Israel
I think there are three things we can learn from antisemites: the Jewish people are an inseparable unit, the Jewish people are powerful, and all Jews are Israelis.
The third one, that all Jews are Israelis, needs some explaining.
When you hear the name Israel, what does it refer to?
Probably the country Israel — but not surprisingly, it’s more complicated than that.
In this week’s Parsha, Yaakov finds himself on a riverbank at night, alone, and is attacked by a mysterious angel, whom he wrestles and overpowers. At daybreak, the angel blesses Yaakov with a new name — Yisrael — explaining, “because you have lorded (sar) over angel (El) and man.”
From there, we get Bnei Yisrael — the Children of Israel — as the Torah’s name for our people.
Then Moses drops the bnei, “children,” and calls the people simply Yisrael — “Shema Yisrael…” The nation as a whole had become Israel.
Only much later, in the book of Samuel, do we first encounter the term Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel, and there it clearly means the land of the people called Israel.
Fascinatingly, after King David and Solomon, the kingdom split. The ten northern tribes sided with Yeravam, a minister in King Solomon’s court, and only Yehuda and Binyamin went with Rechavam, Solomon’s son, as their king. The northern kingdom is named Israel, and the southern kingdom is Judah or Judea. Shortly after, the ten tribes were conquered by the Assyrians and dispersed — hence the Ten Lost Tribes — and the name Yehudim, or Jew, for all those remaining, including many centuries later, Mordecai HaYehudi. In essence, though, the people are still Israel.
Fast-forward to May 12, 1948 — just two days before the Declaration of Independence — the People’s Administration, a ten-member cabinet-in-waiting led by David Ben-Gurion, had to decide on the name for the “new” country. Several names were proposed, including Zion and, of course, Judea, but Israel won the vote, and the people of the land that was once called the land of the people Israel are now the people who live in a land called Israel; Israelis are born.
However, our antisemitic friends, by consistently placing the responsibility for Israel on all Jews, remind us — correctly — that Israel, the country, is not a country like any other; it’s the land of the people called Israel!
