15 July 2006
Millburn, New Jersey
This morning I was awakened by the radio playing an interview with Elie Wiesel. In Night, Wiesel declared that he had lost his faith in G-d but not his belief in G-d. He is a person who has spent his entire life trying to get us all past the beliefs and the collaborations that result in things like the Holocaust or Darfur or Rwanda. And he includes on his personal list of suffering that must cease, the suffering of the Palestinians.
But at the same time, Wiesel says that we cannot give in to terror. In Dawn, Wiesel describes Jews who decided to become terrorists in order to drive the British out of Palestine. The argument is that the time had come for Jews to cease being the only people to receive and accept the Mitzvot (in particular the one about not killing) and act like all the other nations. That by killing they could throw off the oppressors and become people again. The terrorists have perverted the role of the martyr. In Jewish and Christian history, martyrs are willing to die for faith but are not willing to kill for faith. The Islamists have managed to turn this on its head and use martyrdom as a weapon; as a career aspiration, as a rallying point for liberation.
Wiesel rejects this pathway. He notes that the very next commandments after the first ten are prohibitions against owning slaves and against returning escaped slaves to their masters. Thus, he feels the obligation to alleviate suffering by ending oppression and rejecting violence. Elie Wiesel would have us work to establish two states in which Arabs and Jews could live as neighbors in peace. But, at the same time, he would not give in to terror, as that puts us all on the slippery slope back to Auschwitz.
Which brings us to the subject of today's spam. In the Middle East, an optimist believes that things can get worse. A pessimist knows that they will. Personally I take it as a sign that we are almost hitting rock bottom when I turn on the radio and Bibi Netanyahu sounds good.What we are staring at today is a combination of the inevitable results of violence and the unintended consequences of using violence as a political tool. It’s just one big dysfunctional family repeating the same mutually destructive patterns of behavior. Why? Because no one in the family knows any other way to behave. Everyone has a rationale for why they are right and everyone else is wrong. You can say that your side is justified because what is done in your name is clearly self defense, to which you have a right. You can readily cite historical events which prove that the other side started it and all you have ever done is respond. Hey, it gives you something to talk about while you watch the funeral of someone else's child on CNN.
A few days ago, I sat waiting for the inevitable moment when both sides concede by their actions that they really can't get anything done without each other (repeat after me, you make peace with your enemies, not with your friends). As part of the cycle, the usual suspects work out the deal that everyone can deny having agreed to. Corporal Shalit goes home to his parents and the Qassam firings either stop or are limited to a few token firings that conveniently do not hit anyone or anything. Israel announces its objectives have been achieved and withdraws from Gaza, allows Rafah to reopen and, a couple of months from now, as a unilateral good will gesture, lets a group of women, minors and old men out on parole.
But then the unintended consequences started to set in. In the West Bank and Gaza, Israel gave Hamas and Fatah a way to avoid a pending civil war and achieve a sort of unity. True, they have not signed the "Prisoners' Statement" but they did manage to work out wording acceptable to both factions.
Hezbollah, who everyone (even the UN) recognizes as a terrorist front for Syria and Iran, seizes the opportunity to attack Israel across most of what everyone (even the UN) recognizes as an international border between Israel and Lebanon. Israel proceeds to shut down Lebanon and now we have daily hails of missiles (that Hezbollah has been positioning in southern Lebanon for just such an occasion) upon just about every part of Israel north of a line from Haifa to Tiberias. Hezbollah and Hamas, two groups that have a history of either ignoring or competing against one another, are now holding unity rallies.
And, of course, things can always get worse. If you agree that much of what is happening is being directed, encouraged and/or supported financially by Iran and Syria ($76 a barrel oil buys a lot of munitions), then you have to ask when, not if, Israel will decide to hit targets in Damascus and Teheran. Or, if you prefer, Syria (which was very careful today to stress that an Israeli missile attack on a border crossing did not invade Syrian space) makes the same mistake Jordan made in 1967 and decides that they are going to join the war for the sake of Arab unity. Or Iran decides that it is time to defend Lebanon, liberate Palestine and, everyone's all time favorite, kill more Jews. Of course, perhaps Israel will show restraint yet again in the face of extreme provocation while the Arabs abandon not only the Palestinians (who are generally left to twist slowly in the wind except when their fate can serve some larger regional purpose) but also Hezbollah. After all, the Israel-Syria cease fire of 1973 has, according to both sides, never been violated. And maybe Iran only (for now) wants the world to forget about its nuclear program without having to find out if Israel really does have nuclear weapons. Well, maybe.
As the region slides down the slippery slope to total chaos, we might ask whether the key players have lost their minds. I think not. I think that what is happening is the logical end result of a belief that violence can (a) create security for Israel, (b) achieve political goals for Arabs, or (c) is the only viable alternative that any of the players has. After all, in the Middle East, anyone who does the right thing is viewed as weak (e.g., Barak gets out of Lebanon, Carter chooses not to start World War III over the embassy seizure, Abu Mazen tries to broker a cease fire by and among terrorist groups) while those who use violence get respect (e.g., Iraq, Al Queda, Hamas, Hezbollah, the IDF). But you have to be asking yourself the question, and perhaps Ehud Olmert and the rest of his government could ask themselves the question: Is Israel safer now than it was 40 years ago? If you think the answer is "Yes", I have a bridge or two I'd like to sell you to finance my apartment in Tel Aviv. If you think the answer is "No" then you have to ask: What is to be done?
There is no easy answer. But, with 40 years of evidence that violence and occupation do not work we ought to at least consider an alternative. Which brings us to a really good Thai restaurant in Greenwich Village. Liz and I got to have a conversation with our friends Dan and Iros Rabinowitz. Dan is an anthropology professor at Tel Aviv University and a fervent post-Zionist. He was very patient, answering Liz' questions and putting up with my speeches. If born in the USA instead of Haifa, Dan would most certainly have spent his youth in High School SNCC, SDS and similar ventures. Most importantly, Dan is Gal's Dad and I am Becky's Dad, which is how we met and became friends.
Dan is among a hopefully growing number of Israelis (as usual, the peacenik-integration crowd is mostly academics and artists; does this sound familiar?) who think the time for ending the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is long overdue and that the ending of discrimination against non-Jewish citizens of Israel is essential for Israel to survive as any kind of place you'd want to live (unless your idea of a fun time is pre-Mandela South Africa). This will require either ending or radically transforming the Zionist project or redefining Zionism to make room for Arabs, Druze, Christians, Bedouins and long term migrant workers to live as full citizens. At risk of sounding like Michael Lerner, Israel needs to embrace its minority populations rather than try to put them in cages or drive them out.
Why talk about this now? How does any of this eliminate the threat of Hezbollah? And, most importantly, what would cause an Israeli government and a majority of Israelis to change some very ingrained behaviors when it comes to Arabs and the like? I submit that unless behavioral changes can be made by all concerned, the dysfunctional cycles of violence will simply continue. Put another way, if enough people get truly sick to death of watching children get killed they just might be willing to try a behavior pattern that could lead somewhere other than back to the next war.
We have to recognize that over the past 40 or 50 years a nation dedicated to a perverse version of martyrdom has been created. The citizens of Palestine have consistently rejected the Partition of 1947 and have now elected a government pledged to implement their collective dream of reversing the Nakbah. Martyrdom is seen as a legitimate weapon in The Struggle. The Arabs' continued rejection of a Jewish presence generally and the 1947 Partition in particular, coupled with Zionism's tendency to impose hegemonic control over Greater Israel, are the main driving forces of the conflict. So, unless you are prepared to live with an eternal cycle of violence followed by shaky cease fires followed by more violence, you have to at least consider some course of action that might break the pathological behavioral patterns that pass for daily life in Israel and Palestine.
So, just what should be done? In November of 2000, following the killing of 13 Israeli Arabs who were demonstrating in support of the second Intifada (shortly after Sharon's famous visit to the Temple Mount), a group of Israeli academics submitted an unsolicited report to then Prime Minister Barak which outlined the areas in which Israel could and should change its treatment of its own citizens. The report, titled After The Rift: New Directions for Government Policy Towards the Arab Population in Israel, outlines those areas that cry out for change and suggests ways to go about it. I am attaching it to this blog. Non-Jews generally and Israeli Arabs in particular currently suffer discrimination in areas of education, welfare, land use, employment, law, local governance and civic/cultural inclusion that even the Roberts/Scalia/Thomas/Alito court would find unacceptable. The economic and political fallout from such discrimination is a threat to Israel's internal stability and undercuts Israel's credibility in any serious effort to make peace. Crude self interest, if nothing else, should drive a change toward democracy. Integration of non-Jews into a democratic State of Israel could be the catalyst that breaks the behavioral cycle.
Breaking a behavioral cycle depends upon a key family member refusing to play the old games. Other family members may not want to change but can't keep the cycle going without the cooperation of the dissenter. Why start change with the Jews and not the Arabs? Well, it’s my own prejudice that most Jews (regrettably not all Jews) really do want to live in peace and are really willing to give up dreams of Greater Israel to get there. I would like to be wrong about this but I see little evidence that Arabs are willing to take at least a fair share of the responsibility for what has happened and what could happen in Israel and Palestine. But, perhaps more importantly, Israeli Jews have hegemonic control over all of Israel and a good chunk of Palestine plus, recent events notwithstanding, military dominance over the rest. Thus, any material change in Jewish Israeli behavior will have far reaching consequences upon the entire populations of Israel and Palestine. Incorporating non-Jewish citizens of Israel as full citizens of a democratic state can change the tone of life in the region. Such change could raise the level of trust to the point where Palestinians who would like to try achieving statehood without homicide bombings start to come into the ascendance. Lowering the propensity toward violence would, in turn, encourage Israel to get back on the trail toward disengagement, though perhaps this time in the context of a negotiated settlement. This, in turn, might allow the West Bank to reunite (its now in four zones kept separate by the IDF). Lowering the potential for violence could get Palestine a means of transit between Gaza and the West Bank, an airport or two and a commercial port. Once empowered in serious ways that improve their quality of life, Palestinian Arabs may cease to see violence as a career path.
If Israel makes changes, will the Palestinians reciprocate? Maybe not. Will Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Iran, Syria and all the other projectionists stop undercutting every Palestinian effort at compromise? Probably not. So it could all come to naught as rockets continue to fall on Israel. But then again, where would the failure to institute change leave Israel? It would leave Israel exactly where it is today: fighting a two front war and worrying about whether the war will expand to a regional conflict (which Israel gets to fight on at least five fronts). Of course, it would also leave Israel with easier to defend borders, with 20% of its population not ready to join the other side, and the moral high ground (not much use on the front lines but very useful in the propaganda wars and international diplomacy). In other words, Israel may have nothing to lose and much to gain.
