Two days after Israel's tumultuous and divisive April 9 elections, something united Israeli citizens: the shared hope that the Israeli spacecraft Beresheet would successfully land on the moon. Close to 10 p.m., an entire nation held its breath while watching television, which carried the moon landing live. But at a critical moment, an unanticipated failure caused the spacecraft to crash. After four suspenseful minutes, the mission’s directors announced that Beresheet had crashed on the moon. The mission, as defined at the start of the project, failed.
Besides the project’s staff, who had toiled for many years, those who were especially disappointed were Israeli children, thousands of whom had followed the launch of the craft. Some of them came to President Reuven Rivlin’s residence to watch the landing, and expected to celebrate the successful mission with him. Yoav Edelstein, 8, from Modiin-Maccabim-Reut, came with his mother Yael. “We built a special model of Beresheet on the moon out of cardboard, and we planned to present it to the guests at the event at the president’s residence after the successful landing,” the mother told Al-Monitor. “When we saw that the landing failed, my son decided to leave the model in the bag. While the president encouraged us, the atmosphere was less festive. It didn’t seem right to present the model.”