Ambassador Yechiel Leiter at the Colel Chabad Florida Gala 2025

About 100 years ago there was a great debate between Albert Einstein and Enri Burkson great philosopher and the argument was about time. What is the essence of time? Einstein argued that time is chronographic. It's one minute, the next minute, the third minute. It's a day after day, year after year. And Bergson argued that time is qualitative, that there are qualitative moments that erase hundreds and thousands of years between them. That's what our rabbis meant when they said that on the night a person has to experience the leaving of Egypt. There's experiential time. There's qualitative time. I had a qualitative moment just a little while ago when that beautiful young lady Zaga played the organ. You see, I remember when her father was killed. It was a Friday night at 1:00 in the morning. And my son was home for Shabbat and he was called to his unit to track the terror cell that killed Tria's father. So here I am 21 years later completely unexpectedly listening to the beautiful music of who was three and a half years old when her father was killed. And I'm connected with her because I remember my son running to the room and dawning his uniform and grabbing his weapons and running to his unit to track the killer and the cell that sent him. I'm here tonight because of the woman by the name of Hadas Hershkovitz. You see, if Hadas asked me to walk on my hands to the moon, I would do it because Hadas's husband De Mo was killed together with my son as they discovered a shaft that they were looking for that led to a tunnel in northern Gaza. Yasi was a beautiful person. So beautiful I can't begin to tell you how beautiful he was. The pictures of Yussi with my son in Gaza show them in between fighting when Yussi brought his violin. Yes, he played a violin beautifully. He was a principal of a school in Jerusalem, father of five. He loved music. Another qualitative connection to the Zaga family. And one of the pieces of music that he wrote in Gaza during the war was a new melody to the words of King David. Even as I walk the valley of death, I fear not because you are with me, God. You are with me, Hashem. And so Yasi and Moshe walked actually led the division that entered Gaza three weeks after the attacks on October 7th. And they together led very successful battles in the first two weeks that set the pace for the war. You see, when a division enters, it enters like a pyramid. And my son Boscher was the lead commander of that company. And on Friday afternoon parat the para in which we learn about Abrau purchasing a cave or in more common parliament a tunnel underground to bury Sara. And the intel said that it was in a mosque in Banon. He got the order at 2:00 in the afternoon and he took his command team. They scoured the mosque and didn't find the shaft. Moshe was a field fox. He sensed there was danger. and he sensed that if he started withdrawing the troops, they would open fire from behind the terrorists. And he was convinced that he had to find that shaft. So he began to move into the surrounding homes, house to house. And in the second house, the inner room, he found the shaft. Little did he know that the kamas terrorists were following his command team with a hidden camera. And when he found the shaft, he was in the room together with Yosi and Matan Mayer from the Golan Heights and Serjmarin from Keratona. When he found the shaft, he took the wireless and he said, "Matsu, we found the shaft. Shabbat shalom. And the moment he said shalom, the terrorists in the tunnel set off the explosion. It tore out their legs from below and it brought the walls down and the ceiling on top of them. They had no chance of making it out alive. And on the other side of the wall, five of Moshe's command team lost their legs. About a month or so after the schlloim for my son, I was asked to participate in a delegation that was coming from the Gaza envelope to the March of the Living. I'm sure you all know the program March of the Living. Holocaust Day is a march from Avitz to Burkanau and they said they're taking a delegation for the Gaza envelope and they'd like two berd fathers to join. Would I please come together with Elan Kamami whose son Assaf Shemikcom De Mo was a division commander who was killed on October 7. I didn't know Elan. I thought though that this had particular significance because I had never been on this march and I felt that I had my own march. I had my own march to deal with. So I decided to go. And when we arrived in Kov, I was very emotional because my bubby is from Kraov and her entire family was erased in the Holocaust. And they took us first to um an old sh in the ghetto where the sponsor of the delegation completed writing a Torah scroll. And I was asked to be the first one to fill in the letters. And the sofam the scribe said to me, "Let's look for your son's name for Moshe." And at the top of the last column of the Torah is the braha is the blessing of min is meon shinh. So the sofur told me he said the noon falls like in ashray the noon is put aside so what's left is meshinh and he took my hand because I couldn't