NOT CELEBRATING

David Geffen notes in his article (“Basking in our nascent independence,” May 3) that Rabbi Herzog of the Yeshurun Synagogue hosted a morning service attended by the chief rabbis and prime minister, and stated, “We stand at the threshold of humanity’s reparation for the great injustice meted out to the Jewish people. Just as one good deed leads to another, so will this act of recompense spread throughout the world. We are at the beginning of the redemption of the whole world, which was foretold by the prophets.”

This was 1950 and indeed it must have looked like that, with the Jewish people at last in their historic homeland. They could never have imagined how all their sacrifices would be in vain: that there would be Israeli governments willing to surrender the land they fought and died for.

They could never have imagined Moshe Dayan, after the loss of thousands of our people in the Six Day War, begging our enemies to stay and telling them their Muslim flag over the Temple Mount must remain – as the Temple Mount meant little to us, with the result that Jews trying to access our holiest site are treated like criminals.

They could never have imagined that, today, a prime minister with the undeniable strength of the IDF has allowed our enemies to grow into strong armies, by supporting their every demand, due to his fear of confronting and destroying them; that today, after a barrage of some 700 rockets and five deaths, he once again surrendered to their demands and will allow Qatar to double its money to them in the sum of $30 million, together with the easing of restrictions that were nonetheless never kept.

While the blood of our people flows and our land burns and the enemy stands strong, I see no cause for today’s celebrations.

YENTEL JACOBS

Netanya