The Jewish people and their millennia-old heritage are built upon collective memory—expressed not only through study and recitation but also through physical, embodied acts: eating matzah, building a sukkah, sounding the shofar, lighting Hanukkah menorahs. These acts are designed to breathe life into the stories of the past and draw them into the present, making history more than something we only read about but something we actually live.
Today, the Jewish people—wherever they are in Israel or across the Diaspora—mark Yom HaZikaron, the Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen soldiers and victims of terror. We remember and will always carry in our hearts the memory of the 20 Jewish souls lost to antisemitic violence around the world this past year, including the victims of the devastating attack at Bondi Beach in Australia.
As the day draws to a close, we will gradually transition from the grief and mourning that has defined it, toward deep gratitude and profound joy, as we mark 78 years of our existence as a sovereign, independent state.
The three sacred days of the Jewish month of Iyar—Holocaust Remembrance Day, Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen, and Independence Day—form an emotional tapestry of Zionist feelings. Pride, fulfillment, commitment, worry, and sorrow are woven together into a single, colorful wreath—flowers of grief alongside flowers of joy—all bound by an infinite ribbon of memory and responsibility that ties us to generations past, to generations to come, and to Jewish communities around the world that share this moment with us.
North America’s JCC Movement will hold memorial ceremonies honoring the heroism of 25,644 Israeli soldiers—170 of whom fell in the last year alone—and bearing witness to the price paid by Israel’s civilians, 79 of whom were murdered in acts of terror during the last year. Alongside these solemn ceremonies, JCCs will also host Independence Day celebrations, street parties, and performances by Israeli artists. Each community marks Yom HaZikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut in its own way, shaped by the spirit and character of its members.
In Palo Alto, California, the Oshman Family JCC will hold its memorial ceremony in true Israeli style—not inside an enclosed theatre on a rainy California evening but as though participants are in one of Tel Aviv’s bustling, lamp-lit squares. The evening will weave together Israeli memorial melodies and communal singing—a format deeply characteristic of every Israeli ceremony.
In a similar spirit, the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan in New York City will invite community members to write the name of a fallen Israeli soldier, and each one will be woven into a communal art installation—a tapestry stitched together from grief, love, and the refusal to forget.
At the Pozez JCC in Fairfax, Virginia, the communal events—B’yachad | Together—are described as “a collective experience of national pride and joy that also solemnly recalls the sacrifices made to secure a Jewish state and the enduring freedom of our people.”
Many communities are marking, for the third consecutive year, the staggering losses of October 7, and the weight of the long war that followed. Others are weaving into their ceremonies the bereavements accumulated across eight decades since the founding of the State. Sadly, there are enough stories of pain and orphanhood—complemented by those highlighting resilience and survival—to fill ceremonies across the entire world.
Just as in Israel, where Independence Day festivities will fill the central squares of every city with street fairs, artistic performances, and the finest Israeli food and music, so, too, will the JCC Movement in the U.S. and Canada celebrate Israel’s independence as a Jewish holiday for all. At JCC of Greater Boston, an exhibition of photographs by Erez Kaganovitch will bring Israel’s landscapes and people to life.
At the Shimon and Sara Birnbaum JCC in Bridgewater, New Jersey, Ellen Berkowitz will lead a joyful Israeli folk dance festival, and in St. Louis at the J, Israeli stand-up comedian and social media sensation Shahar Cohen will bring warmth and laughter to a wonderful celebration.
At the Hecktman JCCs of Chicago in Illinois, the streets alongside the JCC will be washed in blue and white for the Blue and White Block Party, open to all the JCC’s families and friends.
The Prosserman JCC in Toronto, Ontario, will welcome two remarkable guests: Noam Buskila, a singer, musician, and IDF soldier on a personal mission to strengthen connection to Israel through song, and Amit Soussana, a former hostage, who will share the story of her captivity and her hard-won return to life.
At the JCC of Greater Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania and in other communities, my dear friend and a gifted musician Gilad Segev, a bereaved brother and founder of Project Heroes, will perform. In recent years, Gilad has devoted his artistic life to honoring Jewish and Israeli heroes throughout history. Since October 7, he has carried that mission forward with music, education, dialogue, and memory.
