It's doubtful anyone thought about it ahead of time, but it's as if the intersection of the holidays and the period of wound licking that followed the election was planned.
One of the best-known midrashim about the Four Species – one of the commandments of the Sukkot holiday – talks about each one of the species having its own special quality. The citron (etrog) has taste and smell, the palm frond (lulav) is taken from a tree that gives fruit but has no scent, the myrtle branch (hadas) has a scent but no taste, and the willow branch (aravah) has neither taste nor scent.
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The midrashim draw a parallel between the Four Species and the different kinds of Jews – one who studies Torah and also does good deeds; one who knows the Torah but does not do good deeds; one who does good deeds but does not have the Torah in him; and one who has neither. The idea is that to discharge the obligation of blessing with the Four Species, you need to bundle them together.
It's almost too easy to compare that to the daily reality of Israeli society but it's very important to emphasize the message. In the last election, the tribes within Israeli society were separated almost brutally – Russians, haredim, "messianics," right-wingers and leftists. For three months, Israel was busy stressing the gaps, the differences, and pitting one against the other. It's good that following the election, we gather all the species and all the types in Israeli society, with all their different characteristics, good and bad, together. Only if all of us come together can we exist here.
There is another lesson we can learn from during Sukkot. Sages always say that leaving a permanent home for the temporary one (the sukkah) for a week causes us to value our home. The one we've gotten used to, the one we take a bit for granted. When we leave it for a week to eat and sleep outside, we understand how important it is, how we must not take it for granted and how precious it is.
Here, too, the parallel to life in Israel is almost too easy. The Land of Israel is our home. Anyone who leaves it for a week starts to miss it, and understand how we must not take our presence here for granted.
