israeli politics

Here’s the only news I care about at the moment – Ezi is still testing positive (despite the paxlovid) and by my calculations there is no way we can get home before Monday.  And that’s an optimistic estimate. 

Fortunately, for the first week we had a friend pushing food on us, and I slowly learned about local deliveries.  Now my cousin arranged food deliveries for sick people – glatt kosher.  

And it really is nice to isolate from the world and do nothing if that’s all we need to get better.

But now I am beginning to understand why Jews are lowering their profiles… maybe I’ll expand on that sometime soon.

 

 

 

 

 

may 17, 2022 – positive is negative Read Post »

israeli politics

Because these days are the anniversaries of numerous massacres in towns in Lithuania and Belarus, i spent too much time on zoom today and have passed on one of my favorite towns, Zhedtl.  My aunt, who lived in Zhedtl but joined the partisans when she escaped the camp where the Nazis imprisoned the Jewish inhabitants, was killed in the forests.  I have long tried to find someone who knew her, or could identify her, but she faded into anonymity and that hurts me as much as her loss.  

So I went to the memorial for Lida, where I know there is no one who remembers my family and everyone wants to tell about their own family.  And at the end, this guy comes on who acquired a bunch of files of photographs, lists, and a variety of information that would be very basic to tracing all of our families. He didn’t know where to place these files – and has been sitting on them for 5 years.  I was left speechless.

 

 

may 16, 2022 – memorials Read Post »

israeli politics

you keep asking me about the journalist – and i don’t know anything much from here.  but here are some guidelines.

  1. why were there Israeli soldiers in Jenin if we aren’t there?  They were going after a terrorist or two.
  2. why did they need to go into a place controlled by the palestine Authorities? Because they Palestinians have been enabling terrorists from Jenin throughout the past years.
  3. whose guns killed the journalist?  Both sides have the same guns.  Israel doesn’t have access to the bullet so they can’t tell, but Israeli army bullets are clearly marked.  So if we got the bullets we’d know.
  4. why did we interfere with the funeral? We’re frustrated and play into their hands.  idiots.  

may 15, 2022 – The Journalist Read Post »

israeli politics

It took almost all day to get the answer, but as expected, I’m negative.  To get the answer in writing, however, I need to go back there and fill out another set of forms.  Ezi too, needs more tests and more forms and more doctors.  and now we don’t have a reservation because who knows when we’ll be able to get back.  

kvetch kvetch kvetch.  i still have a pile of work to do and this isolation is a great opportunity.

 

 

May 14, 2022 – covid conundrum Read Post »

israeli politics

Ezi tested positive today.  I’ve been testing all week because I was coughing and sneezing and kvetching just a little more than usual.  But yesterday Ezi started feeling lousy, slept more than usual, and listened a little less to my kvetches.  So I demanded proof of his health, and was shocked that he was actually more ill than me.  

So surprised that it took me a little while to figure out who to ask for help.  An old friend sent a car for us to go to NY Presbyterian where he had long ago matched Ezi up with a hemotologist.  

That was fun – a tiny emergency ward with pleasant and efficient staff.  Ezi got medication – paxovid –  I got tested, and we’re experiencing New York to the fullest.

So far so good.  

 

may 14, 2022 – testing positive Read Post »

israeli politics

I have to admit that I wrote a whole long retraction of my last post just now – and I erased it by fooling with it too much.  I can’t remember the complications of my argument about how modern art is reinventing what art is .  Let me just add that politics is important in contemporary art but we’ve got to be careful not to confuse the two.  Just because something is forceful and well made doesn’t mean it’s true.

may 13, 2022 – grandma Read Post »

israeli politics

I know I try to write about Tel Aviv as much as possible, but now we’ve been in the US for weeks, enjoying some of our relatives – sadly postponing others, uncertain whether to contact friends, uncomfortable about going to plays or concerts, not well enough to go to my high school reunion, just barely strong enough to drag ourselves to museums, and enjoying almost every minute of it.  

Normally I try to do readings and interact with others – friends and poets – as much as possible.  And it would have been really nice to do that.  But we have pretty much isolated ourselves and are interacting with portraits, multi-media and sketches.  I mean the noble introverted expressions of Hans Holbein’s subjects, the vital red of Matisse, the effective inclusive politics of  Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme’s complex project May amnesia never kiss us on the mouth. 

What I see in the museums is what I see on the streets, in the news, with my friends, and inside of me:  a total confusion of ethics, aesthetics, guilt, and pretension.  If we can only acknowledge this confusion, we may be able to get beyond it to a new morality and more useful and pleasing standards.  

may 12, 2022 – museums Read Post »

israeli politics

something so obvious.   Usually I brush off accusations of colonialism against Zionist – it seems too ridiculous to me to argue about.  But when some of my family and friends in the states bring this up – I find it impossible to ignore.  There are some people who are indiginous to this part of the middle east – we see it every day even in the ground under our feet.  The israelites were here thousands of years ago.  That’s a fact.  So were other peoples.  But as Abraham told his nephew – there’s room enough for all of us.

may 12, 2022 – colonialism Read Post »