israeli politics

Mishnah 4:24  שְׁמוּאֵל הַקָּטָן אוֹמֵר, בִּנְפֹל אוֹיִבְךָ אַל תִּשְׂמָח וּבִכָּשְׁלוֹ אַל יָגֵל לִבֶּךָ, פֶּן יִרְאֶה ה’ וְרַע בְּעֵינָיו וְהֵשִׁיב מֵעָלָיו אַפּוֹ:  (proverbsP 24:17)

Mishnah 4:24. [19].  Shmuel Hakatan said:  “If your enemy falls, do not be happy; if he trips, let your heart not rejoice, lest God see it and be displeased, and avert his wrath from him.”

i can’t help it – i’m happy, Somehow it has been incredibly important to me to leave this world in a better place than when i found it. and i found it when my family was still being bombed by Hitler, and my parents were searching to see if anyone had remained. I didn’t think that was going to happen in the past few years, even though Trump was making some incredible gestures for Israel. But he was doing it at the cost of the suffering of the Palestinians, and I couldn’t believe anything positive can be done for us at the cost of them. Somehow I believe Biden and Harris will try to make it good for both people.

i sincerely hope that the loser finds a way to be comforted, and concedes with honor and respect for the people he served for four years.

november 8, 2020 – Enjoying the victory Read Post »

israeli politics

 

1930-2020 

he thought about his death for many years

His last years were unbearable.  No one should have to fade away as he did, with such bitterness and sadness.  

years and years ago i translated some poems of his.  I got the idea before he agreed to participate in a conference on creative writing that I had organized at Tel Aviv University.  And I presented him with the poems as I drove him to the conference.  Then, when i introduced him to the audience seated in the auditorium, he motioned with his head that he didn’t want to get up and speak, and I was left to waffle something on the stage.  I never published the poems, and now I don’t know where they are.  All i have is this:

 

 

Natan Zach:

It is not good for man to be alone,

but in any case he’s alone.

he waits but he is alone

and he delays and he’s alone

and he alone knows that even if he delays,

it will surely ensue

 

I always hear this song and I feel I am a guy who knows he’s got to leave this woman, but he keeps putting it off.  It is sung by Yudit Ravitz and so soulfully that I don’t always listen to the words.  But when I do, I think of the woman he’s leaving, and how she probably has no idea of his inner struggle, and maybe she’ll jump off the roof when he leaves.

november 6, 2020 – Natan zach, r.i.p. Read Post »

israeli politics,

it’s pretty clear at this moment that Joe Biden has won the election. I should be happy – i have been repulsed by Donald for well over four years. i don’t even trust the peace deals he made with our Arab neighbors – despite the fact that peace is warmly welcomed when and wherever it comes. I suspect dirty deals behind every enterprise in which Trump is involved. I think it is pathetic that he was ever elected.

Nevertheless I can’t rejoice in the fact that so much damage has to be undone, that so many people have died needlessly, that we have such a long way to go to bring all the people together again so that we can make peace, beat this virus, and repair the economy of the world. I’m sorry that some of my friends are angry with me because they believe i didn’t vote for what they think is good for Israel, but what I believe is good for the US. I really think that my right to vote in the US demands my considerations first on what is right for America. Enough. i don’t think i have a right to talk this much about the elections in the US.

november 6, 2020 – rejoicing in elections Read Post »

israeli politics

My late father-in-law Bandi always talked about his father with great love, and he always aroused my curiousity.  “You have no idea how great he was,” he told me all the time.  But he never gave me any details.  But one day, long after Bandi had died, I was standing in Jaffa Port, and looking at an old wooden boat.  i asked the two Arab men sitting next to the boat why this boat is displayed on the shore, and the older one said, “My grandfather built this boat.”  He was so proud and i was impressed.  And then I heard Ezi just behind me saying, “My grandfather built this hangar.”  It was the first I’d heard of it, but soon after I began to discover dozens of monuments Arpad Gut (Api) had built – the water towers in Tel Aviv and Jaffa, the dome of the big synagogue on Allenby, the famed historical Casino, the Nesher factory near Nahariya…We went to Hungary with the kids and stayed in the Gellert Hotel, where Api had built the famed dome over the spa, other hotels, department stores, many other places.  In Siofok there is a gorgeous water tower that he built. Then there was the famous bridge in Raqqa during World War II, about which i wrote a series of poems.  The list went on and on.  I thought we had found everything. 

