By COLlive reporter
The Israeli Knesset Parliament in Jerusalem held a special session on Tuesday honoring the Rebbe on the 20th anniversary of Gimmel Tammuz.
Legislators from across the political spectrum expressed their deep appreciation for the Rebbe and the selfless work of his followers around the country and the world.
“20 years of the passing of the Rebbe of Lubavitch” was suggested by Yaakov Margi, Knesset member for the Sephardic Shas party.
In the opening, Speaker of the Knesset Yuli Edelstein welcomed the session and emphasized the Rebbe’s “love for every Jew with all his heart and soul.”
Edelstein, who was a refusenik in the former Soviet Union, noted how Lubavitch helped keep his Jewish flame alive, smuggled him a siddur and married him off in a Jewish ceremony.
“What is so amazing is that the same stories can be told by anyone who visited Chabad centers in Kathmandu, Mumbai, Beer Sheva or Manhattan,” he said.
The session was co-chaired by Arab Knesset member Ahmad Tibi, who serves as Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, and Ethiopian Knesset member Pnina Tamano-Shata of the Yesh Atid party.
Speakers included members of the Shas party – Arye Deri, Avraham Michaeli, Nissim Zeev, Yitzchak Cohen, Eli Yishai and Amnon Cohen, the latter both graduates of the Chabad school system in Israel and Uzbekistan.
Cohen related that in June of 1948, after Golda Meir was appointed Israel’s Ambassador to the Soviet Union, she instructed delegates to bring with them a pair of Tefillin to smuggle into the Iron Curtain.
“I don’t know how the Rebbe’s instruction got to her,” he said, “but they got where the Rebbe wanted them to go.”
Knesset member Shuli Mualem of HaBayit HaYehudi religious Zionist party, pointed out how the Rebbe saw the women as equals of men in the mission to repair the world.
“In 1952 the Rebbe founded the Nshei Ubnos Chabad, the Chabad’s women’s organization, a trailblazer back then,” she said.
Speaking on behalf of the United Torah Judaism party (Yahadut Hatorah) were Meir Porush and Menachem Eliezer Moses.
Dov Khenin, member of Jewish-Arab socialist party, told of his grandfather, the chossid R’ Yaakov Alter Khenin, who helped spread Yiddishkeit in Belarus and later built a shtible in Tel Aviv.
Israeli Deputy Minister of Education Avi Wortzman noted in his remarks that “the last weeks involved lots of pain, but we also saw an unprecedented Jewish unity. We need to continue the Rebbe’s legacy in these times.”
Knesset member David Rotem of the Yisrael Beiteinu party mentioned the Schneerson Archive which is still being held by Russian authorities in Moscow, which the Rebbe insisted must be returned to Chabad’s hands in New York.
Rotem told of the impact he felt from meeting the Rebbe at 770 Eastern Parkway. “Those moments are engraved in my mind, and that’s why I keep a photo of that moment in my office,” he said.
Hilik Bar, Deputy Speaker of the Knesset and Secretary General of the Labor Party, said it was “important for me to speak about the Rebbe although I’m not religious. He worried about the individual and the global community.”
Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Yair Shamir spoke of the Rebbe’s “power and legacy that continues with us” and that “he was the true spiritual leader of the Jewish nation in our times.”
Shamir also recalled the relationship his father Yitzhak Shamir had with the Rebbe, beginning from his service in the Mossad and later as Israeli Prime Minister, serving two terms.
Deputy Minister of Religious Affairs, Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan spoke about meriting to be present in the meeting between the Rebbe and Israel’s then Chief Rabbis Avraham Shapiro and Mordechai Eliyahu, OBM.
“As Israel fights for its survival, there’s no coalition and opposition,” stated Knesset member Rabbi Yoav Ben-Tzur. “And it is now that we remember the Rebbe who is surely praying for the nation and its safety.”
He added, “Unfortunately, the Rebbe isn’t with us. But I have met him in schools, in centers around Israel and the world. Let us learn from his legacy and go in his way to prepare.”
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Feiglin !!? hes the one carrying the Rebbes ideas and hopefully will bring an end to the madness of oslo, the biggest failure, costing many Jewish lives….
It’s interesting that wherever you stand politically or religiously, genuine love and concern penetrates deeply, touching the heart and soul that breaks all barriers…. This is what the Rebbe uniquely achieved
the knesset is empty 🙁