Third Mission Still Exciting
Page 11-THE NEWS-June/July, 1986
Con’t from page 10
Our eighth day I had the op
portunity to give a pint of
blood at Hadassah Hospital. I
have given blood many times
before but never felt so good
about doing it as I did there.
We also visited “The City of
David,” one of the many new
excavations near the Kidron
Valley just south of the wall
ed city of Jerusalem. They
really kept us moving and we
covered so very much as we
toured Jerusalem and its
suburbs, both old and new.
Our last day was filled with
the saddest part of the trip.
We went to Yad Vashem, the
cemetery on Mt. Hertzl, and a
hill called Ammunition Hill,
where over 100 young men
gave their lives during the
1967 war. This made an im
pression on all of us.
Soon it would be time to
depart, I know that even
though I felt sad at leaving, I
could rejoice that I had come.
I had made new friends, had
new experiences, and could
begin to make mental plans to
come again.
Many of you may be
wondering if you should go to
Israel in the near future. If you
have never been, you know
you must go. If you have been,
but it has been years ago, then
you owe it to yourself to go
again. See the differences. See
what I, £ind you, and our peers
have done jointly and collec
tively with our brothers and
sisters in Israel. It gives you \ •
such pride. I guarantee you
will walk taller and feel better.
It has been a real pleasure for
me to share my experience
with you.
s
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Southern Regional UJA Mission Delegation. See if you can spot the Charlotte tourists.
First Timer^s Impressions
Con’t from page 10
are given homes, taught
Hebrew, trained for jobs,
counseled, and absorbed into
the mainstream of Jewish life
and culture. One young
woman lost three small sons
during the famine and walked
across the desert to the Sudan.
Here she had given birth to a
baby g^irl, Israela. For Jews
who were not acculturated
during the mass waves of im
migration after 1948 and 1967,
Israel has an innovative pro
gram, Project Renewal. Neigh
borhoods £ire revitalized and
the residents renew'ed. Cities
around the world are twinned
with one of 58 Project
Renewals in the country. They
help provide the financial
resources for social, educa
tional and recreational pro
grams. We are greeted en
thusiastically as we arrive;
everyone smiles warmly for
the pictures we take, and
words are exchanged in many
tongues. The children cling to
us and we hug one another as
if we are old friends.
We drive north. Caught be
tween Syria and Lebanon, I
see now why the Golan
Heights is one of the most im
portant strategic positions in
the country. We tour an Army
Base and have lunch with the
soldiers. Boys and girls at 18
must serve two to three years
of active duty and remain in
the reserves until age 50.
Some of the soldiers who
spoke a little English talked
candidly. “Yes, we are afraid
but we have no choice. This is
our way of life.”
Our excitement mounted as
we neared Jerusalem. From
Mt. Scopus we had a pano
ramic view of “Jerusalem of
Gold.” Here lies the soul of the
entire concept of God. As I
gaze at the city, I can pick out
landmarks that touch on three
millennia of history: the City
of David, the shrines of Chris
tianity, the Islamic sanctuary,
the Dome of the Rock. The set
ting sun casts a golden pink
hue over the city. We prepared
for the Sabbath with a visit to
the Western Wall, one of the
holiest places of the Jewish
people. Until the reunification
of Jerusalem in 1967, the city
had been occupied by the Jor
danians; Jews, Christians and
Moslems were denied access to
their holy places. Now all three
Rabbi Robert Seigel and his wife Faye cavorting in Israel. That’s a live
camel they’re riding!
religions live side by side in
the walled city and are free to
visit and worship at their ho
ly shrines. A shofar sounded
to welcome the Sabbath and
hundreds of Jews poured into
the plaza to touch the wall, to
pray, and to insert written
prayers into the cracks and
crevices of the giant gray
stone. I, too, touched the Wall
where millions of Jews have
prayed for thousands of years,
and silently I reaffirmed my
identity with my brothers and
sisters.
Another moving experience
was our visit to Masada, a
massive rocky outcrop rising
1,424 feet above the level of
the Dead Sea. Here 900
Zealots held off 20,000 Roman
soldiers for three years rather
than submit to slavery.
Masada has come to sym
bolize, for the Israel today,
Jewish assertion of will even in
a hopeless situation. The oath
of allegiance sworn by Israeli
military recruits on this spot
is, “Masada must not fall
again.”
We spent the afternoon
floating on the Dead Sea, the
lowest point on earth. Nothing
lives in the Dead Sea but it is
life-giving and therapeutic.
The Dead Sea. with its 58 min
eral deposits, is a source of in
dustry. Thousands of tourists
seek relief from a variety of
physical maladies, others seek
the calming air and burnless
tan.
Each experience, each event
is more wonderful and mean
ingful than the one before. We
tour Hadassah Hospital, one
of the most renown in the Mid
dle East. We visit the syna
gogue there and see the
original Chagall windows. We
tour the Israel Museum and
see the Dead Sea Scrolls which
were discovered in 1947. We
stand on the steps of Temple
Mount, one of the few remains
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of the ancient Temple before it
was destroyed in 70 A.D, We
tour the Knesset, the Israeli
parliannent.
Our visit to Yad Vashem, a
memorial to the six million
Jews murdered by the Nazis in
the Holocaust, was an awe
some and moving experience.
We make our way through the
Avenue of the Righteous Gen
tiles, a tree-lined walkway to
commemorate those non-Jews
who helped Jews escape from
the Nazis. I could not suppress
my emotions as I walked
through the museum and saw
the pictorial history of those
years and events. Everyone
was silent, there were no
words. I tried to comprehend
the horror I saw as I stopped
at each picture; emaciated
nude bodies of men, women
and children, mass graves,
smoking chimneys of the
crematoria, cavernous eyes
looking out from behind elec
trified fences. A service was
held in memory of those who
died. The building was cold
and dark as the death camps
must have been. The smoke
from the eternal flame drifted
up toward the small opening in
the roof. As a red rose was
placed on the names of the
concentration camps, and the
Kaddish was recited, I cried
uncontrollably for the sense
less loss of life and the poten
tial of those lives that were
now in ashes lying beneath the
stone floor.
Their deaths were linked to
the deaths of 187 young
soldiers who died at Ammuni
tion Hill, in the reunification of
Jerusalem during the 1967 Six
Day War. There was a purpose
in this tragic loss. This is what
the State of Israel is all about.
Jews for Jews, people for peo
ple, we are linked one to the
other by the miraculous
adventure of redemption after
the Holocaust and rebirth of
the nation. I felt a bonding
and an inter-connectedness
with this country and its peo
ple. We shall never forget...one
people, one destiny.
Since my return home, I
have put my mind on rewind
and tried to relive and savor
every moment and every ex
perience. If you have only
dreamed of going to Israel,
make your dream a reality and
go on the next UJA Mission.
It will be for you as it was for
me, one of the most mean
ingful and educational ex
periences of my life.
4700 E. Independence Blvd.
535-7980
I am now
associated with
Crown Oldsmobile
and invite all my
friends to call or stop
in to see the exciting
new Oldsmobiles
SIMON ESTROFF
There is a special feel
in an