(Communicated by the Prime Minister’s Media Adivsor)
PM Netanyahu and his wife Mrs. Sara Netanyahu participated last night (11 September 2017, Buenos Aires time) in an event with the heads of the local Jewish community. Following is Prime Minister Netanyahu's address
:This is an historic visit because it is the first time a prime minister of Israel has visited any country south of the United States, and I chose to open my visit to Latin America here in Argentina. We share a great friendship here the President of Argentina, Mauricio Macri, is a great friend. He and I speak the same economic language, and I look forward to meeting with him tomorrow and strengthening the ties between Israel and Argentina, as Israel is a rising power because we developed our economy and changed Israel’s economy.
Today, Israel is a technological force, first of all because it has economic freedom. Maricio and I speak the same economic language, and I wish Argentina much success in our cooperation to this end. There is no doubt that there has been a change. We feel it.
But there is one thing that has not changed, and that is the warm Jewish community in Argentina. It was always with Israel and Israel was always with it – always. It is a vibrant and warm community, a community with wonderful members. On behalf of my wife and myself, I allow myself to say that we love you in Israel and here in Argentina as well. We have experienced difficult times, and today we marked the two tragic events that took place here, at the embassy and at AMIA. The community proved itself strong and steadfast, and together we maintain our connection, which also finds expression in the 100,000 Argentinian immigrants in Israel who contribute daily to the State of Israel. I salute them as well, and their representatives are here with us now.
This is a permanent fixture, the permanent bond between two countries, and what is truly interesting is, of course, what has changed with regard to Israel’s destiny, because something has changed. Augustin, you said that Jews first came here in the 19th century, and then again in the 1930s. I would add that they did so to escape anti-Semitism, in order to find new and safer lives. The Jews wandered, and some of them wandered across the world. The Jews could not defend themselves against anti-Semitism; it was impossible. They could only run to the New World, come to new countries and build lives there. One thing that characterized Jewish life before the establishment of the State of Israel was that the Jews did not have the capability of self-defense. It is important to understand this. The Jews could not defend themselves and this is the great change that took place.
If we look at the image of the Jew, at the way Jews were perceived just 70, 80 or 100 years ago, they were perceived as leaves blowing in the wind, the Wandering Jew, even the cowardly Jew. And when we look back, this is astonishing, because we know that the Jews had the greatest heroes in human history: Joshua, Gideon, Samson, King David, the Maccabees, Bar-Kochba. It is hard to find other peoples in ancient times with such strong warriors, so brave, so determined in the face of tremendous forces. We were not always successful, but we always fought, we always defended ourselves, our existence, our freedom. That is what characterized the Jews in ancient times. Knowing how to defend themselves was the strongest Jewish characteristic. They were always called stubborn, but with tremendous ability to gather together at the decisive moment and defend themselves. This ability disappeared. It disappeared when we lost our country and our independence. Slowly but surely, year after year, generation after generation, century after century, the Jews lost the ability to control their destiny.
The great change took place, of course, only after we paid a price. During the 19th century, during the rising tide of anti-Semitism that brought your ancestors here, there were several Jews who stood and said that the solution to the Jewish problem would be resolved, first and foremost, through the Jews’ ability to control their destiny by establishing their own state with their own army. This was certainly a revolutionary concept that said that if the Jews returned to their land, they would also regain their character, and the destiny of living in the Diaspora would also change upon the establishment of the State of Israel. The Jews would suddenly have a choice and they would freely choose to be in their own land. Their stature and their destiny would look different.
All Jews have all rights, including an inherent and clear right to live wherever in the world they so choose in freedom, in safety and in independence, but one more right is always reserved for them, and that is the right to come to Israel. One hundred thousand have already come. We welcomed them with a warm embrace.
And a wondrous thing happened, because when we returned to our land and established our country, we rediscovered our ability to defend ourselves. The fathers of Zionism, Herzl, Pinsker, Nordau and others – eight geniuses – they never said that anti-Semitism would stop when the state was established. They did not say that the attacks on the Jews would stop when the Jewish state was established. That is not what they said. Rather, they said that when the state was established, the Jews would have the tremendous capability to push back these attacks, and that is exactly what has happened. Sometimes I tell myself that it exacts a terrible cost, too heavy to bear. Miriam [Peretz, participating in the event] knows this very well, as do others who are here tonight, as do I. But what a change, what a change.
We established an army whose representatives are here tonight. They represent Jewish warriors who rediscovered the Maccabean spirit. Not only do they defend us and our people, even in the Diaspora, but we are also showing the world the way to fight terrorism, the way to fight the new barbarism, the way to stand strong against these waves of destruction. Israel is leading this global campaign.
At the same time, we built our economy; we built our technology; we built our science; and we built our culture. We nurture our economic, military and political strength because today the countries of the world look around to see who has technology for the future and who has technology to fight terrorism in the present; who can develop water, agriculture, health and cyber security; who can develop digital medicine; who can develop agriculture that is almost like science fiction. The answer is Israel. And therefore, our military and intelligence capabilities on the one hand, and our economic and technological capabilities on the other, help create partnerships with countries that we never could have dreamed possible just decades ago, or even just several years ago.
Israel is becoming a world power because of its capabilities, because of its people, because of our people. This brings us closer to all the continents: to Asia, to Africa, as well as to South America, Central America and of course North America. I know this connection is powerful. I know that, at the end and at the beginning, our power is derived from our spiritual strength, from the fact that we never forget our heritage, our values, our roots, our unity. The people of Israel are like an ancient tree with deep roots in our heritage and our homeland, but we are always sending branches upwards, way up high towards the world of tomorrow.
I want you to know that there has been a huge turnabout in Israel’s status, not only here in Latin America, but all over the world. However, we know that in all these shifts, in all these changes, in all these challenges, we know that we have one central strength, and that is the strength of the people of Israel, the Jewish people, this wonderful people that has such a tremendous past and so much future thanks to you.
I want wish you a Shana tova, a happy New Year, and I want to tell you what I wrote in the memorial book at the AMIA Center today. I wrote a simple thing that is the essence of what I said here tonight: Am Israel Chai, the people of Israel live.
Thank you, dear friends.
Shana tova to you.
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