Some Remarks on the Book of a Freedom Fighter and a Friend

Dr. Israel Eldad

Principles for a Hebrew Liberation Movement
by Dr. Eldad

Transcripts of Dr. Israel Eldad on IDF Radio

Excerpts from Dr. Israel Eldad's Op-Ed Column

Collection from Zote Ha'aretz
by Dr. Eldad

Memorial for Fighters for the Freedom of Israel
by Dr. Eldad

What We Need Is A King
by Dr. Eldad

You Should Be Ashamed!
by Dr. Eldad

Jabotinsky Distorted
by Dr. Eldad

The Fifth of Iyar
by Dr. Eldad

Temple Mount in Ruins
by Dr. Eldad

Jerusalem: The City of Faith
by Dr. Eldad

The Challenge of Jerusalem
by Dr. Eldad

Between Giving the Torah and Receiving It
by Dr. Eldad

The Jewish Defense League of Shushan Habira
by Dr. Eldad

An Open and Distressed Letter to Menachem Begin
by Dr. Eldad

Elnakam: Story of a Fighter for the Freedom of Israel
by Dr. Eldad

The Israel Restraint Forces
by Dr. Eldad

The Real-Politik of Our Sages
by Dr. Eldad

Jerusalem: A Burning Issue Trial of Faith
by Dr. Eldad

A New Type of Jew
by Dr. Eldad

Foundation Stones
by Dr. Eldad

Dr. Eldad & the Supreme Court of Israel
Selected Judgments

Biography: Dr. Israel Eldad
by Chaim Yerushalmi

BIBLICAL COMMENTARIES

Ezra Yakhin's
Elnakam: Story of a Fighter for the Freedom of Israel

Some Remarks on the Book of a Freedom Fighter and a Friend
by Dr. Israel Eldad

At first glance it would seem that there is no shortage of books dealing with the underground: historical books, personal reminiscences, political and ideological analyses, and the literature of the underground itself such as proclamations, pamphlets, etc. Yet there is still something lacking no less important than all of these, an element that would bring those days and, even more so the nights, alive for the contemporary reader, make him participate in the fighters’ experiences, their moods and emotions, sense what the Jews were feeling in the street, at home, in the synagogue day after day, night after night, feel the reality behind the newspaper headlines, beyond the thunder of explosions, watch and listen with them, know their longings and fears, sense the flesh-and-blood reality of the underground and its peculiar environment. To do all this it seems there must be poets and artists, dramatists and interpreters skilled in the art and craft of representation. All these will come in time, who can doubt it, even though they have held back till now for reasons not to be discussed here. There is no subject under the sun too lowly to serve as material for there writing, sculpting and painting; all has been grist to their mill but for this unique treasure of dramatic experience - a treasure assiduously ignored as if relegated to oblivion by force. Is this manifestation of self abnegation, an attempt to escape from ourselves? One Arab’s death in the 1948 war, another Arab’s suffering at the hands of the Israeli ‘oppressor’ - these are ‘interpreted’, considered worthy of dramatization. But for two or three exceptions, has any attempt been made to create an epic, an educational model out of the heroism and self-sacrifice of the men who died on the scaffold, of the youth caught putting up proclamations and tortured to death by a minion of the Empire?

They are still to come, these artists, and future generations will yet be nurtured by the song, story and drama of those days of glory, just as we, in our time were nurtured on the tales of Deborah the Prophetess, of Samson, of the Holy Temples and the Ten Victims of Tyranny. But what in the meantime?

In the interim it is most important to prepare documentary material, a living testimony not only in the form of catalogs and descriptions of operations or collections of proclamations and speeches but living evidence in its most literal form and meaning, facts of life of the underground, the living cells, their formation, their cohesion into a fabric palpitating and glowing, often to go up in flames - the testimony of the rank and file.

Such a testimony is offered in this book, showing how a Hebrew youth found his way to the underground movement. The stress is laid not on the technical ways and means of the process but rather on the emotional development leading to such a step; what he read, heard, felt before taking the crucial step. We not only find here the mechanics of pasting proclamations on the walls but see his emotional involvement with the deed, an involvement investing those proclamations with a power not less than that of written words, a power that was transmitted the following morning to all those who read them. We read how a decent, honest boy is driven to deceive not just the British policeman his own father and mother, motivated by a love so deep that it sanctifies his behavior, makes it acceptable and even compulsory. The authenticity and scope of the book are deepened and widened by the considerations of state to be found in it and also by the manifestations of love and hatred with which it abounds. For it is only pseudo-intellectual eunuchs to mock the "emotionalism" of the underground, those whose inability to feel makes them hate anything imbued with emotion.

