israeli politics

richard III?

“And therefore, — since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days, —
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.”

Is this our leader?  he doesnt talk to me.  he doesnt talk to anyone.  except foreign reporters.  And you think – here he’s planning an operation where at least 1000 boys will be killed – and he didn’t even ask us, didn’t even ask the mothers who are about to send their kids to war.  Is he a lover or a villain?  He’s certainly not a Samson, sacrificing himself to kill his enemy.  We tried revolting by not going to the army, but then when Gaza started massacreing and violating  … we came back in droves.

richard III? – 8.8.25 Read Post »

israeli politics

helplessness - 8.7.25

Everyone I speak with agrees with me.  The primary reaction to the failure of all our efforts to influence the actions of our government, of our enemies, of the environment, the heat – is helplessness.  All we can do is cultivate our gardens.  

One of the reasons I first fell in love with Israel was the sense that every individual can make a difference here.  When I was visiting as a student, I hitchhiked a lot around the country and met many different kinds of people.  One man who picked me up was an Arab doctor whose daughter sat in the back.  I don’t remember the entire conversation or even what he looked like, but I remember that he warned me that I couldn’t control every situation.  It was a warning about hitching rides and also my sense that this was a country much more complex than my sense of freedom and control warranted.

 

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israeli politics

heart clinic - 8.6.25

A European friend sent us a video of Gideon Levi talking about how Israelis think themselves superior to Arabs, and I sputtered to myself something about how all the pharmacists and at least a quarter of the doctors are Arabs, but I didn’t write her.  I didn’t write her about the physiotherapist who got me walking the day after my surgeries and encouraged me to the point that within months I was back to normal.  I didn’t write her about the tiny experience I had yesterday in the heart clinic with the turbaned secretary who seemed like a very typical haredit, but who laughed at my jokes.  Then a hijabed woman in a long dress with long sleeves entered the room and began talking to the secretary through the reception window. 

I waited for a scene. 

But after a few humorous pleasantries the Arab woman went into the secretary’s room and began using the phone.  “I’m calling from the heart clinic – you missed your appointment with me this afternoon, Mrs. Cohen, and I want to make sure all is okay with you.”

 

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israeli politics

Partisans -8.5.25

I took a break from translations of poems of the holocaust, and the book I’m trying to finish on Kurt Gerron to try to figure out how my new mini-tablet works.  I uploaded my kindle and lo and behold a book I had never read appeared – The Jewish Partisans of Belarus by Zeev Barmatz – that was published in 2012.  I must have downloaded it years ago but my book club reads only novels, and a lot of them, so this little document got lost in all the trash we talk about and appeared just as I was trying to escape the issue. 

And there were all the stories I’d heard about my aunt.   

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israeli politics

social contract - 8.4.25

Watching the knesset today, busy with getting rid of amazing leaders of our country while the hostages starve, I couldn’t help thinking of the first time I learned academically about Democracy.  My teacher for two years was a Quaker named Phillip Schuyler Benjamin.  I forgot which numerals followed his name, but I remember every philosopher and historian we read, and I clung to every concept.  The meaning of democracy was brought to us gradually, from Hobbes to Locke to deToqueville to Thoreau, and I distilled the idea that government exists to improve our lives, all of our lives.  I learned that the majority gets to choose who are in office, but their function is to follow a system by which all citizens are protected to live their lives as they wish as long as they do not impose their will on others.  

As I watched the knesset fanatics I kept thinking about the gentle Mr. Benjamin and one story he told about a Quaker meeting he attended where no one spoke – for hours.  Suddenly one man got up and said,  “Two skeletons were in the closet for centuries.  Suddenly, one turned to the other and said, ‘You know, if we had any guts we’d get out of here.'”

 

social contract – 8.4.25 Read Post »

israeli politics

By the rivers of babylon - 8.3.25

I’d forgotten that Boney M pointed out our history – 

Bombarded by fake news, we tend to forget basic truths.

Still, I wish that tomorrow our parliament would not be discussing tightening the security of the prime minister instead of getting the hostages out.  The reason the prime minister needs tighter security ….

 

by the rivers of babylon -8. Read Post »