control my hand. And we slowly filled in the letters. BM Shinhi, memory of my son, great grandson of my Bubby who was born in Kraco. I sat next to Elon and then they called Elon up and Elon looked for Alf Sam P. Then he sat down next to me. We're both in tears. I took Elon by the hand and I said, "Elon, did you always believe in miracles?" He said, "What do you mean?" I said, "Listen, look at us. Look at the two of us. You're from Yemen. I'm from Galitzia. We didn't know each other for 2,000 years. We have no connection. We come back after 2,000 years in Shivation, the return of the Jewish people to the land of Israel. We come here to Kov as victors, the March of the living. We complete the same safer Torah. You have the same Torah I have. 2,000 years of separation. They're the same letters. I studied philosophy. I told him they discovered Aristotle's writings after a thousand years. And to this day, scholars argue over what the real Gearsa is of Aristotle, what the real text of Aristotle is. And here we are sitting in Krakco. We share the same safer Torah. So what a miracle. What a miracle our people is. Then the next day we went to Avitz together and at the entrance to Avitz is a crematorium. I had never been in a crematorium and outside the crematorium everybody is milling around. There's a lot of noise. People are talking and as soon as you walk into the crematorium there's silence. Friends, the silence in a crematorium is a silence like you've never heard. It's silence that you can cut with a knife. And we walk together, this group of Gaza envelope refugees to the end of the crematorium. And sticking out of the ceiling is a rubber pipe. the pipe from which emanated cyclon B which gassed our people and out of the silence comes a voice please say kadesh and I couldn't get a word out of my mouth I couldn't utter kadesh and Donnie from beer kibuts beri who a Holocaust survivor. Imagine he's a Holocaust survivor, 86 years old, and he was a survivor of Bailey that day on October 7th. And he showed me how he saved himself and his wife. You see, he's 86 with Parkinson's. And he held on to the handle of the secure door in his house in Ber like this for 15 hours. Parkinson's holding on to the handle for 15 hours to protect him and his wife. And now he's back in Ashvitz and he comes over to me and he says, "Please Yil, say Kadesh." And I can't say Kadesh. And then Elon comes up to me, Elon from the Safer Torah, and he puts an Israeli flag on my shoulders and he ties it here, front of my neck. on my throat and he says, "Please, I'll say kadesh with you. Please say kadesh." And I managed to to get the words out of my mouth. And I say kadesh. And everybody says kadesh with me. And as I'm marching to Burkanau, I'm trying to think what was going on in my mind. Why was I tongue tied? Why was I choking? Why couldn't I say kadesh? And I realized what was going through my mind. What kadesh do I say? What kadesh do I say in a crematorium? I'm saying kadesh for my son. My son wasn't helpless and hopeless. My son was a commando. inahal is the Israel Defense Force. He led our boys in battle. Is that the same kadesh for my family that went to gas chambers helpless and hopeless who couldn't take a gun in their hand and fight and I remembered at the Shiva when the prime minister came to pay a shiva call and I told him. Mr. Prime Minister, we know each other a long time. At the end of this process, Kamas must be destroyed like the Nazis were destroyed. You have to destroy them like the Nazis were destroyed. [Applause] And I told him and I told afterwards to anybody who wanted to listen. I said, "If God forbid the state of Israel didn't come into being after the Holocaust, what would have been etched onto our collective hearts?" This remember this. Remember the little boy in the Warsaw Ghetto, helpless and hopeless with with those eyes, those forsaken eyes in that picture with the Nazi guns pointing down at him. That's what it would etched into our soul. What did the state of Israel do? The state of Israel came and put a gun into the hands of that little boy in the Warsaw Ghetto and said Jews fight. So am I saying the same Kadesh? Am I saying the same Kadesh? one of the greatest scholars that Benim Zbe who was one of the greatest postkim in Europe great Torah scholar wrote in the holocaust about kushashem which has kulashem and kidushem which doesn't have kulashem and he said which is greater there's kidushem where people give their life for the Jewish people but where the nations of the world can say where's god That's kidushem with kulashem. But when Jews protect and defend themselves, that's kidushem without kilashem. When Jews fight, that's kidushem without kilashem. So how did I make peace and how did I say kadesh? And then I remembered two stories about my son. First, when he came back from basic training, it's a grueling basic training. It's the equivalent of the American Delta Force. And he came back one Shabbat and he was so tired. Couldn't imagine the the fatigue. And I said, 'How do you do it with 65 kilo on your back and 90 kilometer hikes and the heat and the mountains day after day, week