The Hebrew version of this short article was written by Ora Lev-Ron and Shmuel Bartenstein. It appeared on the Hofesh website under http://www.hofesh.org.il/articles/chagim/independence.html.
Israel was declared an independent state on Friday, the 5th of the Hebrew month of Iyar, at 4pm.
David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister, delivered the declaration speech. Most Israelis were glued to their radios and even nowadays the old statements provide reason for excitement.
It was Friday, the evening before Saturday – an extremely important evening for the renewed Jewish settlement in the land of Israel. It was established as a holiday – the most important holiday of the state of Israel: Independence Day.
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The holiday has been allegedly celebrated ever since in the original date, each year, similarly to other countries. However, in Israel, the religious political power has increased. Suddenly religious people remembered it was not nice to create states on Fridays, when the Sabbath may arrive any moment and bump into the young emerging country. Slowly they have also gained political power. Eventually the Israeli parliament, The Knesset, gently “moved” Independence Day from its original date.
Until 1957, the Israeli Independence Day had been celebrated in its correct time, twice on Saturday and once in Friday. In 1958 it was first “moved” and recently it has changed so much such that only three days of the week have been left, in which it is now “allowed” to celebrate the Independence Day: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Thus, when pupils in school are told that “today it’s Independence Day”, the meaning is that probably it is not really today, but today it’s ok to celebrate according to political compromises.