April 17, 2026
We are in the midst of a ten-day period of modern Jewish holidays that began Monday evening with Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. Rabbi Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi labeled these days, in this week’s For Heaven’s Sake podcast, as Israel’s “10 Days of Awe.” The days continue from Yom HaShoah to Yom HaZikaron, the day to remember Israel’s fallen soldiers, and conclude on Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day. We associate the 10 Days of Awe with the traditional liturgical time on the Jewish calendar between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Tying these modern holidays to the traditional 10 Days of Awe elevates their meaning, as these days invite us to dive into our past and recognize the thread that connects the Jewish people across the present moment and throughout history.
In the podcast, Rabbi Hartman refers to the holidays as a “speed bump to stop you from your regular flow of life. A holiday descends on you and demands something of you. It demands that you think about something. It demands that you remember. It demands that you concentrate on a certain value or idea. That’s the way all holidays work.” It’s a remarkable metaphor because speed bumps are meant to slow us down. In my neighborhood, they were installed because people drove too fast, putting young children in danger. To call the holidays speed bumps shows us that we need to slow down and pause. In Israel, on Yom HaShoah, sirens blare and everything stops for two minutes. On Yom Ha’atzmaut, the nation stops—and the celebration begins. The debates pause for a day, and we simply celebrate Israel’s existence.
Yossi Klein Halevi adds another layer to the conversation when he explains that Yom HaShoah is the consequence of Jewish powerlessness. Yom HaZikaron is the consequence of Jewish power, as we mourn the lives of those who fought to create and preserve independence. Finally, Yom Ha’atzmaut is the day we “suspend our grief, agony, and debate” and simply celebrate that we exist.
I appreciate the need to pause the debate so we can celebrate our existence. God knows (literally) that we, as a Jewish people, spend much of our time debating and discussing who we are and where we are going. We spend days doing that. For one day, we need to celebrate. If these are days that call on us to remember and concentrate on a certain value or idea, then let us do just that. Can we remember where we came from? Can we remember the stories of those who helped build the State of Israel?
When I read The Genius of Israel by Dan Senor and Saul Singer last year, I was drawn to a story about a man named Tzvika Fayirizen (pp. 108–111), who retired in 2020 after 35 years of service in the IDF. His final position was commanding the IDF Education Corps. Fayirizen wondered why the IDF had an education corps when no other Western country did. He asked what motivates a young person to respond to their enlistment letter by saying, “I want to be a combat soldier,” and to take an oath to die for a cause greater than themselves.
He offers three answers. First, the willingness to die for one’s brothers and sisters in arms. He acknowledges, however, that a young person has not yet gone through training, so there must be something more. His second answer is what he calls the heritage of battle—stories shared by previous generations of soldiers, passed down as a sense of responsibility.
For me, though, the third answer is the most compelling. Fayirizen shares that when he turned 18, his grandfather took him on a walk and told him a story no one in the family had ever heard before. His grandfather had served in the Polish army, was captured by the Germans, and lined up in front of a pit to be executed. Instead, he threw himself into the pit, waited until everyone had died, and then escaped into the forest. He went on to serve with the partisans during the Holocaust.
Then Fayirizen’s grandfather said, “During those six years, I had many dreams. I dreamed of food. I dreamed of my wife and son” (no one had known he had a wife and son before coming to Israel). “I had many dreams, but I could not dream of one thing. A person can only dream of something they can imagine, and I never imagined that I would walk unbowed as a Jew in the State of Israel—and that this country would be mine.”
Then he shared words that struck me deeply: “Do me a favor. Make sure that it does not fall apart.” As we celebrate Israel’s 78th birthday, we think about all the people who have done the sacred work of keeping Israel alive. It is a place that allows Judaism and Jewish culture to thrive. It is a place at the heart of the Jewish people, even if we do not all live there. As Fayirizen says, it is a home we are meant to nurture and protect.
If that is a story to remember, then perhaps the idea we should reflect on is found in the closing words of Theodor Herzl’s The Jewish State, published in 1896. He writes, “The Jews who wish for a State will have it… We shall live at last as free men on our own soil and die peacefully in our own homes.” Herzl envisioned a state that would benefit both the Jewish people and humanity. Yom Ha’atzmaut is a time to celebrate what Israel has contributed—not only to the Jewish people, but to the world—through advances in science, literature, technology, community, and more.
The debates and the grief can be suspended for the day. These are days to remember—and to celebrate.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Rick Kellner