by Rick Steves
Israel’s ultra-Orthodox community dresses in black and sticks together.
Among ultra-Orthodox Jews, there are many groups who follow different teachers or rabbis. Rabbis are typically charismatic and have huge followings. (One died the day I arrived in Jerusalem, and the streets of the city were at a standstill as thousands came out to mourn.) In Mea She’arim, storefronts are lined with posters and paintings of the top rabbis; a quick survey tells you which are the most popular.
Leading rabbis have enthusiastic followings. They’re like pop stars…without the pop.
Israelis are split on the role that Orthodox Jews play in their society: Some see them as leaders of their faith, while others have a more negative view. One secular Israeli told me, “To these Hassidic Jews, I—with my modern ways—am the enemy. And to me, they are parasites. They don’t work. Our taxes pay them to just sit around and learn the Torah. Their ‘job’ is to be religious.”
All of this got me thinking about other charismatic religious leaders, and how Evangelical Christians back home can also get caught up in the teachings of one particular dynamic minister. Meanwhile, in both Christianity and Judaism, mainstream worshippers have a spiritual keel provided not by an individual, but by a steady liturgy or theology that doesn’t flex with the comings and goings of various leaders.
Religions around the world seem to always be stoking turmoil—even though the teachings of those religions say “love your neighbor,” and all of them have the “do unto others…” Golden Rule. I’ve decided that fundamentalism is the crux of the problem. I think the rainbow of religions on this planet is a delight—except for the fundamentalists in each. Perhaps there are “different strokes for different folks” fundamentalists, but it seems to me that, in a nutshell, a fundamentalist (Christian, Jew, or Muslim) believes, “I am correct in my understanding of God, and you are wrong”…and then proceeds to intrude into the lives of people who see their relation with God differently. And that’s reason enough to be thankful we live in a nation that is vigilant about protecting the separation of church and state.
The Muslim Quarter, with over half of the Old City’s population, is mostly Arab. But wandering the Muslim Quarter, I noticed several houses fortified and festooned with Israeli flags. These are homes of ultra-Zionist families determined to stake out this bit of the Old City for their Jewish community. Considering the rich historic heritage of each of these communities, it’s understandable that both vie for this sacred real estate.
Deep in the Muslim Quarter, a few houses boldly fly Israeli flags.
This struggle over control of Jerusalem is a huge political challenge. While complete Muslim control of Jerusalem is unrealistic, many Arabs envision an independent Palestinian state with this part of Jerusalem—East Jerusalem—as their capital. It’s a contentious issue, and Israel seems determined to keep Jerusalem whole and under its control.
And yet, exploring Jerusalem’s Old City—with its tight quarters and religious passions—I was impressed by the diversity, the feeling of community, and how things all seem to work together. Life is a celebration here, from the man who’s evangelical about the quality of his falafel, to the man whose niche in life is serving the sweetest pomegranate juice.
In Jerusalem’s Old City, the little things in life are celebrated.
Jerusalem’s Unforgettable Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial
In 2013, for the first time, Israel’s Jewish population passed 6 million. This is considered highly significant because it’s symbolic of the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust.
Understandably, Israel works to keep the memory of the millions of Jews killed by Hitler alive and strong. I imagine that with the passing of the generation that actually lived through that horror, this will become a bigger and bigger challenge. To help accomplish this, Israel has constructed a memorial and museum, called Yad Vashem, to honor those victims.
A visit to Yad Vashem is part of every Israeli’s upbringing. All visiting heads of state are also brought here. The modern state of Israel rose from the ashes of the Holocaust—and to understand the history of modern Israel, you must comprehend the cause and the enormity of that massacre. Yad Vashem imprints on visitors a searing impression of the suffering of the Jewish people under Nazi Germany, turning tourists into pilgrims.
The museum brings the hate-filled horror of Nazism to life. It primes you for the grounds, which are a place to think. A train car—one of countless German wagons once jammed with people en route to death camps—sits on rails that stop in mid-air high above.
