Yom Ha’Shoah

Yesterday I had the opportunity to observe Yom Ha’Shoah in Israel. The day of remembrance started the evening before where all the members of Kibbutz Tzuba came together for a ceremony to honor the 6,000,000 Jews who perished in the Holocaust. The ceremony was lead in Hebrew therefore I did not understand what the people were saying, But seeing a community come together as a whole and support each other was very nice to see.  

In Jewish History class we learned how after the holocaust the survivors living in Israel were forced to be ashamed of what had happened to them. At the time, people would ask why they did not rebel or why did they allow themselves to go like sheep to the slater, not understanding the full story.  

Now look how far we have come. We now have ceremonies such as these that educate.  In class we talked about whether or not we should have Yom Ha’shoah or is it too much. I explained to the class that I believe it is important to educate because everyone needs to understand all the elements of what took place so it does not happen again. I related it to Remembrance Day. On November 11th every school in Canada remembers the World War 1 victims and soldiers.  We have a small ceremony which includes standing for a minute of silence, reciting the poem In Flanders Field. All throughout the month of November everyone wears a poppies on their coat or sweater. Even though most people in my school have no direct family connection to WW1 everyone participates and comes together as a community. Each year I learn something new about the events of WW1 and the Canadian troops who risked their lives.  

Today, just before 10:00 AM our class got up and went outside to the overlook of the Judean Hills where we had a great sight of the highway. At 10:00AM a siren sounded over all the speakers, radios, and televisions in the country. I did not know what to expect. Unfortunately we could only see a very small portion of the highway below and could only see the few cars that stopped right away and then saw all the other disrespectful cars that continued to drive during the moment of silence. I am sure if we had a bigger view of the highway the ratio of cars stopped to those still moving would be closer.  I thought it was amazing to be in Israel over this holiday. I had always heard about the moment of silence and how the siren sounds, but to be here standing in Israel, the Jewish State after just visiting Poland a month ago……wow