Israel's 73rd Independence Day, flickered, immediately after honoring, Remembrance Day's 23,928 fallen soldiers, and civilian victims of wars and terrorism, accompanied by sounding the sirens and playing on the Radio most melancholic Israeli songs,
On the Eve of Independence Day
On Wednesday evening (4/14/2021) the country's mood indeed switched, but not as sharply as it had, in the previous more "normal" prior to the Corona, era.
The yearning for festive celebration was clobbered, by the experience of the mayhem related to the raging pandemic, despite the relief from the restrictive directives.
In 1948, when the Jewish state was established, the population of Israel numbered only 806,000 people, and only 6% of Jewish global population of 11.5 million, lived in Israel.
This year (2021) out of 9,327,000 Israeli population, nearly 6.9 million are Jews, accounting for 73.9% of the population, of which 78% are native-born.
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Since last Independence Day, 167,000 babies were born, 50,000 people died, of which over 6000 from the pandemic, and 16,300 immigrated to the country,
Israelis tend to emigrate out, much less than those in other OECD countries and emigration has declined.
Almost 50% of the world’s total Jewish population lives now in the Jewish state, and this number will continue growing.
The average happiness index score among OECD countries is 6.5 out of 10, Israel's score is 8.5. and among OECD countries, Israel also ranks 4th in healthcare.
Following the successful Israeli vaccination administration, any Jew even if residing abroad, yet holding an Israeli passport, was assured entry to the country even during the closures, and was also given the shots. Apparently many more world's Jews applied, since, for change in immigration status, so they can access and stay in the country.
Furthermore Israeli Economy fared Better than other developed nations during Pandemic.
The rapid transition in mood from a National Remembrance bereavement to rejoicing with the living at the Independence festivities, has been best celebrated, in my humble opinion, by attending interpretive reading of the Israeli Independence Proclamation.
The Independence Declaration is being viewed as a canonical document, the 6th Megila in addition to the existing 5 biblical ones, formulated for the first time, by the Jewish sovereign state and people, since the biblical text was canonized in 200 AD.
This special event of Reading Megila, which David and I, have been attending for several years now, and which was initiated by the secular Jewish Movement for Social Change Bina Institute, took place until 2019, at the famous Dizengoff House (1910) on Rothschild Ave in Tel-Aviv. where the Declaration was proclaimed (May 14, 1948) and signed in a ceremonial presence of David Ben Gurion - Israel's first PriMinster
Dizingoff House
At each such ceremonial event, a representative of various tribes/sectors of the Israeli societal tapestry, voices interprets and renews a paragraph of their choice, from the Declaration, based on ideological, religious or secular thought and values.
Usually about 4 -6 representatives address the invited attentive public, and the entire uplifting event is also accompanied by a singer and played music relevant to the occasion.
However as the Dizingoff structure has been under reconstruction, this year,
the festive event was conducted at the out doors compound of the Abu Kabir Botanical & Zeological Garden, in the south part of the city, where the first location of Tel-Aviv U once was, but now houses the office space, and activities of Bina Institute.
Abu Kabr was once a satellite village of Jaffa, founded by Egyptians, following Ibrahim Pasha's 1832 defeat of Turkish forces in Ottoman era Palestine.
During the 1948 war, it was mostly abandoned, later destroyed, then renamed to Givat Hertzel and offered by TLV municipality to the Biological-Pedagogical Institute, to Forensic institute, and then to TLV U.
The Zoological Gardens became part of the University and were moved to the Ramat Aviv campus in 1981. The Nature Gardens are still in the original facilities.
The weather was quite windy and cold that evening, when sitting in the outdoors of the lovely nature surrounding. Yet the interpretative words of wisdom, voiced by the younger generation, who will be carrying the burden of executing the Declaration's spirit and legacy, were heartwarming.
The second part of the festive evening, to which we were kindly invited by friends of friends... continued later, in a private house garden, with a cultural operatic performance by the known opera singer- Ira Bratman who we heard just 2 days before at the TLV Opera itself. She was accompanied by Yotam and a fantastic piano player, and the three entertained the small group of invitees, with a wonderful repertory of classic, Russian, Latin and Israeli musicalhit pieces..
Independence Day
Israelis are known to be celebrating this festive day, by swarming the beaches and parks , and every nature's vacant plot, in large family droves and various social constellations, as to spectate together the traditional Israeli Air Force's Air Show,
and to BBQ - meat on the mangal fire,
It was reported that this year, with so many Israelis, finally aloud to be celebrating this national holiday, in the outdoors, and in large clusters, after all restrictions were rolled back, too many patriotic citizens hit the road, and created enormous traffic jams.
On the other end, nutty members of an extreme ultra-Orthodox faction torched Israeli flags, yahrzeit candles and wreaths, placed on graves of fallen soldiers in Jerusalem.
On Independence Day itself, we joined our daughters and a group of friends for a vegetarian picnic, at the popular TLV Gan Haazmut - Garden of Independence, which is nested on a the coastline sand hill, between the Hilton and the Carlton hotels, on Yarkon St, above the beach promenade, and from which the Airshow could be best spectated,
The air show, which was much shorter and consisted of less planes then in the previous years, was though as spectacular..
The spectacle of the steel acrobatics has always filled the viewers with much excitement and national pride . (For more photos)
Strangely, Pole Dancing acrobatics, on the background of the Israeli flags, became a popular attraction, as well on Independence Day's celebration, as the photo below I took, of human body maneuvers, on display, next to a Pole training facility, by the beach,
Happy 73 Birth-Day Israel