There is a beautiful recounting of the wonderful friendship Shimon Peres had with the French PM who on the last night of his stewardship before being thrown out, made concrete his promise of cooperation with Israel to build a Nuclear Plant in Dimona in the Negev.
Recalling
those nerve wracking last moments, Shimon Peres recollects the episode in No
room for Small Dreams: Courage, Imagination, and the making of Modern Israel:
In
this way, I felt that our work on Dimona, an effort once marked for certain
failure, had fulfilled the covenant I had made with my grandfather, but on a
far grander scale: to always remain Jewish and ensure the Jewish people always
remain.
Those
of us, with certain convictions, need no reminders; we will do our bit, in our
own minor capacities in this big drama that Jewish People survive.
Those
Jews who in the false sense of being liberal and open minded, would drown their
own people, and shout support for a group of people bent upon destroying the
Jewish state, we cannot change their minds, but we can use every opportunity we
have and we get in the future to do our drop in the ocean bit to ensure that
Jewish People survive.
I
do not have surplus money to give to institutions that ensure our survival but
I have surplus time and I come across a lot of ordinary people who harbor
ignorant but innocent hatred towards our people and when I meet them or look
for an opportunity to inform them, of Israel or the Israeli people and also the
fabulous gift that is being Jewish, highlighting the common concern, the
devotion to study and innovation and the desire to help others, the mitzvah,
without being a braggart or without substance. I tell Uber drivers in Moslem
countries who invariably have the name Mohammed, that the technology of the
accessories in the car, are all Israeli in origin. And then I have to be a good
example of the people I represent so that they would question themselves: we
were told the Jews are bad but how come the Doctor from Cuba who is Jewish is
so pleasant and gives me self-confidence and listens to my story and gives
credibility to my existence?
I
have won over many a Mohammed in Malaysia and Qatar and Indonesia with the
presentation of symbolism in my behavior which represents the best of our
people, the people whose existence we have to strive for, as promised by Shimon
Peres to his grandfather.
Am
Israel Chai
Which
has the sentiment much like what indigenous people say everywhere
Mitakuye
Oyasin (in Lakota)
We
are all related.
And
we would actively practice this relationship; enhance it at our simple level,
by understanding the knot that ties us, the link in the chain that we are in
the long chain of the history of our people.
Let
me raise this glass of South African Sauvignon Blanc in the 22nd
Floor of a building in this Muslim country and city where everything gleams of
newness and prosperity
L
Chaim to Life.
