President Isaac Herzog reviews IDF Honor Guard on Israel’s Independence Day (Photo: Tzipi Bini GPO)
President of Israel Isaac Herzog addressed the nation Sunday about the ongoing war in Gaza. He began his remarks by talking about how every time Israelis hear the words Each time we hear the words “cleared for publication our hearts shudder with renewed pain and grief.”
Behind the name of every fallen soldier in the fighting in Gaza, Herzog explained, “There is an Israeli hero. A member of a family. A parents’ son. A partner. A father. A brother. A grandson. A loved one.”
“Our sons and daughters fight with supreme bravery,” he said. “They risk their lives in the alleys, tunnels and shafts. In enemy territory, with a complex, dangerous challenge, they bring results and achievements. They fight with heroism, responsibility, with determination, morally, to achieve two interrelated goals: to eradicate a bitter and cruel enemy, and bring home the hostages, and rescue them from the abyss. They protect our collective home in a war we did not choose, against brutal terrorists so that we will not see a return of these bloody rounds, again and again and again. They fight so that we – the Jewish nation – will have a better future, so that the entire region, and even humanity as a whole will have a better future.”
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On the hostages, Herzog declared that Israel’s “obligation to return them in any way possible is an indelible commandment burned deep in our consciousness. We will not rest until they come home.”
President Herzog also called on Israelis not to devolve into the same political bickering that characterized their nation before the October 7 Hamas attack. Israelis, he said, need to remain united until the end of the war in Gaza.
“The enemy is just waiting to see the cracks within us,” said Herzog, “for us to start fighting one another. They also see the conflicts, the arguments, the struggles between egos, and the political conflicts – both in the days before and in the days after. They celebrate when they see the cracks between us.”
“We will not break, nor blink, nor fall apart, and we certainly will not tear ourselves apart from the inside. We shed a tear – and we shoulder on together.”
“This is the time to offer strength to the home front and the frontline, with small victories compounding goodness and mutual responsibility,” said President Herzog. “This is the time to restore normality in every way as much as possible. This is the time for more light, and hope, and unity. It is in our hands. And in our hands alone. Because even if the road is long, – as already said – to walk in it, is to live.”
