Praying next to those ancient stones, a feeling of deep connection to our history washed over me. I wondered if the Jews at Sinai declaring “naaseh v’nishma” had felt the same awesome connection to Hashem, the Torah, and to one another as we did that Shavuot at the Kotel.
In retrospect, bulldozing the neighborhood to prepare a plaza in front of the Kotel was a positive act, a first giant step that opened the area to large masses of worshippers. Hakodosh Baruch Hu had returned the other half of our divided city to us after years of barbed wire fences and gray concrete walls. Jerusalem was reunited under God, the indivisible capital of the sovereign State of Israel.
On the fortieth anniversary of that victory, we recognize tremendous achievements – the rebuilding and settling of a land divinely reinstated. At the same time, we are faced with the hate and anger of nations who wish and threaten Israel’s destruction, as well as the self-destructive actions of some of our own people.
The decades since the Miracle of ‘67 have been defined by countless new battles, wars, and terrorist attacks. Rockets are still hitting our hills, valleys, and cities. We long for quiet days – a future described at the conclusion of the Song of Deborah (Judges 5:31):
“So may all your enemies perish, O Lord. But may they who love you be like the sun when it rises in its strength. Then the land had peace forty years.”