Mount Herzl: The Creation of Israel's National Cemetery

The issue had been on the official Zionist agenda since the 1930s. In 1935, a special committee on behalf of the Zionist executive concluded that "[Mount Herzl]'s last resting place should be in Jerusalem, the capital of Palestine, and that, furthermore, both national sentiment and the political, national, and historical moment make Jerusalem the only choice."9 After the foundation of Israel, the reinterment of Herzl in Israel acquired additional meaning as a demonstration of the triumph of Herzl's vision.10 Celebrated as a token of honor to the founding father of modern Zionism, the reinterment of Herzl in Israel also belonged to the construction of the symbolic foundations of Israeli nationhood. The reinterment of Herzl was meant to concretize the Zionist ethos in terms of a sacred place and to support, through the myth of the founding father, the legitimacy of the state as the fulfillment of Herzl's vision. An additional element in making the site into a shrine to Herzl was the construction of a small museum. While the gravesite was permeated with the mythic, the museum bore witness to Herzl as an historical figure. The main part of the museum comprised Herzl's original workroom. The artifacts on display (e.g., his hat and desk) exuded authenticity and supplemented the mythic with the authority of historical "facts." In this sense, the (relative) eloquence of the museum complemented the severe and laconic message of the gravesite. Originally established as a"Herzl room" in 1938 on the promises of the National Institutions (the Zionist headquarters) in Jerusalem, it was relocated for the occasion of the ceremonial inauguration of the tomb on the 100th anniversary of Herzl's birth in 1960.(51) The site at the entrance to the premises of Mount Herzl, at a considerable distance from Herzl's tomb, ensured the mutually uninterrupted functioning of the two foci of Herzl's remembrance within the course of a visit to the place. The symbolic implications of the spatial adjacency to Herzl tomb were immediately recognized by Y. Dekel, the head of the DCF: "...on one hill will be the tomb of the creator of the Zionist vision and the cemetery of the implementers of Zionism."(68) From the outset, however, it was clear that the civilian and the military plots were to be distinguished in the local landscape and properly separated by a planted wood. Further, the DCF ensured that the building of the military cemetery would not interfere with the planning and construction