Born Jossi Rabinsky, Barak Ben Canaan is wise and noble. He has a contemplative nature and never behaves rashly. When he arrives in Palestine as a young man, he has a profound moment of understanding that it is his true home and where his life’s work will take place. Barak sacrifices the rest of his life in pursuit of an Israeli state where people from all over the world can live in freedom and with dignity. He pursues this freedom quietly and with restraint. As the violence ramps up between the Jewish people and their Arab neighbors, the army that forms is one that operates only in defense. This is in large part because of Barak’s influence. He also forms a unique friendship with Kammal, an Arab landowner. The two men rise above the hatred that fills so many people living in Palestine. Barak’s generosity and vision leads him to teach Kammal’s people how to farm and set up schools for the children of his village.  

At the end of his life, Barak mourns that he did not spend more time with his family. All he has ever wanted is to tend his fields and enjoy the company of his beloved wife Sarah and his children. However, because of Barak’s outsized stature in Jewish Palestine, he is constantly pulled away by the fighting, and later, by his diplomatic responsibilities leading up to the United Nations vote for partition. When he is nearing death, he worries that he has failed his children. He fear that the cost of the freedom is a generation of unemotional warriors who only know war and violence. Barak does not regret his actions, because of his deep belief that nothing is more important than defending one’s homeland. However, he bitterly regrets the high human toll that Israeli independence has taken on those who have fought for it.