It is important to note that many JCCs had hoped to bring Israeli artists and guests to their communities this year, but due to the war with Iran and the resulting uncertainties, many have been unable to travel. As they often do, these JCCs pivoted at the last moment, finding new and creative ways to honor their commitment to mark Israel’s national days no matter what.
Equally important, although this is only a partial list, it is deeply representative of the richness, commitment, and profound connection the JCC Movement has to the Jewish people and Israel—and why JCCs across the continent choose to remember together, to grieve together, and to celebrate with gratitude, year after year, the miracle of our national home.
In an environment increasingly poisoned by antisemitism and Jew hatred, to celebrate Israel and mourn its losses publicly and with full dignity is no small feat. It is an act of courage, Jewish identity, and love—the foundation of the JCC Movement.
And back to us here, in Israel.
Once again, Yom HaZikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut arrive differently than they have in the past. They are heavier, and they carry grief that is still raw and accumulating, still pressing on the chest.
The names of all the fallen are seared in memory, announced in the flat, careful voice of broadcasts that deliver the unbearable news. Some names are new, including soldiers who fell in recent battles and civilians killed by Iranian and Hezbollah missiles. Again, as always, communal ceremonies will be held across the country, like the one we and thousands of our neighbors attended last night in Modi’in.
And again, as always, from the first moment the memorial siren sounds its long, piercing cry to mark the beginning of this sacred day, hearts across Israel will skip a beat. Is this the distinguished Yom HaZikaron siren or the one that warns of rockets? Is it the one to which we have grown painfully accustomed in recent weeks, we wonder, as small children turn their frightened eyes to their parents: Is it starting again?
Hostages who last year marked Yom HaZikaron from within the dark terror tunnels of Gaza—where they prayed their names would not be added to the already too-long list of Israel’s fallen—were released this past Simchat Torah. Now they mark these days as free people, even as the shadow of fear, the memory of death, the faces of friends lost remain burned into them, perhaps forever.
To strive for peace, to guard our beloved homeland, to never let go, and to insist on living here, we all pay a price. My heart is heavy and full of sorrow for the need to pay that price. It cries out for far too many lives lost, for young lives cut brutally short, for wounds that will never fully heal, and for bereaved families—scarred for life—whose entire present is now defined by their loss.
At the same time, my heart sings for the new stories of extraordinary heroism added to our national story every year, each one a magnificent building block, laid one upon another to form the true and enduring glory of the Jewish state.
Amit Mann is one of those magnificent, radiant building blocks.
An Israeli paramedic, Amit was murdered at Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7. Throughout the attack, as chaos and horror surrounded her, she remained at her post, treating the wounded at the kibbutz clinic, one patient after another. For hours, she stayed in constant contact with her mother and sisters over WhatsApp. They tried everything to reach her, to save her. Nothing worked. In the final minutes of her life, she said goodbye. In her last message to a beloved sister, she wrote: “They shot me. I won’t survive this. They murdered everyone.”
For her heroism, Amit, a gifted musician, was awarded the Presidential Medal for Civilian Courage posthumously. This week, at memorial ceremonies in JCCs across North America, musician Gilad Segev will perform a song written in Amit’s memory that includes a virtual duet that weaves her voice into his in a musical rendition that reaches across the unbridgeable distance between the living and the dead.
My beloved homeland, how does one find the words to bless you on a day like this? A day of tears for your sons and daughters, your builders, those who gave everything and left us holding grief that we can never quite let go.
At the same time, how does one bless you on your birthday as you turn 78—so young and already so tested; so wounded and worn and still so alive?
May we be worthy of you, dear homeland. May we prove ourselves worthy of the ultimate price paid by those who gave everything—for you and for us—so that tomorrow may be a little better than today and the day after brighter still, each filled with the laughter of children and the quiet joy of those who love them.
Leah Garber is a senior vice president of JCC Association of North America and director of its Center for Israel Engagement in Jerusalem.
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