Shalom, bitzchut mori u’bizchut morati, baruch ata adonai eloheinu melech haolam, she’echiyanu v’ekiyemanu v’ehygiyanu lazeman haze.
Dr. Fisher, the President of the Government of the Canton Basel, Dan Tichon, the Speaker of the Knesset, and Dr. Stamm, the President of the National Parliament of Switzerland, dear delegates.
I would like to envision Dr. Theodore Herzl sitting with us here, up there on the balcony, having a report from us, the Zionists of a century later, about what happened since his early departure from the Zionist activity, dying so early in his life. I would like to take Dr. Herzl on a very short and brief tour along the century we just finished these days. Very few of the details that you envisioned, wrote about, dreamt about, spoke about, conspired with your diary about, came about - few details. But on the other hand a big thing - The dream. The prophecy. The fulfillment happened. The miracle you wanted is a reality when you look at this real dream, you know this reality is much better than anything you could have expected, prayed and hoped for. It was an amazing century, Dr. Herzl, an unbelievable one, from the cornerstone you placed a century ago, we turned from being a very old and ancient people to a very new, modern and progressive one. And maybe, we should consider adding a subtitle to your book and calling it: “Alt-neu Land fur ein alt-neu Volk”.
You can’t imagine what happened to us in this century. Only ten decades. We retrieved and renovated our ancient language, and on the shoulders and wings of our language we actually renovated our ancient culture from a deep past into the far future. We came back -- we came back to the land. We came back to the regions. We came back to the historic sites, to the archeological and biblical excavations. We came back to the original Jewish names of Jewish individuals living in the Holy Land of Israel. And we came back to a place that we were far away for so many years. We came back to the cradle of our civilization, our beloved land of Israel.We came back to the family of nation and acquired for ourselves an honorable place, and honorable status unprecedented in the life of the Jewish people during its entire history.
The Jewish people of today are not a passive people any more. They are, perhaps, the most active people around the world. I would say - or dare say - that they are almost hyper-active people in comparison to the 2000 years of passivity enforced on us despite our good will.
During this century, when we came back to ourselves, to our senses, to our land, to our culture, to our language, to the present time from the past, we took out of ourselves two unbelievable exhausting energies:
The total absolute energy of destruction of the Holocaust and the unbelievable total and absolute energy of the construction of the redemption of the people and building the State of Israel.
You were right, Dr. Herzl, Europe betrayed us. And for six million brothers and sisters of ours, children and elderly people. We were not ready enough. Not on time. Too many of you, too many of us, did not listed to you. Did not hear your outcry, did not see the writing on the wall for all of us. And we shall never have enough tears to cry for the loss of the Jewish people. But we learnt our lesson. When you visited Israel a century ago, in order to meet “Kaiser Wilheim”, there were only approximately 50,000 Jews in the Holy Land of Israel. A hundred years later we are more than a hundred times that. Eager as a people, many people from the four corners of the earth, seventy different Diaspora’s, regathered and immigrated to our homeland. It is not that we expect the (Olim) to thank us - we thank them, we thank you - all of the olim of the last century coming to Israel because by coming by (aliya) you elevated the people.
And today, when you look at the Jewish people, the mosaic of the Israeli society is from Morocco, Romania, Poland, Yemen, Syria, Germany and from the whole universe. You understand that we, in Israel today, are the richest society in it’s human resources in the entire world. When you understand what happened just in the last ten years to our people, when Israel kept it’s doors open for refugees from the former Soviet Union countries, for people to come from the deep deserts of Ethiopia, you have a source of pride for our national moral. Israel is the only civilization in the Western modern world which did not deny immigrants that knocked at it’s doors and did not say we have“Guestarbeiter” problems. We have black and white tensions. This is your home, knock on the door and like every home, somebody with a smile will open the door, embrace you, kiss you, give you something to eat and be happy that you came home.
When you look at this country there (abip ateimisrah),at the edge of the Orient, don’t misunderstand the heat. It is not just the weather, it is like Basel, and it is not even - God forbid - the heat of the melting and dismantling of this society. This is the heat of the meeting. This is the heat of the hearts, of brothers and sisters who were separate from each for 2000 years and thanks to you, Dr. Herzl, we meet each other again and again and again....
