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December 11, 1998/ 22 Kislev 5759, Vol. 51, No. 12
'A Profound Gift'VICKI CABOT
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 Phoenix Mission participants grab hands and spontaneously dance around the seven-branched menorah outside the Israeli Knesset in Jerusalem. Such emotion and enthusiasm characterized the 10-day trip to the Jewish state. Photo by Gary Steiner |
A trip to Israel.
It was an opportunity to connect with the Jewish past, to understand the present and, in the true spirit of Hanukkah, to commit to the future. Traveling the length and breadth of the Jewish state, some found, and others renewed, their ties to their Jewish heritage. In heartfelt words (see sidebar), and with hard-earned dollars ($651,321 was raised for the annual UJA/Federation campaign, according to campaign chair Steve Geringer,) they acted on that commitment, returning home with a heightened appreciation of what it means to be a Jew.
"It reaffirmed my sense of being Jewish," says Liz Tregor-Dokken. "It made me proud."
Participants in the Israel at 50 Mission, sponsored by Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix, spent eight days Oct. 27-Nov. 4 exploring the Jewish state. Their travels took them north to Haifa and then on to the Golan Heights and south to Masada and the waters of the Dead Sea. They explored the narrow walkways of the Old City of Jerusalem and traversed the bustling streets of Tel Aviv. Along the way, they learned of Israel's past, visiting the wondrous archaeological excavations at Beit She'an and Tzippori, and met its future, spending time with bright, motivated university students in Jerusalem, a microcosm of Israel's vast melting pot, and lively kindergartners at an after-school program in Kiryat Malachi, which has a special link with the Valley through the United Jewish Appeal's Partnership 2000 program.
Mission participants learned about the hard-won history of the state, its fight for independence and the subsequent wars to follow, visiting the vast Mount Herzl Cemetery in Jerusalem with its rows of military dead, and Yad Vashem, the national Holocaust memorial. They discussed issues as timely as pluralism and politics, land and security. They heard from Arab Israelis and from Ethiopian Jews. They met Russian and American immigrants to Israel; they visited beautiful agricultural cooperatives that are greening the desert with computerized irrigation systems and cutting-edge, high-technology incubators that rival those in the Silicon Valley.
Throughout the trip, mission leader Mark Schwartz, who wanted to lead the trip to mark his, and Israel's, 50th birthdays this year, together with bus captains Mim Bottner, Shelly Flexer, George Cohen and Dave Sherman, created a sense of shared purpose. Israeli guides on each of the buses provided essential background and running commentary, their knowledge augmented by a number of other prominent speakers throughout the week who gave form and context to the often overwhelming barrage of experiences and the emotions they evoked.
"I don't know how to describe the feeling," says Barnett Lotstein, another mission participant. "I felt a sense of pride, of identity, of connectedness. I didn't expect to be as emotionally affected as I was."
Often days went from laughter to tears and back again, as participants felt the intense joy, and intense pain, of their Jewishness. Near the end of the trip, keynote speaker Rabbi Donniel Hartman of the famed Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem explained that sharing those emotional highs and lows is the very essence of the Jewish experience.
"If you don't share the joys and pains of your people, then you are not part of the people," he said.
Speaking just before each of the four busloads of participants met to spend an hour or two sharing feelings about the meaningful eight days, he urged the group members to renew their commitment to the past and rededicate themselves to the future, regaining a sense of peoplehood through meaningful Jewish experience and connection to the Jewish state.
"Find out who you are," he said, and actualize that identity through your actions.
"For three-thousand years we've been walking together as a people," Hartman said. "It gives us a sense of destiny, of roots, of belonging."
And that, said Hartman, "is a profound gift."
| First-timers say they can't wait to return |