THE DAYS OF CLOSURE

December 25, 2000

[Written at a critical juncture in Israeli-Palestinian Peace negotiations]

By Yitzhak Frankenthal - Arik's father, who fell on 7th July 1994 because there was no peace

The one hundred years' conflict is about to end, like a Yom Kippur's Closure Prayer. The Closure Prayer is not only a prayer at the end of Yom Kippur but also a prayer to open up a gate when a gate is shut. So much is at stake in the next few days.

In this article I would like to relate peace to spirit and earthiness, to spirit and the body, to vision and sight, to the individual and the public, to Rabbis and leaders, to politicians and leaders and to Settlers and citizens.

The State of Israel was born in the forties with the consent of the United Nations and following the terrible massacre of Jews by the Nazis. The State has created injustices on both sides. Yes, there were Israeli injustices towards the Arabs, not just Arab injustices, but Israeli injustices too. The State of Israel is not only a state of citizens, but is first and foremost a state of Jews even if these are not citizens of Israel. Every Jew wherever he is knows that he has a home to come to, and knows that he has an insurance policy in case the holocaust is repeated. The State of Israel is the Jewish people's national home. In the Declaration of Independence equal rights were granted to all citizens of Israel, not just to Jews. As a Jewish state and leadership we are bound by moral ties and Jewish justice. Socialism is the Jewish gift to the world, the compassion, the giving, the repentance and the forgiving, but mainly the belief in one God and the worship of God are the Jewish gift to the world. Judaism arose about 3600 years ago, 1600 years before Christianity, and 2300 years before Islam. The fundamental base of Judaism was never sovereignty, never the worship of holy places or stones. The Jewish basis was always behavioral norms according to the Torah, a teaching demanded of every human being be he Jewish or gentile, to observe first and foremost the Seven Noahite Commandments. These include the worship of the Creator, the forbiddance of murder, social norms through the courts and the justice system, the commandments between man and God and between man and his fellow men. Yom Kippur (The Day of Atonement) is a day of prayer to the creator, to atone our sins as human beings before the creator. Yom Kippur does not forgive the sins done between one man and another, unless one personally asks for forgiveness from the person offended, and if the offense against a fellow human-being involved financial injustice, one must reimburse and compensate him in order to receive forgiveness.

Peace is not a prayer, peace is in the hands of each and every one of us. Peace is not just between states, peace is between a man and his friends, man and wife, parents and their children, between neighbors, between partners, between all human beings and between states. The basis for any peace is compromise and reconciliation. Peace without reconciliation and compromise is not peace. One of the greatest obstacles of peace is the reversal of the meaning of peace. The root of the word "peace" is Shalem ("wholesome" in Hebrew). In order to achieve peace one must not only be wholesome, but one must also compromise, and this is easily misunderstood. Often we hear from people "we shall give peace if we receive peace" and we do not understand that in order to receive peace we must compromise. In order to receive forgiveness in Yom Kippur I must confess my sins, I must acknowledge my sins, for if I do not acknowledge my sins I will not receive forgiveness from the Creator. In order to receive peace from my enemies I must acknowledge my sins, and I must compromise on the wholesomeness.

Ever since the Six-Day War we have been ruling the West Bank and Gaza, the Temple Mount and the Old City of Jerusalem. In the War of Independence, many refugees fled Israel, well over 4 million people. Many injustices were committed. I could not make peace if it meant the return of all refugees to Israel since it will mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state. Can you imagine the return of 4 million refugees and Israel consisting of 5 million Jews and 5 million Arabs. the Knesset having 60 Jewish members and 60 Arab members? This will bring an end to The State of Israel as a Jewish state. Apart from an insignificant minority, no one is prepared to grant Arabs the right of return to Israel. In other words, the fulfillment of the right to return to Israel is the one condition that will prevent me from making peace with the Palestinians. On the other hand, the Palestinians have a red line of their own which is the Old City of Jerusalem, the Arab Sectors, the Temple Mount Khram-el-Sherif. I am prepared to compromise and grant them sovereignty over these places on condition that they recognize our right and our historical affinity to these sites.

In March l995 I published a model for peace called "A Wise Peace", not "A Just" peace but a "Wise Peace". There is no such term as a "just peace". What is just for us is unjust for the Arabs and vice versa. This model was not constructed lightheartedly and in haste. It was done following scores of meetings with people from the right and left wing in Israel, with Arab Israelis and with Palestinians including Hamas members. The model was presented before the Israeli and Palestinian leadership and received their unofficial consent. The big question of what will happen in Israel on the day after the signing of the peace agreement remained unanswered. I foresee a big breakdown within the Settlers. I do not want to elaborate on the Settlers as I have already referred to them in the past. I do want to state that they are the creme de la creme of the People of Israel, the true pioneers, and people with inspiration and nobility. I believe that most of them will accept the will of the people.

