When Dr. Bilha Bachrach hears the one-minute siren ringing throughout the State of Israel at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, she, like the rest of Israel, will stop whatever she is doing, stand in silence and mourn. The sound of the siren marks the beginning of Yom HaZikaron, or Israel’s Memorial Day. It’s a day dedicated to commemorating all those who gave their lives for Israel, and those who lost theirs to terrorism.
Bachrach’s son Ohad is among those remembered. In 1995, on the third day of his three-year-stint in compulsory military service, Ohad and his friend were sitting by the river in Wadi Qelt, an oasis in the West Bank near Jericho. The water was gushing down rapidly so they couldn’t hear the foot steps behind them.
“Then someone came up behind them,” Bachrach told The Media Line, “and shot them. I first heard about the incident on the radio, ‘two unidentified boys shot dead in Wadi Qelt,’ and started to prepare myself. I knew it was him.”
As a therapist, Bachrach studies this instinctual gut feeling, and says she has seen many families with similar experiences during a time of grief. Yom HaZikaron is a day where families, friends and the nation as a whole grieve together. Bachrach says while the commemoration helps her heal, the day is not about her.
“Memorial Day is for the nation,” she explained, “not the parents or families. It’s a great feeling of solidarity to know that everything everywhere stops, and for one moment everyone is thinking about the dead. It’s a connection from everyone to everyone to everyone, giving us all strength.”
Israel has a compulsory draft and a majority of men serve for three years, and women for two. Members of Israel’s Arab minority are exempt from service, although some volunteer. Almost every Israeli is personally affected on Yom Hazikaron and the mood in the country is somber. Flags fly at half-staff, all places of entertainment are closed, and memorial services are held in cemeteries around the country.
Then, as darkness falls, the mood shifts dramatically. The Israeli flag is brought back to full staff, and there is an abrupt change from sadness to joy as Israelis celebrate their Independence Day, known in Hebrew as Yom Ha’atzmaut. There is music and dancing in the streets at night. The day is devoted to barbeques on every available patch of green, even on highway medians.
Nir Avieli, a food anthropologist, says that roasting meat represents a combination of power, masculinity and territory.
“Barbecues are homage to white, male colonials conquering space,” he told The Media Line, “and represent male patriarchy.”
Avieli explains it’s a symbolic turning over of the destruction, and that the back-to-back commemoration into celebration is no accident.
“We start with Passover and the story of getting free from Egypt,” Avieli summarized. “Then there’s the establishment of the state, the explosion of the Jews, the creation of the Diaspora, and then Holocaust day. It goes from destruction to a new state, then Memorial Day, then Independence Day – tragedy to celebration. It’s the suffering and the price you pay and then independence, and it’s how Jewish Israeli time works.”
However, there are those who do not believe this sharp shift from mourning to celebration makes sense. David Rubinger, the famous photographer who took the iconic photo of three Israeli soldiers at the Western Wall just after they’d recaptured in 1967, is one of the sceptics.
“I’ve always said it’s a terrible idea. It’s a stupid idea,” the 90-year-old told The Media Line. “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s now 6:39 p.m. We now start mourning. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s now 6:39 a.m., start rejoicing.'”
David Ben Gurion, the founding father and first Prime Minister of the State of Israel, is believed to be the person responsible for implementing Yom HaZikaron the day before Yom HaAtzmaut, according to Jeffery Woolf, senior lecturer in the Department of Talmud at Bar-Ilan University and an expert in Jewish history and law. Woolf explains that though Ben Gurion was an atheist, he had a profound Jewish awareness.
“If you go back to the Jewish calendar, there is always a period of reflection before the high holidays,” Woolf told The Media Line. “It’s a standard motif within Jewish tradition. You have to have an understanding of the beliefs of what the holidays are. It was formally developed by biblical or rabbinical tradition. Memorial Day into Independence Day is just a modern embodiment of an old tradition.”
It’s a tradition that Bachrach will honor with her 6 children and 14 grandchildren in memory of her fallen son. Though they will spend their morning together at a cemetery, it won’t be a completely dark day.
“There will be jokes and happy stories,” Bachrach said, “then we’ll go home and have a great meal. It’s something I did even years before my son was killed. We invite couples over, discuss independence and where each of our families came from.”
The longstanding Jewish tradition of turning tragedy to triumph, from Yom HaZikaron to Yom HaAtzmaut, from Memorial Day to Independence Day, from commemorating to celebrating is a custom that allows the Israeli people to reflect, uniting the nation in appreciation of all that they’ve lost for all that they’ve gained.