Israel began celebrations Monday evening for its 76th freedom time, with the state still at war, pursuing the destruction of the Hamas terrorists who carried out the terrible attack of October 7 that killed around 1, 200 people.
Yum HaZikaron ( Memorial Day ) has ended, and Israel’s Independence Day is starting. The Kotal ( Western Wall ) with ceremonies and prayers for the Jewish state pic. twitter.com/agKhA6Qjyq
— Raylan Givens ( @JewishWarrior13 ) May 13, 2024
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed a flame- lighting service ( language via Government Press Office ):
Seventy- six years ago, in the War of Independence, we stood single. We were some against some. Five Arab forces invaded our territory to kill the fledgling state. We were short on wings, had little tools. But we had one key tool: the soul of generations, the life force of an age- older people that refuses to death, a nation that stood up against those who would kill it. As is written in Psalms: ‘ I shall never expire, but live.’ It is owing to this nature that we prevailed over our foes and secured our life. Now we are immensely stronger, but the desire to kill us has never disappeared. It is still around.
We saw this on October 7. This month’s Independence Day is not like any other month’s freedom day. The conflict is also raging. It was forced upon us on that black day of the horrible murder. Many of our brothers and sisters are still being held in the vaults of Hamas. Their people are suffering significantly. We will take them all house, the living and the dead.
People from the north and the south are also evacuated from their homes because of the battle. We will profit them household properly. Our best soldiers fell in noble wars. The grieving families suffer the pain of damage. The wounded are coping with the accidents of war with amazing respect. I embrace people with like. I wish a quick treatment to the wounded. When I meet many of them and with the people of the fallen, they say:” Our soldiers did not die in vain, they were not wounded in vain. Do not stop until the Hamas demons are eradicated”. And I promise: That is what we will perform.
Although this is not a typical Independence Day, it is a unique opportunity for us to realize the significance of our democracy. Independence means being a completely people in our country, having the freedom to protect ourselves by ourselves and the independence to meet the insistence of years: not again!
We are doing all this up. Just like our valiant soldiers fight up, shoulder to shoulder, in tanks and armoured automobiles, in tunnels, in aviation and military vessels. At the moment of fact, the whole country took up arms. What an amazing technology we have, a era of joyful heroes.
The lights that we set fire this hour will shine a bright illumination on the mystery that is our country. They recount, in flames, the narrative of our amazing country. We may raise our banners and lamps in honor of our society.
Israelis observe their independence day on the 5th day in the quarter of Iyar, which corresponds to May 14, 1948, the day that the American Mission in Palestine expired and the Jewish society of the neighborhood declared independence.
Palestinian Arabs refused to consider their own state — which was supposed to have split the terrain, under a split plan approved by the United Nations in November 1947. Instead, they joined five Arab states in attacking Israel.
Israel won the ensuing war — though Jordan took over, and destroyed, the Jewish communities of Jerusalem and Judea. Roughly 700, 000 Palestinian Arabs were displaced, a similar number of Jewish refugees left Arab countries.
Palestinians have come to observe May 15th as” Nakba Day”, the day of the so- called” catastrophe”, even though the disaster was of their own making, after rebelling against the British, siding with the Nazis, and then attacking Israel.
Normally the two days do not coincide, but every 19 years the Hebrew and secular calendars line up again, meaning that this year — 19 x 4 = 76 — Israel’s Independence Day,” Yom Ha’atzmaut”, falls on its original secular date.
Many Jewish communities around the world also mark the day with parties and celebrations. The South African Jewish community held a carnival for Israel’s independence day, which was open to members of the general public.
People holding Israeli flags in Johannesburg on May 13, 2024 during the celebration of Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israel’s national day that commemorates the 76th anniversary of the creation of state of Israel on May 14, 1948. ( Photo by Wikus de Wet / AFP ) ( Photo by WIKUS DE WET/AFP via Getty Images )
In Israel, Independence Day immediately follows Memorial Day (” Yom Hazikaron” ), an emotionally- charged transition. The week before Independence Day also marks the observance of Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor- at- Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p. m. to 10 p. m. ET ( 4 p. m. to 7 p. m. PT ). He is the author of the recent e- book,” The Zionist Conspiracy ( and how to join it )”, now available on Audible. He is also the author of the e- book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U. S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