Any discussion of alternatives has to be held in the harsh light of a reality in which neither side is yet prepared to stomp on its own extremists. Take it from a guy who used to earn a living doing this stuff, the hardest part of any negotiation comes when you have to go back to your own people and explain why the other guy is right. In the Middle East, the parties have probably moved beyond the point where talking or economic bribery is going to do the trick. Unless Arabs are prepared to kill Arabs (that's what it would take for Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah or Palestine to disarm Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al Aksa Martyrs Brigade and the rest of the terrorists) and Israel is prepared to come down equally hard on the folks who perpetrate almost daily violence against Palestinians (clearing out places like Skali Farms and returning a demolished Modi’in Illit to its rightful owners would be good starts), its unlikely that any alternative to eternal rounds of violence will take hold. That's the real peace deal. Each side stomps hard on its own crazies, which isn't going to happen this week or, unfortunately, any time soon.
The other harsh reality is that Iran, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Al Queda, Syria and the other rejectionists have nothing to gain from peace between Israel and Palestine. The creation of a democratic Palestinian state remains anathema to most of the Arab world. Without the Palestinian cause, the rest of the Arab world might start looking inward and that spells nothing but trouble for the ruling classes. Without Palestinians to do the suffering, other Arabs may have to feel some real pain for a change. So I have no illusion that Hezbollah's and Hamas' masters or our dear friends the Saudis or any of the others (except perhaps for Jordan and Egypt) would sit back and allow Palestinians to resolve their differences with Israel. As a Jew I know we cannot trust the "international community" to step in and do the right thing. (That's why there has to be a State of Israel in the first place.) So trying to break the cycle might be a waste of time. But it strikes me as a project that has more upside potential than merely rearming for the next war.
Read more!
Saturday, July 15, 2006
Monday, February 6, 2006
Disengagement - Part 1 - Our Farewell Tour
2 February 2006
Millburn, New Jersey
For our last few days in Israel we crammed in several good, expensive meals that my cardiologists would definitely not approve of (and then probably go eat there themselves hoping no patients walked in the door). We started with a train ride to Jerusalem, twisting through narrow valleys of farms and olive groves that can’t be seen from the highways, to spend the day at the Israel Museum. We went for the art (Chagalls and Magrittes that you don’t see in New York or Paris) and not the archeology, though a walk through the Shrine of the Book is mandatory. The real reason for another swing through Jerusalem is Liz can’t go home without having the sweetbreads at Hess, the Sausage King of Germany, Switzerland and, now, Israel. We gorged ourselves on veal (sausage and chops), goose breast and the sweetbreads. Mr. Hess took the good wine glasses out of the cupboard (the restaurant is decorated to give the atmosphere of a farm house/wine cellar for our Tishbi Cabernet (try the 2002 or the 200 if you can get it – Metrowest suspects can get Tishbi at Wine Library but you’ll have to wait for next week’s shipment as I got the last two bottles of the Cab).
Friday night we had the DiCastros over for Shabbos dinner. Keren’s quiet younger brother Daniel joined us. He’s the sort of teenager who doesn’t seem to speak or eat. It turns out he does both (if you only count appetizers and dessert) and his English is much better than he lets on. One thing I notice about the meal is that we are managing to have a long dinner conversation without having Keren constantly translating. Liz’ Hebrew has reached the point where she can communicate pretty well, especially if we are talking about cooking. At the same time Nurit, the biological mother of Keren, is more willing to use her English than she was when we first met last March. I even manage to get in 6 or 8 words, which is about the extent of my usable vocabulary. Give us a few more months of going to Ulpan and dealing with taxi drivers and we may be functional in a second language.
On Monday, 30 January, we go on our “farewell tour.” Remember the band, Cream? Their farewell tour lasted about 3 or 4 years and would still be going on but for the fact that the drummer overdosed on amphetamines. Well, our last full day in Tel Aviv was something like that, only without the amphetamines. We managed lunch with Marcia and David (dropping off a few items for them to hold onto for Becky – including the laptop which will live out the rest of its binomial life in Israel) and then headed out for Beit Noar Kadima.
Beit Noar’s staff and students put together a good-bye party for us. We were thanked by a number of children who had made thank you cards. Now I have to keep studying Hebrew just so I can read them. Those who wanted to got up and read them to the entire group. It was a bit like having the Lollipop Guild from Munchkin Land honor us for killing the wicked witch. We are definitely going back next year. It didn’t take much for Yael, the center’s director, to get me to do a couple of songs with the kids, including a reprise by my talent show group (next time, Jeff, my Gibson gets to go to Israel). You don’t get this kind of satisfaction, or learn as much, on the packaged tours.
Then its one last Ulpan class with good wishes coming in 12 or so languages. After class we go have what may be the ultimate in comfort food, Hungarian blintzes. The restaurant is small and half the place is taken up by a post-wedding party gathered to sing and recite the Sheva Brachot. The blintzes were the size of large manicottis and stuffed with potatoes, cabbage, cheeses, onions, mushrooms and lots of paprika (so you’ll know its Hungarian). Dessert includes a blintz stuffed with chocolate mousse and drowning in whipped cream (I told you my cardiologists would not be happy but I’m going with a smile). More wine and we stumble back to the apartment to start packing.
Leaving the country began as a depressing affair. Yossi, our Persian cab driver, got us to the airport without incident. We got past the first security officer, the pleasant young woman who engages you in a pleasant conversation. She finds out about your trip and whom you know (I give up my cousins in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Yagur) and where you stayed and probably has a decent-sized dossier in the making before she decides you are harmless and lets you through. As this is my third (Liz’ fourth) trip to Israel, and this was the longest by far, the conversation with the nice security woman went on far longer than previous encounters of this kind. But finally she concludes that I really am a harmless, middle-aged tourist from New Jersey (who has packed his own bags and not taken anything from anyone) and we get to the x-ray machine. And then it happens.
I have a history of almost getting arrested. Its not that I live such a moral life, it's just that I’m not very good at criminal enterprise (I once failed to get arrested at a demonstration where the whole idea was to get arrested). From time to time, however, my wife or one of my friends will manage to put me right in the path of law enforcement. Like the time Liz got me stopped at the Canadian border for having peaches and then made me eat a dozen peaches while sitting at the US customs station at the border between Montana and Canada. Or the time Burt Solomon, the most honest, law-abiding, stickler for following the rules no matter the consequences, an attorney of the highest integrity and a pillar of our community, came within a hair’s breadth of getting us both arrested for grand theft auto. This time I get stopped by Israeli airport security for carrying – strawberry jam.
Liz had two jars of the stuff in one of her bags. They will either be a present or, more likely, get spread on the muffins when Mark Chodrow comes over to shmooze or push wood around a chessboard. But in Ben Gurion Airport two jars of strawberry jam must look mighty suspicious on an x-ray. The third security person of the evening is still polite but not quite as laid back as the first two. He brings up the x-ray picture on his monitor and tells Liz to open the bag. He carefully pokes around and finds, the package. He asks Liz to open the package. This takes longer than you would like because the jars have been wrapped in lots of paper in the hope that the baggage handlers won’t spread the jam before its time.
Apparently two jars of jam look sinister on an x-ray and lead to the following conversation:
Security: What are these?
Liz: Strawberry jam.
Security: How did you get these?
Liz: I bought them.
Security: Where did you buy them?
Liz: At Supersol
Security: Where?
Liz: In Tel Aviv?
Security: What was the purpose of the purchase?
Liz: To have something to go with the muffins when my husband tries to play chess.
Security: OK, you may go.
I may have embellished the last couple of quotes but you get the idea. Not long after, I tell more security people that I can’t go through the metal detector because of my pace maker/defibrillator. They tell me to stand aside and ask for my card (us wired up folks carry cards that describe what we are wired with and when we got so lucky). A large gentleman walks over, looks at the card and, as I brace to be frisked which is what always happens at US airports (air travel since 9/11 has, for me, become a more intimate experience), he hands me my card and says, “Have a nice trip.” They spent far more time on Liz and the jam. Yes, the Israeli security apparatus has decided that I am completely harmless. The former SDS member/union organizer part of me is actually disappointed. The rest of me just wants to have a nap and eat the jam.
Read more!
Millburn, New Jersey
For our last few days in Israel we crammed in several good, expensive meals that my cardiologists would definitely not approve of (and then probably go eat there themselves hoping no patients walked in the door). We started with a train ride to Jerusalem, twisting through narrow valleys of farms and olive groves that can’t be seen from the highways, to spend the day at the Israel Museum. We went for the art (Chagalls and Magrittes that you don’t see in New York or Paris) and not the archeology, though a walk through the Shrine of the Book is mandatory. The real reason for another swing through Jerusalem is Liz can’t go home without having the sweetbreads at Hess, the Sausage King of Germany, Switzerland and, now, Israel. We gorged ourselves on veal (sausage and chops), goose breast and the sweetbreads. Mr. Hess took the good wine glasses out of the cupboard (the restaurant is decorated to give the atmosphere of a farm house/wine cellar for our Tishbi Cabernet (try the 2002 or the 200 if you can get it – Metrowest suspects can get Tishbi at Wine Library but you’ll have to wait for next week’s shipment as I got the last two bottles of the Cab).
Friday night we had the DiCastros over for Shabbos dinner. Keren’s quiet younger brother Daniel joined us. He’s the sort of teenager who doesn’t seem to speak or eat. It turns out he does both (if you only count appetizers and dessert) and his English is much better than he lets on. One thing I notice about the meal is that we are managing to have a long dinner conversation without having Keren constantly translating. Liz’ Hebrew has reached the point where she can communicate pretty well, especially if we are talking about cooking. At the same time Nurit, the biological mother of Keren, is more willing to use her English than she was when we first met last March. I even manage to get in 6 or 8 words, which is about the extent of my usable vocabulary. Give us a few more months of going to Ulpan and dealing with taxi drivers and we may be functional in a second language.
On Monday, 30 January, we go on our “farewell tour.” Remember the band, Cream? Their farewell tour lasted about 3 or 4 years and would still be going on but for the fact that the drummer overdosed on amphetamines. Well, our last full day in Tel Aviv was something like that, only without the amphetamines. We managed lunch with Marcia and David (dropping off a few items for them to hold onto for Becky – including the laptop which will live out the rest of its binomial life in Israel) and then headed out for Beit Noar Kadima.
Beit Noar’s staff and students put together a good-bye party for us. We were thanked by a number of children who had made thank you cards. Now I have to keep studying Hebrew just so I can read them. Those who wanted to got up and read them to the entire group. It was a bit like having the Lollipop Guild from Munchkin Land honor us for killing the wicked witch. We are definitely going back next year. It didn’t take much for Yael, the center’s director, to get me to do a couple of songs with the kids, including a reprise by my talent show group (next time, Jeff, my Gibson gets to go to Israel). You don’t get this kind of satisfaction, or learn as much, on the packaged tours.
Then its one last Ulpan class with good wishes coming in 12 or so languages. After class we go have what may be the ultimate in comfort food, Hungarian blintzes. The restaurant is small and half the place is taken up by a post-wedding party gathered to sing and recite the Sheva Brachot. The blintzes were the size of large manicottis and stuffed with potatoes, cabbage, cheeses, onions, mushrooms and lots of paprika (so you’ll know its Hungarian). Dessert includes a blintz stuffed with chocolate mousse and drowning in whipped cream (I told you my cardiologists would not be happy but I’m going with a smile). More wine and we stumble back to the apartment to start packing.