When you envisioned our State of Israel, our sovereignty, our independent place, you did not envision a century of bloodshed. You did not see the victims, you did not see the prices. But you knew that there will be peace in Israel. For one school of thought from another school of thought - the entire Jewish people is united by it’s motivation to bring peace, and for us peace is like parents that are expecting a new baby. Pregnancy and the birth process has a lot of pain, a lot of suffering, much agony and a lot of blood. But at the end of the process we have new life, and this peace will come around. It will come about as peace out of power, as peace out of might, as peace out of victories, peace out of morality, because the Jewish people living in Israel are not a Jewish people who are ready to compromise the tradition of the Chapters of Fathers and do answer mihu hagibor- who is a hero, he who controls his passion and who is a hero among heroes, he who makes his worst enemy his beloved friend. This is a very difficult , painful, moral decision that our generation has to make. To compromise the dream. To compromise the land as difficult as it is. We believe that we are ready to try very carefully, cautiously, securing ourselves around to try to compromise our whole dream of the greater land of Israel, for the future of the entire nation. It is a painful thing. It is a pain for the hope for the tikva. It is a prize for our children’s generation. When we come to the region and want to integrate ourselves in the Middle East, we have a Zionist message to our neighbors. Let us put an end to the brutality and let us renew our spirituality for the betterment of the entire world. We have it. We have it for ourselves. We have it together. Let us do it because peace is one of our good Lord’s name, and because this is in Israel. The Western world is a free world which is used to living in an unprecedented reality.
We have one enemy. An enemy which has no face, no ideology, no leadership, no organization, no troops - This enemy looks as if it is winning us. The name of this enemy is assimilation. The Jewish people is evaporating. Dr. Herzl, you have made your way to Judaism all the way from assimilation on your own. Your words still echo in our ears, and they are still correct as the operational program for the Jewish people for the next century of Zionism. You said at the time, “the return to Zionism is primarily a return to Judaism”. And I, therefore, l believe that the new Jewish Zionist agenda for the century to come is the struggle for the spiritual distress of the Jewish people because my generation for the sake of the positive answer we must give to our children’s generation, we must say, yes, the Jewish people will survive without an external enemy. And together, we in Israel with the strength of Jewish unity, are still committed in building the exemplary community which will reflect the Jewish microcosm which is based on religious tolerance and social pluralism for the message of ticonu la’am , repairing and correcting the word. And this modern peace and tolerance will bring about the next dream of Zionism and this is a massive tidal wave of aliya from Jewish communities and Jewish individuals from the Western free world. This is good and essential and crucial for the life of the communities abroad. It is something more than needed and much more welcome by the Israeli society. “Welcome Jews” - the doors are still open.
And here is Basel - thank you Basel for allowing Theodore Herzl to be here a century ago and let time have the stage of our modern renaissance. Here started the resurrection of the Jewish body. The redemption of the prisoners and the rescue of the souls of Jews for which we dedicated the last Herzlian century. The next century - so do believe, will be the century of the renaissance of Jewish spirituality and the rebirth of modern Jewish morality, so help us God.
In forty-six we came back to Basel. We came back from the ashes. We came back from the camps. We came back from the death and we said Hai V’kayam. And before we went to the land of Israel, we had a Zionist Congress here which was the Zionist Congress of the re-birth of the Jewish people. Here we started a century ago here we came back in the names, some of the names of people who were here in forty-six and are the founding fathers of the founding parents of our beloved State of Israel. When I call your name, please stand up.
The elder of the tribe, my dear friend - Isaac Ben Aaron
A dedicated fighter and a partisan - Stephen Greg
An active Zionist and a passionate speaker - Jacques Durchine
A political partner and a reliable friend - Kalman Sultanik
Somebody who was there when I was born - Mr.Eyal Hedler
A Swiss born activist of “Hashomer Hatzair” - Hanny Bornstein, Dr. Mail Cortic
and last but not least, one I owe my entire life to , my dear teacher, mentor, friend, partner, grandfather of my children....my dear father - Dr. Joseph Burg
Those who were delegates of the Congress and many others who participated and were not delegates, but with us here today, thank you very much for the legacy you left for our generation. Thank you Dr. Herzl, we won’t disappoint here, we shall continue your prophecy for our children. lema’an netzach Israel, hazak hazak venitchazek