"In the beginning there was a sky... In the beginning there was the earth, soft grass grass like it... From the sky good rain fell and God was merciful at dawn, and he gave me you as a watchman."
The lyrics of the song, written by Ehud Menor, took on new meaning when the singer and composer Shuli Rand sang it on Friday morning in the dining room of Kibbutz Ruhama.
About 400 men and women were there and moved together as a mass prayer.
The families of the abductees were with us, who carried photographs of their loved ones who are in the shelters in Gaza.
Hundreds of people joined together to help and remember that the eyes are on the goal - to return the kidnapped.
Carob trees were planted together in the soil of Ruhama forest, planting for generations.
Religious and secular, right-wing and left-wing.
Rabbi Yaakov Medan of the Har Etzion synagogue, General (res.) Tal Russo, retired judge Ila Proccia, Rabbi David Stav, Elisheva Barak, Rabbi Racheli Frankel.
And also Attorney Raz Nazri, Major General (Ret.) Amikam Norkin, former commander of the Air Force, Danny Rupp, Uri Zaki, Eyal Veldman, two former Shin Bet chiefs, Yoram Cohen and Ami Ayalon, Ruthi Rodner, director of Kaplan Hospital, cell "To (res.) Prof. Trif Bader, Eyal Neve from the reserve protest and Moti Sheklar and many others. Sons and daughters of the country.
Such were the people who participated in the event, the landscape template of their beloved homeland.
Homeland from the language to be born.
In my estimation, most of those who were there were indeed born in Israel.
It rained hard on Friday morning, but the response was full
The initiative began with a group called "Bereshit".
It includes religious Zionists, who joined Kaplan's protest against legal reform.
The signs then read - religious, Zionists, democrats.
This time they felt that something must be done for the families of the abductees.
Hagai Stadler, the chairman of "Top Gam", who was one of the leaders of the Kaplan protest of the religious and its movers, took over the organization. Naturally, at first it featured kippah wearers and rabbis. It was the former chairman of Emunah and the chairman of the executive committee of the Chamber, Liora Minka, who said that the idea is great, but we must expand the canvas and add more shades to it.
Naturally, they wanted to find the author and not the divider among such a heterogeneous group, and it was decided that Rabbi Madan would offer a prayer for the peace of the country and Judge Procacia would read excerpts from the Declaration of Independence and Tschernihovsky's "Games of Chess", who also said that a person is the pattern of the landscape of his homeland - and these were the people who participated At the event, a landscape pattern of their beloved homeland.
Homeland from the language to be born.
In my estimation, most of those who were there were indeed born in Israel.
It rained hard on Friday morning, but the response was full.
Almost all of those who signed the petition made their way to the south, passing Sderot, Yad Mordechai, Netivot, and Havat Shechemim, in Vacha Ruhama - the first settlement established in the Negev.
The wheat fields are green and spectacular next to the anemones that paint everything a beautiful red.
And before we left for planting, just as the sky stopped its rains, we sang the hope together.
On my way back to Tel Aviv I couldn't help but think that it is so good to find the unifier instead of the divider and the divider.
And what a shame that these great initiatives are done by private individuals, and not under the auspices of the state.
The feeling intensified following the settlement conference in Gaza and the call for transfer.
Unfortunately, my native landscape template is not your native landscape template.
The abyss is deep, but initiatives like that of Bereshit can be a kind of rainbow, which maybe in the end we will all be able to huddle under.
were we wrong
We will fix it!
If you found an error in the article, we would appreciate it if you shared it with us