Leaving the country began as a depressing affair. Yossi, our Persian cab driver, got us to the airport without incident. We got past the first security officer, the pleasant young woman who engages you in a pleasant conversation. She finds out about your trip and whom you know (I give up my cousins in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Yagur) and where you stayed and probably has a decent-sized dossier in the making before she decides you are harmless and lets you through. As this is my third (Liz’ fourth) trip to Israel, and this was the longest by far, the conversation with the nice security woman went on far longer than previous encounters of this kind. But finally she concludes that I really am a harmless, middle-aged tourist from New Jersey (who has packed his own bags and not taken anything from anyone) and we get to the x-ray machine. And then it happens.
I have a history of almost getting arrested. Its not that I live such a moral life, it's just that I’m not very good at criminal enterprise (I once failed to get arrested at a demonstration where the whole idea was to get arrested). From time to time, however, my wife or one of my friends will manage to put me right in the path of law enforcement. Like the time Liz got me stopped at the Canadian border for having peaches and then made me eat a dozen peaches while sitting at the US customs station at the border between Montana and Canada. Or the time Burt Solomon, the most honest, law-abiding, stickler for following the rules no matter the consequences, an attorney of the highest integrity and a pillar of our community, came within a hair’s breadth of getting us both arrested for grand theft auto. This time I get stopped by Israeli airport security for carrying – strawberry jam.
Liz had two jars of the stuff in one of her bags. They will either be a present or, more likely, get spread on the muffins when Mark Chodrow comes over to shmooze or push wood around a chessboard. But in Ben Gurion Airport two jars of strawberry jam must look mighty suspicious on an x-ray. The third security person of the evening is still polite but not quite as laid back as the first two. He brings up the x-ray picture on his monitor and tells Liz to open the bag. He carefully pokes around and finds, the package. He asks Liz to open the package. This takes longer than you would like because the jars have been wrapped in lots of paper in the hope that the baggage handlers won’t spread the jam before its time.
Apparently two jars of jam look sinister on an x-ray and lead to the following conversation:
Security: What are these?
Liz: Strawberry jam.
Security: How did you get these?
Liz: I bought them.
Security: Where did you buy them?
Liz: At Supersol
Security: Where?
Liz: In Tel Aviv?
Security: What was the purpose of the purchase?
Liz: To have something to go with the muffins when my husband tries to play chess.
Security: OK, you may go.
I may have embellished the last couple of quotes but you get the idea. Not long after, I tell more security people that I can’t go through the metal detector because of my pace maker/defibrillator. They tell me to stand aside and ask for my card (us wired up folks carry cards that describe what we are wired with and when we got so lucky). A large gentleman walks over, looks at the card and, as I brace to be frisked which is what always happens at US airports (air travel since 9/11 has, for me, become a more intimate experience), he hands me my card and says, “Have a nice trip.” They spent far more time on Liz and the jam. Yes, the Israeli security apparatus has decided that I am completely harmless. The former SDS member/union organizer part of me is actually disappointed. The rest of me just wants to have a nap and eat the jam.
Read more!
Disengagement - Part 2 - Amona and the Altalena
2 February 2006
Millburn, New Jersey
Part 1 would have been the end of the blogs for this year but I can’t resist one last political ramble. Part of our last full day in Tel Aviv was spent at the Etzel Museum. This museum serves to educate and be a memorial to members of the right-wing underground. The main organizations so memorialized are the Irgun, led by Menachem Begin among others, and the Stern Gang. Whoops, sorry, my mistake, at the Etzel Museum Mr. Stern and his followers had a minor ideological difference with Irgun, Lehi and just about everyone else on the planet and so formed a splinter organization known, in this museum as the “Stern Group.” Nice ring to it. Sound like a bunch of financial advisors or accountants. What all these groups did was engage in a national liberation struggle to convince the British to leave and the Arabs to stop shooting at Jews. Fortunately for them their side won the war and, eventually, became part of the government. So they get to be heroes of the struggle for independence and not terrorists who indiscriminately killed civilians along with military and political targets. In the Etzel Museum, the Haganah and the leaders of the Yishuv (the governing body for Jewish affairs in Palestine) play minor roles at best or are stumbling blocks at worst, in the struggle for a Jewish State. This would come as a surprise to David Ben Gurion, Chaim Weizmann and any of your children who learned Zionist history at school or summer camp (unless, of course, you send them to a Betar summer camp)
So, it's 1948 and Ben Gurion has announced the formation of the State of Israel and now he has a critical task to perform. What distinguishes a State from “a bunch of folks” is the ability to define its own borders and to have a monopoly on the use of violence within those borders. Whenever a national liberation movement manages to gain the upper hand, its leadership has a short-lived window of opportunity in which to get all the factions into one unified government. Oh, there can be political differences of opinion but, as the Palestinians now like to chant, there can only be one people and one gun. If the liberation movement fails to get this level of control, someone else will soon be running the show. For example, Sun Yat Sen in China and Kerensky in Russia failed to get everyone under one command. But Lenin and Stalin and Mao did manage to gain such control. This can be done by merging groups or by winning the Civil War (you can be nostalgic for Jeff Davis and Mars Robert but Abe Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant were the big winners).
So, shortly after the State was declared, Ben Gurion and Begin, et al, cut a deal under which Irgun fighters would form two distinct brigades within the Haganah. The combined organizations will eventually become the Israel Defense Force (Tseva HaHaganah Le Yisrael). For a few months during 1948 Haganah and Irgun were ostensibly under a single command. But not really. Etzel’s international wing had continued its fund raising and arms buying activities outside of Israel and, in the early fall of 1948, sent the Altalena sailing toward Tel Aviv. The ship was loaded with arms, ammunition and about 900 volunteers ready to fight the Arabs. Well, the government didn’t mind receiving guns and conscripts to fire them. What the government objected to was Irgun’s contention that its brigades should get a substantial portion of the weapons first and then Haganah could have the rest. Ben Gurion rejected this and, taking a page from the British playbook, sent troops to prevent the Altalena from unloading its cargo. Things got out of hand and the new government of Israel wound up firing upon a ship of Jews, blowing up munitions and killing a dozen or so people. Etzel relives this tragedy much like the south likes to refight the Civil War. But the government of Israel had to do what it did or risk falling apart before it could really dig in.
As noted in another blog, Menachem Begin goes on to help form a political party that eventually becomes part of Likud, becomes Prime Minister after the Labor Party has failed to deliver security and jobs and has suffered a series of corruption scandals and, within a few years, the man who once espoused and would never give up a dream of Israel within Mosaic, if not Solomonic or Hasmonean borders, became the first Prime Minister to dismantle a settlement. Netanyahu would interject that Begin got something in return for the disengagement from Sinai but no one on the right has ever described the pull out from Sinai as anything other than a tragedy. Nevertheless, Begin had to decide what the borders would be and he had to be ready to use force if necessary to defend those borders from without and from within...just like Ben Gurion had to sink the Altalena or watch his government fall.
Which brings us to Amona. Unlike the Gaza disengagement, the settlers’ groups decided to use violence against the police and army rather than give up nine illegally constructed houses. No one is talking about the fact that the rest of the Amona settlement is still alive and well. This time the settlers decided that it would be OK to throw rocks at and otherwise try to injure representatives of the government rather than give up an inch of what they claim as Israel. Problem is that the government, including a couple of panels of the Israel Supreme Court, has determined it to be an illegal settlement (one established without government permission). Well, where I come from, if you throw a rock into a policeman’s face your head, arm or some other body part that you have become attached to is going to be broken and you are going to be arrested and charged with assault and resisting arrest (police just love charging people who are lying on the ground, writhing in pain, with resisting arrest). Lots of people are shocked and outraged that (pick your side) would do this to (pick your side). I’ll spare you my rant about how the settlements were a bad idea in 1972 and have gotten only worse since then. Let’s just state the obvious: If you’re the government and want to remain the government, then, when faced with uncompromising opposition to your rules, you have to sink the Altalena.
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Millburn, New Jersey
Part 1 would have been the end of the blogs for this year but I can’t resist one last political ramble. Part of our last full day in Tel Aviv was spent at the Etzel Museum. This museum serves to educate and be a memorial to members of the right-wing underground. The main organizations so memorialized are the Irgun, led by Menachem Begin among others, and the Stern Gang. Whoops, sorry, my mistake, at the Etzel Museum Mr. Stern and his followers had a minor ideological difference with Irgun, Lehi and just about everyone else on the planet and so formed a splinter organization known, in this museum as the “Stern Group.” Nice ring to it. Sound like a bunch of financial advisors or accountants. What all these groups did was engage in a national liberation struggle to convince the British to leave and the Arabs to stop shooting at Jews. Fortunately for them their side won the war and, eventually, became part of the government. So they get to be heroes of the struggle for independence and not terrorists who indiscriminately killed civilians along with military and political targets. In the Etzel Museum, the Haganah and the leaders of the Yishuv (the governing body for Jewish affairs in Palestine) play minor roles at best or are stumbling blocks at worst, in the struggle for a Jewish State. This would come as a surprise to David Ben Gurion, Chaim Weizmann and any of your children who learned Zionist history at school or summer camp (unless, of course, you send them to a Betar summer camp)
So, it's 1948 and Ben Gurion has announced the formation of the State of Israel and now he has a critical task to perform. What distinguishes a State from “a bunch of folks” is the ability to define its own borders and to have a monopoly on the use of violence within those borders. Whenever a national liberation movement manages to gain the upper hand, its leadership has a short-lived window of opportunity in which to get all the factions into one unified government. Oh, there can be political differences of opinion but, as the Palestinians now like to chant, there can only be one people and one gun. If the liberation movement fails to get this level of control, someone else will soon be running the show. For example, Sun Yat Sen in China and Kerensky in Russia failed to get everyone under one command. But Lenin and Stalin and Mao did manage to gain such control. This can be done by merging groups or by winning the Civil War (you can be nostalgic for Jeff Davis and Mars Robert but Abe Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant were the big winners).
So, shortly after the State was declared, Ben Gurion and Begin, et al, cut a deal under which Irgun fighters would form two distinct brigades within the Haganah. The combined organizations will eventually become the Israel Defense Force (Tseva HaHaganah Le Yisrael). For a few months during 1948 Haganah and Irgun were ostensibly under a single command. But not really. Etzel’s international wing had continued its fund raising and arms buying activities outside of Israel and, in the early fall of 1948, sent the Altalena sailing toward Tel Aviv. The ship was loaded with arms, ammunition and about 900 volunteers ready to fight the Arabs. Well, the government didn’t mind receiving guns and conscripts to fire them. What the government objected to was Irgun’s contention that its brigades should get a substantial portion of the weapons first and then Haganah could have the rest. Ben Gurion rejected this and, taking a page from the British playbook, sent troops to prevent the Altalena from unloading its cargo. Things got out of hand and the new government of Israel wound up firing upon a ship of Jews, blowing up munitions and killing a dozen or so people. Etzel relives this tragedy much like the south likes to refight the Civil War. But the government of Israel had to do what it did or risk falling apart before it could really dig in.
