Tzel U'Mei Be'er

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Hebrew: צל ומי באר (Shade and Well Water). Circle dance by Chaim Shiryon, 1987.

The dance is somewhat complex, with many pieces in each section. When first introduced many considered it "gratuitously complicated"; that judgment has of course weakened with time, as complex dances have become commonplace.

The melody was composed by Levi Sha'ar, but it is the lyrics that are the most compelling. They were written by the great poet Yoram Taharlev about an event he witnessed at the age of seven on Kibbutz Yagur, where he was born Yoram Tarlovsky to Lithuanian-born immigrants.

In October 1945 a group of forty Jewish refugees from Iraq entered Israel via Syria and Lebanon. This immigration was illegal under the laws of the British Mandate. British forces took the refugees from Kfar Giladi, where they were hiding, and imprisoned them along with hundreds of other illegal immigrants in the detention center at Atlit. Such things had happened often before, but in this case it was learned that the British intended to return the refugees to the country from which they had entered, to face imprisonment and punishment there.

Fearing that the immigrants would be executed, the Palmach broke in to Atlit on October 10 and freed these refugees and all the other detainees at the camp. Traveling by night on foot, most made it to Kibbutz Beit Oren and Kibbutz Yagur. (A few dozen got lost and walked all the way to Haifa!) There they were sheltered, and they mingled with the residents and with a thousand residents of Haifa and environs who came to fill the kibbutz and distract the British. Not one of the refugees was recaptured; the British realized that an attack on Yagur would result in unacceptable casualties.

Thirty-eight years later, in 1983, Taharlev was given music composed by Sha'ar, an oleh from Odessa, and wrote lyrics commemorating the event. The song appeared in 1985 on an album released jointly by the Dudaim and the Parvarim.

The song's chorus begins "Whoever is hungry will find bread here, whoever is tired will find shade and water from the well", images from the Torah. When the Israelites needed to cross Edom, they requested permission from the king, saying "Please let us pass through your country. We will not go through any field or vineyard, or drink water from any well." (Numbers 20:17) The King of Edom refused their request and brought his army against them. In the next chapter, the Israelites make the same request of the king of the Amorites, again promising not to drink any well water, and were similarly refused. Later, God bans the Ammonites and the Moabites and all their descendants from his Assembly, because "they did not come to meet you with bread and water on your way when you came out of Egypt". (Deuteronomy 23:4) Taharlev's message could not be more clear: "Those who come here are our brethren, whoever comes will stay with us, . . . and can remain with us forever."

(On the topic of shade, see Ilan.)