“I find it difficult to visit Germany. I’m uncomfortable with the sound of the
language, the police uniforms, the large industrial buildings… When I was first
invited to participate as a golfer in this summer’s Jewish Olympics, the Maccabiah
Games in Berlin, I declined. Then I learned
that the Opening Ceremonies for the Games would be held in the stadium used by
Hitler to stage the 1936 Berlin Olympics, and that thousands of Jewish athletes,
coaches, family members and spectators would sing Israel’s national anthem Hatikvah,
in memory of the 6 million who perished in the Holocaust. When I heard this, I knew I had to go to
Berlin.”
I remembered this story from my friend Jeremy Freedman, who
was selected to be Canada’s Flagbearer at the Berlin Maccabiah, when on June 28 I
was the first passenger to check in on El Al’s maiden flight from Boston to
Israel.
Before the flight there was a flag-raising ceremony at Logan
Airport. Genuine enthusiasm was in the
air. To the sounds of Hatikvah and The
Star-Spangled Banner, the Israeli flag was raised proudly alongside the flags
of the other countries that fly directly from Boston. At the ceremony were leaders of the Boston
Jewish community and the local Israeli community, State dignitaries, Israeli
diplomats, senior El Al management and few frequent flyers like myself.
El Al‘s top executives were there to make sure the first
flight took off uneventfully. A feeling of celebration was in the air, as
Boston was added to El Al’s three other North American destinations. Was this “just business”? It is always easy to be cynical, but I felt
there was more than business. It was
sort of modern Zionism. Blazing a new
trail in the air.
We live in a challenging time for Israel. Despite the Jewish New Year blessing, our
enemies have not been uprooted. Not
every day and not in every place the Israeli flag is raised and the national carrier opens its counters at a
new airport (at the end of the terminal, off course, surrounded by armed police
and increased security). Opening a
direct route from Boston is a significant contribution to commercial relations,
investments, academic research, and connecting Israelis and local Jews to
Israel.
While waiting for the flight I told some El Al people that
on my previous flight, I sat next to a friendly businessman who bemoaned the comfort
level of the El Al seats compared with those of competing airlines. I said that beyond the obvious considerations
of price, availability, comfort etc., choosing to fly El Al has a Zionist consideration. I still remember last summer, when several
airlines stopped flying to Israel because of rocket fire from Gaza, reminding
us once again that at the moment of truth, we can rely only on ourselves.
On the Sabbath evening prior to the flight I was invited to
the Harvard Chabad House. After the
meal, Rabbi Zarchi asked me to speak on the weekly Torah portion. I shared some thoughts about a sense of
proportion. “In the Torah portion”,
I suggested, “The Israelites complain of unquenched thirst and Moses strikes
the rock to produce water. Imagine that
the Israelites had remembered how, just a short time earlier, they had been
slaves in Egypt, where they were beaten, humiliated, their firstborn murdered… Remembering that terrible period would have
put their thirst into proportion and perhaps reduced some of their complaints.”
A sense of proportion could be useful today also. With a worrying increase in boycotts against
Israel, the fact that less than a century ago the Jewish people were almost
wiped out by the scourge in Berlin, and last summer that was anything but a
relaxing one, we should be thankful for the Maccabiah Games in Berlin, the
aviation pioneering from Boston, and hopefully - for a quiet, relaxing summer
in Israel.
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