As noted in another blog, Menachem Begin goes on to help form a political party that eventually becomes part of Likud, becomes Prime Minister after the Labor Party has failed to deliver security and jobs and has suffered a series of corruption scandals and, within a few years, the man who once espoused and would never give up a dream of Israel within Mosaic, if not Solomonic or Hasmonean borders, became the first Prime Minister to dismantle a settlement. Netanyahu would interject that Begin got something in return for the disengagement from Sinai but no one on the right has ever described the pull out from Sinai as anything other than a tragedy. Nevertheless, Begin had to decide what the borders would be and he had to be ready to use force if necessary to defend those borders from without and from within...just like Ben Gurion had to sink the Altalena or watch his government fall.
Which brings us to Amona. Unlike the Gaza disengagement, the settlers’ groups decided to use violence against the police and army rather than give up nine illegally constructed houses. No one is talking about the fact that the rest of the Amona settlement is still alive and well. This time the settlers decided that it would be OK to throw rocks at and otherwise try to injure representatives of the government rather than give up an inch of what they claim as Israel. Problem is that the government, including a couple of panels of the Israel Supreme Court, has determined it to be an illegal settlement (one established without government permission). Well, where I come from, if you throw a rock into a policeman’s face your head, arm or some other body part that you have become attached to is going to be broken and you are going to be arrested and charged with assault and resisting arrest (police just love charging people who are lying on the ground, writhing in pain, with resisting arrest). Lots of people are shocked and outraged that (pick your side) would do this to (pick your side). I’ll spare you my rant about how the settlements were a bad idea in 1972 and have gotten only worse since then. Let’s just state the obvious: If you’re the government and want to remain the government, then, when faced with uncompromising opposition to your rules, you have to sink the Altalena.
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Saturday, January 14, 2006
More Shabbos Musings
14 January 2006
Tel Aviv
In The Rhythm of Life
This week Liz and I got into a rhythm of living in Tel Aviv. We go to Ulpan five nights. Liz is now so good that she can translate between a woman who speaks French and a butcher who speaks only Hebrew. She does La Soba twice a week and we both go to Beit Noar twice a week. Other days are spent finding a museum or just setting up shop in a café and doing our Ulpan homework while we eat and drink. Food and coffee have definitely been upgraded here from 13 years ago. Life here today is a matter of so many cafes and so little time. I asked the rental agent to get us this place for four months (December through March) next year and am waiting for an answer.
Someone donated an old, beat up guitar to Beit Noar Kadima. It came with strings that were more rust than steel so I put on a new set. I've used the guitar to teach some kids an Israeli song in English (Bashanah Habaah – Next Year – a pop classic here). One of the kids was Orli, one of my girls from the talent show. Orli has a good ear and really should be getting music lessons. This may be something her family can’t afford and the local community center can’t provide. I’m going to make inquiries. Jeff’s backpacker guitar is great to travel with but having a full sized guitar just feels better. My ambition is to buy an airline proof guitar case and bring my Gibson. My guitar went to Woodstock and deserves a trip to Israel.
Football Shabbos
Becky came home from Marva for the weekend, bringing four friends from her base (two of whom were in Hatikvah with her). Plus Deborah who is working in a school in Acco came back for a second weekend, needing to decompress from dealing with troubled kids and having to do it in Hebrew. This all meant that Liz spent three days cooking chickens, brisket (a real adventure in using her Hebrew as no one at the Supersol knows what brust deckle is), noodle pudding, mandel bread, soup and lots of veggies. But mostly we are eating strawberries. Strawberries are in season here and they are delicious. Every time Liz passed another vendor in the shouk their strawberries looked better than the last vendor’s (and they would, of course, assure her that such was the case). So she came home with about four times as many strawberries as she set out to buy. This turned out to be a good thing as the feeding frenzy lasted for about a day and a half.
Becky regaled us with the tale of getting to fire an M-16 both during the day and at night (she couldn’t see the sights let alone the target). Also learning to crawl without putting any body parts up where they can be shot off. And lots of other good Army stuff. Her next assignment is to run a seminar about what they will encounter in the north. This would not be hard as Becky has written and given many Peulot (which I think is Young Judaean for educational programs). Only this time all the information is written in Hebrew and her partner is a lovely young woman from Spain who speaks no English (to go with Becky’s complete lack of Spanish). How this seminar gets done is a bit of a mystery but I think the concept is that one of Becky’s friends can read Hebrew (Thank G-d for Day Schools) while the Spanish girl’s boyfriend knows English. Well, the Army commander ordered this one up so we’ll see what happens.
Meanwhile, later tonight we get a bit of home right here in our Tel Aviv living room. The NFL playoffs are shown live on the European version of Fox Sports and something called METV. Last week I watched the Giants self-destruct. This week we get Washington and Seattle at 23:30 and, for insomniacs and the truly obsessed fans, Denver and New England at 03:00. Maybe if I get up early I can catch the last quarter.
Bibi and Robertson, Perfect Together
For the record, Israeli politicians are still holding off campaigning out of consideration for Sharon’s condition. In reality this means that they don’t openly impugn one another’s maternal heritage. Meanwhile, the campaigns are in full swing as various parties get their lists together or just implode before our very eyes.
Last Thursday was a fun day for Likudniks. First, Bibi once again ordered the four remaining Likud ministers to resign. Bibi wanted them out of the cabinet before the Likud Central Committee voted Thursday night to nominate the party list for the March elections. Silvan Shalom’s people (he was Foreign Minister) took a public shot right back and said that Bibi might be party chairman (a post he got by default after Sharon left (or was driven out) of the party) but he’s not the boss of the cabinet ministers. So Bibi had to sit down with Shalom and basically apologize. Shalom, in the interest of party unity, and also because he was already guaranteed the number 2 spot on the list, agreed to resign but on Friday, not Thursday. So Likud gave up the Foreign, Education, Agriculture and Health ministries. This allows Bibi to run as the leader of the opposition. He also gets the bullet proof Mercedes and the perks. His four former ministers will be lucky to get re-elected as MKs. Sharon’s people, also not actively campaigning, pointed out to any reporter who would listen (which is most of them as the Sharon story is getting to be dull – Ariel is unconscious and its unlikely his condition is going to change any time soon) that this is another example of Bibi being unable to take any pressure and quitting rather than standing up for his beliefs. Good thing the campaigns are in abeyance or this could really get nasty.
Before we leave Bibi, his people somehow got the Times reporter to deny that Bibi said that Bibi is the true inheritor of Sharon. The Times man says that he made the remark as part of his own write up of the interview. Well maybe yes and maybe no. I saw the CNN International interview that Bibi gave the same day and there’s no doubt but that he was claiming to be the real inheritor of Sharon. Given that Bibi’s people cut off Sharon’s microphone and literally drove him out of the Likud Central Committee this goes beyond farce to true comedy.
As long as we are speaking of sleazeoids, Pat Robertson rides again. First he tells his 700 Club audience that Sharon’s illness is a punishment from G-d inflicted as divine retribution for pulling out of Gaza. Israel’s response was to cut off negotiations for an Evangelical Christian center in the Galilee. Evangelicals are usually well treated in Israel. First, they provide strong political support in Washington, which translates into serious foreign and military aid. Second, they provide a lot of tourist dollars. Telling the Evangelicals that a $50 million dollar religious center won’t receive the necessary permits (or the land from the government) is serious business. Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network is one of a number of Evangelical organizations that are on board for the project. Faced with the loss of a new, major source of fund raising, its obvious that the other partners in the project prevailed on Robertson to do the Christian thing and apologize. Of course, his apology was in writing to one of Sharon’s sons, the Israeli Ambassador to the US and released to a bunch of newspapers, none of which Robertson’s hard core followers will read because Robertson has convinced them that any non-Christian news source is a cover for Satan, Communists, Liberals and other evil doers. What Robertson did not do was apologize on the 700 Club (at least no news report indicates that this happened). Also, he apologizes like Palestinians condemn terrorism. He says he’s sorry that ill-considered words caused pain to the family of such a wonderful friend as Sharon, but he doesn’t say that just maybe Sharon’s illness is not divine retribution for giving up a piece of Greater Israel. Meanwhile, it’s not clear that the Evangelical Center is going to go forward. Kadima controls all the cabinet ministries, thanks to Bibi, and those folks are still not happy. My bet is that eventually the center gets built but after the elections and a bit more groveling from Pat.
Israel and the Evangelicals have a relationship that should cause Jews to be more concerned than we are. Yes, Israel needs all the friends it can get but do you really want to be in bed with Pat Robertson and the rest of the Christian Right. Even the Bush White House is distancing itself from him. Also, the reason Evangelicals support Israel is the Book of Revelations. For those of you who haven’t made it that far in your biblical readings, Revelations goes into the details of what has to happen before Christ returns and the new, final Kingdom of G-d on Earth gets going. Before any of the good stuff, however, a whole lot of bad stuff goes on. Part of the action requires that the Jews return to Israel in general and Jerusalem in particular and re-establish the Jewish state. We will, when JC shows up, all admit our guilt and convert. This is not exactly what we Jews have in mind. In the meanwhile, the Evangelicals try to make themselves helpful and, times being what they are it’s hard to turn away the help. I think Malcolm Hoenlein, the Executive Director (I think) of the Organization of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations (don’t you love that name?), probably has the best take on the Evangelicals. Malcolm suggests that, for today, we need all the friends we can get in Washington (and some tourist bucks never hurts). When the Messiah comes, if it turns out that the Jews are right, none of this will matter. If it turns out that the Evangelicals are right, Malcolm will apologize.
Meanwhile several parties that once were able to influence government policy by joining or quitting a coalition seem on the verge of becoming irrelevant if not disappearing altogether. Among these are Shinnui, which used to be the main centrist party run by a former TV announcer named Tommy Lapid. Last spring Lapid, who for years whenever he was in the governing coalition had decried parties (usually Shas and other religious parties) that would black mail the Prime Minister for money for their pet projects in return for enough votes to adopt a budget. So, last Spring Lapid goes ahead and blackmails Sharon into cutting off funds for Shas projects and adding nearly a billion shekels to Lapid's favored activities in return for enough votes to pass the budget. You’d think someone so shameless would be rewarded with re-election. But Lapid’s party will be lucky to have any seats in the next Knesset and Lapid himself has lost so much support within his own ranks that he may quit the party and form his own party. If he leaves with a majority of current party MKs he gets to keep the party name. So Shinnui will split from Shinnui and run against Shinnui. Shinnui, by the way, means Change. How can you not love this stuff?
And, speaking of religious parties, the two religious Zionist parties, National Religious and National Union, have been told by every pollster they pay that if they unite they’ll get twice as many seats as they separately have now. If they don’t unite, they may not get enough votes to have any seats. So, of course, their unity talks have broken down over how gets to head the list (they resolved all the substantive policy issues). Actually, there is some poetic justice here, if not divine retribution (one would hope that G-d has a low tolerance for arrogant asses). The religious parties have over the years gained control of funding for religious education. They then put all the funds into their Yeshivas and leave nothing for public, secular schools. As a result they have raised a generation or two of Israelis who haven’t a clue why Israel is what it is or where it is. They get some inkling of this when they go into the Army as the Army is smart enough to know that you really do need to give an 18 year a good reason why he or she may have to do something that is likely to get them killed. But the sad truth is that the Jewish education of most secular Israelis isn’t even up to the sorry state of such education for too many American B’nai Mitzvahs. And it’s the religious who are a root cause of the problem.
