Many emotions flooded the public in Israel earlier this week regarding the death and funeral of Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, mainly following the coverage of these in the media.
Of all of them, a historical line suddenly emerged: above the bed of the late rabbi, the term "Israeli consensus" was redefined.
What is an Israeli consensus?
This is not about the partnership of fate, which knows once every few years to send us all to shelters and once in a millennium to put us in closures and cover us with masks.
What is a civic, everyday, trivial consensus that everyone gathers around?
The answer is simple: there is no such thing.
There is no figure we know to gather around us all, there is no such date, no such idea and no such moment.
There is also no such song or picture.
There simply is not.
On this refugee nation, returning to the land of its ancestors from all sorts of different and strange places and finding neighbors in it who do not quite align with its story, is doomed to have a tribal and divided society that the only thing that unites it, besides horror and photographicism, is the steam of bi-monthly reporting to the tax authorities.
There is no Israeli consensus because there is no uniform Israeli.
There is no room here to extend and deploy a sub on the matter, but no one will disagree on the premise: there is no one story that is really common to all Israelis.
Even on the sacred Zionist idea itself we have been quarreling for decades.
Hence the question arises: if there is no Israeli consensus, how do you decide when to close a road?
When are TV broadcasts confiscated in favor of a live broadcast when it is not a war or an event that by definition concerns the whole?
Well, for too many years it has been clear to everyone that even a half-consensus, or a quarter-consensus - is considered a sufficient reason.
Expropriate freedom of movement in favor of an urban marathon and TV broadcast time in favor of the departure of a cultural figure, a festival or even a demonstration, even though all of these do not interest the general public but only its part.
Makes sense, right?
The problem is that for too long this definition has been blatantly one-sided.
It was activated only when the interest was of the strong group, not of the minority groups.
As such, it was not a co-operative compromise decision, but rather coercive and unfair.
Hundreds of thousands also attended the funeral of Rabbi Kanievsky's father a few decades ago, but it did not occur to anyone in the media to report it, and certainly no one thought of closing Geha Road for something that was happening at The Hams.
But this week, as we sat five dossiers in Sivan Rahav-Meir's studio in Aretz 12 and eulogized Rav Chaim, I did not feel compelled or taken over, even when viewer Narkis wondered in a phone interview why her children should study zoom for the funeral of someone she did not know.
What did I feel?
Great redemption.
I tried to explain to Narcissus that this was also an opportunity to thank her and hundreds of thousands of her friends for their understanding and forgiveness;
Libby tells me that they too understood the magnitude of the moment.
This week we redefined the concept of Israeli togetherness.
kobiarieli@gmail.com
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