israeli politics

mirror - 4.9.26

Have I aged in this month?  I see myself in the mirror every day and it’s always a bit of a disappointment, but I don’t see daily wear and tear.  We’ve been meeting with old friends and there is always something different to notice, but not usually age.  But today I decided to watch the news carefully and see whether the commentators have been affected physically by the strain of war.  Here are my conclusions:  the women have been fixed up or replaced, unless they are well known experts in their field.  Expert women take care that their plastic surgery is very gentle.  The men, however, have acquired innumerable worry lines in their face – worry lines that will not be erased.

There are other signs of an altered society – the fact that my car was smashed up by a careless driver is a detail multiplied thousands of times. That only today, after ten days, has someone looked at the car to see whether it can be repaired, and that only once the damage is determined can I be provided with a substitute car (because all the insurance adjusters are busy evaluating damage from the cluster rockets), are signs of the times.

But what the hell – now that there’s a break in the fighting (in central Israel at least) – we have all been behaving like dogs who are let off their leash in the park.  

And now I’m going to put on make up so nobody sees all the wrinkles… 

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israeli politics

discovery -4.8.26

first off I’m not going to talk about the mess we’re in and how we have to work out a completely different scenario.  

Let me tell you about today.  of course we were still up for the ceasefire and even though we weren’t mentioned in it we knew it would change our lives.  

But we couldn’t do anything – there was nothing to do.  And we decided to give up – and revel in our helplesness.  We took our first bath, walked around with no shoes,  took a nap, went walking along the beach (along with half the city), took another nap and discovered that we’ve been missing far too much sleep.

I didn’t turn the news off fast enough and heard we’re bombing Hizballah like crazy. 

For years I have been writing about people in Lebanon, helpless like we are now, and now my feelings for them surged.  But then my numerous friends  up north who have gone without sleep, without work, without school, without bathing.. for months… reminded me.  

How terrible to turn off the news and not think, but how wonderful not to think for one whole day.

 

discovery – 4.8.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

life - 4.8.26

we were still awake when the cease-fire was supposed to take effect. 3 a.m. There were alarms, some cluster bombs and it was possible we would have a pause.  Then we slept – deeply.  I dreamt that people who were long dead were still alive and rejoicing with me in an elegant bar.  I kept forgetting where I left my purse and didn’t care.

Is it possible our neighbors will begin to accept our existence and we can stop fighting?  Is it possible for all of us to recover from this horrific loss of life, of culture, of civilization?  I believe in Iran’s culture and our ability to rise above hatred and fear. I believe that the desire for life is more powerful than the desire for death.

 

life – 4.8.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

wha happened? 4.7.26

I was expecting such a barrage of rockets tonight about the time we were planning to celebrate the evening of the holiday.  We even moved the holiday meal back to the afternoon so no one would get caught in the booms.  But up to now it has not been much different from any other day.  Hizballah has been pounding the north, but Tel Aviv has had some close calls and some houses damaged but it isn’t as wild as I thought.  Is it possible that Iran wants to talk cease fire?  

I can’t imagine how wonderful even a cease fire would be for war-torn countries.  For me too.  Even though the post-trauma will not be easy in any way.

I’m still overwhelmed by the fact that we only had two sirens so far and its already late in the evening.

 

 

wha happened? 4.7.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

There must be something else to talk about 4.6.26

There must be something to talk about besides the war.  But everything in my existence is related to the war.  Today I said I’d try to go normal and finish the chapter on Holland I’m writing about in the biography of Kurt Gerron.  But we were woken up at 6:30 by a rocket attack and I had fallen asleep late trying to figure out why no one has been talking about the cluster bombs that are getting more and more effective and are absolutely illegal warfare on citizens.  so i couldn’t get my mind around Gerron.  

Then I went to get my hair cut.  Well, Ezi had to drive me because my car is in the garage and his car is a Tesla that my heart won’t let me drive.  And while Amir was cutting my hair, the siren went off.  Amir, remembering how I ran off to find a shelter the last time, held me down and finished my hair and Amir took me to the shelter.  Turned out Ezi had come to pick me up and found another shelter.  So we met after the rockets and went home.  

That’s when the cluster bomb rockets started coming in succession.  We made it to the shelter at home and as usual were met with our neighbors who all claim to know whatever is happening next with the war.  And I was so depressed I couldn’t cheer myself up with the rounding up of the Jews in Amsterdam and Gerron’s positive attitude.  So now I’m going to try to go through the Dutch newspapers again and try to focus.

You can see the situation is really bad when the Holocaust cheers me up.

 

There must be something else to talk about 4.6.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

three against one - 4.4.26

Its pretty clear that we’ve got 3 against one right now.  Israeli citizens are getting bombed all the time by three coordinated peoples.  The Hizballah and Houthis have coordinateed their rockets with Iran – and now none of them are letting me sleep.   

But where are the rockets coming from?  Last year at this time we were saying that Hizballah has been considerably weakened – and now we’re saying they have thens of thousands of rockets.My guess is that they’re coming to Lebanon through Syria, and that the new Syrian government is helping out.

The real victims of course are the people in the north – Jews, Druze, Arab…  They can barely breathe between rockets.

 

 

 

 

three against one – 4.4.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

losing friends- 4.2.26

sometimes I lose patience with people who think they know everything about this war – whose fault it is, what’s going to happen, which leaders should be erased, etc.  that’s when my weird sense of humor kicks in and I start defending even known villains and madmen.  And the phone goes silent or the email breaks off.  that means it isn’t worth even arguing with me and they have to find some excuse to get off.  what I’m intending is to open up the possibilities, and maybe hint that we don’t have all the information to decide exactly what should be done.  One thing is certain – we have to constantly examine our reasoning and the sources of our information. 

 

losing friends- 4.2.26 Read Post »

israeli politics

The morning after - 4.2.26

It started off crazy.  our inlaws had to cancel because the rockets were so intense.  (the gefilte fish cancelled as well) We were down in the shelter most of the time.

And then the seder began, and we read about the significance of freedom, and all was quiet.  But when it was time for the afikomen we were down in the shelter again, reminded of the fact that we were not free people but targets.    

The morning after – 4.2.26 Read Post »