Yad Vashem tells a compelling story and stirs powerful emotions.
In the Hall of Names, a vast archive surrounds a powerful collection of faces of Jews killed during the Holocaust. Of the roughly 6 million Jews murdered, about half have been identified by surviving family and friends. Pages of their testimony are archived here. The purpose: to give victims—whose deaths were as ignominious as their killers could manage—the simple dignity of being remembered.
Yad Vashem’s Hall of Names is an archive with a mission: to give each victim of the Holocaust the dignity of being remembered by name.
The Children’s Memorial starts with a gallery of photos showing the faces of adorable kids from many countries lost to the Holocaust. You learn that a quarter of Hitler’s victims were children. Then, stepping into a dark chamber, you’ll see one small light reflected by mirrors 1.5 million times to make a galaxy of flickering souls while a somber voice reads their names in a steady roll call. Emerging back into the daylight, I found myself trying to imagine how such a heritage would impact my outlook if I were Jewish.
Along the “Avenue of Righteous Gentiles,” trees are planted to honor non-Jews who risked their lives to help the persecuted. The memorial honors 24,000 Europeans who aided the Jews…while reminding us that another 160 million turned a blind eye. A recurring theme at Yad Vashem is how humanity ignored the plight of the Jews in the 1930s and 1940s. The memorial reminds us that when Hitler was warned that his plan to exterminate the Jewish race would damage his image, he responded, “Who remembers the Armenian genocide?”
For a powerful finale, the Yad Vashem memorial finishes with a platform overlooking the land Israelis have worked so hard to establish as the one nation on earth that is Jewish.
An Appreciation for Israel’s Determined Pioneers
To many, Israel represents a beacon of democracy, stability, and prosperity in the middle of a bunch of very troubled states. (Having traveled recently in Egypt and Iran, I can certainly appreciate that.) To others, its very existence is an offense against groups who were displaced after living here for centuries. As with everything here, it all depends on which people you talk to. And first, I talked to the Israelis. (Palestinian partisans, your turn is coming up.)
There are Jews who don’t concern themselves about Israel at all. There are Jews who think the state of Israel is a terrible, even un-Jewish idea. And there are Jews who believe that their people should live together in the single homeland God chose for them. These Jews are Zionists. Zionists built Israel.
During my visit, Israel was celebrating 65 years as a nation. Star of David flags flew everywhere. Perhaps caught up in the excitement, I welcomed the opportunity to gain an appreciation for the Zionist pioneers who built the country—slowly in the early 20th century, then very quickly after its modern founding in 1948—and to see how far the nation has come.
This iconic photograph of determined Zionists—still wearing their concentration camp stripes as they labor to create their country in the late 1940s—stirs the Israeli soul.
After World War II, a generation of Holocaust orphans helped end the Jewish Diaspora. Back then, there was an inspiring slogan: “A land without a people for a people without a land.” The problem was that this land wasn’t empty—it was inhabited, albeit sparsely, by many Palestinians. Still, when you look at a photo of the early Zionists who came here and mixed sand, sweat, brain power, and a determined vision into a powerful nat
ion, you can understand the passion Israelis have for their homeland. In the countryside, lush valleys farmed by co-operative communities called kibbutzes recall generations of patriotic Israelis who turned the desert into orchards.
I find the poignancy of nation-building most inspiring in the big coastal city of Tel Aviv. In 1908, Tel Aviv was just a big sand dune. Today the city feels like San Diego. The skyscrapers of Tel Aviv are exclamation points that seem to declare, “We’ve come a long way.”
Tel Aviv, born in 1909, must be the youngest major city on the Mediterranean.
