State of Israel turns 59
Monday night torch-lighting ceremony marks end of Memorial Day,
ushers in Independence Day celebrations
Lilach Shoval
Latest Update: 04.23.07, 22:40 / Israel News
Israel's leaders on Monday evening participated in a torch-lighting
ceremony at Mount Herzl, marking the end of Memorial Day and the
beginning of Israel's 59th Independence Day. At 8 pm, guests of
honor lit 12 torches, with the lighting of the final torch serving
as the official kick of for Independence Day celebrations.
Acting President Dalia Itzik, whose speech opened the ceremony,
referenced the connection between Independence Day and Memorial
Day, saying "our grief encompasses our joy.
"Dear citizens, we live in a long war whose end we cannot see.
Alongside our peace treaties with Jordan and Egypt, we hear from
near and far, constant sounds of war." Addressing the source of
such incitement, she asked Iran and Syria to "leave off your
wickedness, for Israel lives and lets live."
"Residents of Iran, Syria and the Palestinian Authority, has there
not been enough blood spilled, yours and ours? Replace your
Katyushas and Qassams with computers and education, and finally, be
rewarded with peace and quiet," she said.
Torch-bearers at this year's ceremony were:
* Yitzhak Navon: A former Israeli president, in office from
1978-1983.
* Eliyahu Sakharov: The aide to the Hagannah chief in the
30s.
* Shulamit Cohen-Kishik: A Mossad agent from the late 40s, who
helped bring persecuted Jews from Arab nations to Israel and
escaped a death sentence in Beirut.
* Professor Joseph Shenkar: A world renowned
obstetrician/gynecologist, director of the OBGYN wing of Hadassah
hospital and professor at Hebrew University.
* Avinoam Mor-Haim: An actor, and father of Dvir, who was killed in
Lebanon.
* Rachel Saad-Nakar: A former fighter in the Lehi pre-state
resistance movement and sister of Meir Nakar - one of the last
Jewish fighters to be executed by the British in 1947.
* Mordechai Eliav: The founder and director of the 'First
Jerusalem' midrasha, the 'To Jerusalem' education center and the
Western Wall Heritage Foundation. He is a Holocaust survivor.
* Uri Amadi: Founded a work program in Jerusalem, promoting
education of youths from East Jerusalem who work in the
market.
* Professor Nava Ben-Zvi: A leading figure for the advancement of
higher education in the sciences in Israel, she was a founder of
the Open University in 1975 and is now president of Hadassah
College, in Jerusalem.
* Ruth Heshin: President of the Jerusalem Foundation, which aims to
improve the wellbeing of city residents.
* Senior Staff Sergeant Major Avraham Yehuda Shriki: A senior
sapper in the Jerusalem district police force, he received numerous
citations for his treatment of carbombs in Jerusalem, the removal
of a missile from the body of a wounded soldier, and the
neutralization of a suicide bomb on a captured terrorist.
* Police chief superintendent Faras Faraj: He served during the
Second Lebanon War as the commander of the police station in Kiryat
Shmona, a town that was hit by over a thousand rockets at that
time.
* Staff Sergeant (res) Yosef Lieberman: The son of Holocaust
survivors, he served in each of Israel's wars since the War of
Attrition and received a citation for service from the Chief of IDF
Central Command
* Major (res) Dr. Dor Yehuda: An expert in orthopedic surgery, who
volunteered to serve in Lebanon during last summer's war.
In addition to the torch lighting, the ceremony was also comprised
of musical performances and speeches by important public
figures.
Defense Minister Amir Peretz invited families of kidnapped Israeli
soldiers to the ceremony at Mount Herzl.
Among those who attended were the families of the three soldiers
kidnapped by Hizbullah in 2000, the families of Ehud Goldwasser and
Eldad Regev kidnapped by Hizbullah in 2006, and the family of
Zachary Baumel, captured in battle in 1982.
Israel of 2007 is a very different country from Israel in 1948. The
population has grown almost by almost nine times and stands at
almost seven million people. Israel now has five cities with over
200,000 residents each, a far cry from 1948, when Tel Aviv was the
only city with over 100,000 residents.
