Illustrative. Photo: Yonatan Sindel / Flash90.

The story of the Jewish people is one of “against all odds,” said Israel’s Knesset speaker at the official torch-lighting ceremony on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on Wednesday to mark the country’s 71st Independence Day.

Noting that many other peoples were larger and more powerful, Yuli Edelstein asked, “What do we have? We have a story.”

“A story of a slave people who were liberated and became free men, and brought to the whole world a new hope of freedom, a new message of peace, and a new destiny of justice,” he said.

“And though this nation was scattered all over the world,” he continued, “it gathered into one small, magnificent land, and swore that its children would grow up on this land, and that its dreams would be fulfilled on this land.”

“This is our story,” Edelstein said. “A rebellious, striving, daring, insolent people, which has one motto: ‘Against all odds.’ They struck us — and we rose again. They preyed upon us — and we went on. They exiled us — and, against all odds, we always returned to our homeland.”

In a video message, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also spoke of Israel’s historic accomplishments, saying, “We have achieved something that no other people has achieved. We are the only people who live in the same land, with the same name, speak the same language, and have the same faith as we had 3,000 years ago.”

“Yes, we still have antisemitism; yes, we still have those who slander us,” he said, “but more and more people around the world see the truth about our achievement, about our freedom, about our hope.”

Watch Netanyahu’s video message below: