ON THIS DAY: Theodor Herzl re-interred 69 years ago atop Mt. Herzl

• By OREN OPPENHEIM Rabhan told the Post that him to be re-interred in Tel that [Jerusalem] is still a center, various reasons prevented the Aviv, as that city’s name is a focal point [for Israel],” Rabhan Friday, Av 23 in Judaism’s World Zionist Organization Hebrew translation of his book said. “What better way of doing lunar calendar - corresponding from bringing Herzl’s remains Alteneuland (Old-New Land). that than drawing national to August 3 - marks the 69th to Palestine during the British There were also calls for him attention to this place?” anniversary of the re-intern- Mandate. In 1949 with the con- to be buried in Haifa, which From the 834-meter-high ment of Theodor Herzl (1860- elusion of the War of Indepen- Herzl rhapsodized over during peak of Mount Herzl, one can 1904). The date in the Gregori- dence, the issue became a prior- his only visit to the Land of view the Temple Mount. an calendar falls on August 17. ity for the nascent state. Israel in 1898. Representatives from every But while the grave on Mount “[David] Ben Gurion’s sitting Ben Gurion, serving as Israel’s locale in Israel attended the Herzl today is a landmark atop down with his first govern- first prime minister, eventually re-internment ceremony. Each the highest point in west Jeru- Spent... where are they going put his foot down, insisting that in turn poured earth from their salem, other cities in the new- to start? They have a brand Herzl be buried in Jerusalem. locale onto the grave, so that born state nearly claimed the new country,” she said, with “It's 1949; we’ve just finished Herzl would be “buried under honor of housing the mauso- little infrastructure and no laws. fighting this war and we've lost dirt from every single inch of leurn of the founder of modern Yet even so, “one of the first half this city [Jerusalem]... Ben this land, from the land that he Zionism, said Nomi Rabhan, a things they decided to do” was Gurion thought, what better so loved and adored,” Rabhan tour guide at the Herzl Museum to bring Herzl’s body to Israel, way to remind people that even said. located near the tomb on the she said. though we only have half the While the Herzl Museum is Mount Herzl. But where should the father city, and we lost the Temple not commemorating the re-in- Known in Hebrew as Har Haz- of the country be laid to rest? Mount, lost the Kotel [Western ternment, Rabhan said that ikaron (the Mount of Memo- Some Israelis called for Herzl Wall], we still have half our cap- tours on Friday will mention ry) as well as Har Herzl, Israel’s to be reburied in Herzliya, the ital city, and we have to refocus the occasion. Herzl’s grave can national cemetery is symboli- city? north of Tel Aviv named everyone's attention to this area be visited with or without a cally located adjoining the Yad in his honor. Others called for because we don’t want to forget formal tour. Admission is free. Vashem Holocaust Remem- brance Center and the Jerusa- lem Forest. Like the biblical leader Moses, Herzl didn’t die in Israel, the land they both pined for. But while Moses’s remains lie in an unknown location on Mount Nebo in biblical Moab, today Jordan, Herzl’s bones were brought for re-burial in the Jewish state he envisioned, in accordance with his last will. In that document, written in German in 1903, Herzl wrote, “I wish to be buried in a metal cof- fin near my father, and lie there until the Jewish people will transfer my body? to the Land of Israel.” He also indicated that he wanted close family mem- bers to be buried there as well. On July 3, 1904, Herzl died

V:'־of cardiac sclerosis in Edlach, ' v?;• ' ?:vT Nj a village near Reichenau an der Rax, Lower Austria, having THEODOR HERZL'S GRAVE atop Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. (Oren Oppenheim) been diagnosed with heart dis- ease earlier in the year. A day before his death, he told his Zionist colleague Rev. William H. Hechler: “Greet Palestine for me. I gave my heart’s blood for my people.” The Zionist visionary, who in 1897 founded the World Zion- ist Organization, convened the Zionist Congress in Basel, Swit- zerland that year, and tirelessly engaged in international diplo- matic efforts to gain a charter to establish a Jewish state, was bur- ied in Dobling, Vienna, where he had been living. In 1949, his remains were brought from the Austrian cap- ital to Jerusalem to be rebur- ied on the top of Mount Herzl. In 2006 his children Hans and Pauline were disinterred from their graves in France and reburied alongside their father. The following year, the remains of his grandson Stephen The- odore Norman were exhumed in Washington, DC, and re-in- terred alongside his grandfa- ther.