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Nadav Shragai-Israele nel cuore e nell'anima 02/05/2009 Ha'aretz, April 28, 2009

A PLACE IN THE JEWISH HEART AND SOUL Nadav Shragai Ha'aretz, April 28, 2009 "In a Jewish soul, we were always told, a Jewish place is awaiting its fate," Natan Alterman wrote many years ago in his column in the newspaper Davar. "A Jew can be patently ignorant or educated, he can be clever or a moron, he can be your enemy  or your friend ... but he cannot be a Jew without a Jewish place [in his heart and soul]." This Jewish "place" was interwoven with the state's symbols when the state was established. It was interwoven in the national anthem, which declares that "within the heart,  a Jewish soul yearns and an eye still gazes toward Zion "; in the blue-and-white flag that bears the colors of the prayer shawl; and in the coat of arms with the  Temple 's candelabra in the center. It was a code for remembering Judaism. Dr. Yaakov Herzog thought many years ago that the State of Israel was a paradox.  He believed that the biblical phrase "a nation that dwells alone" was the people of Israel 's natural state. According to Herzog, "Normalcy has been proven to be  without meaning. This is a nation soaked in faith and its faith is soaked in its foundations. A state that lives in the present has a right in the present, but all of this springs from the past." In this way the Jewish place that embodied the Jewish historical memory became the thread with which "normalcy" and the past were woven together--the thread that connected a living nation in the present with a foundation consisting of Israel 's religion and heritage. In the beginning, it was indeed "the Jewish state" without any doubt or hesitation, and the people who established it did not imply by this any overtone of racism.... With the aspiration to set up a safe haven, the state's first generation felt a commitment to historical justice and national culture that went beyond the concern for physical existence. Despite the revolt of secular Zionism against the traditional and religious lifestyle that became part of Judaism, agreement existed on the notion that it was impossible to resurrect the past and national culture in the State of Israel without relying on the Jewish heritage that had nurtured national awareness for generations. That was also the basis for the connection between religion and state in the modern period--that of the State of Israel --and it formed the basis of the connection between religion and the nation. From here stems the understanding that you cannot belong to the Jewish people and be a member of another faith--a Jewish Christian  or a Jewish Muslim--as a Frenchman can be a Protestant or a Catholic. However, this Jewish place--the unwritten but vital commitment that established the covenant between the Jewish public and its state--has been replaced in recent years by a substantially different consciousness. For many members of the younger generation, those born when the state already existed, national consciousness has been condensed into something they take for granted and nothing more--their place of birth. Many people born here are naturally connected to the state and land, not because of their heritage, history, religion and culture, but simply by birthright. In any other country, it's enough to have a healthy, natural and elementary tie of this kind, but not in a state like ours, which was born out of the past and for which there is no moral right to exist in the Land of Israel without these historic elements. Anyone who feels free of the baggage of Jewish history and suffices with the circumstantial relationship of being born here can very easily drop their commitment to this land. But at the same time, they would lose the basis for our argument with the Arab world. Against the background of this worrisome change, the Muslim and Arab world continues to see us as outsiders. Were it only possible, they would be happy to see this Jewish island disappear from the region. In the best-case scenario, the Jewish state, from the Arab world's point of view, is a necessary evil and can be tolerated, sometimes as an ethnic group only, as the Iranian enemy has defined it. Therefore, the demand that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made of the Palestinians--to recognize Israel as a Jewish state--is as justified as can be, but it should first be addressed inward, to ourselves, the people for whom the state is taken for granted, and the "we-were-born-here" people, for whom a Jewish place has been put in parentheses. If there is any chance the Arabs of Israel, to say nothing of our neighbors, will one day recognize that our presence here is a continuing presence--not as a guest--it lies in our ability to recognize that first. Because no one will respect our Jewish roots and unique ties to this place if we ourselves do not.