Dear Friends,
In only a few days, we gather again around the Seder table and remind ourselves and most importantly our children, about that unique moment in the history of our people and humanity. That moment, when we simultaneously discovered our identity as a people, our freedom and our mission in this world, Tikkun olam.
A few days after Pesach, we observe Holocaust Memorial Day, Yom Hashoah. On this day, thousands of young Jews from around the world will gather at Auschwitz to participate in The March of Living. This year, as the Chairman of the Jewish Agency, I will have the privilege of leading this march.
The connecting thread between these two events, which appear at first glance to be dissimilar, is the imperative to remember. In both cases, we make a big effort to make sure that the knowledge and memory of these events will stay with the next generations of Jews.
My own life, as the life of many Soviet Jews of my generation, proves that these events can be fully erased from our collective memory. Growing up as an assimilated Jew in the Soviet Union, I knew nothing about our Jewish history, holidays and traditions, or even about the horrors of the Holocaust that occurred but a few years prior to my birth in the very place where I grew up. The relentless dictatorial Communist regime did everything it could to erase our collective memory as a nation, knowing only too well that this was the surest way to turn us into little cogs in the machinery of the Soviet regime.
It was only when we reconnected once again to our Jewish roots and history that we found the courage to challenge the Soviet regime. I vividly remember my first Seder in Moscow in 1973, how I and my fellow refuseniks and Aliyah activists struggled with the Hebrew text of the Haggadah. But each time we came to the words, "This year we are slaves, next year may we be free men"; or "In every generation enemies rise up against us seeking to destroy us" or Next Year in Jerusalem, we needed no translation. We felt that we were, in fact, reliving that Biblical exodus and like way back then, we are rediscovering the power of identity, the power of freedom, and the power of our grand mission--Tikkun olam.
Tyrannical regimes, however, are not the only threat to our collective memory. In today's Global Village when the bonds connecting many of us to our faith and to each other are weakening and when Israel finds itself under constant attack, many young Jews are becoming disconnected from their Jewish identity, their Jewish roots and from the State of Israel.
From the very beginning of its founding, the Jewish Agency had the unique mission of unifying the Jewish People in support of the Jewish state and in the historic process of the ingathering of exiles. Today, in order to continue this mission, we must do our best to bring every Jew to the "Seder table" and to let him or her experience that unique pride and belonging to our unique history, heritage and destiny. This is the crucial and imposing challenge before us -- a challenge summoning us --all of us-- to action.
Together, we can successfully meet this challenge.
Chag kasher v"sameach to you and your family.
Sincerely,
Natan
