After a seven-year hiatus, Israel’s Consulate General in New York revived its official Israeli Independence Day celebration with an event in Midtown Manhattan on Sunday night that blended solemn speeches with Israeli folk dancing, themed cocktails and reflections on the country’s resilience in the wake of the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
As many as 800 guests attended, including the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams; Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.); and Ofir Akunis, the Israeli consul general in New York, who addressed the crowd alongside video messages from Israeli President Isaac Herzog.
Israeli-Arab pop singer Nasreen Qadri entertained the crowd, and an Israeli troupe performed beneath a large screen projecting archival footage of Israelis dancing in the streets on the night that the modern-day State of Israel was declared on May 14, 1948. Guests sipped themed cocktails named for key figures in the founding of the nation—Theodor Herzl, Ze’ev Jabotinsky, David Ben-Gurion, Golda Meir—under blue-and-white decorations, the colors of the Israeli flag.
Akunis told JNS that the consulate’s first Independence Day event in seven years was a chance to celebrate Israel’s resilience post-Oct. 7.
“The Jewish people have a lot of enemies who prefer to see us sad, not happy and proud,” he said. “Despite their wishes, this year is the right time to strengthen the Jewish community in New York and celebrate along with all the Israelis who live here.”
Since the five boroughs of New York City combined are home to the largest Jewish community outside of Israel, it makes it all the more important to recognize the day, according to Akunis.
“For a Zionist and a Jew, Yom Ha’atzmaut is the most important holiday on the Jewish calendar because we waited over 2,000 years and 70 generations, praying from all around the world that our people would be reunited in the Holy Land,” he said. “We finally accomplished this in 1948 when the State of Israel was established.”
The ceremony also featured remarks from Agam Berger, a musician and former hostage held by Hamas in Gaza for 482 days, who spoke publicly for the first time. She shared how her religious faith helped her survive captivity.
“I was kidnapped because I am a Jew,” said the 20-year-old. “In captivity, I risked my life to preserve my sense of self and never surrender my Jewish identity.
“I faced the angel of death and refused to let him win,” she added.
Berger stated that while captivity stripped her of her freedom, history has “shown you can force a Jew into the darkness, but you can’t force the darkness into a Jew.”
“My free will and my Judaism,” she emphasized, “can never be taken from me.”
Akunis told JNS that Berger is an inspiration to the Jewish people.
“When she flew from the military base to the hospital after being released, she said, ‘I kept the faith and the faith kept me,’” he stated. “That one sentence sums up our entire journey. Not just from the exodus from Egypt but from the destruction of the Second Temple onward.”
He said that “in one sentence, this brave 20-year-old Israeli captured the essence of who we are.”
‘A beacon of democracy’
Adams said the city was looking forward to the upcoming “Celebrate Israel Parade” on May 18. He also made it a point to state that rising antisemitism must be condemned.
“We still face serious challenges, and one of the biggest is the surge of antisemitism—this ugly, recurring disease that’s plaguing the United States and other countries,” he said. “The most important thing is that we stand together against antisemitism, stand together against the enemies of the State of Israel, and stand together against the lies.”
“We must speak the truth and stand up for it,” he added.
Lawler, who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa, called for all hostages to be returned home immediately.
“Over the last 19 months, we’ve witnessed a brutal terrorist organization, Hamas, funded by Iran, the world’s greatest state sponsor of terror, alongside Hezbollah and other proxies, seek to destroy and undermine Israel, the United States and the free world,” he said. “We will not let it happen.”
America’s ally, stated Lawler, is a “beacon of democracy” in the Mideast.
“Israel is not an oppressor,” he said. “It is not an apartheid state. The real oppressors of the Palestinian people are Hamas and the Palestinian Authority—and they must be defeated at all costs.”