![\"Elah](\"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/holidays\/files\/Elah-Valley-Israel-e1462356075291-768x513.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
There are those who say<\/p>\n
the present state<\/p>\n
of the Israeli State<\/p>\n
is not enough.<\/p>\n
Enough? I say.<\/p>\n
Nothing man has<\/p>\n
is ever enough.<\/p>\n
There are those who say<\/p>\n
that patriotism for the Jewish State<\/p>\n
is not eminently respectable<\/p>\n
nowadays.<\/p>\n
Faulty, unstable, imperfect,<\/p>\n
this is not the State<\/p>\n
we hoped for.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"Negev](\"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/holidays\/files\/Negev-Landscape-e1462356830501-768x514.jpg\")
But it is the only state we have,<\/p>\n
I reply.<\/p>\n
It is a gift, a challenge, a treasure;<\/p>\n
a child born of longing,<\/p>\n
long travail<\/p>\n
and millennia of pain,<\/p>\n
waiting to be perfected.<\/p>\n
It is and will be what we make it.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
There are those who say<\/p>\n
not everyone sees<\/p>\n
or agrees<\/p>\n
with what I see and say is here.<\/p>\n
But how can they not see?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Earth blessed and fruitful,<\/p>\n
bestowing lavish bounty upon her sons.<\/p>\n
Life giving waters, rain and dew.<\/p>\n
Winds laden with scents of growing things.<\/p>\n
Mountains soaring upwards to seven tiered heavens.<\/p>\n
A sky filled with visions<\/p>\n
of a Godly throne;<\/p>\n
a land filled with visions<\/p>\n
of an ancient, earthly home.<\/p>\n
And across the length and breadth of the land,<\/p>\n
women<\/p>\n
pregnant with dreams and heavy with child.<\/p>\n
Pity the blind who do not see.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
This is my Land,<\/p>\n
legacy of my fathers,<\/p>\n
fruit of my labors<\/p>\n
(I, too, am a pioneer of sorts),<\/p>\n
partially realized fruition of ancient dreams.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I treasure and give thanks<\/p>\n
for the faulty, wayward, imperfect<\/p>\n
State<\/p>\n
we are trying to perfect.<\/p>\n
I love our holy, fearsome, sometimes maddening<\/p>\n
G-d given Land<\/p>\n
and the holy, fearsome, sometimes maddening<\/p>\n
G-d chosen People<\/p>\n
who have chosen to return to its embrace.<\/p>\n
These are my People, my Land, my State.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
May G-d keep us,<\/p>\n
protect us,<\/p>\n
watch over us.<\/p>\n
May He bless us<\/p>\n
and cause His Countenance<\/p>\n
to shine upon us.<\/p>\n
May He bring His promised, perfect peace<\/p>\n
to His Chosen People,<\/p>\n
His Promised Land,<\/p>\n
and to this nascent, wondrous, maddening,<\/p>\n
still highly imperfect<\/p>\n
State.<\/p>\n
Yaffa Ganz,\u00a0\u00a9 2006<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are those who say the present state of the Israeli State is not enough. Enough? I say. Nothing man has is ever enough. There are those who say that patriotism for the Jewish State is not eminently respectable nowadays. Faulty, unstable, imperfect, this is not the State we hoped for. But it is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113,"featured_media":38914,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cloudinary_featured_overwrite":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[354],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-yom-haatzmaut"],"yoast_head":"\n