While I’m ranting about the religious parties, the other problem they have caused involves the sorry records of failing to convert immigrants who are not Jewish under Jewish law (Halakah). Here’s the disconnect. Under the Law of Return anyone who would have been a candidate for a Nazi death camp may claim citizenship in Israel. This group is defined as anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent (the definition used by the Nazis). Halachically, a Jew is anyone with a Jewish mother (let’s not get into the Reform movement’s usage of patrilineal descent). The Orthodox have a monopoly on conversions done inside Israel and, by order of the Supreme Court and directions from the appropriate ministries, are supposed to be expediting the conversions of thousands of immigrants who came here, mostly from the former Soviet Union, under the Law of Return (to say nothing of their non-Jewish spouses who came as family members). The Orthodox do very few conversions every year because, instead of merely insisting on a Halachically correct conversion they want the immigrant to agree to adopt an observant life style satisfactory to the Orthodox. At this point most immigrants (many of whom come from places where it was illegal to live as Jews) just shrug and forget about it. So, Israel is taking in more people but fewer of them are actually Jewish. It’s a good thing we let the Orthodox call the shots, isn’t it?
Finally, the highlight of the week was a proposal from one of Sharon’s campaign managers that Sharon be kept in the first position on the Kadima list. Olmert would be announced as the party’s candidate for Prime Minister but Sharon would head the list. Setting aside the fact that Sharon has until February 7 to wake up and sign a declaration that he wants to run for the Knesset and accepts the first position on the Kadima list, just about everyone thought that this was not a constructive suggestion. The proposal was shot down as a flagrant attempt to play on the sympathy Sharon now gets because he is sick. Bibi’s people joined this chorus. Just one day after Bibi tried to do the same thing. Of course, the polls show that Kadima would probably still get 40 or more Mandates. Personally, I love the thought of Bibi losing the election to someone with the mental and physical capacity of a bowl of Jello.
And here is the rest of it.
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Tel Aviv
In The Rhythm of Life
This week Liz and I got into a rhythm of living in Tel Aviv. We go to Ulpan five nights. Liz is now so good that she can translate between a woman who speaks French and a butcher who speaks only Hebrew. She does La Soba twice a week and we both go to Beit Noar twice a week. Other days are spent finding a museum or just setting up shop in a café and doing our Ulpan homework while we eat and drink. Food and coffee have definitely been upgraded here from 13 years ago. Life here today is a matter of so many cafes and so little time. I asked the rental agent to get us this place for four months (December through March) next year and am waiting for an answer.
Someone donated an old, beat up guitar to Beit Noar Kadima. It came with strings that were more rust than steel so I put on a new set. I've used the guitar to teach some kids an Israeli song in English (Bashanah Habaah – Next Year – a pop classic here). One of the kids was Orli, one of my girls from the talent show. Orli has a good ear and really should be getting music lessons. This may be something her family can’t afford and the local community center can’t provide. I’m going to make inquiries. Jeff’s backpacker guitar is great to travel with but having a full sized guitar just feels better. My ambition is to buy an airline proof guitar case and bring my Gibson. My guitar went to Woodstock and deserves a trip to Israel.
Football Shabbos
Becky came home from Marva for the weekend, bringing four friends from her base (two of whom were in Hatikvah with her). Plus Deborah who is working in a school in Acco came back for a second weekend, needing to decompress from dealing with troubled kids and having to do it in Hebrew. This all meant that Liz spent three days cooking chickens, brisket (a real adventure in using her Hebrew as no one at the Supersol knows what brust deckle is), noodle pudding, mandel bread, soup and lots of veggies. But mostly we are eating strawberries. Strawberries are in season here and they are delicious. Every time Liz passed another vendor in the shouk their strawberries looked better than the last vendor’s (and they would, of course, assure her that such was the case). So she came home with about four times as many strawberries as she set out to buy. This turned out to be a good thing as the feeding frenzy lasted for about a day and a half.
Becky regaled us with the tale of getting to fire an M-16 both during the day and at night (she couldn’t see the sights let alone the target). Also learning to crawl without putting any body parts up where they can be shot off. And lots of other good Army stuff. Her next assignment is to run a seminar about what they will encounter in the north. This would not be hard as Becky has written and given many Peulot (which I think is Young Judaean for educational programs). Only this time all the information is written in Hebrew and her partner is a lovely young woman from Spain who speaks no English (to go with Becky’s complete lack of Spanish). How this seminar gets done is a bit of a mystery but I think the concept is that one of Becky’s friends can read Hebrew (Thank G-d for Day Schools) while the Spanish girl’s boyfriend knows English. Well, the Army commander ordered this one up so we’ll see what happens.
Meanwhile, later tonight we get a bit of home right here in our Tel Aviv living room. The NFL playoffs are shown live on the European version of Fox Sports and something called METV. Last week I watched the Giants self-destruct. This week we get Washington and Seattle at 23:30 and, for insomniacs and the truly obsessed fans, Denver and New England at 03:00. Maybe if I get up early I can catch the last quarter.
Bibi and Robertson, Perfect Together
For the record, Israeli politicians are still holding off campaigning out of consideration for Sharon’s condition. In reality this means that they don’t openly impugn one another’s maternal heritage. Meanwhile, the campaigns are in full swing as various parties get their lists together or just implode before our very eyes.
Last Thursday was a fun day for Likudniks. First, Bibi once again ordered the four remaining Likud ministers to resign. Bibi wanted them out of the cabinet before the Likud Central Committee voted Thursday night to nominate the party list for the March elections. Silvan Shalom’s people (he was Foreign Minister) took a public shot right back and said that Bibi might be party chairman (a post he got by default after Sharon left (or was driven out) of the party) but he’s not the boss of the cabinet ministers. So Bibi had to sit down with Shalom and basically apologize. Shalom, in the interest of party unity, and also because he was already guaranteed the number 2 spot on the list, agreed to resign but on Friday, not Thursday. So Likud gave up the Foreign, Education, Agriculture and Health ministries. This allows Bibi to run as the leader of the opposition. He also gets the bullet proof Mercedes and the perks. His four former ministers will be lucky to get re-elected as MKs. Sharon’s people, also not actively campaigning, pointed out to any reporter who would listen (which is most of them as the Sharon story is getting to be dull – Ariel is unconscious and its unlikely his condition is going to change any time soon) that this is another example of Bibi being unable to take any pressure and quitting rather than standing up for his beliefs. Good thing the campaigns are in abeyance or this could really get nasty.
Before we leave Bibi, his people somehow got the Times reporter to deny that Bibi said that Bibi is the true inheritor of Sharon. The Times man says that he made the remark as part of his own write up of the interview. Well maybe yes and maybe no. I saw the CNN International interview that Bibi gave the same day and there’s no doubt but that he was claiming to be the real inheritor of Sharon. Given that Bibi’s people cut off Sharon’s microphone and literally drove him out of the Likud Central Committee this goes beyond farce to true comedy.
As long as we are speaking of sleazeoids, Pat Robertson rides again. First he tells his 700 Club audience that Sharon’s illness is a punishment from G-d inflicted as divine retribution for pulling out of Gaza. Israel’s response was to cut off negotiations for an Evangelical Christian center in the Galilee. Evangelicals are usually well treated in Israel. First, they provide strong political support in Washington, which translates into serious foreign and military aid. Second, they provide a lot of tourist dollars. Telling the Evangelicals that a $50 million dollar religious center won’t receive the necessary permits (or the land from the government) is serious business. Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network is one of a number of Evangelical organizations that are on board for the project. Faced with the loss of a new, major source of fund raising, its obvious that the other partners in the project prevailed on Robertson to do the Christian thing and apologize. Of course, his apology was in writing to one of Sharon’s sons, the Israeli Ambassador to the US and released to a bunch of newspapers, none of which Robertson’s hard core followers will read because Robertson has convinced them that any non-Christian news source is a cover for Satan, Communists, Liberals and other evil doers. What Robertson did not do was apologize on the 700 Club (at least no news report indicates that this happened). Also, he apologizes like Palestinians condemn terrorism. He says he’s sorry that ill-considered words caused pain to the family of such a wonderful friend as Sharon, but he doesn’t say that just maybe Sharon’s illness is not divine retribution for giving up a piece of Greater Israel. Meanwhile, it’s not clear that the Evangelical Center is going to go forward. Kadima controls all the cabinet ministries, thanks to Bibi, and those folks are still not happy. My bet is that eventually the center gets built but after the elections and a bit more groveling from Pat.
Israel and the Evangelicals have a relationship that should cause Jews to be more concerned than we are. Yes, Israel needs all the friends it can get but do you really want to be in bed with Pat Robertson and the rest of the Christian Right. Even the Bush White House is distancing itself from him. Also, the reason Evangelicals support Israel is the Book of Revelations. For those of you who haven’t made it that far in your biblical readings, Revelations goes into the details of what has to happen before Christ returns and the new, final Kingdom of G-d on Earth gets going. Before any of the good stuff, however, a whole lot of bad stuff goes on. Part of the action requires that the Jews return to Israel in general and Jerusalem in particular and re-establish the Jewish state. We will, when JC shows up, all admit our guilt and convert. This is not exactly what we Jews have in mind. In the meanwhile, the Evangelicals try to make themselves helpful and, times being what they are it’s hard to turn away the help. I think Malcolm Hoenlein, the Executive Director (I think) of the Organization of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations (don’t you love that name?), probably has the best take on the Evangelicals. Malcolm suggests that, for today, we need all the friends we can get in Washington (and some tourist bucks never hurts). When the Messiah comes, if it turns out that the Jews are right, none of this will matter. If it turns out that the Evangelicals are right, Malcolm will apologize.
Meanwhile several parties that once were able to influence government policy by joining or quitting a coalition seem on the verge of becoming irrelevant if not disappearing altogether. Among these are Shinnui, which used to be the main centrist party run by a former TV announcer named Tommy Lapid. Last spring Lapid, who for years whenever he was in the governing coalition had decried parties (usually Shas and other religious parties) that would black mail the Prime Minister for money for their pet projects in return for enough votes to adopt a budget. So, last Spring Lapid goes ahead and blackmails Sharon into cutting off funds for Shas projects and adding nearly a billion shekels to Lapid's favored activities in return for enough votes to pass the budget. You’d think someone so shameless would be rewarded with re-election. But Lapid’s party will be lucky to have any seats in the next Knesset and Lapid himself has lost so much support within his own ranks that he may quit the party and form his own party. If he leaves with a majority of current party MKs he gets to keep the party name. So Shinnui will split from Shinnui and run against Shinnui. Shinnui, by the way, means Change. How can you not love this stuff?
