TNL in Jerusalem #33 - The Tomb of Joseph

[Music] the landof israel.com and Israel national TV present Aria bramwit and Jeremy [Applause] gimpel Live From The Heart of Israel it's Tuesday night live in [Music] Jerusalem [Applause] Shalom and welcome to Tuesday night live in Jerusalem I'm Jeremy gel this is ARA bramz and thank you for joining us tonight we're talking about the tomb of Joseph we're talking about reclaiming our holy sights I'll tell you I went for the first time in my entire life to the tomb of Joseph and it transformed me for years it's been closed to Jews it's been impossible it's in the heart of sh in nais it's in the middle of a like a like a nest of vipers I mean it's a very dangerous place to go we went in the middle of the night we had helicopters and tanks and we had all of these people protecting us and I got out of this armored bus and I was with a few friends of mine I was with Ari you to devid elezar Rovia singer and I saw the tomb of Joseph for the first time and I'm a little bit of a drama queen I know but I started crying because the tomb of Joseph was a garbage dump the Arabs in Shem throw all of their garbage in the Tomb of Joseph it was graffitied there was garbage everywhere it was burnt in fact the the Dome of the tomb of Joseph was cracked in and I looked I said what ysep at sadic that's the tomb of Joseph where the hell is the leadership in this country how could that be how could that be that the tomb of Joseph would be that's the third holiest site to the Jewish people it's the Temple mount the Tomb of the Patriarchs Kev Yosef this is what it looks like like and I'm like all right if we did one of those we took one of their holy sights if it's the Church of the Holy whatever or the mosque of the Holy whatever and we treated it like that you know what would happen there would be human rights activists storming the streets of Israel parading about human rights about freedom of religion about oppression and here I am now in Jerusalem calling on all these human right activists where are you now where are they any human right activist here you're not welcome see the question is you know there there's a lot of tombs in Israel there's there's probably a lot of Joseph's also why did we pick the tomb of Joseph why this show what's it about in my mind the reason the tomb of Joseph was picked is because of who Joseph was what are we facing in Israel right now the government the entire National policy the foreign policy of Israel is revolved around fear fear that America won't support us or fear that the Nations will turn against us say and what was Joseph all about he didn't know the word fear there was no such thing as the word fear his whole life was lived with such a consciousness of God of his his emuna his his belief his faith you know comes from the word imim from training from practice his whole life he lived his faith to the degree where he went before Pharaoh the superpower of the world and Pharaoh said I need you to interpret my dream and Joseph said I don't interpret dreams that's the god of Israel that is courage that is just an instinct a reflex of saying no it's all God and perhaps if we go and we take care of Joseph Our Father we help bring his his tomb back to a respectable way where we can respect it and the world would respect us for that we could then earn and Merit his attributes of courage and honor and faith and Truth for the entire nation and tonight we want to share with every everyone here a short clip of our experiences at the tomb of Joseph enjoy it's the dead of night Jewish settlers in an armored van with an army escort traveled to the tomb of Joseph the biblical patriarch in the heart of nais on the West Bank Israel controlled the tomb until late 2000 when it was taken over by Palestinians after the outbreak of the intifada Jewish worshippers now return always late at night for brief visits these are the hardcore of Israel's settler movement is this a free democracy in the land of Israel are these holy Jewish sites or in fact we're slaves in our own country was that the Zionist dream was that the dream of 2,000 years that we would have to go to the tomb of Joseph with helicopters tanks in a bulletproof van that's not the Jewish dream we're going to bring the Jewish dream back their dream is to reverse the peace process to regain control of the West Bank in Gaza the main message is that that also was wrong that the disengagement was wrong the the Arabs proved in their barbarism in their hate towards us in the rockets that they shoot into our cities that they are not worthy of having their own State they surely not on our land the land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people it was wrong it was wrong to give it over to the Arabs and it must be returned to our hands [Music] Jerusalem HED sukot the year 2008 it's near midnight as tens of Jews are preparing for a long ride in the meantime thousands of Jews from all over the country get ready to make their way in a bus similar to this they are all going to Joseph's tomb in Shem why what is everyone looking for in Joseph's tomb and in the middle of the night what is so special about Joseph's tomb Joseph's tomb is mentioned in the bible both in the Kash and the prophets and Yakov came to shalm a city of Shem which is in the land of Canan and he bought the piece of land on which he spread his tent at the hand of the children of hamor shim's Father for a 100 pieces of money and and the bones of Yosef which the children of Israel brought up out of Egypt they buried in shm in a section of ground which Yakov bought