Last night, the siren announcing the commencement of Israel's Memorial Day for its fallen soldiers and terror victims caught me in the middle of Road # 60, in Wadi Haramiyah. Like Israelis throughout the country, I got out of my car and stood in silence for the duration of the siren. But I was not in the middle of a major highway. I happened to be alone on the road that winds all the way from the hills of Judea, through Binyamin and north through the hills of the Shomron. Wadi Haramiyah, where I stopped my car, is the place where -- just five years ago -- ten Israeli citizens and soldiers were murdered by an Arab sniper.  

The siren on my car radio was a bit distant. Israel's official radio station, the Voice of Israel, doesn't exactly broadcast to Judea and the Shomron. But when I got back in my car and began the winding climb through the hills of Binyamin, the reception cleared and I was able to hear Israel's official Memorial Day ceremony. The solemn and dignified Master of Ceremonies invited the Honorable Acting President, Mrs. Daliah Itzik, to speak in memory of the fallen soldiers. At that point, I turned off my radio. The darkness and quiet of the Binyamin hills seemed more appropriate to the gravity of the evening than the voice of the Honorable Acting President. 

It is easy and natural for a Jew to identify with the Nation of Israel, its pain and its fallen heroes. We should not make light of that solidarity. It may be the only expression we have of an all encompassing Israeli culture. On the other hand, though, identification with the State's official symbols and ceremonies is extremely problematic. 

When people ask me if there will be "religious coercion" in the Manhigut Yehudit-led Jewish State, I use the Memorial Day siren as an example. Is there any law in Israel that requires one to stand during the Memorial Day siren? Of course not. And if there were such a law, I would probably not have stopped my car in the middle of the dark, lonely road in Wadi Haramiyah to stand in silence. But the Memorial Day siren is an inseparable part of my culture. In an authentic Jewish State, a person eating falafel on Passover would feel just as uncomfortable as a person who would walk down the street whistling a tune during the Memorial Day siren. Laws and coercion will not make Israel's public space Jewish. What we need is a cultural revolution that will transform our Torah into our culture.