October 2024 — Page 4 of 6 — Karen Alkalay Gut קרן אלקלעי גוט

Silly Comedy/Drone tragedy – 13.10.24

The theater is next to the camp of the hostage families. How wierd to go there to see a silly comedy. And yet we went tonight – especially because it was Rivka Michaeli and she deserved every minute of the extensive standing ovation she got for starring in a full length play at 86.

And then we came out and the radio announced 67 wounded and four killed by a drone.

The rest of the evening was spent looking for details.

Silly Comedy, Drone Tragedy-13.10.24 Read Post »

israeli politics

bombs over herzlia - yom kippur

Usually we have no news on Yom Kippur – all media is off and the country is silent except for the children riding the streets on their bicycles, and the people chatting after prayers.

We usually sit in our friends’ garden after prayers, but this time low flying planes zooming in the sky and a distant siren sent us to the shelter.

From friends we learned that 2 low flying rockets entered our air space around 10 p.m. and hit an old age home. If I’m not mistaken the home housed a few of my friends, but apparently no one was hurt.

Then I turned on the tv to the foreign news channels and learned that Israel had injured 4 UN peacekeepers in Lebanon. It was clearly a mistake because there would be no advantage to hitting UN staff since they do absolutely nothing – certainly nothing to keep peace. Why should we bother?

I thought this item was signficant enough to break the silence of Yom Kippur.

bombs over herzlia – yom kippur Read Post »

israeli politics

hatima tova -11.10.24

This is a good day to reconsider everything in our power to change. I know change is possible. I have seen people whose lives were turned around completely – not only those whose lives were destroyed when this war began. I have also seen people whose lives were created, whose values have appeared, whose hearts have grown. When I compare the demonstrators in the U.S. colleges to the volunteers in all the recovery organizations here, I am overwhelmed by the difference. And these people were only two years ago doing as much as possible to avoid interaction with society. Now it’s all about helping, donating, joining.

So I’m thinking about what to change in my life.

hatima tova – 11.10.24 Read Post »

israeli politics

another batch of poems - 10.10.24

I think it was last month that I responded to Benny Ziffer’s request and sent him some poems in Hebrew for Ha’aretz. I’m not as comfortable in Hebrew as English and when I didn’t hear from him I assumed they were a little too risque or too primitive for him. He didn’t answer but today I got some letters of congratulations – the poems appeared yesterday.

https://www.haaretz.co.il/literature/tarbut-sifrot/2024-10-08/ty-article/.premium/00000192-6ca5-dcf6-abd2-6ff7486c0000

Unfortunately, however, the link only opens to subscribers, so they also appear here.

שירים ב”הארץ” 8.10.2024

If you have a subscription, please like them there. If you don’t, let me know.

another batch of poems – 10.10.24 Read Post »

israeli politics

lies - 10.9.24

I love to make up stories, telling a joke in the first person as if i myself had experienced it, exaggerating about an accident that almost happened to me, complaining about a bank error that almost….

But I am very careful to separate truth from my imagination. This is why I fact check every article I write against original sources, and although i may make a mistake here and there, I do my best to avoid it.

One of the reasons I don’t reread the entries on this journal is because I’m afraid I’ll pretty them up. After all, what I’ve promised here is impressions of my life in Tel Aviv, not a newspaper. So I don’t ‘cover’ stories, and I don’t always know the truth.

And I’m really good at recognizing lies. And I don’t believe Bibi, Ben Gvir, Smotrich, Miri Regev, any Hamas official or representative from UNRWA there. I do believe the Gazan people most of the time, as well as the Lebanese and I used to believe Nasrallah until about a decade ago. I believe Biden and I tend to believe Kamala. This doesn’t mean I like any of them.

This was just to let you know where I stand and you can decide how much you can trust me.

Oh yes, and sometimes lies can tell a deeper truth if you can figure out where they came from.

lie Read Post »

israeli politics

haifa - 8.10.24

My plan today was to run errands all morning, to make up for the stuff I missed doing yesterday when we had those rockets from Yemen and Lebanon. Normally I think I take the rockets in stride, keep my head down and don’t let it get into my heart or humor. But I found myself watching the tremendous rocket barrages on tv today – the damages to property are incredible. And when you think of a child in a war with a rocket as big as a truck, it is really terrifying.

This is of course true of Lebanon and Gaza as well as Israel, but the rockets here are closer to me – I know those neighborhoods. I know those people.

haifa Read Post »

israeli politics

Oct 7

The greatness of a nation may be determined by its ability to contain opposites and paradoxes. antithetical emotions, values, actions. Today, as the greatness of the monstrousity and the greatness of the loss becomes apparent to us, the amalgamation of this society is also visible.

I can write no more.

Oct 7 Read Post »

israeli politics

Oct 7

I often say I don’t write about Oct 7 because I don’t have the authority – that people who suffered on that day have much more that should be listened to. But today I found myself writing this on Facebook:

This day, October 7, we recall some of the horror stories from last year, terrible events that have left an indelible mark on civilization. So many of these horrible incidents could not have been comprehended while they were occuring, and their monstrous proportion still can not be seen in their entirety because the hostages are still missing. The entire civilized world needs to come together to end this terrible chapter of history.

Oct 7 Read Post »