Israeli Memorial Day
Today, April 14th, Israel is celebrating memorial day. There are a few things that make this day very special and unique and we thought it might be encouraging and edifying to share them with you. In this strange season that we have been in, in which so many have lost so much, the Israeli way of celebrating memorial day has a calming and soothing effect. When the war of independence ended in 1949, over 28,000 Israelis lost their lives. The fighting actually started before the war with what Israelis call the "War of the Roads." On November 29th, 1947, the UN announced its partition plan. Beginning just a few days later, in December, the local Arab leaders decided to block the roads and starve out the isolated Jewish settlements. In Jerusalem, for example, they cut of the water pumps and blocked the roads so that the population there had no access to water or food. Convoys from Tel Aviv tried to break through the road blocks to bring flour and water. Some were successful an