I don't know if the master of ceremonies of the 'Torch Lightening Ceremony,' a significant event that separates Remembrance Day from Independence Day in Israel every year, is fluent in English. If it were up to me and to many others, he should have learned and practiced English long ago.
In the complex Israeli reality, while the 'Israel Prize' is canceled (and reinstated) due to obscure considerations, and while the President of the United States wants to come to Israel and address the nation but is prevented from doing so on the grounds of another obscure explanation about the party affiliation of the Speaker of the Knesset, I think that the time is right, the eyes are focused and the honor is due, to invite the President of the United States, the Honorable Joe Biden, to light a torch at the above-mentioned ceremony.
This is a country that has maintained and reveres important ceremonies since its birth and succeeds in reviving the almost impossible connection between Remembrance Day and Independence Day; a country that honors by lighting torch men and women who have contributed a unique contribution to the state of Israel; people who immigrated here or were born here; enterprises that are intended to strengthen the State of Israel and make us all proud, and sometimes even feel some solidarity among us for a little while.
In this country, especially now, it will be very appropriate to appreciate and respect those who support us from overseas. Specifically, we are talking about a person who defines himself as a 'full-blown Zionist'; this is a person who was here in the great rift during the Yom Kippur War fifty years ago and immediately came over to prevent another rift fifty years later. The oldest politician in the world, of the strongest and leading power in the world, fulfilling the role of an undisputed friend of the State of Israel in the past half-century. So, you tell me if he is not worth the gesture.
The ceremony is not a Nobel Prize for a groundbreaking invention or an achievement of a refugee who came here penniless and established a high-tech empire. It is a much older invention called 'comradeship' and the lifetime work of a Christian Zionist who never made Aliyah.
Saying a simple thank you
Honorable President Biden, we fly on aircraft produced in your country and make intelligent use of the armaments that you make sure will not be lacking here. This is something that should not be taken for granted. While racing for credit rating, the 'people of the book' and the 'startup nation' forgot the word modesty; basic respect is not issued in the stock market, and friendship is not the property of Wall Street. But without these words, nothing will happen. This is the old foundation that guarantees the new future.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, dear readers, as an Israeli citizen, we are still able to say thank you, a simple appreciation without injecting identity politics into it. I would like to see this old Zionist rise from his seat in the cold of Jerusalem, on top of Mount Herzl, stroll towards a particular beacon, and a burning torch is handed to him by an ultra-Orthodox woman soldier in the Israel Defense Forces. The camera follows only them and no one else in the crowd. The 'Hatikva' anthem will seal the ceremony that will be broadcast worldwide, and I have a feeling that some of its words will come to the lips of the friendliest American president we've had here in recent decades; he won't have to learn them, he knows them by heart.
Presidential medals of honor are accepted tributes to men and women worldwide. The United States is no exception with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In Israel, medals are less common, but if there is still a ceremony in the heart of the consensus, a ceremony that found its place in the hearts of the citizens of the State of Israel, whoever they are. This ceremony does not involve a sectorial agenda; it can be found on top of Mount Herzl. Here, the country expresses its collective national honor and gratitude, the entire nation's appreciation. And here is where a whole generation should appreciate a president who is so present in our lives as the leader of the free world, simple as that. Even if there are disputes, they are irrelevant to expressing appreciation.
I do not know if the President of the United States, Joe Biden, will leave the White House at the end of his term or be reelected. I wish the American people my best wishes. However, the term of this administration will end, and this is the appropriate and correct timing to do something we have yet to do: to say thank you as a people to another people, as a small nation to a large country. Even if an entire ocean separates us, the American involvement in Israel is significant and profound; from internal security processes to groundbreaking regional initiatives, they have always been there at the table, by our side.
It is not taken for granted in the world of artificial intelligence, the electric car, and the implanted chips. Friendship cannot be transplanted, and no intelligence can replace assistance to a friend in need. We are as talented as we are, or at least as we believe, but we will only get a little far. As successful as they say we are, we are not alone, and it is better to be surrounded by friends, strong and capable of helping us, precisely as the friends we have.
I wish for a day when, in the appropriate corridors of power, the presentation of the central beacon for the upcoming ceremony will be approved in English. There was no single important intersection in the recent history of the State of Israel; he wasn't present there. How many times did he visit here, especially recently? This is not a foreigner lighting this torch. It is a justified and correct assessment by an entire country, the State of Israel.
I don't know what the president will say about this proposition, but I'm sure these will be moving words for him and the most robust democracy in the world, the United States. These words will envelop a moment of kindness and an opportunity for change, moments of statesmanship lacking here recently. We will learn, and this will become a tradition of Israeli appreciation among the world's family of nations.
I am sure of one thing: the American president will say the closing sentence in Hebrew with open and honest intent and great excitement. He will direct his gaze at the battered audience from the past year's events and say with all greatness something that he believes in, and so do we, expressing great friendship for the people of Israel and for the glory of the State of Israel.
The writer is the chairman of the Israel Airline Pilot Association.