Rabbi Shlomo Lorenz
One day Golda Meir, the prime minister, approached me and said: «Rabbi Lorincz! I am very worried—so much so that for many nights now I have been unable to sleep…»
I asked her: was it because of the security situation? She replied that the security situation was very, very difficult, but she was full of confidence that we would cope with it.
I continued asking: was it because of the economic situation? She replied that the situation there, too, was very, very difficult, but she was absolutely certain that we would cope with that as well.
I asked: was it because of the state of relations within society? She replied in exactly the same words, and did so in response to all my other questions.
I was surprised: «If you are so sure that we will cope with all the difficulties, why are you so worried that you cannot sleep at night?»
Her answer was unexpected: «I worry that a day will come when my sons and grandchildren will say to themselves: why should we struggle with all these numerous problems in our country when we could live a pleasant and comfortable life in the United States? And they will leave our country!»
In response, I asked her: «Do you have similar concerns about my children and grandchildren?»
She replied: «No! As for your grandchildren and the generations that follow them, I am absolutely certain that they will not leave our land, because they are bound to it with every fiber of their being!»
Then I turned to her and said: «Allow me to ask you one more question—perhaps not a very pleasant one: on the one hand, you are worried that your grandchildren will leave this country, while on the other, you are absolutely certain that our descendants will not do so. And if that is the case, why have you spent your entire life fighting against the system of education and upbringing of the haredim?»
Her answer was: «Believe me, Rabbi Lorincz: I often think that I was wrong!»
(Note that Golda Meir's words proved «prophetic». Many hundreds of thousands of former Israelis from the most successful Zionist families live in the United States and other countries, including many children and grandchildren of former and current leaders of the state).
From the memoirs of Rabbi Shlomo Lorincz, a Knesset member representing Agudat Yisrael for 33 years, who knew the leading figures of that era well. From his book «Be-Mechitzatam», published in Russian translation under the title «In the Company of the Great».