And, speaking of religious parties, the two religious Zionist parties, National Religious and National Union, have been told by every pollster they pay that if they unite they’ll get twice as many seats as they separately have now. If they don’t unite, they may not get enough votes to have any seats. So, of course, their unity talks have broken down over how gets to head the list (they resolved all the substantive policy issues). Actually, there is some poetic justice here, if not divine retribution (one would hope that G-d has a low tolerance for arrogant asses). The religious parties have over the years gained control of funding for religious education. They then put all the funds into their Yeshivas and leave nothing for public, secular schools. As a result they have raised a generation or two of Israelis who haven’t a clue why Israel is what it is or where it is. They get some inkling of this when they go into the Army as the Army is smart enough to know that you really do need to give an 18 year a good reason why he or she may have to do something that is likely to get them killed. But the sad truth is that the Jewish education of most secular Israelis isn’t even up to the sorry state of such education for too many American B’nai Mitzvahs. And it’s the religious who are a root cause of the problem.
While I’m ranting about the religious parties, the other problem they have caused involves the sorry records of failing to convert immigrants who are not Jewish under Jewish law (Halakah). Here’s the disconnect. Under the Law of Return anyone who would have been a candidate for a Nazi death camp may claim citizenship in Israel. This group is defined as anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent (the definition used by the Nazis). Halachically, a Jew is anyone with a Jewish mother (let’s not get into the Reform movement’s usage of patrilineal descent). The Orthodox have a monopoly on conversions done inside Israel and, by order of the Supreme Court and directions from the appropriate ministries, are supposed to be expediting the conversions of thousands of immigrants who came here, mostly from the former Soviet Union, under the Law of Return (to say nothing of their non-Jewish spouses who came as family members). The Orthodox do very few conversions every year because, instead of merely insisting on a Halachically correct conversion they want the immigrant to agree to adopt an observant life style satisfactory to the Orthodox. At this point most immigrants (many of whom come from places where it was illegal to live as Jews) just shrug and forget about it. So, Israel is taking in more people but fewer of them are actually Jewish. It’s a good thing we let the Orthodox call the shots, isn’t it?
Finally, the highlight of the week was a proposal from one of Sharon’s campaign managers that Sharon be kept in the first position on the Kadima list. Olmert would be announced as the party’s candidate for Prime Minister but Sharon would head the list. Setting aside the fact that Sharon has until February 7 to wake up and sign a declaration that he wants to run for the Knesset and accepts the first position on the Kadima list, just about everyone thought that this was not a constructive suggestion. The proposal was shot down as a flagrant attempt to play on the sympathy Sharon now gets because he is sick. Bibi’s people joined this chorus. Just one day after Bibi tried to do the same thing. Of course, the polls show that Kadima would probably still get 40 or more Mandates. Personally, I love the thought of Bibi losing the election to someone with the mental and physical capacity of a bowl of Jello.
And here is the rest of it.
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Saturday, January 7, 2006
Pilpul Part III
7 January 2006
Tel Aviv
Contemporary Art and Cholent
Shabbos in Tel Aviv is a combination of contemporary art (the Tel Aviv Museum is open and has a really good Menashe Kadishman exhibit – some of you have seen Kadishman at places like MOMA or Storm King Mountain) and cholent. Kadishman has a thing for goats’ heads but really stands out with his outdoor sculptures of things like negative trees, torn washing hanging from lines, the binding of Isaac and, at Storm King, a huge rectangle, standing on end in the middle of what would be a good-sized fairway if Storm King were a golf course. The rectangle is broken about a third of the way up and the broken piece dangles at an angle and a weight distribution that is simply impossible within Earth's gravity.
Cholent is what you eat when you want hot food on Shabbos but cannot start an oven or stove or cut new vegetables. Cholent (which varies in content depending upon where your great grandmother was born but consists largely of beans, potatoes, mystery meat and whatever else did not make it into the Friday night soup) stays on a stove or in an oven until Saturday afternoon when it has congealed into a uniform mass that instantly expands upon ingestion. There are those who think this stuff is delicious. Batya, a restaurant near our apartment, makes an excellent cholent served with a chunk of kishke. Kishke is lamb or cow intestine (depending on what you had around to kill before the weekend) stuffed with bread, grease and G-d only knows what else. Those of you from in between the coasts who have had a knish or a kosher hot dog and think you have had Jewish food have been spared the real stuff. And, by the way, if your great grandmother was not from central or Eastern Europe you don’t get off easy. There’s jachnun and shakshukah. Jachnun is solid starch and grease mitigated with a hard-boiled egg or two. Shakshukah is egg and cheese in a tomato sauce. Now that I think of it, cholent does sort of go with Kadishman.
You’re In The Army Now
Last night, Friday 6 January, we had Shabbos dinner with the DeCastros (Maurizio, Nurit and Keren, our Yemenite daughter, the officer). Also with us are Deborah and Marissa, two of Becky’s Hatikvah roommates who are taking a break from their current locations. This middle part of YC is, for Becky’s group, the Israel Experience. Deborah is working north of Acco at a shelter/school for troubled and abused teenagers. Marissa is working near Modiin at an environmental/organic farm that runs education programs for schools in the surrounding area. We are also joined by Michal Zur. So we are having a grand old time eating this incredible Yemenite vegetable and chicken soup, ktzitzot (a sort of chicken latke – don’t even try to pronounce this unless you speak Hebrew or you will hurt yourself) and plenty of wine to wash this down. The Kiddush is familiar though done in a Sephardic melody.
My highlight of the evening was the call from Becky. Becky just finished her first week of Marva, a sampling of Army training. She her day (which began at 4:15 and, at 10:30 was not over) has been spent on guard duty, on kitchen duty, cleaning herself, cleaning her weapon, getting into trouble with her commander, cleaning her living area, standing at attention with her weapon while being lectured at and, at 01:00, going back on guard duty. I will directly quote the only quotable portion of the phone call:
Becky: So they get me up at f-----g 4:f------g15 in the morning and we have to run for an hour before they let us eat food that really s---s big time and then we have to clean the f------g tents and the f-----g area around the tents and then, from 10 until 2 for four f-----g hours I have to wash f-----g dishes and then, finally, they let me take a shower but then I have to clean up the f-----g area and stand at f-----g attention with my rifle while they give me a f-----g lecture until they finally let me eat more food that isn’t worth eating and at f-----g 01:00 to 01:30 I have more f------g guard duty.
At this moment I really missed my Father who would have loved the rant and started telling some of his “fond” memories of army life. After I stopped laughing hysterically, I assured her that she will survive this and she should just suck it up and stick it out. She wasn’t asking to come home. She just wanted to complain, like a real soldier. She did ask how I could have let her volunteer for this. I reminded her that I don’t let her do anything.
Seven Jews Are Talking
On 25 and 26 January Liz and Becky and I toured the Supreme Court in Jerusalem. The building alone is worth the trip. It is architecturally a masterpiece of symbolic and functional design. But the fun part, for us retired attorneys, is sitting in on a case.
The Israeli Supreme Court is the highest court in the land. It has a panel of 15 judges, all appointed by a panel of government ministers. They court usually sits in panels of three though the Chief Judge may appoint (on his own volition or on petition) a larger, odd-numbered panel. In Israel there are no juries. Judges determine the facts and apply the law. There is also no written Constitution, just a series of Basic Laws that get amended from time to time by the Knesset and get interpreted by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court has two basic jurisdictions. One is that any case from a lower court can be appealed, creating a serious backlog. The other is direct jurisdiction over certain cases including Human Rights cases. A Human Rights case has a very broad definition here. Remember, there is no Article III and no Judiciary Act for Congress to fool with. The Supreme Court can pretty much take whatever cases it decides to take. For example, a case involving the provision of appropriate education to a learning disabled child or a case involving the separation of a farmer from his farmland by the security fence can both go straight to the Supreme Court. The Judges will listen to testimony, look at exhibits, take briefs on the law and hear argument. The fun part is that this can be an almost simultaneous event. For you New York lawyers, its much more like a wild morning in the Appellate Division than the formality of the Court of Appeals.
We sat in on two cases. One was a criminal appeal. We know because Becky caught the words vodka and hashish (and wouldn’t tell me why these two words just sort of jumped out at her). Liz heard kilograms, which is a heck of a lot of hashish. The other case had Army officers and several lawyers gesturing and talking about a map that was spread out on the Judges’ bench. Possibly a fence case or at least some dispute about whether the Army can take over someone’s land or put up a roadblock that stops someone from commuting to his or her business. In any event, every time a Judge asked a question or just paused to take a breath, one of the lawyers would launch into another long speech. This particular panel was being very patient with all this. Sylvia Ornstein recalls sitting in on a case when the Judge had had enough with a long-winded attorney and verbally whacked him upside the head. Ah, that's the courtroom I know and love. Anyway, for you lawyer types, the Supreme Court tour is a good busman’s holiday.
And speaking of a unique legal system. Has anyone been wondering just how Marwan Barghouti, a man serving five consecutive life terms for murdering Jews, is able to lead a faction within Fatah that has now gained control of the final Parliamentary list, with Marwan in the number one spot? And how he is able to release statements to the Palestinians apologizing for Fatah and the PA to date and asking for another chance? Or saying something diplomatic about Sharon’s condition? Isn’t this guy in prison? Well, yes, but prison here, like the Army here, does not work quite the way it works in the US. Here, prison officials, who ultimately answer to the political leaders of their agency, have certain amounts of discretion with respect to prisoners receiving visitors or making phone calls. Barghouti only speaks with those people who have been approved by the Warden and only communicates in designated rooms or on designated phones. Marwan has been allowed to participate in conference calls originating from the Warden’s office. Clearly, someone up the foodchain has decided that its better to allow Barghouti to become the next Prime Minister of the PA than just sit back and allow Hamas to grab it all. Besides, wouldn’t you like to be able to tape every key conversation between one of your most powerful enemies and his closest advisors (to say nothing of his wife)? Can you see Rumsfeld allowing Osama’s number 2 to call in from Guantanamo? And why wouldn’t that be a good idea?
Take The Aleph Train
What is new since my 1992 trip is that many of the major population centers and the main airport are now linked by Israel Railways. The trains are clean, modern, comfortable and run on time. Once again Israel destroys old stereotypes and replaces them with irony. The Army works, the trains run on time, it’s the education system and the government that are a mess.
But with the trains comes something that I never thought I’d see here. Israelis commuting to work from suburbs by train. You can see the cars parked in the station lots as you whiz by on an express. Try looking at that sight and humming Zum Gali Gali* to yourself.
YC Retreats from Hatikvah
The YC kids are not happy about this. They know that a major part of the experience was actually living in the neighborhood. But Hadassah is not going to put any kids at risk. So, after a series of break-ins, including the fellow who was just standing in the living room when one young woman came out of the shower, Hadassah has moved the current Hatikvah group to a hotel near our apartment. The kids get double rooms and two meals a day plus 20 shekels spending money and a bus pass. They commute to their volunteer jobs. The reaction from Becky’s crew was generally to say that this makes everyone look like wimps and takes away the real benefit of the program. By and large, the kids were part of the neighborhood, looked after by neighbors and merchants and generally made to feel at home. They were not treated like a bunch of prissy do-gooders from the outside. I’m certain most parents are happy with this arrangement. But I think the kids have got this right.