Tel Aviv’s waterfront promenade is the place to rock to the rhythm of contemporary Israel—foamy cafés, sugar-sand beaches, and the beckoning Mediterranean. With a “use it or lose it” approach to the good life, young Israelis embrace the present. I see Tel Aviv as a fun-loving resort, just the opposite of Jerusalem. People in Tel Aviv told me that many don’t like the religiosity of Jerusalem. “The cities have two different mindsets. The sea makes you open. There’s no sea in Jerusalem, and no beach. In Jerusalem, everybody is political, religious, or a tourist.”
The relative prosperity between Israel and its neighbors is striking. Waking up on my first morning here, I looked out my hotel window at the wonderful sandy beach (which is made of sediment blown and washed over from the Nile River). Pondering the joggers and kayakers getting in their morning exercise, I kept thinking it’s as if someone put Southern California in the middle of Central America.
The historic town of Jaffa—now consumed by the sprawl of Tel Aviv—was the Ellis Island of the new state. This was where new arrivals first set foot in Israel. Much of historic Jaffa was destroyed in 1948, in what Israelis call their “War of Independence.” As in any war, there were winners and there were losers. When Israel celebrates its Independence Day each spring, the same day is mourned as “The Day of Catastrophe” on the other side of the wall. While Israelis set off fireworks, Palestinians remember the destruction of entire Arab communities that once thrived here and elsewhere, and how hundreds of thousands of those who survived ended up in refugee camps over a newly drawn border.
Each year on Israel’s Independence Day, the happy soundtrack of families enjoying BBQs fills the parks. It’s like the Fourth of July, only with Stars of David rather than Stars and Stripes.
A few blocks away, just over the wall, Palestinians in the West Bank mark that same day, which they call “The Day of Catastrophe,” with sadness and demonstrations.
How do you build a new nation? For one thing, it’s national policy to welcome all Jews into Israel. The “Law of Return” entices Jewish immigrants with grants and loans, subsidized housing, and classes to facilitate their assimilation. No matter how poor, foreign, and rough the returning Jew may be, the program expects to create well-educated, Hebrew-speaking Israelis out of his family within two generations. Israel claims to have successfully absorbed at least a million penniless refugees this way.
When you’re surrounded on all sides by enemies, military readiness is serious business. All Jewish Israelis go into the military at age 18: men for three years, women for two years. While the primary purpose is to protect the country, a strong secondary purpose for the universal draft is to build social cohesion. Military service functions as a kind of cultural boot camp for first-generation Israelis—new arrivals from places like Russia, Iraq, and Ethiopia. After three years in the army, they’re no longer F.O.B. (“fresh off the boat”).
Half of Israel’s population is first-generation immigrants. Those who are 18 years old go into the military—providing them with a crash course on how to be an Israeli.
While the “Law of Return” sounds wonderful, it’s a policy that angers many Palestinians I met. They recall how their parents were evicted from their villages—now plowed under and providing foundations for forests and parks—and wonder why a Russian Jew who has no connection with Israel is welcomed as if royalty, while a person whose family had lived there for two thousand years is not allowed to go home.
Israel’s Dogged Determination to Keep the High Ground
High in the mountains at the far-north end of Israel, the Gadot Lookout in the Golan Heights overlooks the upper Jordan River Valley. After Israel was created in 1948, its neighbors generally held the high ground around its borders. For a generation, Arabs could lob shells into the towns, kibbutzes, and farms of Israel below. Then, with their victory in the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel surprised all of its enemies (essentially destroying Egypt’s air force on the ground in minutes) and substantially increased its size. To the north, they could have waltzed right into Damascus. But Israel just wanted buffer territory. Today, Israel—determined never again to live under its enemies—controls this and all of the high ground around its borders.
Hearing an Israeli explain the importance of keeping the high ground while overlooking the Sea of Galilee from a former Syrian pillbox atop the Golan Heights, it was easy to get the point.
