The discovery of the Altalena, 78 years after it sank, brings an old story of Jewish division and sacrifice back to the surface. Its message speaks directly to Parshat Nitzavim: the strength of the Jewish people comes from standing together, united before G-d.
Recently, an emotional historical discovery was announced in Israel: after 78 years, the Altalena was located deep beneath the sea, about twenty kilometers west of the Israeli coast, at a depth of approximately 1600 feet.
To understand the significance of this discovery, we have to go back 78 years.
Before the establishment of the State of Israel, there were several military groups and organizations in the country fighting against the British. There was the Haganah, whose leadership was associated with David Ben Gurion, and there was the Irgun, headed by Menachem Begin, alongside other organizations.
Immediately after the establishment of the State, it was decided that everyone would unite into one army, the Israel Defense Forces. There would no longer be separate armies. Members of the Haganah and members of the Irgun would join the IDF, and within the army there would be units made up of former Irgun members as well as units made up of former Haganah members.
But only five weeks after the establishment of the State, this unity was put to an extremely difficult test.
The Altalena, which had been purchased by the Irgun before the establishment of the State, sailed from France to Israel. On board were approximately 930 immigrants, many of them Holocaust survivors who belonged to no organization, as well as an enormous quantity of weapons and ammunition.
A dispute developed between Ben Gurion and Begin: Who did the weapons belong to? Begin wanted some of the weapons to go to Irgun battalions that had already been incorporated into the IDF. Ben Gurion demanded that all the weapons be handed over to the IDF, and that the army decide who would receive them. In an independent state, there needed to be one army and one authority. But the dispute was not resolved.
When the Altalena reached the shores of Israel, the Irgun members were ordered to surrender the weapons. A confrontation developed at Kfar Vitkin, and there was even an exchange of gunfire. Afterwards, the ship sailed south toward Tel Aviv.
At this point, Begin boarded the ship. He boarded the Altalena hoping that the crisis could still be resolved through negotiations and that bloodshed could be prevented. On June 22, the ship reached the coast of Tel Aviv. There, the tension reached its peak.
The IDF demanded that the weapons be surrendered. The Irgun members refused. Then an order was given to open fire on the ship. The Irgun members wanted to return fire. From their perspective, they were being shot at and had to defend themselves. But then Begin gave a dramatic order: Do not fire back. Begin called out, “Jews do not shoot Jews.”
And the most remarkable part is that Begin himself was on deck when the ship was hit and caught fire. He could have gone ashore and taken care of himself, but he remained on the ship until the last wounded person had been evacuated, (and there were many wounded!) and only then did he leave the Altalena. In the end, the ship sank. Sixteen people from the ship, including Holocaust survivors, and three IDF soldiers were killed.
And now comes the most remarkable part of the story.
Many years later, toward the end of his life, Begin was asked in an interview how he would like to be remembered. Begin had done many great things in his life. What did he choose? Begin said that he wanted to be remembered “as a person who prevented a war between brothers.”
His men argued with him: “There is already a civil war! They are shooting at us!” But Begin understood that if they fired back, there would be two Jewish sides shooting at each other. And so he was willing to pay an extremely heavy price, to give up the weapons, to watch his ship go up in flames, as long as one Jew would not kill another Jew.
The Torah Scroll
Raphael Gibraltar, a Holocaust survivor and a member of Betar, boarded the Altalena carrying a Torah scroll in his hands. After surviving the Holocaust, he felt that he was finally bringing the Torah with him to the Land of Israel. When the ship reached the coast of Tel Aviv and the shooting began, he tried to save the Torah scroll, but the ammunition exploded and there were dead and wounded. He was forced to leave it behind and go ashore.
Begin stood on deck and shook the hands of those who were leaving the ship. Raphael entered the water as bullets whistled around him and the Altalena burned behind him. He had survived Dachau. He had survived the death march. Throughout all the years of the Holocaust, he had dreamed of reaching the Land of Israel. He was certain that when he finally reached his homeland, he would be welcomed with flowers. He told his family: “We thought they would welcome us with flowers, but instead they greeted us with hatred between brothers.”
