Jul 9, 2014
A Tale of Two Funerals
a guest post by Tzvi Zucker
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A Tale of Two Funerals
Tzvi Zucker (@TzviZucker)
I am sitting down to
write this after experiencing my first Tzeva Adom here in Israel.
Perhaps it’s not the best time to write, and perhaps it just may be.
Last week, I went to the funeral of Eyal, Gilad, and Naftali.
It was not an easy journey, as I wound up walking close to 5 miles to
get to the cemetery and back; but I thought that it was the right thing
to do, and that my presence there would be meaningful. I only stayed ten
minutes, as it took me four hours to get there. And it WAS meaningful,
seeing what was estimated to be 70,000 people whose hearts moved them to
share in the grief of three families and share in the tragedy of three
lives brutally cut short. People of all kinds made their way to that
cemetery, to the point that when I arrived, the only space left was to
perch yourself on the boulders on the side of the road. The sense of
togetherness was palpable, and it was real – religious or not, right or
left, the country was united.
Of course, as we know, some absolute low life idiots
then decided to “avenge” the murder of those three kedoshim by
committing murder themselves.
And so, today, I
went with Tag Meir to the Abu Khdeir family. My motivations were far
from political – personally, I believe that politics only serves the
purpose of distracting people from where true power is held, and
therefore only exists for entertainment. I went because a tragedy is a
tragedy, and human beings are human beings – just as I went to Modiin
for the funeral of three innocent teenagers murdered in cold blood, I
felt it would be right to the same for a teenager murdered in cold blood
in Shuafat. For some of the more black and white thinkers out there,
its worth pointing out that both were also citizens of the State of
Israel, and both were victims of acts of terror, and so I saw no reason
to differentiate.
I was elated that 400 other people were going to do the same thing.
Upon
arriving, we lined up to pay our respects to the Abu Khdeir family. The
tent was surrounded by PFLP posters and Palestinian flags. After we
each made our way down the line of mourners, shaking each one’s hand and
offering whatever words of condolence we wished to offer. I simply said
“I’m sorry” to Mr. Abu Khdeir, not knowing what else to say, or how to
say it. He seemed touched, though the hostility from some of the other
people in the line (I do not know who they were) was palpable. After we
all had made our way to the chairs in the tent, a speaker addressed the
crowd.
I do not know who he was, or why he was chosen to
speak. I do know what he said made me very, very sad. He began by
telling us that he welcomes us to the mourning of the Shaheed (as an
aside, the person doing the Hebrew translations was made very
uncomfortable by that word, as was I); it is ONLY us whose condolences
were welcome, not the racist government of the State of Israel which
supports the settlements and the racist settlers who are against the
people of Palestine. He continued on and on about this, and I felt
nauseated – couldn’t this have just simply been a moment of shared
humanity? Why cheapen this child’s death for a political message? That
400 people took the time and effort to come show that they care, that
they want to feel your pain and share it, that they are trying to bridge
the divides to simply meet one human to another – none of this matters,
for a flag, for a cheap trick cause? How does one bridge a divide when
the other side of the divide isn’t there?
The other sinking feeling I had was the realization
that these people were citizens of the State of Israel….and yet they
hated it, did not care for it, and looked at fellow citizens as
“settlers”, in lands all inside the “Green Line”. Holding an Israeli
passport or identity card is not going to define your identity,
certainly not to yourself. That on the same day, the Haaretz “Peace
Conference” was debating heady topics like which bomb shelter to run to
first, or how to best insult Naftali Bennett, was not an irony lost on
me; the fault line in Israel is not the Green Line, but the lines in
people’s hearts. And that is saddest of all, for I fear there is nothing
we can do to erase those lines.
And so we sit in bomb shelters, for we are a people
sworn to build a world through words, and not wars...Rachmana Liba Ba’i.
Perhaps the only hope we have left is Devarim sheyotze min halev
nichnasim el halev, just as they managed to do by Eyal, Gilad, and
Naftali’s funerals. After all, we are all sitting in the same bomb
shelters, together, so maybe it’s a good time to talk, and to come
together, k'ish echad b'lev echad.
Tzvi Zucker, LMSW
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Once you realized what the speech was about, shtika k'hoda'a dami. Hard though it would have been, you should have gotten up and left. It would have been even better to interrupt the speaker and tell the speaker -- out loud -- a little of your first point here. But you absolutely should not have remained once you realized what he was saying.
ReplyDeleteI know, I know; your intentions were good. But that doesn't change the fact that you sat silently when we were all maligned.
I am not 100% sure, but it seems to me that walking out wouldnt have been possible for security reasons.
ReplyDeleteYour answer is not acceptable. If necessary, you tell the person trying to block you that you can't stay; you're sick. (True.) And if that doesn't work, you tell him -- increasingly loudly, so other Jews there can hear you -- that you won't stay in the same place where terrible lies are being told about Jews. Let the other Jews there also find the courage to get up and leave.
ReplyDeleteTheir good intentions were rebuffed. THEY SHOULDN'T STAY IN A PLACE WHERE TERRIBLE LIES ARE BEING TOLD ABOUT THEIR FELLOW JEWS!
While your sentiments are ones I would agree with in a place where free speech was valued and protected, I had no desire to create an incident which might turn dangerous.
ReplyDelete