rocking jaffa

2007-05-26T14:46:00.000+03:00

A foray into photo-journalism

Images of buildings in A’jame, the juxtaposition of old and new, for an article that I’m writing about housing and gentrification in Jaffa.

2007-04-25T10:53:00.000+03:00

Jaffa rocked and rocking back

“Residents of Jaffa in danger of eviction/ our houses in danger"

“1948. 2005. and today.”

For over a year and a half, Jaffa, “the bride of the sea,” has been my home. For the first ten months, my life was entwined with the city; working at Sadaka Reut, a nation-wide Arab-Jewish youth organization which strives to be highly involved in local Jaffa community projects and teaching English at al-Rabita: the League for the Arabs of Jaffa. Since my Shatil fellowship ended, my main source of income has come from a part-time job in Jerusalem, I’ve interned in Tel Aviv, worked freelance from my home and spent a month in Morocco. Yet, I’ve tried to stay involved in the Sadaka Reut community, and follow the local Jaffa news because I like the people, it’s important to me to live in a mixed Arab-Jewish city, the humus is superb and I can’t imagine living anywhere else in Israel.

My dad came to Israel to visit for Passover a few weeks ago (a couple days after my mom flew in). At the airport, security personnel asked him to explain the purpose of his visit, to which he answered, “visiting my daughter.” When asked where I live, he specified that I live in Jaffa, rather than Tel Aviv, in case they wanted the exact street address. Jaffa sufficed as a location, but the young woman remarked, “Jaffa…that’s controversial.”

Over the past few weeks, approximately 500 hundred eviction and demolition orders have been issued by the Israel Land administration and the Amidar housing company to families in Jaffa- mainly in the A’jame and Jabaliya neighborhoods, which are traditionally Arab and prime, beach-front property. These homes are technically illegal buildings, meaning they were built without permits, yet most have been standing for decades.

Several weeks ago I attended an early morning protest at the first home to be slated for demolition. It was an unattractive structure built of concrete and tin, standing amongst several more elegant homes and multiple construction sites, where luxury apartments overlooking the Mediterranean will soon stand. The protest itself was rendered unnecessary because concerned citizens raised the 2,000 shekels needed to file an objection, postponing the demolition and canceling the bulldozers, at least for now.

Most of the 500 families in danger of losing their homes share at least two common traits; they are poor and they are Arab. Additionally, most can probably trace their family ties to the city of Jaffa as far back as their ancestry goes.

On Friday, a large-scale demonstration took place to protest these eviction and demolition orders. Hundreds of Jaffo natives were joined by hundreds of others, including those of us who have chosen Jaffa as home for now, the Tel Aviv anarchists, the communists and others. The group paraded through the aforementioned neighborhoods growing in numbers along the way and chanting slogans; “Arabs and Jews against house demolitions,” calling for the mayor or Tel Aviv-Jaffa to resign and proclaiming “yafo l’yafowim” (Jaffa for Jaffa-ians).

While these eviction orders are new, the struggle is perennial. For decades, plots of the seaside neighborhoods have been eaten up by developers who build fancy apartments the former residents probably could not afford. And the poster for the demonstration makes reference to 1948, when the Arab population of the city plummeted from 70,000 to less than 5,000.

Since gentrification may be inevitable, I can only hope that Jaffa will remain ethnically and socio-economically diverse, the poor’s right to housing will be respected and it will be a place I can be proud to have called home.

2007-02-25T17:25:00.000+02:00

the work visa revisited

As I’ve mentioned before, I went through a rather lengthy process of procuring a work visa in order to make my life easier. Not only did it give me legal permission to work in this country, it also provided me with a multiple-entry visa valid for an entire year. No more day trips to Jordan to renew visas, no more hassles at border crossings about bending the rules conveniently exiting and re-entering the country every three months, and best of all, no chance of being detained in Denmark again.

But what I forgot to take into account about the work visa was that in placing those 2 full-page stickers into my passport, I became a foreign worker (“you’re Philippino?” one friend asked). The difference between work visa and foreign worker is simple semantics. But being a foreign worker in this country carries weighty implications.

According to Kav La’Oved there are approximately 200,000 foreign workers in Israel and the territories (including Palestinians who work in Jewish settlements), and many of them are here illegally. They come from the Philippines, Thailand and Eastern Europe among other places. As non-Jews they are not eligible make aliyah/become citizens.

Daily, my life has not changed. In fact, I still haven’t received a paycheck in shekels, so I haven’t actually put the work visa to use. Entering the country, however, is a different story.

