disintegrated on re-entry last week, was to be buried Tuesday, February 11, in Moshav Nahalal in the Jezreel Valley.
The flag-draped coffin of Israeli astronaut Col. Ilan Ramon returned home Monday to the rain-soaked Lod Air Force base near the Ben-Gurion International Airport, the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem said.
Israel’s President, Prime Minister, and dignitaries from all walks of life – rabbis, judges, lawmakers from left and right, haredi and secular attending the ceremony.
"This is not how you imagined – how we all imagined – your homecoming," Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was quoted as saying by the ICEJ News Service. Sharon described Ramon as "among the best" of Israel’s "sons and warriors."
"PROTECTED FROM ABOVE"
Sharon said that Ramon’s "image, projected from above, was the reflection of Israel at its best – Israel as we would have liked to see it – the Israel we love."
President Moshe Katsav paid tribute to the ability of Ramon to what he called a force for unity in times of division. Even before his death "with the blink of an eyelid, [he knew] how to unite all parts of the Jewish people," Katsav said. "He was a representative and symbol of our people."
He spoke in the aircraft hanger turned memorial hall against a backdrop of Israeli and American flags.
PHOTO FROM EARTH
Between them hung a photo of Earth from space, with a quotation from Deuteronomy from the Bible: "The heavens above and the earth below." The symbolism was rich.
Ramon carried with him into space a small Torah scroll rescued from the Holocaust and a copy of a small pencil drawing, titled ‘"Moon Landscape,"’ by Peter Ginz, a 14-year-old killed at Auschwitz. The drawing shows Earth as seen from the moon.
Ramon’s widow, Rona, and his 15 year-old son, Assaf, read a letter emailed to them on the final day of the shuttle mission by fellow American astronaut David Brown, the ICEJ said.
"BEAUTIFUL PLANET"
It spoke of how much Ramon’s involvement had impacted him, especially in remembering the Holocaust – that "such a beautiful planet could harbour such bad things."
"If I had been born in space," Brown continued, "I know I would desire to visit the beautiful Earth more than I have ever yearned to visit space." Ilan Ramon is survived by his wife Rona and four children. Noa, the youngest, is five.
