The outrage machine is predictable. Every year, as Israel prepares for its national Independence Day ceremony on Mount Herzl, the selection of torch lighters becomes a proxy war for the country’s deepest anxieties. This year, the target is Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu. The headlines across international media and local opposition outlets are screaming a singular narrative: a "war criminal" or a "racist" has been elevated to a position of national honor.
This narrative is lazy. It’s a shallow reading of a complex socio-political ecosystem. If you think this is just about a rabbi with hardline views, you’re missing the structural reality of how a nation-state defines its own identity during a period of existential friction. The critics are asking if he deserves the honor; they should be asking why the state feels the necessity to use him as a pillar of its current foundation. Also making news in this space: The Cost of a Carry On.
The Myth of the Neutral National Symbol
Mainstream commentary operates on the flawed premise that national ceremonies should be "unifying" in a bland, universalist sense. They want a lineup of tech founders, soft-spoken poets, and harmless philanthropists. But national symbols aren't meant to be a warm hug for everyone. They are declarations of power, intent, and survival.
In the middle of a multi-front conflict, Israel isn't looking for a consensus figure who appeals to the editorial board of a London newspaper. The state is signaling to its most motivated, high-output demographic: the religious Zionist community. Rabbi Eliyahu represents a segment of the population that provides a disproportionate number of front-line soldiers and officers. To the state, "unity" doesn't mean making everyone happy; it means fortifying the base that keeps the country physically intact. Further insights on this are detailed by Reuters.
Dismantling the War Crime Label
The term "war crime" is tossed around today with the clinical precision of a confetti cannon. When media outlets label a religious leader a war criminal based on rhetoric or fringe legal theories, they dilute the actual legal definition provided by the Rome Statute.
Let’s be precise. A war crime involves specific acts: willful killing, torture, or the intentional targeting of civilians. Holding hardline, even exclusionary, theological views on land ownership or demographics is not a war crime. It’s a political stance. You can find his views abhorrent—many do—but calling it a war crime is a category error designed to trigger international intervention where domestic debate has failed.
When you mislabel rhetoric as a crime, you lose the ability to prosecute actual atrocities. It’s a high-stakes game of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" played out in the International Criminal Court.
The Strategy of Friction
Why would a government choose a polarizing figure during a time of global scrutiny? Critics call it a blunder. I call it a calculated stress test of sovereignty.
By selecting a figure like Eliyahu, the Israeli leadership is telling the international community—and its own internal opposition—that the criteria for "national hero" is no longer subject to external veto. It’s a rejection of the "Global Citizen" archetype. This isn't a bug in the system; it's the feature.
Imagine a scenario where a nation only honors people who are universally liked. That nation has no spine. It has no distinct identity. It becomes a theme park version of a country. Friction creates heat, and heat tempers steel. The controversy itself serves to draw a line in the sand: "This is who we are, whether you approve or not."
The Demographic Reality Nobody Wants to Face
The people most offended by this selection are often those with the least "skin in the game" regarding the country’s long-term defense. There is a brutal math at play here.
- Religious Zionist communities have the highest birth rates among the non-Haredi population.
- They have the highest rates of "meaningful service" in combat units.
- Their ideological conviction is the primary driver of the current settlement and security ethos.
If you are a prime minister looking at the next fifty years, you don't alienate the people who are actually going to be holding the rifles. You validate them. You give them a seat at the table. You let their rabbi light a torch. The "outrage" is a small price to pay for the continued loyalty of your most effective demographic.
The Hypocrisy of Selective Outrage
The competitor pieces love to cite "values." Which values? The ones defined in a vacuum in 1948, or the ones being forged in the tunnels of Gaza and the hills of the north in 2024?
Nations change. Values evolve under pressure. To expect a state under siege to maintain the aesthetic sensibilities of a peaceful European social democracy is not just unrealistic—it’s a form of soft orientalism. It's the demand that the "other" must behave in a way that makes the observer feel comfortable, regardless of the "other’s" survival requirements.
Every nation has its dark icons. The United States has monuments to generals who fought to preserve slavery. France honors intellectuals who supported brutal colonial regimes. The difference here is that Israel is doing it in real-time, in the face of a camera, while the blood is still wet on the ground. It’s not "worse" than what other nations do; it’s just more honest.
Stop Asking the Wrong Question
The question isn't "Is Rabbi Eliyahu a good person?" That's a Sunday school debate.
The question isn't "Does this look bad internationally?" Of course it does. It’s designed to.
The real question is: "Does the Israeli state believe it can survive without the ideological fervor that Eliyahu represents?"
The answer from the current government is a resounding "No." By focusing on the "war crime" allegations and the inflammatory quotes, the opposition is fighting a battle over optics while the government is winning the battle over the soul of the state.
If you want to stop figures like Eliyahu from being honored, you don't do it by signing petitions or writing op-eds for foreign audiences. You do it by providing an alternative demographic and ideological engine that can protect the state as effectively as the one he leads. Until the secular-liberal center can prove it has the same level of grit and commitment to the physical survival of the country, they will continue to lose the battle of the torches.
The ceremony on Mount Herzl isn't a variety show. It's an inventory of power. And right now, the power is exactly where the critics don't want it to be.
Stop complaining about the fire and start wondering why you’re the one standing in the cold.
