8 Families, 19 Children, 85 Yeshiva Students Live Next To Rachel’s Tomb. Can This Community Grow?

JERUSALEM (VosIzNeias)— As tens of thousands of people converge on Kever Rachel to mark her Yahrzeit, (which this year fell on Shabbos, meaning that people came on Thursday, Friday, Motzei Shabbos and Sunday), many of them are unaware that there is a permanent Yeshiva community adjacent to the tomb which has existed for the last 7 years and is still growing.

Rachel’s Tomb, which is literally just a stone’s throw from the southern Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo, has almost miraculously managed to stay in Jewish hands despite being situated on the lands of Bethlehem, a city which was transferred to the Palestinian Authority as part of the 1993 Oslo accords. At that time prime minister Yitzhak Rabin was considering placing the tomb in area A, designated as a region with full Palestinian civil and military control. A fateful meeting with Gush Emunim leader Hanan Porat and veteran Agudas Yisrael MK Menachem Porush, which included bitter weeping by the latter, succeeded in prevailing on Rabin to change the original plan and keep Rachel’s Tomb in Jewish hands.

Seven years later, during the bloody years of the Second Intifada, Israel decided to build a security wall to block its neighbors. The wall was supposed to circumvent Bethlehem, leaving the tomb once again on the Palestinian side. This time it was Ehud Olmert, then mayor of Jerusalem, who insisted that “Rachel’s Tomb is a Jewish site” and demanded that the tomb be included on the Israeli side of the wall. This was accomplished between 2005 and 2007, but not without encompassing the entire area with grey concrete walls, making it look like a dour prison compound.

Despite this the Tomb flourished, with more and more Jews flocking there to pray at all times in the year. A new building was constructed, including a place to study and pray during the day. 20 idealistic young men moved in there in 2010 and began studying there, although due to the tense security situation, they were forced by the IDF to leave every day at 5 PM.

After a long and protracted legal battle, the avreichim were allowed to stay late at night but were not allowed to sleep in the compound. The Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Eliyahu Akselsi, says that when students used to doze off they would be woken up quickly “so that they won’t accuse us of starting a new settlement.” Only in 2013 did the Yeshiva receive permission to sleep in the compound at night and the first family moved in immediately. The Yeshiva now boasts some 85 students, 40 of whom are single and live at the site. The rest, besides a few rabbis, commute from Jerusalem and surrounding communities.

The land adjacent to the tomb on which the community is situated was purchased by an Israeli businessman, but the story behind the purchase is also typical of the site’s miraculous nature. The businessman was concerned that he would not be able to utilize the land with its volatile political situation. MK Eli Ben-Dahan, a relative of the businessman, persuaded him to visit Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, who asked him his name. “Benny” the businessman answered, but Rabbi Eliyahu persisted “That’s not your name, what’s your name?” “Benny Ben Rachel” the businessman answered and once again, Rav Eliyahu refused to accept it until the businessman said “Binyamin Ben Rachel.” Rabbi Eliyahu then said “Let Binyamin, son of Rachel rise and redeem the tomb of Rachel.” The same night the deal was closed.

The Yeshiva hopes to extend the construction right up to the fence and even beyond it (there are more Jewish lands beyond the fence), enabling some 30 families of Yeshiva staff to live on campus, but the bureaucratic nature of the tomb, which is under the official jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority but is serviced by the Jerusalem municipality, has made every new development more complex. It took half a year recently to fix a burst pipe because each authority denied responsibility for the matter.

Security is also a sensitive issue. Pipe bombs are regularly tossed over the fence from the Palestinian side and residents report that four years ago the IDF raided a Bethlehem warehouse and confiscated 200 weapons. But they remain unperturbed, believing in the supernatural protection of the holy place. David Suissa, one such resident and the father of a young child (born on the day after Rachel’s Yahrzeit last year), says that “The only person injured here was an Arab who came to work here. The children play in the courtyard, we live in faith.”

Suissa is not alone in his faith. Thousands come here on a daily basis to supplicate, entreat and pour out their hearts. Naturally, 70% of them are women and many come to pray for children. Stories abound about miraculous occurrences after prayer at the tomb. One woman was childless for 12 years. Doctors could not find anything wrong with her but nothing seemed to help. One day she came to the tomb and wept bitterly. A tap on the shoulder from behind turned out to be a childhood friend who had moved to Costa Rica 20 years before. The two recollected childhood experiences, including the mocking and derogatory treatment they had given to another girl in their class. Suddenly the woman realized that she must find that girl and ask her forgiveness. She found the girl still chafing and hurting from her childhood experiences and somehow succeeded in obtaining her forgiveness. The woman’s first child was born on Rachel’s Yahrzeit the next year.

Rabbi Akselsi downplays the miracles, stating that “We act. We don’t base our faith on this” but the growth and the nature of his community seems to demonstrate that 3000 years after her burial at the side of the road, Rachel is once again welcoming her children home.