and understanding led to the closest Israel has been to peace with the Palestinian people since 1948. May Israel soon have a leader like Rabin, who can speak and listen as he did.

A week before his assassination by Israeli extremist Yigal Amir, Rabin said in an interview that “The threats on my life do not scare me. The phenomenon [of those threats] scare me.”

After his death, Israeli journalist Chaim Gouri wrote: “Words did have a role in this tragedy, words that were as a fire command. Now is the time for sorrow and shame – this has happened among us, a society considered to be enlightened and incapable of having its leader assassinated in the town’s square.”

The following is an excerpt from The Youth Respond, written shortly after Rabin’s death from the perspective of the adults and parents in Israel:

“Saturday evening we were driving home, listening to the radio and we heard the news, shots had been fired. As we pull up to our home it is clear what has happened… We barely sleep watching the faces and hearing the voices of a horrified nation. Morning comes abruptly. We wake sobbing, we who live here today and we who lived here two thousand years ago… We have been orphaned. We are broken. We are responsible. We created an atmosphere of hate, disrespect, and verbal violence. Yigal Amir was the student of a country who overstepped the boundaries of decent debate.

We wanted to be different. We thought that we were. We lived in the shadow of the Zionist dream thinking that this was a country created to be a home, to be a light, to be immersed in values… who reveled in democracy…

[But we find comfort in the reaction of the young people]: Over a million take to the streets. Over a million tears drench the ground as it trembles under our feet. The masses of the house of Israel flow towards Rabin’s home, the place of Rabin’s death, the Knesset where his body late in state, and finally to Mt. Herzl to the cemetery of our dreamers.”

How do we, as Jewish youth and Jewish leaders, use our hopefulness and youthfulness to continue the vision which Rabin had for Israel?

Hatikvah

As long as Jewish spirit

Yearns deep in the heart,

With eyes turned East,

Looking towards Zion.

Our hope is not yet lost,

The hope of two millennia,

To be a free people in our land,

The land of Zion and Jerusalem.

The hope which Hatikvah speaks of, a hope of two thousands years, was maintained through the Jewish people writing and praying and talking, reminding one another to keep the hope alive. A dream which is not shared is hard to maintain. Now that the land of Israel is established, what is the new hope for the Jewish people? Will it be the land of peace and co-operation for which Rabin hoped?