from the sons of hamor the father of shm for a 100 pieces of money and they became the inheritance of the children of ysf the tradition as to the location of Joseph's tomb has been preserved and passed down over the years the ancient madaba map from the 7th Century mentions Joseph's tomb near Shem 600 years later a Jewish traveler writes and from there I went to Shem and saw the grave site of the righteous Joseph son of Jacob which was situated between two marble pillars one at its head and one at its feet throughout all of history Jews made the pilgrimage to the gravite of yosf hat sadik Joseph the righteous one to pray and pour out their supplications to God they are attracted to the figure of Joseph because of his Noble and righteous character as mentioned in the Bible for decades the Yeshiva oseph Kai located near Joseph's tomb in the city of Shem was a place where people of all ages came to pray and engage in deep study of the Torah in addition to the numerous visitors to the holy site there existed a permanent Yeshiva of Torah Scholars studying torad daily with great self-sacrifice but during the second antifa in September 2000 on the second day of rosha Shana Joseph's tomb was attacked by Palestinians one of the soldiers defending the site was injured and killed in the aftermath of the attack the Palestinians take control of the area from the IDF promising to honor the sanctity of the site but the moment the IDF withdraws from the area Joseph's tomb is desecrated toas scrolls are burned the entire area ransacked and [Music] vandalized for several years after that Jews are not permitted to visit at yosef's tomb when I look down to K ysf I feel that we've sold our brother for a second time we see what a farce that was uh this was supposed to be one of the fundamental things that they are going to protect us something that I never believed was going to happen and something that the whole world sees uh has not happened it is obvious that the Palestinian Authority has not complied uh with the stipulations that they provide free and unfettered access to all Jewish holy sites the Jewish people have a right to the land of Israel they have a right to their holy places today through great efforts Jews are returning to Joseph's tomb the government is giving permission for only one visit a month in the middle of the night with a massive Army escort and for only a few thousand Jews each time on the nights in which Jews are allowed to visit there is great excitement and anticipation tens of buses from all over Israel are filled with Jews who come to pour out their hearts and bask in the Holiness of the righteous yosf it is an atmosphere of spiritual elevation and [Music] sanctity [Music] [Applause] [Music] I hadn't been aware of before of the power of yourf it was almost like a magnetic draw for people and I'm not sure many of them could even explain it themselves C yose is not only holy but it's part of our heart and part of our soul and part of who we are he was a uh personality who could uh be the Viceroy uh second only to the Pharaoh in Egypt but yet still maintain his misar still maintain his tradition and his Jewish identity that's why he is so important to us to the Jewish people it's inspiring to see the thousands of people who are coming out in the middle of the night to take part in this event and this brings us further to our ultimate goal of reestablishing kevf and I'm sure that we will reach that goal the variety of different kinds of people who came I think it's impossible to gener I and label them as anything because I mean you had the grandmothers from Rana and from and people who actually in normal life would probably not have that much in common with each other by continuing to visit kevf we're showing the government and our people and our kids how important it is to maintain our rights and our connections with our heritage in this country for after great effort a small flickering light was ignited on Hanukah of 2008 a team of Jewish workers accompanied by the IDF entered Shem and rebuilt Joseph's tomb the restoration is a small part in an overall effort to return Jewish sovereignty and dignity to the historical [Applause] site [Music] we we intend to come in and rebuild the the roof of the building and to finish renovating the entire building and to continue and demand the regular access for Jews to Jews for Jews to be able to enter yourself every day without that access uh to our holy sites to our Legacy we have no future thank God there are people who care and all of the Jewish people need to support the efforts they need to be involved Joseph's tomb Kev yosf the grave site of one of our nation's forefathers is again becoming a place where multitudes of Jews visit and pray in a continuous chain generation after generation of Jews continue the tradition of visiting their patriarch to pray for themselves for their land and for their Nation today there is an opportunity to strengthen our Jewish hold on the site ensuring that this site remains in Jewish hands is fulfilling the legacy of our Holy Father Yosef at [Music] sadik with pesak on the horizon and realizing that the key to the Redemption is actually the bones of Joseph stay tuned next week when we see what's happening practically on the ground in Israel with the head of the Council of Samaria joining us and how the Jewish people are going to reclaim our holy sights and we're going to restore the tomb of our holy sadic Our Father Joseph have a wonderful happy [Music] passover's go hey [Music] hey [Music] [Applause] oh [Music] oh [Music] I [Music] [Applause] n