Last Word On Hanukkah
Its now way past Hanukah and I never did get around to my annual rant about Hasmoneans and the right wingers. My version of the Hanukah story was delivered just once at the Kiddie Service. Treasure and Cynthia have since carefully organized the services so that I am never left alone with the children. I take no offense at this. I have, however, decided to spare you my Hanukah story. At least for this year. Maybe you’ll get unlucky next year.
___________________________________________________________________
* Zum Gali Gali is a sing-a-long whose only words are “Pioneers are for work. Work is for the Pioneers.” Its an early Kibbutz/youth group song that mostly lives on at US summer camps. I doubt anyone sings it while getting coffee on their way to their job for a nanotechnology firm.
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Tel Aviv
Contemporary Art and Cholent
Shabbos in Tel Aviv is a combination of contemporary art (the Tel Aviv Museum is open and has a really good Menashe Kadishman exhibit – some of you have seen Kadishman at places like MOMA or Storm King Mountain) and cholent. Kadishman has a thing for goats’ heads but really stands out with his outdoor sculptures of things like negative trees, torn washing hanging from lines, the binding of Isaac and, at Storm King, a huge rectangle, standing on end in the middle of what would be a good-sized fairway if Storm King were a golf course. The rectangle is broken about a third of the way up and the broken piece dangles at an angle and a weight distribution that is simply impossible within Earth's gravity.
Cholent is what you eat when you want hot food on Shabbos but cannot start an oven or stove or cut new vegetables. Cholent (which varies in content depending upon where your great grandmother was born but consists largely of beans, potatoes, mystery meat and whatever else did not make it into the Friday night soup) stays on a stove or in an oven until Saturday afternoon when it has congealed into a uniform mass that instantly expands upon ingestion. There are those who think this stuff is delicious. Batya, a restaurant near our apartment, makes an excellent cholent served with a chunk of kishke. Kishke is lamb or cow intestine (depending on what you had around to kill before the weekend) stuffed with bread, grease and G-d only knows what else. Those of you from in between the coasts who have had a knish or a kosher hot dog and think you have had Jewish food have been spared the real stuff. And, by the way, if your great grandmother was not from central or Eastern Europe you don’t get off easy. There’s jachnun and shakshukah. Jachnun is solid starch and grease mitigated with a hard-boiled egg or two. Shakshukah is egg and cheese in a tomato sauce. Now that I think of it, cholent does sort of go with Kadishman.
You’re In The Army Now
Last night, Friday 6 January, we had Shabbos dinner with the DeCastros (Maurizio, Nurit and Keren, our Yemenite daughter, the officer). Also with us are Deborah and Marissa, two of Becky’s Hatikvah roommates who are taking a break from their current locations. This middle part of YC is, for Becky’s group, the Israel Experience. Deborah is working north of Acco at a shelter/school for troubled and abused teenagers. Marissa is working near Modiin at an environmental/organic farm that runs education programs for schools in the surrounding area. We are also joined by Michal Zur. So we are having a grand old time eating this incredible Yemenite vegetable and chicken soup, ktzitzot (a sort of chicken latke – don’t even try to pronounce this unless you speak Hebrew or you will hurt yourself) and plenty of wine to wash this down. The Kiddush is familiar though done in a Sephardic melody.
My highlight of the evening was the call from Becky. Becky just finished her first week of Marva, a sampling of Army training. She her day (which began at 4:15 and, at 10:30 was not over) has been spent on guard duty, on kitchen duty, cleaning herself, cleaning her weapon, getting into trouble with her commander, cleaning her living area, standing at attention with her weapon while being lectured at and, at 01:00, going back on guard duty. I will directly quote the only quotable portion of the phone call:
Becky: So they get me up at f-----g 4:f------g15 in the morning and we have to run for an hour before they let us eat food that really s---s big time and then we have to clean the f------g tents and the f-----g area around the tents and then, from 10 until 2 for four f-----g hours I have to wash f-----g dishes and then, finally, they let me take a shower but then I have to clean up the f-----g area and stand at f-----g attention with my rifle while they give me a f-----g lecture until they finally let me eat more food that isn’t worth eating and at f-----g 01:00 to 01:30 I have more f------g guard duty.
At this moment I really missed my Father who would have loved the rant and started telling some of his “fond” memories of army life. After I stopped laughing hysterically, I assured her that she will survive this and she should just suck it up and stick it out. She wasn’t asking to come home. She just wanted to complain, like a real soldier. She did ask how I could have let her volunteer for this. I reminded her that I don’t let her do anything.
Seven Jews Are Talking
On 25 and 26 January Liz and Becky and I toured the Supreme Court in Jerusalem. The building alone is worth the trip. It is architecturally a masterpiece of symbolic and functional design. But the fun part, for us retired attorneys, is sitting in on a case.
The Israeli Supreme Court is the highest court in the land. It has a panel of 15 judges, all appointed by a panel of government ministers. They court usually sits in panels of three though the Chief Judge may appoint (on his own volition or on petition) a larger, odd-numbered panel. In Israel there are no juries. Judges determine the facts and apply the law. There is also no written Constitution, just a series of Basic Laws that get amended from time to time by the Knesset and get interpreted by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court has two basic jurisdictions. One is that any case from a lower court can be appealed, creating a serious backlog. The other is direct jurisdiction over certain cases including Human Rights cases. A Human Rights case has a very broad definition here. Remember, there is no Article III and no Judiciary Act for Congress to fool with. The Supreme Court can pretty much take whatever cases it decides to take. For example, a case involving the provision of appropriate education to a learning disabled child or a case involving the separation of a farmer from his farmland by the security fence can both go straight to the Supreme Court. The Judges will listen to testimony, look at exhibits, take briefs on the law and hear argument. The fun part is that this can be an almost simultaneous event. For you New York lawyers, its much more like a wild morning in the Appellate Division than the formality of the Court of Appeals.
We sat in on two cases. One was a criminal appeal. We know because Becky caught the words vodka and hashish (and wouldn’t tell me why these two words just sort of jumped out at her). Liz heard kilograms, which is a heck of a lot of hashish. The other case had Army officers and several lawyers gesturing and talking about a map that was spread out on the Judges’ bench. Possibly a fence case or at least some dispute about whether the Army can take over someone’s land or put up a roadblock that stops someone from commuting to his or her business. In any event, every time a Judge asked a question or just paused to take a breath, one of the lawyers would launch into another long speech. This particular panel was being very patient with all this. Sylvia Ornstein recalls sitting in on a case when the Judge had had enough with a long-winded attorney and verbally whacked him upside the head. Ah, that's the courtroom I know and love. Anyway, for you lawyer types, the Supreme Court tour is a good busman’s holiday.
And speaking of a unique legal system. Has anyone been wondering just how Marwan Barghouti, a man serving five consecutive life terms for murdering Jews, is able to lead a faction within Fatah that has now gained control of the final Parliamentary list, with Marwan in the number one spot? And how he is able to release statements to the Palestinians apologizing for Fatah and the PA to date and asking for another chance? Or saying something diplomatic about Sharon’s condition? Isn’t this guy in prison? Well, yes, but prison here, like the Army here, does not work quite the way it works in the US. Here, prison officials, who ultimately answer to the political leaders of their agency, have certain amounts of discretion with respect to prisoners receiving visitors or making phone calls. Barghouti only speaks with those people who have been approved by the Warden and only communicates in designated rooms or on designated phones. Marwan has been allowed to participate in conference calls originating from the Warden’s office. Clearly, someone up the foodchain has decided that its better to allow Barghouti to become the next Prime Minister of the PA than just sit back and allow Hamas to grab it all. Besides, wouldn’t you like to be able to tape every key conversation between one of your most powerful enemies and his closest advisors (to say nothing of his wife)? Can you see Rumsfeld allowing Osama’s number 2 to call in from Guantanamo? And why wouldn’t that be a good idea?
Take The Aleph Train
What is new since my 1992 trip is that many of the major population centers and the main airport are now linked by Israel Railways. The trains are clean, modern, comfortable and run on time. Once again Israel destroys old stereotypes and replaces them with irony. The Army works, the trains run on time, it’s the education system and the government that are a mess.
But with the trains comes something that I never thought I’d see here. Israelis commuting to work from suburbs by train. You can see the cars parked in the station lots as you whiz by on an express. Try looking at that sight and humming Zum Gali Gali* to yourself.
YC Retreats from Hatikvah
The YC kids are not happy about this. They know that a major part of the experience was actually living in the neighborhood. But Hadassah is not going to put any kids at risk. So, after a series of break-ins, including the fellow who was just standing in the living room when one young woman came out of the shower, Hadassah has moved the current Hatikvah group to a hotel near our apartment. The kids get double rooms and two meals a day plus 20 shekels spending money and a bus pass. They commute to their volunteer jobs. The reaction from Becky’s crew was generally to say that this makes everyone look like wimps and takes away the real benefit of the program. By and large, the kids were part of the neighborhood, looked after by neighbors and merchants and generally made to feel at home. They were not treated like a bunch of prissy do-gooders from the outside. I’m certain most parents are happy with this arrangement. But I think the kids have got this right.
Last Word On Hanukkah
Its now way past Hanukah and I never did get around to my annual rant about Hasmoneans and the right wingers. My version of the Hanukah story was delivered just once at the Kiddie Service. Treasure and Cynthia have since carefully organized the services so that I am never left alone with the children. I take no offense at this. I have, however, decided to spare you my Hanukah story. At least for this year. Maybe you’ll get unlucky next year.
___________________________________________________________________
* Zum Gali Gali is a sing-a-long whose only words are “Pioneers are for work. Work is for the Pioneers.” Its an early Kibbutz/youth group song that mostly lives on at US summer camps. I doubt anyone sings it while getting coffee on their way to their job for a nanotechnology firm.
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Wednesday, January 4, 2006
Our Daughter, The Officer
4 January 2006
Latrun
Today, Keren, our Yemenite daughter, became a lieutenant in the Israel Defense Force. The ceremony at which about 40 young women became officers in various armor units (Keren is an Engineer) was held in the fortress at Latrun. The symbolism of swearing in new armor officers here is obvious and compelling.
Keren was very happy today as she was told just a few days ago that her job will be in support but at her current base in the southern Negev (about 45 minutes north of Eilat). So Keren got to smile her wonderful smile as her Israeli and American parents, an uncle, some friends from West Orange and a bunch of her friends. After the ceremony we adjourned to Rishon Letzion to drink, eat and let the political conversation begin.
Keren, now 21, lived with us in Millburn for about six months during the 2003-2004 academic year. Keren fits in neatly between Molly and Jessica (who are a few years older) and Rebecca who is a couple of years younger. Her parents are Maurizio, whose family emigrated from Italy, and Nurit, whose family is from Yemen. Keren worked in our part of New Jersey as a youth ambassador (that's the best translation I can do of "Rishonim"). She worked mostly with Jewish teenagers, including the children of Israelis for whom she led a Hebrew-speaking scout troop. (Keren herself is a Young Diplomat.) Mostly she's remembered as a wonderful kid who, having earned her driver's license just three weeks before coming to America (and having learned to drive in Israel where highway fatalities are still the leading cause of death), was given a car and set loose at night in northern New Jersey. She never caused any physical damage and the damage to the three or four cars she went through was minimal. Nevertheless, she did build something of a reputation. So, when she went home and was drafted the Army made her an instructor in the civil engineers. Teaching Israelis how to drive heavy equipment and personnel carriers. No matter where you are the army remains the army.
