At eleven a.m. on Israel’s Memorial Day, the sirens blast for two full minutes, and all life comes to a stop.
Today, I watched my children, aged 7 and 9, stand together somberly with their classmates as the Memorial Day siren rang out, and then listen to a list of young men and women who had attended their elementary school who had lost their lives in Israel’s wars. There were 33 names.
I don’t think you can truly understand Israeli culture until you experience the key two weeks in which the country observes Holocaust Remembrance Day, and then Memorial Day for the soldiers who fell in battle in Israel’s wars, followed by Independence Day.
It is a collective and communal experience that I have a hard time finding a parallel for in American life.
The entire country mourns for generations of young people who lost their lives at terribly young ages – who will forever be age 18, 19 or 20. No generation is untouched. Some of them died in the country’s early wars, without which it wouldn’t exist. The most recent, immediate losses, the soldiers who died over the past 13 years that I have lived here are especially meaningful to me: many of them died rooting out a terrorist who might have easily harmed me or my kids.
Israel has a citizen’s army. The people who die in wars aren’t professional soldiers, many of them had no affection for things military. They were doing what they had to do to protect their country, whether or not they agreed with ever decision their leaders made.
The deep crimson flower above has many names: red everlasting, cudweed, Helichrysum sanguineum. In Hebrew it is called dam ha-maccabim—blood of the Maccabees.
This is the flower that symbolizes the memorial day for Israel’s fallen soldiers and victims of terror attacks. On this day, which started just a few hours ago and which will end tomorrow night—ushering in the festivities of Independence Day—many people wear special stickers bearing an image of this flower and the Hebrew word nizkor—“We will remember.â€
Last week we remembered the millions of Jews who were murdered before they could reach these shores. Today we remember those who paid the ultimate price for our ability to live here as free human beings and as Jews.
Actually, we always remember. Not a day goes by that we do not. But most of the time it is a private remembrance. Today it is a shared, public one.
Read the rest of both their posts.