By Divine Providence, this historic discovery came precisely before Rosh Hashanah, and in particular before the Shabbat on which we read Parshat Nitzavim.
Every year, on the Shabbat before Rosh Hashanah, we read Parshat Nitzavim. In some years, it is only Nitzavim, while this year we also read Parshat Vayelech. Why specifically before Rosh Hashana?
The Rebbe explains in a talk that at the beginning of the parsha, G-d says to the Jewish people: “You are standing today, all of you.” “Today” refers to Rosh Hashanah, the Day of Judgment, and on that day “you are standing,” standing firmly, existing and enduring, and meriting a favorable judgment.
The expression “standing” represents a firm and powerful standing, the power of a king, as it says: “A king stands.” In other words, he stands with the power of the king. The king is the one who gives him the authority to be his representative. When the Talmud wants to illustrate the power of a king, it says: “The king says, uproot the mountain.”
This, then, is the strength that G-d gives a Jew: the power to uproot a mountain!
Sometimes a person encounters obstacles in his service of G-d. He wants to perform a mitzvah, and suddenly there are all kinds of obstacles. His family does not want him to do it, he does not feel well, there are a thousand and one excuses explaining why it will not work, and sometimes there are also genuine obstacles that seem to him like a mountain, something extremely difficult to overcome. The Torah comes and tells us that G-d gives a Jew the strength to uproot the mountain.
However, the condition for this strength of the Jewish people and for the fulfillment of the blessing of “you are standing” is “all of you,” a sense of unity.
The Torah continues by listing all the different layers of the Jewish people: your heads, the leaders of the nation; your tribes, the heads of the tribes, representing the different groups within the Jewish people; your elders, the Torah scholars; your officers, those responsible for enforcement; every person of Israel, the ordinary person who does not necessarily hold any special position; your children, the younger generation, which does not share in public responsibility; your wives, who are an inseparable part of the congregation of Israel; your convert, your woodcutters, the person engaged in simple labor; your water drawers, the person engaged in the simplest kind of work.
And after the Torah lists all the differences in status, role, and importance, it says: “You are standing today, all of you.”
In other words, everyone stands together before G-d. The greatest leader and the person performing the simplest work are all part of the same nation.
There are certainly different levels within the Jewish people. Each person has his own role and uniqueness, and there is no need to blur the differences between the various types of people within the Jewish nation. Yet everyone must feel the unity that binds us all together.
This unity comes from the fact that everyone stands “before the L-rd your G-d.” Because every part of the nation stands before G-d, a deep sense of unity is created among them, and that unity is the vessel for receiving G-d’s blessing. (Shulchan Shabbat, Deuteronomy, p. 233)
G-d has built into the nature of the world that unity brings blessing. It is not that when a person makes peace with his fellow, he receives a reward in the form of blessing coming into his business. Rather, it happens automatically. Wherever there is unity, blessing rests there. This is hinted at in the first two letters of the Hebrew alphabet: the first letter represents unity, (Alef for Achdus) and the second letter represents blessing – Bracha.
The second parsha we read this week is Parshat Vayelech, where we are told that Moshe Rabbeinu wrote the first Torah scroll and gave it to the tribe of Levi.
Rashi, at the end of Parshat Ki Tavo (29:3), adds that when the Children of Israel saw Moshe giving the Torah scroll to the tribe of Levi, they came to him with a complaint: “We too stood at Sinai and received the Torah, and it was given to us. So why are you giving authority over it to the members of your tribe?” And “Moshe rejoiced over the matter.”
Precisely because all of the Jewish people felt that the Torah belonged to them, Moshe said to them: “Today you have become a nation. Today I understand that you are devoted to G-d and desire Him.”
The Torah scroll is the thing that connects us all.
Everywhere in the world, regardless of which Jewish community a Jew comes from, which customs he follows, or what kind of lifestyle he leads, we all have the same Torah. The Torah is the common denominator of the entire Jewish people. It is what unites us, and it is also what protects us from deteriorating into a situation in which we stop seeing one another as brothers.
And through the merit of unity, may we receive the greatest blessing of all, the true and complete redemption, in which all of Israel will stand “before the L-rd your G-d” in the Third Temple, which will be built immediately, truly and literally.