THE SHOOTINGs on Thursday of last week have left Israelis worried about further attacks. Before the shots were fired, leaving eight students dead, there had not been a serious attack in Jerusalem for four years.
But apart from these obvious fears, the incident has proved particularly emotive for other reasons.
Israelis are used to seeing the staples of secular life targeted — cafés, shopping malls, and, in Tel Aviv in 2005, a packed discothèque. This time it was a yeshiva, an institution of higher religious learning, traditionally considered even more sacred than a synagogue.
Choosing to translate yeshiva as “rabbinic training school”, the world’s media has failed to grasp the significance of this. Instead of an esoteric institution for trainee ministers alone, a yeshiva is a centre where religious men who will go into all sorts of careers study for two or more years after leaving school. Its sacredness is accepted by religious and secular Israelis alike.
Another nuance of the attack missed overseas is that it took place shortly after nightfall on the second day of Rosh Chodesh. This means that it happened just a few hours into Adar 2, the month of Purim.
Israelis — religious and secular alike — herald the arrival of Purim as the start of the carnival season. Purim marks the turning of the tables in the Book of Esther, transforming the Jewish people from victim to victor as their destruction loomed.
The most important nuance that has been missed is the specific institution chosen. The 700-student yeshiva is one of the largest and most important — Mercaz HaRav Kook, named after its founder, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the first chief rabbi of mandate Palestine.
The umbrella organisation of the settlers, the Yesha Council, has declared itself convinced the choice of target was intentional. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at the start of his cabinet meeting on Sunday: “Mercaz Harav is a very special place in Jerusalem and for the Zionist movement. It is the flagship of religious Zionism.”
Proponents of this religious-political ideology — many and politically powerful — are already a serious obstacle to reconciliation between Israel and the Palestinians that the US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, spent last week pushing for.
Having witnessed death in their holy of holies, they have already stepped up their protests against the government.
Yuli Tamir, the education minister and a founder of the organisation Peace Now, was forced to cut short a condolence visit to Mercaz HaRav Kook on Sunday, after being verbally attacked by angry young people gathered outside. She told the press that, while the atmosphere inside the yeshiva was restrained, “the mob that gathered outside greeted me with harsh chants, including ‘murderer’.”
The attack will not only exacerbate the political conflict between the religious right and the government. It will also spur direct action that will make any territorial compromise even harder to implement. The yeshiva’s students, alumni, and admirers will be looking for a constructive channel for their grief — and will almost certainly turn to invigorated settlement-building.
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