A Country Comes to a Standstill

April 16, 2007
28 Nisan 5767

A notice appeared in our mailboxes last week. It informed all citizens that a representative of the Home Guard would be calling during this coming week between the hours 16:15 and 21:45 (military time, of course) to pick up each family’s emergency kit—including gas masks and other protective paraphernalia—providing a receipt to pick up a new kit at a local distribution center.

Well, as new immigrants, we don’t have an emergency kit! All this time we have been exposed to danger, falsely clinging to the illusion that the “bomb shelter” in our apartment (yes, we have a room right here, I’m sitting in it now, typing away) would provide ample protect should—heaven forefend—a katyusha, scud or other projectile land on us.

I guess the friendly representative from the Home Guard will present us with a coupon to get our “new” issue emergency kit. I plan to get the gas mask model for bearded men, a very popular design here in Israel. Given so much saber rattling from Iran, Hamas and—recently from Gaza— al Qaeda, maybe an emergency kit isn’t such a bad idea.

Today at precisely 10:00 AM a siren sounded. Now, with the threats from all around us you might think that we would head straight into our secure room, not exactly. Last night began what in Israel we call our national “Days of Awe,” or “High Holy Days”—the commemorations from Yom HaShoah ve-HaGevurah (Holocaust Memorial Day) through Yom HaZikaron (Memorial Day) and culminating with Yom HaAtzma’ut (Independence Day). During Yom HaShoah and Yom HaZikaron all Jewish places of entertainment are closed. With the exception of the few foreign stations, all broadcast channels on radio and television play only programs appropriate to the themes of memorial—about the Holocaust on Yom HaShoah and about the struggles for Israel’s survival on Yom HaZikaron. Finally, with the fading of the sun at the close of Memorial Day, the celebrations begin as the BBQ’s light up and the bands begin to play as we begin the festivities of Yom HaAtzma’ut.

That siren at 10:00 AM marked the solemn minute when the entire country stops—traffic, commerce, teaching, everything—and people stand at attention in sacred memory of those who died during the Shoah.

It is an amazing sight. On the streets everything comes to a standstill. The traffic stops (even on the highways) and people get out of their cars to stand for the duration of the siren’s blast. The ubiquitous cell phones attached to the ears of most Israelis come away (disconnected?) and there is reverent silence for one minute. I have never seen anything like it anywhere else.

This morning Wendy and I decided to take a walk so that we would be out and about when the sirens went off. At precisely 10:00 AM we heard the piercing sounds. We were sitting on a low wall at an intersection near our home and immediately stood at attention—even Kipper seemed to sense the solemnity of the moment and didn’t squirm about. Cars stopped in the street and the drivers got out. Pedestrians stood in their places. The huge industrial cranes (Israel’s “national bird”) ceased their load-bearing motion in mid-air. Everything stopped—almost.

We watched, and it was interesting to see who continued about their business while the rest of us stood at attention. Arab cars continued past (it was obvious as the women were wearing Muslim head coverings). But, also moving about normally were what appeared to be Europeans (or Americans) who make up the many foreign diplomats, NGO workers, and UN employees that live in our neighborhood. It struck me that as all-encompassing, as this moment of memory was it was not universal.

Quite frankly, I can understand why our neighbors might not stop when the siren sounds next week in memory of those fallen in Israel’s wars (a clearly national commemoration), but this silent vigil was in memory of the victims of the Shoah! Isn’t the message of the Shoah universal? Is the Holocaust only a Jewish memory?

The front page of today’s Jerusalem Post carried the headline, ‘Worldwide violence against Jews surging.’ The study conducted by Tel Aviv University, notes that the change in the nature of the incidents as well as the number is cause for concern. Now, more and more, people as well as property are the targets.

In an op-ed piece in the same paper, Manfred Gerstenfeld writes of the distortions of Holocaust memory. First is what he calls “Holocaust promotion,” encouraging the extermination of Jews to finish Hitler’s work. This is manifested in some neo-Nazi groups and in extremist voices from the Muslim world. Next he cites “Holocaust justification,” suggesting that the Jews were responsible for their own destruction.

Gerstenfeld suggests that this view is promoted by many of those who seek the destruction of the State of Israel. Then there is outright Holocaust denial—those who claim that the Holocaust is a Jewish lie. A not-too-subtle variant is “Holocaust depreciation,” which belittles the severity of the Holocaust, suggesting that reports of the extermination of Jews were “exaggerated.” Another category is “Holocaust equivalence,” alleging that the Nazi’s behavior was similar to the actions of the Allies such as the bombings of Dresden and Hiroshima. Then there is “Holocaust inversion,” which targets Israel and Israelis claiming that Israelis have become the Nazis of today. Holocaust inversion has made major inroads in the Western world and is being used to legitimize the very existence of the State of Israel today.

As Gerstenfeld notes, “Portraying Israel as a Nazi state enables its enemies to kill three birds with one stone.” It delegitimizes Israel by associating it with a symbol of ultimate evil; it allows for attacks against Jews by equating them with the perpetrators of evil and genocide; and, it frees Europeans of remorse and shame for their history of lethal anti-Semitism going back many centuries.

If the truth be told, most of the world is sick and tired hearing about the Holocaust. It seems that we Jews are obsessed with it. That may be why many of the non-Jews living and working in Israel may not have stopped when the siren sounded (though many, I am absolutely sure, did). And that, my friends, is why we must continue to remember.

Those who remember the Shoah first-hand are almost gone now. Of the 110 eyewitnesses who testified at Adolf Eichmann’s trial, only ten are alive today. If we do not remember the lessons of the Shoah then “Never Again” will become an empty slogan with as much moral meaning as “Drink Coca Cola.”

That is why it is so enormously important that—at least in one place on earth—almost an entire nation comes to a standstill for one moment in sacred memory. And for a full day a people that loves to party refrains from cafes and restaurants, gives up on shopping and outings, and watches documentaries and memorials instead of The Simpsons and Seinfeld. It is just one of the many things about Israel that make it so unique—and why I live here.

Shalom from Jerusalem.