Upon my return from Morocco in January I was actually looking forward to passport control. With the year long visa already in my passport no snippy airport worked could give me grief about abusing tourist visas. After taking my passport and asking some standard, prerequisite questions- “where did you learn Hebrew?” and “where do you work? - she point to a small waiting room in the corner and said, “go wait there.”

At 5am, the airport was quiet and I stood alone in the corner until someone came out and without explanation returned my passport and allowed me to go on to baggage claim. No one would answer my questions.

When I returned from 10 days in the states this past Friday afternoon, Ben Gurion Airport was packed with tourists and Israelis coming in to the country. I braced myself as I got one of the crowded lines for foreign passports. Again, I was told to wait on the side. This time, the room was teeming with people, men and women, young and old. Without speaking to any of them, I began to imagine their stories: Palestinians, other foreign workers, travelers who had been to Syria or Lebanon. All undesirable (read: probably non-Jewish) whose entry will be impeded.

As an American I could be automatically entitled to the 3-month tourist visa, as a Jew I could become an Israeli citizen, and as a Hebrew speaker I am rarely seen as an outsider or a threat. My B-1 visa overrides all that, and gives me new perspective on what it’s like, although marginally, to be among the unwanted.

2007-02-04T11:22:00.000+02:00

Hebron: A city of two tales

In reality, Hebron is more than a city of two tales. It is a city of over a hundred thousand residents, over 4,000 years of history, the patriarchal tombs of Judaism and Islam, and innumerable tales. But last week I heard a couple accounts, on two different tours of the city. If nothing else, I came away understanding that Hebron (Hevron in Hebrew, Khalil in Arabic) is a complicated, tense, multifaceted, historical, religious, humanitarian, political mess.

Basic facts, both Mikhael of Shovrim Shtika (“Breaking the Silence” –Israeli soldiers talk about the occupied territories) and David, spokesman for the Jewish community of Hevron agreed on. Ten years ago, following the Oslo and Wye accords, Hebron was divided into 2 sectors; H1 to be under the control of the Palestinian Authority and H2 to be under the control of the Israeli government. Indisputable square mileage tells us that the PA received 80% of the city, with the remaining 20% designated to the Israeli government. This division only begins to tell the story.

David laments that the Jews, in reality, have access to only 3% of the city, while Mikhael points out the fact that at the time of this 80/20 partition, there were over 100,000 Palestinian residents of the city and approximately 600 Jews. Additionally, included within the Israeli-controlled 20% are notable landmarks such as the remains of the old city of Hebron, the central market of the modern city and Ma’arat HaMachpelah (Cave of the Patriarchs), where Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca and Leah are believed to be entombed.

When the city was partitioned in 1997 most estimate that 30,000 Palestinians (out of the total 120,000 in the city) were put under Israeli-control in the H2 sector of the city. Since then, life has become increasingly difficult and most who could afford to do so, left, mainly across the blockades into H1. Mikhael quotes a B'Tselem report that 43% have left, while David implies the number is higher and that only 3000-5000 remain.

The central souk (market), 1000 shops which once served the entire undivided city, has been closed by military order because of violence and tension between the Jewish and Palestinian communities. Several main roads in H2 are closed to Palestinian foot and vehicle traffic, even to those whose front doors open to the street, forcing residents to exit via rooftops or become virtual prisoners in their own homes. During the second Intifada, curfew was regularly imposed on Palestinians in the city, forbidding them to leave them homes. Mikhael reports this was the status quo for over 500 days in 2002 and 2003 alone.

The ratio of soldiers to Jewish settlers is 1:1, with additional police and border patrol stationed throughout the city. Both guides mention that today is the best situation Hebron has seen in the past 7 years; there is a smattering of open shops and relative calm in the city. But this is relative and the years have taken their toll, leaving H2 as a deserted ghost town, with rows of boarded-up stores and far more soldiers than civilians in sight.

No one disputes that 1929 was an, if not the, integral year in modern Hebronite history, when the mufti of Jerusalem incited Arab residents of the city to riot which resulted in the deaths of 67Jews and the end, more or less, of Jewish settlement in the city until after Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967.

Today’s Jewish community cites this earlier community (that existed pre-establishment of the state of Israel), in addition to the weighty religious significance of the city, as grounds legitimizing their presence in Hebron. This massacre weighs heavy on the minds of Jewish residents and graffiti covering the closed-up shops of H2 regularly reads “death to Arabs”, and “נְקָמָה” (nekama - revenge) making not-so-subtle references to the 1929 killings.

