By Marney Blom
The colourful yearly celebration of the Jewish festival of Purim is an auspicious reminder of an ancient time when Israel was rescued from certain annihilation. Purim is the biblical account of the story of Queen Esther — the beautiful young Jewish heroine and her uncle Mordecai who together helped save the entire Jewish race approximately two and a half thousand years ago.
Purim is an occasion for the corporate reading of the book of Esther in synagogues, often in a light-hearted and joyous fashion. At Jerusalem’s reform Kol Ha Neshama Synagogue, congregants came for the reading dressed in costume.
“My last name in Hebrew means horses,” said Gaby Sayah. “So our whole family dressed up as horses. My brother made [our costumes] out of balloons.”
The creativity of the costumes is only outdone by the noise made at the mention of the name Hamen – the villain of the Purim story.
“It is a commemoration of Jews surviving. We’ve been through a lot and we are still going through it. We carry on … and we can still do it with joy.”
The celebration of Purim doesn’t stop in the synagogues. Israelis, young and old, don costumes in the streets and in the marketplace. For many the holiday is a welcomed diversion from the escalating threats to their personal safety in a country surrounded by enemies.
“We can release what we have been taking [in] all year. Most of the holidays are very heavy,” said an Israeli dressed in a Mexican costume. “We are talking a lot about wars, how we won, how we lost … [Purim] is about being happy, about releasing all your problems.”
As a tiny island of democracy in a region of growing Islamic hostilities, Israel is faced with a number of existential threats.
Hamas, the terrorist organization responsible for firing more than 3,000 rockets at Israeli civilian populations from the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2015, continues to enlarge its stockpile of weapons and its capacity to strike every corner of Israel.
Inside Lebanon, along the northern Israeli border, Hezbolla boasts an arsenal of 100,000 rockets and missiles, all pointed directly at Israel. The militant Shi’a Islamist group has stated that their “Struggle will end only when this entity [Israel] is obliterated.”
Along Israel’s northeast border lies Syria — a nation consumed by civil war and an enormous efflux of refugees. Syria’s current government is backed by Iran, Hezbolla and Russia. This in itself is alarming. If, however, the current Assad regime falls, the presence of radical Islamist militants on Israel’s northern border poses an immediate threat. Possession of Syria’s military arsenal believed to include chemical weapons, would be a security nightmare.
Israel’s greatest concern, however, is a nuclearized Iran. If not stopped, Iran could have the capacity to carry out its threats of “wiping Israel off the map,” as well as supplying nuclear arms to Israel’s enemies.
According to retired Israeli Major General Amos Yadlin, the director of Israel’s Institute of National Security Studies (INSS), a nuclear-armed Iran is clearly within sight.
“[The] Iranian nuclear program will become even more dangerous. They have all the ingredients for a nuclear bomb. They know how to spin centrifuges. They have 10,000 [of them]. They have enough material for five to seven bombs. Strategically they are ready,” stated Yadlin at the INSS headquarters in Tel Aviv.
“I’ve come here today because, as Prime Minister of Israel, I feel a profound obligation to speak to you about an issue that could well threaten the survival of my country and the future of my people: Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons,” said PM Benjamin Netanyahu in his address to the joint session of the U.S. Congress on March 3, 2015.
“In our nearly 4,000 years of history, many have tried repeatedly to destroy the Jewish people. Tomorrow night, on the Jewish holiday of Purim, we’ll read the Book of Esther. We’ll read of a powerful Persian viceroy named Haman, who plotted to destroy the Jewish people some 2,500 years ago. But a courageous Jewish woman, Queen Esther, exposed the plot and gave for the Jewish people the right to defend themselves against their enemies. The plot was foiled. Our people were saved,” continued the Israeli PM to the applause and cheers of his American audience at the U.S. congress.
The celebration of the biblical story of Esther is clearly a timely reminder for Israel to ultimately look to the God of Israel for protection.
Marney Blom is news director for the Acts News Network.
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