after week? And he said, "Aba, Aba, I have a patent, a patent. I have my own patent." He always used to smile. He said, "I have my own patent." And I said, "What do you mean?" He said, "I add weight." Said, "Come on, Moshe. Stop pulling my leg. What do you mean you add weight? You have to take off weight to get through it." Says, "No, no, no. I add weight. I add the hopes and the prayers of my bubbies and zetes on my shoulders. And as soon as I put them on, the weight becomes easier to bear. I'm able to get through the hikes. So I made peace with the kadesh. His bubbies and his zadies were on his shoulders when he went into Gaza. Then I remembered the second story as I'm marching in the march of the living to Burkanau. I remember that he once brought my parents, my mother, she lived till 120 and my my father may rest in peace. When he was still alive, Moshe brought them a picture of him coming out of an attack helicopter. He's coming down the rope. It's a classified picture, but he brought it to my parents. And I was zoh merited to be with my father in his last months of life. I sat with him. I connected with this eight-year-old boy who came here as a refugee from the Nazis in 1938. I connected with him and that's how I connected with all of my Zades. And he he was a psychologist but he loved the garra. He loved Talmud. And his last months, he would sit in front of the Talmud the whole day. And my mom hung the picture of her grandson coming out of the helicopter on the dining room wall. My dad used to sit in front of the Talmud and every once in a while he'd pick up his head from the from the gamarra from the page and he'd look at his grandson coming out of the helicopter and he would smile and go back to the town, go back to the page. At some point I said, "Aba, Dad, what's going on here? What's the story? What is this all about? you're learning the DAFF and then you pick up your head, you look at Moshe, you smile and you do this again and again and again. He looked at me and he said, "You don't understand. Ever since Ravina and Ravashi, the compilers of the Gomorrah, wrote this page, my ancestors have been learning this page. But none of them had a grandson that comes out of an attack helicopter of the Israel Defense Force. None of them merited having a grandson that fights for the survival of the Jewish people with a gun in his hand. They didn't have an IDF. So when I come back to the page, it's a different page. It's not the same page that my father learned. It's a different page of the Taba. I come to it with a different spirit. My friends, had sent me here and I'm so glad I came. I didn't know of all the important work you do and now I do and I'm richer for it. But I want you to know that we're all on a march of the living. It's not between Avitz and Burkanau. It's a march of the living that has gone on for 2,000 years. And it's a march of the living now that the world is trying to come to grips with. And if you want to understand why they're running around campuses screaming from the river to the sea, it's because we are a disruptive nation. The idea that we're fulfilling the prophecies of 2500 years disrupts everybody's way of thinking. It's difficult to grasp. It's going to the root of our very existence. And don't think for one moment that you can fight anti-semitism without fighting anti-sionism, without fighting anti-Israelism, without fighting this despicable attempt to eradicate the state of Israel. I sat just a few weeks ago together with the prime minister in the Senate. The prime minister sat to my right, Minister Durmer, the other side of the prime minister, and there was a leadership of both the Democrats and the Republicans, Senator Schumer, Senator Thun, six other Democrats, six other Republicans. Prime Minister spoke for about 30 minutes about current events in the Middle East. And then he turned to me and he said, "This is our new ambassador." He said, "Mr. Ambassador, would you like to say something to the Senate? You know, I have these moments when I'm unprepared. You say this quick prayer, you know, this is for you. Please help me out. And I said, "Senators, you're all united in one thing. You're all united in fighting anti-semitism. But I want you to know that you cannot succeed as long as the prime minister sitting to my right is called a war criminal. Because if he's called a war criminal, Jews are war criminals. I'm a child killer. According to the International Criminal Court, we're a genocidal nation. We're an apartheid country and until you fight that aparttheid, until you fight that genocide, until you fight that new blood label, I said it's no difference between the blood liels of the Middle Ages and this blood label today. We don't bake matzas with Christian blood and we don't kill innocent people in Gaza. We do everything we possibly can to avoid collateral damage. In the annals of modern urban war history, there has never been a more moral war fought. And you need to say that in every function, at every occasion to everyone you know that this attempt to brand us as genocidal will not stand. We're going to fight it together with you because we