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Moshe Kempinski , author of The Teacher and the Preacher, is the editor of the Jerusalem Insights weekly email journal and co-owner of Shorashim, a Biblical shop and learning center in the Old City of Jerusalem.
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By Moshe Kempinski
November 11, 2007
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Condoleezza Rice was meeting with Tony Blair and Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem again and the call went out to gather in front of the hotel and voice our displeasure.
I knew it was the right thing to do, but the decision to go back out into the streets seemed so difficult. Parking my car near the American consulate and venturing into Independence Park where the people were gathering felt like trying to walk through quicksand. Each step was cumbersome and I had to struggle against a growing feeling of wanting to just go home and stick my head under the covers.
The sense of deja vu was not only overwhelming, it was painful. As I arrived at the gathering spot I saw the same signs we had been carrying for almost twenty years and heard the same slogans and the same songs. I stood back in the darkness under a tree and had flashbacks of all that our people have had to go through since the nightmare called the Oslo Peace process first overwhelmed this land and seemed to sap the sanity out of our leadership.
I thought of the powerful prayer gatherings and I remembered the passionate days in Kfar Maimon that ended in a whimper. I thought of the protests in Jerusalem, Sderot, Tel Aviv and in Gush Katif. I shuddered when I thought of that long painful night in the Park of Ofakim as we attempted with great futility to break through the ring of security forces blocking the way into Gush Katif on the night of the expulsion.
Here we were again. Nothing seemed to have been learnt from the funerals and the Kassam rockets. Nothing was absorbed after the Second Lebanon war and the Hamas victory in the Gaza strip. Here we were again facing the same policemen and the same black-uniformed Yassam thugs.
Worst of all, I ran into familiar pain-etched faces of people who had lost their loved ones to the clutches of terror. I walked over to one of them with whom I had once joined in a hunger strike after the murder of one of his children. I said to him, "it is all so painfully familiar, the same signs, the same chants and the same songs." He smiled sadly and said we have no choice we need to be here but on the other hand think of them (gesturing to the hotel meeting place) they are like dogs returning to its vomit." He was quoting a verse from the book of Mishlei: "Like a dog that returns to its vomit is a fool who repeats his folly." (Proverbs 26:11) He was right. We needed to be here as we needed to in the past and will probably have to again in the future.
I stood back and looked at the quickly growing crowd and suddenly realized that many of the young people chanting slogans and singing songs were infants when the Oslo accords were signed. They never knew a time wherein the lands of Judea and Samaria blossomed and grew. They did not experience the exhilarating moments of the liberation of the Kotel in 1967. They do not remember Israeli leadership capable of producing an Entebbe rescue and yet still feeling humbled by that success.
Yet even without those memories they were on the streets yearning and struggling for a different Israel. They continue to believe in an Israel with vision, faith and hope. I watched them and entered their circle of dancers and was rejuvenated.
We began to march with torch lights towards the King David Hotel and ran into many bystanders shouting out their support. At one point I passed a well-dressed American couple that was clearly part of the Secretary of State's entourage. They asked me what the protest was about. I told them that it was about our concerns regarding the Annapolis summit. They smiled a little smugly and I said to them, "I am very confused about your country's policies. America is busy fighting a war with three terrorist states. Why would you people want to create a fourth such entity?" The smug smiles disappeared.
Before I continued on my way I couldn't help but throw out another comment: "I think that this summit is not really about "land for peace" , its really about "land for fame, legacy and selfish goals" -- Rice's fame, Blair's legacy and Olmert's selfish concerns. That is why the summit will probably fail" ... and then I continued on with a smug smile on my face.
As we walked through the cool night air it was clear that we were taking new steps along this new section of the long voyage of destiny. I was reminded of the understanding that had motivated so many of us through the long years of the struggle." Rabbi Tarfon would say: "It is not incumbent upon you to finish the task, but neither are you free to absolve yourself from it."
So we walked through the streets holding the torches high and the flags flying with the complete knowledge that even if Olmert disdains these people on the streets, Condoleezza Rice ignores them and Tony Blair does not even know that they exist, these actions and protests are being measured in the Heavens. The commitment and faith that is acted out on these streets is being carved into the hearts and souls of many fellow Israelis. Most important of all: the perseverance and commitment is etching out in indelible ink the unfolding history and destiny of the Jewish people.
Views expressed by the author do not
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