Words From The Rabbi

This month we will be celebrating Israel’s 70th birthday. Those who went out with ecstasy onto the streets of Tel Aviv to celebrate her birth in 1948 were unsure whether they would be dancing at her first birthday. Yet, seventy years later, and Israel is an island of economic, social and military stability in the very volatile region of the Middle East. I was born in Israel and there I spent half my life. I am proud of my Israeli identity and I keep close connection with my family and friends there. It amazes me how at almost every visit I see how Israel is growing and changing before my eyes.

I also consider myself lucky to be a proper Ashkefaradi. I am 50% Ashkenazi from my father’s side, and I am 50% Sepharadi from my mother’s side. 

The story of my parents and their (somewhat unlikely) marriage encompasses in many ways the story of the birth of the State of Israel. My father was born in Alsójára, a small village in Transylvania. He was wise enough to leave before the war and after some wandering in Europe, he made his home in Haifa. Like many men in the yishuv (the Jewish population in Mandatory Palestine) He served in the British army during WWII. After the establishment of Israel he became a pioneer in Hatzor, in the Upper Galilee. His entire immediate family perished in the Holocaust together with the majority of Jews who were left in the area. My father, the only remnant of his family, lost his faith in the Almighty and led a secular life. 

My mother was born in the town of Demnate at the foot of the Moroccan High Atlas Mountains. The family moved to the Moroccan capital Rabbat before setting off for Israel in the late 1940s and early 50s. The vast majority of new immigrants from Arab countries to Israel at the time were sent to abandon Arab villages or newly-formed settlements in remote places in the Negev and Galilee. My family was no exception. Most of them were sent to the abandoned Arab village of Beit Dagan (Bayt Dajan in Arabic). I remember as a child playing among the ruins of the Arab village. The state of my grandparents’ house and the houses of their neighbours were just a little better than the state of these ruins. 

On arrival in Israel, and at her request, my mother was separated from the rest of her family and was sent to Hatzor. There she tasted the life of a pioneer in a variety of outdoor jobs in the harsh winter and scorching summer days of the Upper Galilee. She met my father shortly after arrival, and the rest is history. I am fortunate to be Ashkefaradi because it gives me the opportunity to understand both worlds. These worlds were parallel in the young state of Israel. I recall that in my childhood Ashkefaradi children were a rare and strange phenomenon. There were times where I had to cling to one of my identities and hide the other. Hardly anyone in my predominantly Sepharadi primary school knew that I had an Ashkenazi father. The same happened at my predominantly Ashkenazi High School. I recall a few incidents where hiding my ‘other’ identity literally saved my skin. 

Seventy years after the establishment of the State, social undercurrents in Israeli society create a situation where there are many more Ashkefaradi children and adults. In my childhood there two types of music. There was the ‘mainstream’ Israeli and Western music that you could hear on the radio and purchase in record shops. Then there was the ‘alternative’ Mizrachi (oriental) music you could only purchase in dodgy cassette tape stalls in the marketplace in Tel Aviv's Central Bus Station. Nowadays many of Israel’s top singers use Mizrachi music or combine it with Western and ‘classic’ Israeli music. Omer Adam, one of the top Mizrachi singers in Israel, a Yiddisher mama, of Polish descent. 

Seventy years after the establishment of Israel, the boundaries between people, denominations and places of origin are gradually disappearing. The Zionist project was remarkably successful on many levels. However, there was a heavy price to pay for this success. Some of the heavy price was paid by those Jews who came from Arab and oriental countries, who sometimes were treated like primitive and ignorant second-class citizens, as if they were ‘the enemy’. Many of the problems faced by those who were coerced into settling in remote places with no job security, no future and no hope are now faced by their second and third generations. This perhaps could explain the overwhelming support of right-wing political parties form those who live in Israel’s ‘development towns’. It will take a great deal of change to convince them to vote for left-wing parties, historically associated with the Ashkenazi domination and oppression of the 1950s and 60s. I believe that these deep social wounds at the time of Israel’s early years could be healed over time, and with a great deal of effort and willingness. 

Happy 70th birthday Israel, may you go from strength to strength, and may you continue to be a beacon of light, hope and stability in the quick sands of the Middle East. 

Rabbi Yuval Keren