In the forthcoming election for Prime Minister, if Barak will bring a agonizing peace agreement I will support and vote for it and I hope that most Israelis will support it too. But with the Knesset being the same Knesset as before, it is possible that Members of Knesset will not be prepared to support this agreement and then there will be no other choice but to call for election to the Knesset based on the peace agreement. There may be a scenario wherein Barak will not obtain the confidence of the people and Arik Sharon will be elected to be Prime Minister. At least we will know that there is a peace agreement that he cannot overlook and will have to bring it to fruition with pressure coming from other nations of the world. Barak, as I know him, does not care whether or not he is re-elected, he cares about making peace even if it means that the person implementing it will be Sharon. Barak is no politician, he is a statesman with inspiration beyond that of Ben Gurion or any previous Prime Minister Israel had. True, he is impatient with mediocrity, but no one is perfect. Barak is honest, fair, frank and brave like no other.

In the Closure Prayer we undertake to accept the Kingdom of our Creator. In the peace that we will make, we will make room for the holy places under Muslim, Christian and Jewish as well as other denominations' sovereignty. Just as said in the main Yom Kippur prayer "And God will become king of all the earth on that day God is one and his name is one". Any believer will feel that God is The God, and will feel attached to the holy places.

What is the role of Rabbis in the making of peace? To date, we have seen how some of the Rabbis, a small but noisy minority, have ruled that it is an imperative for the Land of Israel to remain whole, to fight for the holy places, and that it is forbidden to compromise on parts of the Land of Israel. There is no doubt that the Land of Israel belongs to the People of Israel from the historical and religious aspects. But it is our duty to make compromises to achieve peace. The Rabbis' role is to assure the Israeli society that even if sovereignty over the Temple Mount is not ours, in spite of it belonging to the People of Israel, no barm will be done if the sovereignty will Palestinian. We received the Torah in Mount Sinai and not in Israel, and it is a sign that we can worship in the Sinai and any other place without having sovereignty over it.

Rabbis have a crucial role in forbidding to use of force, forbidding civil war and forbidding disobedience against a democratically elected regime by fellow citizens of Israel. I doubt whether Rabbis will be able to transcend themselves before they dismantle their soiled robes and have remorse on sins they have committed over the past 33 years of misleading the Settlers. The grave damage caused by Lewinger and his associates will not be easily forgiven. There is a reason for forbidding worship of false gods in the Bible. To regard the Land of Israel as the foundation of God's seat and thus to justify the blood-shedding of our children and of the Palestinians is nothing more than worshiping false gods and sacrificing in vain before the alter. We, as citizens of Israel, will have to stretch a warm hand to the Settlers. We must embrace them, we must be with them in the difficult time that awaits them. The Palestinians on their part must do everything to prevent continuation of the terror and prevent the Hamas from disrupting this historical process. If, God forbid, the Hamas will continue its acts of terror, we must call on Palestinians and Israelis to come out in their thousands, demonstrate against terror and demand that the peace process be continued.

These days we are working with our partners, the bereaved Palestinian parents, to encourage them to come out and demonstrate against a possible future act of terror either in Palestine or in Israel. It is very important that Israelis see bereaved Palestinian parents who oppose terror. We shall try and reach Ramallah or Gaza and visit Palestinian hospitals as a group of bereaved Israeli parents. We will listen to the wounded with amputated limbs explicitly say to Israelis "we have lost a limb because of you but we bear no hatred and seek no revenge, only peace and reconciliation". Moreover, we as bereaved Israeli parents, intend to donate blood to Palestinians in order to demonstrate to Israelis and Palestinians that there is no difference between one blood and the other and that we have all been created in the image of God. We also hope to bring bereaved Palestinian parents to meet Prime Minister Bark as part of the historical reconciliation between the two people.

Finally, there will be peace, and Prime Minister Barak together with President Arafat must do all that is in their power to bring the peace. Who will be the next Prime Minister - Barak or Sharon - does not concern me. What is most important is to come to the elections with a agreement on peace, implement and realize the agreement on peace. If this will be done by either Barak or Sharon does not concern me. Sharon has in the past proved himself by evacuating the Settlers of Yamit and the Sinai and he will do the same to settlements and Settlers in order to bring peace. Peace will not be wholesome, it will include many compromises. The duty of the people's leaders is to make peace and the duty of the Rabbis is to encourage the people to follow the sovereign government of Israel.

After peace comes we shall have to address Israel's real problems. The attitude towards others, the problem of Israeli Arabs and the granting of equal rights to all citizens, the reconstruction of the Israeli ethos to include most of the state's citizens, the reconstruction of a Jewish ethos for world Jewry including orthodox, conservatives and reform streams. A state that will afford welfare, higher education, care of the elderly to all its citizens, but first and foremost the separation of the state from religion. No religious enforcement, no religious legislation but the worship of the Creator out of love of people and out of complete free choice. The State of Israel must be a state worth living in and the death of our children must be for a state worth dying for. I have not lost a child for a state with distorted values, whose people are not worthy of this sacrifice. We must do all that is in our power to ensure that the death of the children was for a state worth dying for.

The Closure Prayer in Yom Kippur ends with "Next Year In the Rebuilt Jerusalem", Jerusalem of the heavens, Jerusalem the spiritual and not Jerusalem the forceful or the sovereign.