"A marvellous virtue in time of Trouble to cancel the Gzerah ..." - a special prayer composed by the great Kabbalists and sages and rabbis of Jerusalem as the German army led by Rommel approached the gates of the Land of Israel and threatened its inhabitants. "Eretz Israel" print - Jerusalem, around the end of 1942.
In the text of the prayer, the verse referring to the German threat was copied: "הצילני נא מיד אחי מיד עשיו" [As is well known, Esau was likened to the Ashkenazi people, unlike Ishmael, who refers to the Arab enemy] And further in the special prayer the terrible was called 'War of Gog and Magog': "Save us from war and siege ... and from the war of Gog and Magog and cancel from us and from all your people Israel wherever they are all hard and evil Gzerot and especially those sitting in the Holy Land ...".
The threat of the forces of the Nazi commander Erwin Rommel who advanced with his army from victory to victory in North Africa was well felt in the Land of Israel, and was a real threat to its inhabitants. The rumors about the fate of the Jews of Europe, the inhabitants of the country knew, could become a Middle Eastern reality, and the anxieties among the Jewish inhabitants of the country increased day by day. At that time the great Kabbalists in the country composed a number of prayers and 'Tikunim' to violate the evil of the gzera, and indeed miraculously, Rommel was defeated by the British at the famous battle of El - Almein and the Nazi commander considered invincible retreated beaten and humiliated, leaving tens of thousands of corpses scattered in the desert sands. The Jewish community breathed a sigh of relief. The detailed plans prepared for the day of the Nazi invasion - from taking over British weapons, continuing to fortify the Carmel and conduct a guerrilla war, to committing suicide so as not to fall into the hands of the enemy - were shelved.
[1] leaf. 35x25 cm. Few stains. Good condition.
