13 September 2013

Yom Kippur war - 40 years

Not by a bravura of military marches and not by tearful funereal keens. This song, written by our late and much beloved Naomi Shemer 40 years ago, during the war, is part of our collective inheritance and is forever associated with that war.

13 comments:

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Stirring, actually, thanks.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Wish I had a translation handy. It is, in fact, Beatles' "Let it be" reworded by Shemer, who disagreed with Paul McCartneys' reading of it.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Hmmm. Didn't remind me of the Beatles tune. As for the translation, in linking to you I found one: http://www.hebrewsongs.com/?songID=176

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Hmmm. Doesn't remind me of the Beatles tune at all and the words are very different. As for the translation, in linking to you I found one: http://www.hebrewsongs.com/?songID=176

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Ha! Seems we have stumbled on the same one. Mind, the translation looks like it was done by Google or similar.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Gemar chasimah tovah, Snoopy. Have a good and healthy year!

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Gemar chasimah tovah. Have an easy fast.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Oh, too bad. It reads good. Maybe you should do your own?

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Oh, the level required (in both languages) is beyond my puny abilities.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Thanks, Yitzchak, and same to you and all yours.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Thanks, Katie, and te same to you.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Thanks Snoopy, that was a beautiful song with meaningful words that said what really mattered.


A poem by one of the defenders of the Golan Heights in 1973.


My Brothers the Heroes of Golan


I wanted to write to you, my brothers
With beards and sooty faces and all the other marks
I wanted to write to you - you who stood alone

Facing Enemy tanks from front and flank.
You whose clanking tracks set a land trembling,
You who proved that armor is iron but man is steel,
To you, who gave a shoulder and extended a hand
Abd destroyed them in their masses one by one
I wanted to write you a hymn if only one
For each of the few who stood against the many,
I stand here on the ramps and count them by their scores
Sooty hulks and abandoned tanks and cold corpses
And I remember how you worked alone and in pairs

One turning on a light while the other struck from close,
And I look on towards the bloody path and Mazrat Beit Jan
And the night of move to ambush at America-Yair crossing
And the artillery that pounded at dawn
And I remember the hundred and twenty-seven
And the gang on tanks, and their joy
When they heard and felt cease-fire coming
I look back and see the faces of heroes,
Who will not come back with us, nor tell their exploits
Those who saw the oncoming monster and fired till it stopped,
Who loaded another shell and another belt till they paid with their blood.
I remember all of them - Yair, Ami and Amir
Amir and Zelig Bluman and all the others who fought like lions till morning dawned.
I stand here alone and my heart is filled with a silent prayer: Let there be no more war ...

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Yes. Thanks.