opinion
What Queen Elizabeth Meant to
a British Jew Like Me
BY JEREMY HAVARDI
T 18
SEPTEMBER 15, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
Queen Elizabeth II toasts with Israeli President Ezer Weizman.

and harmful. It was that facet of her character,
her ability to show coolness and fortitude despite
crisis and sadness, that endeared her to millions
of her countrymen and women.

In her own life, those sad episodes included the
breakdown of her children’s marriages, the death
of Princess Diana, the fallout caused by the disil-
lusionment of Prince Harry and his wife with the
monarchy, and, above all, the loss of her beloved
husband, Prince Philip. Yet her belief in service
and her promise to the nation meant that she
never contemplated stepping aside. She simply
got on with her job, exuding a steely strength and
determination that won her so many admirers.

The queen was also an internationally renowned
fi gure. It is easy to forget that she visited some 117
countries as monarch, meeting countless leaders,
statesmen and diplomats. She acted as head
of state to 15 British prime ministers and met no
fewer than 13 American presidents. Indeed, her
reign lasted more than one-quarter of the entire
history of the United States.

She was the fi rst British monarch to travel to a
communist country when she toured Yugoslavia
in 1972. She was a symbol of the reconciliation
with Japan, receiving the emperor in the United
Kingdom, while her visits to China and Russia in
the 1980s and 1990s were equally signifi cant.

She also refl ected a changed mood when she
went to the Republic of Ireland in 2011, something
that would have been unthinkable decades ear-
lier. She was undoubtedly the most experienced
diplomat of her age and a fi gure to whom many
would turn for wise counsel.

She was also a friend of the Jewish commu-
nity in the U.K. She met many faith leaders and
gained the praise of fi gures such as the late Rabbi
Lord Jonathan Sacks, who described her and the
royal family as “one of the great unifying forces
in Britain, a unity we need all the more, the more
diverse religiously and culturally we become.”
She hosted Israeli leaders in the U.K., including
President Ephraim Katzir in 1976, and gave an
honorary knighthood to Shimon Peres in 2008.

In 2000, she also inaugurated Britain’s fi rst per-
manent memorial to the Holocaust and served as
patron of the UK Holocaust Memorial Day Trust
for a decade. It is true that she did not visit Israel
as a monarch despite a number of entreaties from
the country’s leaders. But this did not refl ect any
personal malice or bigotry and instead resulted
from longstanding Foreign Offi ce policy to avoid
antagonizing Britain’s Arab allies. Accordingly, the
queen’s death has seen a genuine and palpable
outpouring of grief from Jewish communal lead-
ers of every denomination. British Jews are feel-
ing the loss of this remarkable monarch as much
as their gentile counterparts.

For now, Britain has a king who will provide the
nation and commonwealth with a sense of much-
needed continuity. But Queen Elizabeth II was a
truly unique fi gure whose guiding presence sym-
bolized unity, constancy and, above all, human
decency. We will not see the likes of her again. JE
Jeremy Havardi is a journalist, historian and
political activist and the director of the Bureau of
International Aff airs of B’nai B’rith UK.

Israel Government Press Offi ce
he death of Queen Elizabeth II after 70 years
on the throne is a devastating loss for Britain,
the Commonwealth and the free world. It is hard
to overstate the sense of grief that will be felt
at her passing, including from within the Anglo-
Jewish community.

I was brought up in a typical liberal Jewish fam-
ily that showed a healthy respect for the queen,
and the royal family more widely. I recall marching
down the Mall in London for the 60th anniversary
of VE Day and catching a sight of our monarch
on the steps of Buckingham Palace. Like other
British Jews, I also remember hearing the prayer
for the royal family which was, and is, a feature of
every Shabbat service.

For Anglo-Jewry, the queen was a rock and
mainstay of her nation, a constant, familiar and
reassuring presence amid the turbulence of both
domestic and international crises. Indeed, she
became such a fi xture in British life that she cre-
ated the illusion that she would always carry on
as head of state. Of course, no one is immortal.

But the queen etched herself so deeply into her
country’s story that she became emblematic of its
very character, the unspoken essence of modern
Britain. She was truly the matriarch of the nation.

The queen was unlike political heads of state.

She was not a polarizing fi gure because, being
unelected, she was in no way beholden to vested
interests or parties. Instead, she united her nation
by becoming a symbol of its most enduring and
cherished values. What she brought to her role
was an old-fashioned sense of duty and loyalty,
refl ecting the vow that she made in 1947 to live
a life of service, no matter how long or short it
lasted. Her values were those of an older Britain,
a nation framed by a Christian ethos in which self
mattered less than duty and obligation trumped
personal ambition.

Those values had resonance for British Jews
too, given that their own faith encompassed
notions of religious duty and communal service.

They recognized that the queen’s tireless devo-
tion to her nation was an example of tikkun olam
at its fi nest. The queen never compromised her
fi delity to those values and conducted herself
at all times with dignity, decency and propriety.

If only one could say the same about today’s
leaders. Above all, she was a steadfast symbol of
old-fashioned calm and stoicism in an age when
the stiff upper lip was being assailed as quaint