Page 16 - HaMizrachi Tisha bAv 5783 USA

G-d Works in

Mysterious Ways:

The Transformation of Aviv Geffen

Rabbi Aron White

ll singers are entertainers, but in Pink Floyd” was more important to him “When I came off stage, I looked at my
the 1990s, Aviv Geffen became than the Kotel. phone and I had 420 messages. I started
much more than that. As an Geffen was also a vocal opponent of the reading through them – someone had
Aeighteen-year-old, he burst onto settler movement in Yehuda and Shomron. passed my number on, and I had message
the scene in 1992, with angsty, rebellious During the Gaza Disengagement in 2005, after message from Bnei Brak residents
songs that spoke powerfully to thousands he said that he wanted all the settlers saying how much they appreciated it, how
of young Israelis, making him an Israeli removed from Gaza, “whether dead or much they love my music. ‘You are bring-
cultural icon. His songs attacked the IDF, alive.” For religious parents, Geffen rep- ing hope to Israel,’ one message said. I sat
Judaism, and everything, it seemed, that resented all that was wrong with Israeli there and cried.”
his parents’ generation stood for. An Israeli society, a dangerous cultural threat to the The rock singer’s rapprochement comes
version of John Lennon, he yearned for a spiritual health of their children. at a time when Israeli artists of radically
peaceful future with “no religion, race or different religious and ethnic backgrounds
gender,” and once said that “one chord of Today, Aviv Geffen is no less famous, but have created a cultural environment of
he has radically changed his tone. In unity and mutual respect. Singers such
2021, he performed at Breichat HaSultan
in Yerushalayim together with Avraham as Ishay Ribo, Hanan Ben Ari and Amir
Dadon bridge the cultural divide by sing-
Fried in a partnership that would have
been unimaginable just a few years ago. ing for mixed crowds of religious and
secular Israelis.
Last year, he even performed in the settle-
ment of Beit El, where he publicly apolo- This past January, comedian Udi Kagan
gized for his past statements about those sat with Aviv Geffen and religious singer
living in Yehuda and Shomron. Evyatar Banai, creating together a remix/
mashup of their songs. As the show pro-
The newfound appreciation for Isra- gressed, the songs of these two singers
el’s religious community has been merged together, fusing the words of two
well received, to say the least. different worlds into an unlikely harmony.
In a Channel 12 TV inter-
view, Geffen described Exhilarated, the thousands of fans in the
performing for a crowd, religious and secular, sang along.
crowdless con- It was a deeply hopeful, even messianic,
cert during the moment. Can Aviv Geffen, a most unlikely
COVID pan- uniter, help the two halves of Israeli soci-
demic that ety learn to sing in harmony?
was broadcast
on television,
where he ded-
icated a song
to the resi-
dents of Bnei
Brak, a city that
was being sav-
aged in the media Rabbi Aron White
for its COVID regu- is the Managing Editor
lations compliance. of HaMizrachi magazine.

(PHOTO: NIR ROITMAN/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS)
16 |