"Aichah!" Why Is It...?

Batya Medad
Shilo Musings
8 Av 5769

While our pre-Tisha B'Av meal is cooking on the stove, the words I heard in the Knesset two day ago, at MK Dr. Michael Ben-Ari's seminar about Har HaBayit (the Temple Mount) are "cooking" in my mind.

This morning I read something from Aish.com which raised the flame, or made it more like a "pressure cooker."

The prophet describes all of the suffering that befell the Jewish people at the time of the destruction of the Temple. "Eichah! How is it possible? The proud majestic city of Jerusalem, in ruins! Her inhabitants in exile! Her enemies rejoicing!"
The sages point out the similarity of the word "Eichah" (How!) and the word "Ayecha?" in Genesis when God asks "Where are you, Adam?" The answer to Jeremiah's question - How did it happen? - is that the Jewish people disregarded the Almighty, just as Adam did in the Garden of Eden

For years it has been bothering me that we, as a nation, people, religion, failed to do something crucially important as the 1967 Six Days War ended. G-d performed a miracle for us on the level, size of a Biblical miracle and we have been rejecting it.

The miracle is two-fold, and I'm using the present tense, because it still holds, bli eyin haraa, (keep away the evil eye.)

One is that the State of Israel, the first Jewish State in two thousand years survived the well-planned military onslaught from the north, south and west, which aimed to literally throw us into the sea. When the Jewish People left Egypt, G-d had to make miraculous passages through the water. In 1967, we stayed on dry ground.

The second miracle is the gift of the HolyLand, Judea, Samaria, Gaza, Sinai, Jordan Valley, Golan and the missing parts of Jerusalem including the Temple Mount.

One of the speakers on Monday, (sorry, but I didn't take detailed enough notes,) reminded us that although two hours after we, with the help of G-d, liberated the Temple Mount government ministers decided to give the keys to the Wakf, the Temple Mount is still in our hands. Not all is lost. We can fix it. We can fix it if we want to.

Judea and Samaria, where most of our Biblical History took place are also still in our hands.

"Eichah! How is it possible?" How is it possible that Jewish leaders, rabbis from all over the world haven't returned home and settled our precious land?

"Eichah! How is it possible?" How is it possible that we haven't built our Holy Temple in the forty-two (42) years since Har HaBayit b'yadeinu, The Temple Mount is in our hands?
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