A similar spot is the fortification atop Mount Bental. From this Golan Heights viewpoint, you can look into Syria toward its capital, Damascus—just 35 miles to the north. As long as things are peaceful, the fort is treated as a scenic tourist depot. The trenches and barbed wire here provide a kind of commando playground for visiting Israelis. There’s even an open-air modern art gallery with installations made of rusty military hardware and barbed wire. The café on Mount Bental is named “Coffee Annan,” a clever reminder that former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan once led the UN troops stationed below.
Mount Bental’s fortifications are a fun tourist attraction in good times…and a strategic military stronghold in bad.
Towering above the Dead Sea is yet another fortified mountaintop—but this one’s 2,000 years old and in ruins. The powerful and historic Masada fortress was built back when the Jews were the rebellious subjects of Roman occupation. In A.D. 70, Roman Emperor Titus, in an effort to put down the Jews once and for all, destroyed much of Jerusalem, including the main Jewish temple. Nearly 1,000 Jewish rebels—the original Zealots—fled to this fortress to defend their families and faith. An army of 15,000 Romans attacked the rebels at Masada. Preferring a direct attack to a drawn-out siege, the Roman army had a huge ramp built up this mountain. Knowing the Zealots wouldn’t kill their own countrymen, the Romans forced Jewish slaves to do the backbreaking construction. Slowly, under the frustrated gaze of the rebels, the ramp was completed. The Zealots realized they were doomed to a life of slavery or worse. So, on the eve of the inevitable Roman breakthrough, Masada’s rebels methodically took their own lives.
At Masada in A.D. 70, Jewish rebels—facing imminent defeat by Roman soldiers—committed mass suicide. The hilltop ruins remain an important symbol for defense-minded Israelis.
Today, Masada reminds us that Israel’s staunch “they’ll never take us alive” commitment to independence started 2,000 years ago. This patriotic site is popular for Israeli schoolchildren, for the ceremony swearing in Israeli soldiers, and for tourists.
Imagine a people maintaining their culture and traditions for nearly two millennia without a homeland. Imagine them remembering the holy temple destroyed and that epic last stand ending in mass suicide on a fortified hilltop. Imagine a generation of people whose parents were killed in the Holocaust and who, with a love of their heritage, found themselves in the position to retake what they believed to be their homeland. A rallying cry among these Zionists is “Masada shall never fall again.”
More and more Israeli Jews, along with people around the world who care about peace in the Middle East and believe in the survival of a strong and secure Jewish state, think Israel would be wise to lighten up a bit on the Palestinian issues. But when you travel here and interact with the older generation, you appreciate why most of them take every threat to their nation extremely seriously—and make their own rules for security without waiting for anyone else’s approval. These people remember 1967, when Hebrew-language propaganda radio from Egypt broadcast to a young generation of I
sraelis: “Dear fish of the Mediterranean, don’t bother eating now—because in a few days, you’ll be dining on two million Jews.”
Christian Pilgrims Flock to the Sea of Galilee
As a Christian, I enjoy making travel a spiritual experience—whether hiking on a ridge high in the Swiss Alps with nothing but nature and the heavens around me, or stepping into the great cathedrals of Europe to be bathed in sunlight filtered through exquisite stained glass created by poor and simple people with a powerful faith nearly a thousand years ago. I’m touched by the delicate yet mighty love of parents for their little children in hardscrabble corners, and I’m inspired by the faith of people who see God differently than I do. Being tuned into my spirituality as I travel enhances my experience.
For a person of faith to travel without letting the experience stir what’s inside them is a lost opportunity. Of course, many people actually go on religious trips—pilgrims on pilgrimages. While I’ve never done exactly that, every time I’m at a pilgrimage site, I endeavor to keep a positive attitude about the devotion that surrounds me. It’s easy to be cynical about the reverence given to relics I don’t understand, the determination many have to believe in what seem like silly miracles, or the needless pain someone suffers in the name of their faith—whether by climbing a mountain in bare feet or a long staircase on their knees. But it’s far more meaningful to let your heart be warmed.
Meditating on Bible lessons where they actually took place helps a Christian better connect with the word of God.
