History, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, especially when there are few, if any, other versions of records with which to compare when researching the veracity of the information. Thus, Josephus, a Jerusalemite who was born almost 2,000 years ago, is regarded as the foremost authority on the Roman conquest of the Galilee, where he had led the Jewish forces prior to defecting after conceding defeat.
There were not enough scholars of his era to contradict what Josephus wrote about Rome or what he wrote about Jesus, by whom he was strongly influenced.
Historical bias and inaccuracies have persisted to the present day, fueled in number by social media platforms.
This was a problem even prior to the advent of the Internet.
Until very recently, reports of Israeli forces entering the Old City on June 7, 1967, stated that IDF chief rabbi Shlomo Goren had traveled with them and, blowing a shofar and carrying a Torah scroll, had been the first rabbi to pray at the Western Wall after the 19 years in which Jerusalem had been a divided city.
Now Rabbi Menachem Hacohen, an aide and close confidant of Goren’s and native son of Jerusalem, has let the cat out of the bag.
Who blew the shofar at the Western Wall?
While it has been known for many years that no sound came from the shofar when Goren put it to his lips at the Western Wall, the person credited with sounding it was paratrooper Brig. Gen. Uzi Eilam, who, as a skilled trumpeter, succeeded in sounding the stirring call of the ancient Jews. But in September 2023, an IDF photograph showed that it was neither Goren nor Eilam but a reservist by the name of Yaakov Cohen.
For over 50 years, his identity was unknown, though the photo was widely published. But two years ago, during a visit to Ammunition Hill, when reminiscing with officials about his wartime experiences, Cohen, who was 81 at the time, said that he was the soldier – a reservist – whose photograph was featured in Bamahane, the weekly (now defunct) publication of the IDF.
Cohen said that he saw Rabbi Goren’s driver searching for a Torah scroll. He joined them, and they went to the Schneller army base and took one from there. On the way back to the Western Wall, they came across an elderly man with a shofar who asked to accompany them. Shots were being fired, and they thought it was too dangerous to take a civilian in the jeep, so Cohen promised the man that if he gave him the shofar, he would blow it at the Kotel.
He kept his word. But after the initial sound, Goren’s aide took the shofar from him and gave it to Goren. Thus the iconic photograph of Goren with the shofar at his mouth and the Torah scroll in his arm, which helped perpetuate a legend.
But now there is another version from Rabbi Menachem Hacohen in a new book that was reviewed by Nadav Shragai in last Friday’s weekend edition of Israel Hayom.
Hacohen, who is now 92 and a former politician, author, and retired chief rabbi of Romania, is not up to writing any more books, even though his mind remains sharp. His three children – Prof. Aviad Hacohen, Dr. Hagit Hacohen Wolf, and Adv. Meron Hacohen –asked him to record his memories, which were then transcribed and edited under the title For My Brothers and Friends.
The way Hacohen tells it, Goren, who outranked Motta Gur, the commander of the 55th Paratroopers Brigade, met Gur at the nearby Rockefeller Archaeological Museum and tried to persuade him to enter the Old City and capture it. When Gur declined, waiting for further orders from central command, Goren ordered him to enter. But Gur, having been instructed to surround the Old City but not to enter it, waited. The order to enter came the following day.
Goren had expressed the wish that if the IDF reached the Western Wall, he wanted to be with them to blow the shofar as a sign of victory and rejoicing.
Hacohen rushed to the home of the famous Nazarite, Rabbi David Cohen, retrieved a shofar from the top of a bookcase, and returned to accompany Goren.
As they entered the Lions’ Gate of the Old City, Goren blew a few notes on the shofar as had been customary at the outset of a battle in ancient times.
When Gur’s famous declaration, “The Temple Mount is in our hands,” was heard on the communication system, Goren again sounded the shofar in the vicinity of the Temple Mount but not yet at the Western Wall.
Meanwhile, Hacohen, with the help of two paratroopers, commandeered a Jordanian jeep. He remembered how, as a young boy, he had accompanied his father and brother to the Western Wall every Shabbat. Goren did not know how to get to the Wall from the Temple Mount.
Hacohen thought it important that three recognized members of the priestly tribe be present at the Western Wall on the day of conquest. So, in his Jordanian jeep, he returned to the home of the Nazarite, then to the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva to pick up Rabbi Zvi Yehuda HaKohen Kook, to bring them to the Western Wall. Hacohen himself was the third member of the priestly tribe.
They arrived before Goren, who later entreated Hacohen and Gur not to tell anyone that he had not been the first rabbi at the Wall in 19 years. They agreed and kept the secret. Gur went to his grave in July 1995 without breaking his word, and Cohen waited until now.
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