Keren, being a smart kid, and personnel carriers not being items that wilt from simple fender benders (it helps to be made from armored steel and have no fenders to bend), was offered the opportunity to go to officers' training school. The first four months of the six months course was general training taken by hundreds of candidates, male and female. The last two months were training for specialized jobs, with the group divided into combat, support and non-combat jobs. The women still go to support and non-combat units.
Keren has been unhappy because, rather than the training position she thought she was heading toward, she was being trained to allocated troops and resources based on changing conditions in the field. This meant that if additional troops were needed to help move casualties, re-take a position, or set up roadblocks, Keren would be one of the people who selects the available soldiers and machinery and sends them in. This is a job that you can do perfectly but still know, every day, that another soldier may be killed or maimed. Also, you often get to do it in or close to area you would not want to drive through without your armored personnel carrier and a lot of guys with guns. Far better to decide who gets to train in "live fire" areas and who gets to drive the armored vehicle through the obstacle course. And do it on a Negev base well out of the line of fire.
Fortunately, her original base commander decided to get her back. She's not entirely certain what she will be doing but she won't be doing it in an unsafe place and won't be directly sending other young people into danger. All of her parents are relieved, though we know that this will mean that someone else's kid gets to step up and do a nasty job. This is the part of Israel that I admire the most and which definitely sucks the most.
Here's an example that is all too easy to pick out of the newspapers. During Hanukah, Israeli intelligence received a number of warnings about suicide bombing attempts. A prime target would have been the many public children's parties in places like Tel Aviv. Ori Binamo, a 21 year-old lieutenant, was ordered to take his squad and set up a surprise checkpoint inside the security fence but on the road to Israeli cities. Ori stopped a taxicab with Palestinian plates. Three passengers, strangers to one another, were sharing a ride. One passenger was about 18 or 19 and looked very nervous. Ori asked the kid to step out and pull up his shirt. The kid stepped out and detonated the bomb belt, murdering Ori, the cab driver and another passenger. Had someone not sent Ori to that spot, had Ori not done his job, the homicide bomber could have made it into Tel Aviv. The heavier-than-usual bomb and all the nails taped around it would have had an even more devastating effect if detonated inside a crowded room. Keren did not know Ori but Maurizio thinks she knows his girlfriend.
In the US, young people go into the Army and sort of disappear for long periods, especially if they get assigned overseas. In Israel everyone and everything is always close to home. The good news is you get to see your child at least once a month. The bad news is that's because the "front" is also your front yard.
A few days ago, on the train from Haifa to Tel Aviv (a beautiful ride on new equipment - Israelis have discovered how to commute by train - I'm not certain if this is a good or a bad thing though anything that keeps them out of cars is probably a good idea - soldiers in uniform ride for free), we sat across from a young woman with Sergeants' strips and an armor patch. Like one of my daughters (who shall remain nameless so I can go home and not have my throat slit), her acne has mostly but not entirely cleared up. In her breast pocket was a pink pen. She puts on her headphones and falls asleep. Probably on her way back to her base or post after a weekend at home.
The British built Latrun during the 1930s following Arab riots. It sits on a hill over the main route between Jerusalem and the sea. There was a time not so long ago when holding Latrun meant you could choke off Jerusalem's supply line from the west. After the UN partition, the British handled the place over to the Arabs who used it for that very purpose. The Israelis tried to take the fortress as part of their efforts to lift the siege of Jerusalem but, after suffering terrible casualties, failed and instead broke the seige by building the "Burma Road" to bypass the fortress.In 1967, the IDF took Latrun and the hills and vallies around it. Suffice it to say that no one thinks any of this is ever going back to the Arabs.
The fortress is now at the center of a memorial and museum to armored warfare. Surrounding the fortress (the walls of which still show holes and craters from artillery and rifle fire) are dozens of tanks, mobile artillery pieces and other mechanized war machines. The picture on the left shows Maurizio in front of a 160 mm mortar. He rode one these into Beirut in 1982. That's me on the right in front of a tank converted into a mobile bridge. Sharon used these to cross the Suez Canal in 1973 where he proceeded to disrupt the Egyptian supply lines and, crossing back, surrounded half the Egyptian army, forcing them to give up and go home. There are also tanks that are currently in use. These have low, sleek profiles and are packed with electronics giving them the ability to hide behind a hill and still hit a target on the other side of the hill. The collection also includes numerous examples of armor captured over the years. Which is how the Israelis have a German, WW II model anti-tank gun given up by Syrians who got it from the Russians who captured it from the Germans. Plus a number of other Russian, British and American built tanks used for and against the country. If you have an interest in serious military hardware, this place is a must-see and is easy to get to as you travel between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
The final picture is Keren with her American parents.
Read more!
Latrun
Today, Keren, our Yemenite daughter, became a lieutenant in the Israel Defense Force. The ceremony at which about 40 young women became officers in various armor units (Keren is an Engineer) was held in the fortress at Latrun. The symbolism of swearing in new armor officers here is obvious and compelling.
Keren was very happy today as she was told just a few days ago that her job will be in support but at her current base in the southern Negev (about 45 minutes north of Eilat). So Keren got to smile her wonderful smile as her Israeli and American parents, an uncle, some friends from West Orange and a bunch of her friends. After the ceremony we adjourned to Rishon Letzion to drink, eat and let the political conversation begin.
Keren, now 21, lived with us in Millburn for about six months during the 2003-2004 academic year. Keren fits in neatly between Molly and Jessica (who are a few years older) and Rebecca who is a couple of years younger. Her parents are Maurizio, whose family emigrated from Italy, and Nurit, whose family is from Yemen. Keren worked in our part of New Jersey as a youth ambassador (that's the best translation I can do of "Rishonim"). She worked mostly with Jewish teenagers, including the children of Israelis for whom she led a Hebrew-speaking scout troop. (Keren herself is a Young Diplomat.) Mostly she's remembered as a wonderful kid who, having earned her driver's license just three weeks before coming to America (and having learned to drive in Israel where highway fatalities are still the leading cause of death), was given a car and set loose at night in northern New Jersey. She never caused any physical damage and the damage to the three or four cars she went through was minimal. Nevertheless, she did build something of a reputation. So, when she went home and was drafted the Army made her an instructor in the civil engineers. Teaching Israelis how to drive heavy equipment and personnel carriers. No matter where you are the army remains the army.
Keren, being a smart kid, and personnel carriers not being items that wilt from simple fender benders (it helps to be made from armored steel and have no fenders to bend), was offered the opportunity to go to officers' training school. The first four months of the six months course was general training taken by hundreds of candidates, male and female. The last two months were training for specialized jobs, with the group divided into combat, support and non-combat jobs. The women still go to support and non-combat units.
Keren has been unhappy because, rather than the training position she thought she was heading toward, she was being trained to allocated troops and resources based on changing conditions in the field. This meant that if additional troops were needed to help move casualties, re-take a position, or set up roadblocks, Keren would be one of the people who selects the available soldiers and machinery and sends them in. This is a job that you can do perfectly but still know, every day, that another soldier may be killed or maimed. Also, you often get to do it in or close to area you would not want to drive through without your armored personnel carrier and a lot of guys with guns. Far better to decide who gets to train in "live fire" areas and who gets to drive the armored vehicle through the obstacle course. And do it on a Negev base well out of the line of fire.
Fortunately, her original base commander decided to get her back. She's not entirely certain what she will be doing but she won't be doing it in an unsafe place and won't be directly sending other young people into danger. All of her parents are relieved, though we know that this will mean that someone else's kid gets to step up and do a nasty job. This is the part of Israel that I admire the most and which definitely sucks the most.
Here's an example that is all too easy to pick out of the newspapers. During Hanukah, Israeli intelligence received a number of warnings about suicide bombing attempts. A prime target would have been the many public children's parties in places like Tel Aviv. Ori Binamo, a 21 year-old lieutenant, was ordered to take his squad and set up a surprise checkpoint inside the security fence but on the road to Israeli cities. Ori stopped a taxicab with Palestinian plates. Three passengers, strangers to one another, were sharing a ride. One passenger was about 18 or 19 and looked very nervous. Ori asked the kid to step out and pull up his shirt. The kid stepped out and detonated the bomb belt, murdering Ori, the cab driver and another passenger. Had someone not sent Ori to that spot, had Ori not done his job, the homicide bomber could have made it into Tel Aviv. The heavier-than-usual bomb and all the nails taped around it would have had an even more devastating effect if detonated inside a crowded room. Keren did not know Ori but Maurizio thinks she knows his girlfriend.
In the US, young people go into the Army and sort of disappear for long periods, especially if they get assigned overseas. In Israel everyone and everything is always close to home. The good news is you get to see your child at least once a month. The bad news is that's because the "front" is also your front yard.
A few days ago, on the train from Haifa to Tel Aviv (a beautiful ride on new equipment - Israelis have discovered how to commute by train - I'm not certain if this is a good or a bad thing though anything that keeps them out of cars is probably a good idea - soldiers in uniform ride for free), we sat across from a young woman with Sergeants' strips and an armor patch. Like one of my daughters (who shall remain nameless so I can go home and not have my throat slit), her acne has mostly but not entirely cleared up. In her breast pocket was a pink pen. She puts on her headphones and falls asleep. Probably on her way back to her base or post after a weekend at home.
The British built Latrun during the 1930s following Arab riots. It sits on a hill over the main route between Jerusalem and the sea. There was a time not so long ago when holding Latrun meant you could choke off Jerusalem's supply line from the west. After the UN partition, the British handled the place over to the Arabs who used it for that very purpose. The Israelis tried to take the fortress as part of their efforts to lift the siege of Jerusalem but, after suffering terrible casualties, failed and instead broke the seige by building the "Burma Road" to bypass the fortress.In 1967, the IDF took Latrun and the hills and vallies around it. Suffice it to say that no one thinks any of this is ever going back to the Arabs.
The fortress is now at the center of a memorial and museum to armored warfare. Surrounding the fortress (the walls of which still show holes and craters from artillery and rifle fire) are dozens of tanks, mobile artillery pieces and other mechanized war machines. The picture on the left shows Maurizio in front of a 160 mm mortar. He rode one these into Beirut in 1982. That's me on the right in front of a tank converted into a mobile bridge. Sharon used these to cross the Suez Canal in 1973 where he proceeded to disrupt the Egyptian supply lines and, crossing back, surrounded half the Egyptian army, forcing them to give up and go home. There are also tanks that are currently in use. These have low, sleek profiles and are packed with electronics giving them the ability to hide behind a hill and still hit a target on the other side of the hill. The collection also includes numerous examples of armor captured over the years. Which is how the Israelis have a German, WW II model anti-tank gun given up by Syrians who got it from the Russians who captured it from the Germans. Plus a number of other Russian, British and American built tanks used for and against the country. If you have an interest in serious military hardware, this place is a must-see and is easy to get to as you travel between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.The final picture is Keren with her American parents.
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