The previous night Prime Minister Eshkol had addressed the nation and assured it that things were looking up. He spoke in the future tense, predicting better times and general prosperity, made some humorous quip about great efforts being rewarded in the end, warned against impatience, called for perseverance, and did not minimize the dangers ahead but nonetheless concluded with an optimistic quotation from the poet Bialik. Immediately afterwards, a special feature was broadcast about the restoration of the newly settled Ta’anach region to its ancient fertility, followed by a program of old pioneering songs.

At each stop, men bundled in work clothes boarded Yolek’s bus. From time to time, whenever the sun peeked through the thick clouds, a sharp change swept over the mountains and valleys to the east. No sooner did light touch their slopes than they turned to a vibrant, luxuriantly deep green. Atop a newly built fence in a newly built village perched a bird, soaking wet. A cat scrounging among nearby garbage cans whose lids had been blown off by the wind pretended not to see it. Throngs of children trooped by on their way to school, cheap imitation-leather briefcases strapped to their backs. A blue and red poster on a signboard promised one and all a gala evening.

We are halfway through the sixties, thought Yolek. It is a long and rainy winter between wars, long enough for the people to fill their lungs with the scent of wet citrus groves and the fragrance of their fruit. When everyone is cultivating his garden, should not my task be to rejoice in our achievements and make others feel that joy too? Be not jaded, O foolish heart, but gala, and full of joy!

Nineteen sixty-five. A winter between wars. Before joy can prevail, all the nightmares, all the suffering, all the wounds must heal. But we’re turning over a new leaf here. A safe haven for the Jewish people, that’s what we used to say when we were young.

Yolek opened the window a crack, since the bus was full of cigarette smoke, to take a breath of fresh air. Ga’ash, Rishpon, Shefayim, the old village of Ra’anana—all these settlements along the road seemed to him like final, unchallengeable arguments in the age-old debate with ancient rivals that was still going on in his mind.