Volume 26 Issue 15 26 May 2017 1 Sivan 5777

The two faces of Yom Yerushalayim

Yom Yerushalayim by Nathaniel Knoll – Alumnus

Yom Yerushalayim commemorates and celebrates the reunification of Jerusalem during the six day war. This year’s celebration was particularly notable as the 50th anniversary of the reunification. The streets of West Jerusalem were packed with people dancing, partying and parading. Meanwhile, East Jerusalem has once again been partially evacuated to “protect” the Palestinian citizens from a fringe group of violent extremists who, each year on this day, take it upon themselves to knock on Palestinian doors and scream at the residents about how this is the Jewish city and they should all leave. And this is the milder form of violence committed.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it is wonderful to celebrate the fact that once again the Jewish people have managed to survive a war and retain the state of Israel. However, I think it is very important to recognise the other side of Yom Yerushalayim to realise that, as we celebrate, some of those who live in Israel are mourning, feeling unsafe and tensions arise.

The problem is not only due to the fringe group committing acts of violence towards Palestinians, but also one that is similar in nature to the debate over the date of Australia Day. The main argument against Australia Day being on the 26th of January is that the chosen day marks the beginning of a long period of violence, oppression and other atrocities towards to Aboriginal community. Similarly, Yom Yerushalayim marks the beginning of a period wherein the West Bank region was no longer part of Jordan, and Palestinian citizens became second-class citizens of Israel with less rights and lower quality of life.

Today I went with my youth movement, Netzer, to join a form of peaceful activism that recognises the duality of Yom Yerushalayim. We gathered flowers tagged with stickers marked “Flowers of Peace” in English, Hebrew and Arabic, and took them to the Jaffa Gate where we handed them out to as many passers-by as we could. The goal of this was to simply spread peace and make people a bit happier. We gave no words except for “would you like a flower for peace?”. I would like to share with you the responses we got. Some individuals came up and asked for flowers. Some of them knew what this was about, others just wanted a flower. Some would thank us and gratefully accept the flowers we offered to them, and some would simply take them and walk on. Some avoided our group entirely. Some said “Peace? I don’t want peace!” and took the flowers to stomp on or refused to take them at all. One individual remarked that “having peace in Israel is like having a soccer game without the soccer”. These mixed responses truly represent the situation in Israel. Some people will happily have peace but won’t work for it. Some will do what they can to achieve peace. Some are entirely impartial and some don’t want peace at all.

This was my Yom Yerushalayim experience in Jerusalem that I wanted to share with the Emanuel Community. I hope that each of you who read this can still happily celebrate Yom Yerushalayim, and I do hope that your Yom Yerushalayim this year was a joyous one. I only ask that as you celebrate, you also acknowledge that there is more to this day, and that we should not just ignore the face of the coin that we don’t like, because that will not change the fact that it is there.