This book is a revelation of the inner feelings of a youth in the underground. It has the additional grace of being imbued with the very atmosphere of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is not only the scene of the action, with the stress placed on the battle for the city, but we get an insight into the lives of the Jerusalem suburbs where patriotism and faith go hand in hand. This is a stylized reconstruction of actions and experiences and also a fighter’s lament for the liberty of Israel, rising from the very roots of the people and their faith, roots going back for generations. The dominant characteristic of this testimony is it authenticity. Without the help of such no historian, let alone a poet, may hope to understand that generation and its struggle, sense the flesh-and-blood reality of waging a war in the underground. This war is seen here through the eye of the writer, symbolically enough an eye that was wounded and turned to bleeding flesh during the battle for the (Jerusalem’s) Old City. It is fitting that this war, this city and even the reality of today and our struggle should this be regarded: with love and pain, with love in spite of pain. From being just another testimonial to the past, this book is transmuted by the power of love into a link in the continuous chain of the struggle for liberty and complete salvation.

At first glance it would seem that there is no shortage of books dealing with the underground: historical books, personal reminiscences, political and ideological analyses, and the literature of the underground itself such as proclamations, pamphlets, etc. Yet there is still something lacking no less important than all of these, an element that would bring those days and, even more so the nights, alive for the contemporary reader, make him participate in the fighters’ experiences, their moods and emotions, sense what the Jews were feeling in the street, at home, in the synagogue day after day, night after night, feel the reality behind the newspaper headlines, beyond the thunder of explosions, watch and listen with them, know their longings and fears, sense the flesh-and-blood reality of the underground and its peculiar environment. To do all this it seems there must be poets and artists, dramatists and interpreters skilled in the art and craft of representation. All these will come in time, who can doubt it, even though they have held back till now for reasons not to be discussed here. There is no subject under the sun too lowly to serve as material for there writing, sculpting and painting; all has been grist to their mill but for this unique treasure of dramatic experience - a treasure assiduously ignored as if relegated to oblivion by force. Is this manifestation of self abnegation, an attempt to escape from ourselves? One Arab’s death in the 1948 war, another Arab’s suffering at the hands of the Israeli ‘oppressor’ - these are ‘interpreted’, considered worthy of dramatization. But for two or three exceptions, has any attempt been made to create an epic, an educational model out of the heroism and self-sacrifice of the men who died on the scaffold, of the youth caught putting up proclamations and tortured to death by a minion of the Empire?

They are still to come, these artists, and future generations will yet be nurtured by the song, story and drama of those days of glory, just as we, in our time were nurtured on the tales of Deborah the Prophetess, of Samson, of the Holy Temples and the Ten Victims of Tyranny. But what in the meantime?

In the interim it is most important to prepare documentary material, a living testimony not only in the form of catalogs and descriptions of operations or collections of proclamations and speeches but living evidence in its most literal form and meaning, facts of life of the underground, the living cells, their formation, their cohesion into a fabric palpitating and glowing, often to go up in flames - the testimony of the rank and file.

Such a testimony is offered in this book, showing how a Hebrew youth found his way to the underground movement. The stress is laid not on the technical ways and means of the process but rather on the emotional development leading to such a step; what he read, heard, felt before taking the crucial step. We not only find here the mechanics of pasting proclamations on the walls but see his emotional involvement with the deed, an involvement investing those proclamations with a power not less than that of written words, a power that was transmitted the following morning to all those who read them. We read how a decent, honest boy is driven to deceive not just the British policeman his own father and mother, motivated by a love so deep that it sanctifies his behavior, makes it acceptable and even compulsory. The authenticity and scope of the book are deepened and widened by the considerations of state to be found in it and also by the manifestations of love and hatred with which it abounds. For it is only pseudo-intellectual eunuchs to mock the "emotionalism" of the underground, those whose inability to feel makes them hate anything imbued with emotion.

This book is a revelation of the inner feelings of a youth in the underground. It has the additional grace of being imbued with the very atmosphere of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is not only the scene of the action, with the stress placed on the battle for the city, but we get an insight into the lives of the Jerusalem suburbs where patriotism and faith go hand in hand. This is a stylized reconstruction of actions and experiences and also a fighter’s lament for the liberty of Israel, rising from the very roots of the people and their faith, roots going back for generations. The dominant characteristic of this testimony is it authenticity. Without the help of such no historian, let alone a poet, may hope to understand that generation and its struggle, sense the flesh-and-blood reality of waging a war in the underground. This war is seen here through the eye of the writer, symbolically enough an eye that was wounded and turned to bleeding flesh during the battle for the (Jerusalem’s) Old City. It is fitting that this war, this city and even the reality of today and our struggle should this be regarded: with love and pain, with love in spite of pain. From being just another testimonial to the past, this book is transmuted by the power of love into a link in the continuous chain of the struggle for liberty and complete salvation.


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