Yesterday I was translating a poem and there was a reference to the prophecy of Ezekiel.  Ezi decided to look it up in English and took the Bible from the shelf above my computer, with the words “Api’s Bible” on the cover,

When he had finished comparing the English with the original, he turned to the frontspiece and saw that it was stamped with the name of a bookshop in Aleppo.  How had Api come to buy a book in Aleppo?

Ezi looked again and noticed that the first two pages seemed stuck together – and there it was – a dedication in Hungarian, with a translation into English glued into the opposite page.

while Ezi read the dedication I recognized the dot matrix printer of Bandi that we had worked on together.  But it was the dedication that stunned us both – a love letter by Api to his wife, explaining that he was busy building an Aerodrome in Aleppo.  It was June, 1941.  What was he doing there? then?  

but that’s for another day.  

it’s time to return to biting my fingernails over the election.

 

november 5, 2020 – Arpad gut Read Post »

israeli politics

if you think we can rest while the US is glued to their screens waiting to see who the next president will be, you’re wrong.  i don’t know anyone who slept well last night.  and i am already half in mourning.

yesterday an old friend from Britain called me about something else and at the end of the conversation asked me, “Did you vote?”  I did.  That’s when he began to remind me of how pale and uninteresting one of the candidates is and how i couldn’t have voted for him.  Not only did I vote for him, but i’ve been waiting for four years to vote.  Tired, yes.  questionable – i don’t think so.  but i’m used to mourning the lost morality of the world and the loss of hope.  After all, this is the month Kennedy was killed.  this is the month Rabin was murdered…

november 4, 2020 – elections Read Post »

poetry,

ONE STORM

 

The rain excites me

—drought of the passing months,

earth cracking like aging skin,

fires breaking out from within the earth

or the kindled hearts of arsonists,

trickles meandering through the vadis

that were once rivers, Sea of Galilee receding

as if it given up its dialogue with the shores—

 

One storm and my heart swells with hope

as if I’d been born

yesterday

november 4, 2020 – first rain – hayoreh Read Post »

blog, ,

nah. i’ve been corssing my fingers to keep from biting my nails. but whatever happens there is no way we will go back to facts and truth. my entire education was spent in building knowledge on knowledge, working from solid ground, etc. and now i am not even sure of the ground on which i stand. nobody has slept tonight. not only because of who wins but what will emerge from the reaction of the people.

i’m going to the beach

november 4, 2020 – will we go back to believing in truth? Read Post »

poetry

when things get really bad, think about worse things, i sometimes say.  and the worst song i have ever heard is Papirossen (cigarettes).  So to comfort myself i translated it today from the Yiddish.  It was written by Herman Yablokoff  about a child selling cigarettes on the street around the time of World War I.  Here is the draft:

A foggy cold night
With windows everywhere.

A sad little boy stands
looking all around.
Only a wall protects him

From the pouring rain
He holds a tray in his hand
And his eyes strike every one dumb.

“I have no strength left
to walk around in the street.
Hungry and ragged,
wet from the rain

I drag myself around from dawn,
Nobody helps me earn a thing
Everyone laughs, they mock me.

Come buy, come buy cigarettes

Dry, not wet with rain.

Come buy, cheap, authentic.

Buy and have some mercy on me.
Save me from burning starvation.

Buy some ancient matches
With it you will restore an orphan.
My calls and my running are in vain

From me no one wants to buy

Like a dog I will have to die.

Once I had a sister
A child of nature.

She dragged alongside me
for an entire year.

It was much easier with her around

The hunger was more tolerable
When I would look at her.

Suddenly she became

Weak and very ill

She died in my arms

On a street bench.
And I lost her,
I have been through everything

Let death too come to me already.

Come buy, come buy cigarettes

Dry, not wet with rain.

Come buy, cheap, authentic.

Buy and have some mercy upon me.
Save me from burning starvation.

Buy some ancient matches
With it you will restore an orphan.

 

november 3, 2020 – the saddest song: Papirossen Read Post »