are on this march of the living. We don't stop marching. And we're not going to stop marching in our homeland. Our widows, our orphans, those who you support, had my Moshe, they give us life. And they say our loved ones gave their life so that we can go on living as Jews. And now we have an obligation to do that. I'll tell you on a personal level, I was ready to retire, write books, and teach. When the prime minister called me and said, "I want you to go to Washington as the ambassador of Israel. On the tip of my tongue was, I told you no three times over the past 10 years. I'm going to tell you no again. And then I thought of my son. And I thought of what Moshe would tell me to do. And Moshe would tell me, "Aba, you have a responsibility now. Live for me." He lived 39 years, but as his best friend said at his funeral. He lived 80 years, double his lifespan. 15 years in special ops and then med school. He finished med school and was supposed to start his rounds in the hospital on October 8th. It's called Plan B. Whenever I would tell him he's taking too much on himself, he loved the story of Rabbi Steinald. He loved to tell the story. Rabbi Stein one came to Baba Rebbi and he said, "I'm writing a translation and a commentary on the Torah, a translation and commentary on the Talmud. I'm writing so many articles, so many books and I'm asked to speak in so many places. I can't do it all. What should I detract from my schedule? And the Reb thought for a moment and he said, add something. And my son loved the story. And everybody, every time I would tell him, Moshe, you have to cut something out of the schedule. You're doing too much. He would say to me, Abba, I'm going to add something. You stay on my back. So, I'm living for him. And what I ask you all is to live for the Hadases and for the and for the,200 people on October 7th and for the 900 soldiers that have given their lives and for the 5,000 soldiers that are laying injured, some very seriously injured. You have to live for them now because they lived for you. And whatever you're doing, I ask you to do a little more. A little more. Whatever you committed to, commit to a little more. And I I can't leave you without one final message. I came back from bearing my son He's my oldest, my best friend. And I'm sitting there in his home and the tent that they created outside the house. And just before Mina, Raviakov Midan Schlita, the Rashiva of Haratio, one of my teachers came in and he always comes in with a storm with a lot of enthusiasm. And I said, "Ravakov, what are you doing here? Your son Alicia is in the hospital in Shahitk." Alicia was one of those soldiers, the best friend of Yosi, by the way. The best friend their whole lifetime together. He He's between heaven and earth. He's hanging on a thread. He lost both legs. And he said, "I came to give you a hug." He said, "I need your hug. I need you to hug me." He said, "I want to go back to Shedek and be next to Alicia and pray that he survives, but I need you to hug me." He said, "Because Moshe was the best commander Alicia ever had." And he spoke between menar about my son and it was it was very emotional and you know he comes from Gusion from Judea. About an hour later in came a gentleman with his son to the tent. There was a lot of commotion and he he sat down opposite me and he said he said hello I'm I'm Ga Pedote. I said he said I did I did medics course with you 41 years ago. This is my son who serves in seat matkal and I just want you to know that my son Amos was also a son who was also a kayal was also a soldier of your son Moshe and he's also in char but he's going to live he has one leg he lost one leg and then he was quiet he waited a few minutes and then he said just a second I just want you to know that he used to demonstrate every week on Kaplan in Tel Aviv against the government. I thought about it for a few minutes. I wondered why he said that to me and then it hit me and I asked for quiet. There were now maybe 2,000 people and I asked for quiet and I saidim all of you have come to console me. I want to share a thought with you. Jacob Maidan was just here. He came from Gusion. He's a settler. Elicia is a settler from Judea. He came from the hills. He lost both legs. Amos. Think about that for a moment. Amos. Alicia. Just the names. Both. Amos. The prophet was also from Judea by the way. Alicia and Amos. almost lost one leg and he comes from Tel Aiv from the left and together Amos and Alicia have one leg. Whenever you have a fit of disunityity, of Jewish disunityity, think about Amos and Alicia. Friends, we're on one leg. That's the leg of Jewish unity. It's unity around our people, around our state, around our destiny. If we kick that leg out, if we kick that leg of unity out, we're endangering our future. Hold that leg together. Think of Amos and Alicia. Do a little bit more for our people, for our state, for our future. And we are going to have the most beautiful destiny that our prophets imagined. and we're going to partake in it. We're going to be active participants in it. We're going to have qualitative time together. And so is humanity. Thank you very much.