On Iyar 5, 5708 (1948), David Ben-Gurion proclaimed Israel an independent state at a ceremony in Tel Aviv, establishing a national homeland after centuries of persecution and displacement. Since then, the fifth of Iyar has been a national holiday celebrated by barbecues, hikes, concerts, and the awarding of the Israel Prize, while in many synagogues, a special service including Hallel is recited.
The proclamation came just days after the first legislative act of the newly declared provisional government of the State of Israel repealed the British White Paper of 1939, which had restricted Jewish immigration and the acquisition of land in pre-state Israel. This 78th anniversary of independence is preceded by Iyar 4, Remembrance Day, or Yom Hazikaron, the official memorial day for the soldiers who fell in Israel's wars, when all places of entertainment are closed, flags are flown at half-mast, people visit military cemeteries, ceremonies are held, and the country comes to a halt during a siren while observing two minutes of silence.
Historical Foundations and Resistance
The path to statehood was paved by international commitments and resistance movements. On April 25, 1920, marking its 106th anniversary, the San Remo Resolution was adopted at the post-World War I Allied Supreme Council, allocating League of Nations mandates for the administration of three then-undefined Ottoman territories in the Middle East: Palestine, Syria, and Mesopotamia. The resolution made Britain responsible for putting into effect the Balfour declaration in favor of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, with Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations as the basis for the British Mandate, transforming the Balfour Declaration from a letter of intent into a legally binding foundational document under international law. It also laid the political foundation for the creation of the 22 Arab League states, none of which had existed as an independent country previously.
On May 4, 1947, marking its 79th anniversary, the Irgun Zeva'i Leumi, or Etzel, an underground organization fighting for an independent Jewish state, broke into the British prison fortress at Acre and freed 41 Jewish prisoners, an action later immortalized in the movie Exodus. On April 30, 1925, marking its 101st anniversary, the Zionist Revisionist party was founded by Ze'ev, also called Vladimir, Jabotinsky, who demanded a more aggressive policy toward the British, believing that only worldwide pressure would force them to abide by the mandate, and whose followers, who included Menachem Begin, became the founders and leaders of the Israeli right-wing political parties.
Holocaust Memory and Survival
The state's founding occurred against the backdrop of the Holocaust's devastating toll. On April 19, 1943, marking its 83rd anniversary, after 265,000 Jews were deported to the Treblinka death camp and another 100,000 Jews died of disease and starvation, the remaining 35,000 Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto, from an original 400,000 and 30% of the entire population of Warsaw, staged an organized uprising and drove back the Nazis when they began the final liquidation of the ghetto. Approximately 300 Germans and 7,000 Jews were killed in the fighting, the Jews held out until May 16, and besides a few dozen fighters who escaped through the sewers, the remaining Jews were sent to their deaths in Treblinka.
On May 8, 1943, marking its 83rd anniversary, Mordechai Anilewicz, commander of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, was killed in the main bunker at the age of 24. He had united the various factions, published a newsletter called Against the Stream, and started an urban kibbutz. On May 9, 1945, marking its 81st anniversary, the Theresienstadt ghetto/concentration camp was liberated by Soviet forces, and of the 155,000 prisoners that passed through there, 124,352 were either killed there or deported to extermination camps.
On May 13, 1939, marking its 87th anniversary, 937 Jews fled Nazi Germany on board the luxury liner MS St. Louis, intending to reach Cuba and then the US to begin a new life, but were turned away from Cuba, the US, and Canada before being forced to return to Europe, where more than 250 were murdered by Nazis. Captain Gustav Schroeder was posthumously named one of the Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem for his valiant efforts to find them refuge.
Leadership and Liberation
On May 3, 1898, marking its 128th anniversary, Golda Meir was born in Kyiv, raised in Milwaukee, and made aliyah in 1921. She served as head of the Jewish Agency, ambassador to Russia, labor minister, foreign minister, and Israel's fourth prime minister from 1969 to 1974, and was described as one of the first female heads of state ever and as the "strong-willed, straight-talking, gray-bunned grandmother of the Jewish people." She was quoted as saying, "No matter what they throw at us, we will beat them."
On Iyar 28, 5728 (1967), marking its 59th anniversary, Israeli paratroopers liberated the Old City of Jerusalem during the Six Day War, restoring Jewish control of the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site. Soldiers danced, sang, and cried at the Western Wall, the site of Jewish prayers for centuries, and Iyar 28 is celebrated today as Jerusalem Day, or Yom Yerushalayim, which includes a special service of prayer composed by the Chief Rabbinate, commemorating the reunification of the Holy City, which has stood as the capital of the Jewish nation for 3,000 years.
Why This Matters:
Israel's Independence Day commemorates not just a declaration but the culmination of a struggle for self-determination by a people who faced systematic persecution, displacement, and genocide. The historical context—from the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising where 35,000 Jews from an original 400,000 fought against annihilation, to the Theresienstadt camp where 124,352 of 155,000 prisoners were killed or deported to death, to the MS St. Louis passengers turned away by multiple nations and sent back to their deaths—underscores the urgent need for a secure homeland that the state's founding addressed. The repeal of the British White Paper as the first legislative act highlights how restrictive immigration policies had directly endangered Jewish lives. Today's celebrations honor both the achievement of statehood and the memory of those who did not survive to see it, while Remembrance Day ensures that the human cost of independence remains central to the national consciousness.