'Remember that behind the national grief there are personal tears'
Photo: EPA
Yoaz Hendel
The shadow behind us
Op-ed: For one day, remember Israel survives thanks to individual's willingness to sacrifice his life for it
Remember the fallen.
Remember that they loved this country their way and not your way. That they loved it with God and without him.
Remember that they enlisted in the army in order to live, that they put on their uniform in order to be like everyone else. Just another link within a country which is still new. Remember that they went one day and waved goodbye, that they left their warm house in order to return and not in order to bid farewell.
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Remember that they loved it from the left and from the right. With a Greater Israel and against the occupation.
Remember that in their death they didn't order us to do anything – how could they order? After all, they didn't know anything and didn't plan any of this memory.
Remember that none of them was a saint. They were like you and me – human beings, flesh and blood, young people who got angry and laughed, insulted people furiously and embraced them with love.
Remember that even when they left to fight in the battlefield – they thought about life and about tomorrow, and not about the price and pain that death holds.
Remember the shadow standing behind us on days of raising children and a family. Remember the desire for peace and tranquility from Isaiah's vision to the Declaration of Independence – remember the need to fight all the years from the declaration of reality.
Remember that behind the national grief there are personal tears. Families torn apart, siblings whose course of life has changed from one end to another.
Remember that behind the dead remained heartbroken girlfriends, friends whose dreams from a young age turned into an adult's nightmares. Remember that behind the personal and private there is a general history and one country. A country which was founded and survives thanks to the individual's willingness to sacrifice his life for it.
Remember that those who fall can stand up again, and they will never get up.
Remember for one day, between the sirens, during the ceremonies and while facing the pictures and sad songs. Remember for one day, because during the rest of the year it is good for a country like ours to fall into routine and forget a little.