Mikhael cites a second definitive year in Hebron’s recent history, which David avoids discussing until directly questioned about: 1994, when Jewish resident Baruch Goldstein entered the mosque portion of the Cave of the Patriarchs and massacred 29 praying Muslims, wounding another 150.

David brought us into Beit Hadassah, a former hospital and the first building to be re-settled by the Jewish community in 1979, against the wishes of not only Palestinian Hebronites, but also, the Israeli government. Today this building houses a museum of Jewish history in Hebron and a memorial to those killed in 1929. He spoke to us about using democracy as a tool: with which all should be given some rights- healthcare, education- but Arabs should be denied the right to vote and serve in government. Interaction between Jews and Arabs in the city is almost nonexistent, he told me, and went on to cite several examples of Arab violence against the Jewish community. He doesn’t believe there can ever be true peace.

Mikhael took us in the home of Hisham and his family, Palestinians who have remained in their house in H2. Hisham spoke to us of the difficulties his family faces navigating forbidden roads. He showed us several videos; of local Jewish children taunting and throwing rocks at Palestinian children on their way home from school and of local Jewish adults breaking into Palestinian homes to heckle during curfew days. He attests that these are regular occurrences.

Ignorance, Mikhael believes, is the largest problem. The vast majority of the Israeli public doesn’t know the details of what goes on in Hebron. He wants to believe that raising awareness is the first step to understanding where to go from here.

2007-01-16T12:28:00.000+02:00

Kivu-Morocco trip makes it on to the Haaretz English website

A search for Jewish roots and Arab neighbors in Morocco

2007-01-02T21:54:00.000+02:00

over the river and through the woods

on sunday, rabat smelled like barbeque. i imagine the rest of the morocco did as well. i went up to the roof of my friend's apartment building to watch her neighbor, mbarak, and his family slaughter their sheep. from the rooftop, i counted over a dozen other sheep on neighboring buildings meeting, or waiting to meet, the same fate. the sidewalks throughout the city were adorned with drops and pools of blood. as soon as the lamb stopped kicking, mbarak's wife passed out cookies. festivities were underway.

another friend, who is in the peace corps, told me they arent allowed to travel during the week of 'eid al-kabir (the big feast, also known as 'eid al-adha, the feast of sacrifice). leading up to the big day i expected the roast, but couldnt quite see how commemorating abraham's near-sacrifice of his son ishmael could be cause for such a ban.

now i think i understand. 2 days before the 'eid, i tried to make my way back from spain to rabat. after a bus, ferry and taxi, my friend and i arrived at the tangier train station and found it mobbed like nothing we had ever seen. the hordes of moroccans anxious to sacrifice sheep with their loved ones were rushing the doors and picking up metal barricades. we decided we weren't ready to fight that hard for train tickets and we would hired a shared taxi, with our new friends moulay, a moroccan who lives in holland, and his dutch girlfriend, hannuka.

about 1.5 hours into our 3.5 hour trip, the engine made a funny noise and the cab started filling with smoke. we pulled over. although we were about 10 km from a town, the driver insisted that we could only trust his friend who would come from tangier to pick us up. despite our protests, he had the final say. and luckily we managed to crawl the car to a rest stop where we drank tea while we waited out the 2 hours. we eventually made it back to rabat where we even had a home-cooked meal waiting.

yesterday, i tried to beat the post-'eid rush and get down to ouarzazate while the rest of the country sat and digested. my 5 hour train ride to marrakech went pretty smoothly. but then i went against my friends advice and opted for a bus over a shared taxi (since i couldnt bare the thought of 7 people smushed into a mercedes for 5 hours). the bus, like most in morocco, looked to be from my grandparents generation and smelled of exhaust fumes.

although ive taken many moroccan buses before, the road from marrakech to ouarzazate makes me nervous as it contains some of the most windy and dangerous passes through the high atlas mts. the sun set, we reached the snowcaps and other than the fat moroccan in the seat next to me falling on sleep on me, things were ok. 3 hours in, the engine made a bad sound and smoke started pouring out of the bus' underbelly.

broken down for the 2nd time in 4 days, and this time in lesser-traveled snowy mountains, i was less than amused. and this time, i did not have a moroccan, or darija-proficient (moroccan arabic) american friend as a travel companion/translator. i didnt even have european with a name that still makes me crack a smile. we lit fires and waited.

eventually some vans showed up and some of us payed for new rides. i was almost ready to swear off ground transportation and look into splurging on a flight to casablanca. but i think i am going to brave it again with an overnight bus back to rabat tomorrow night.

2006-12-06T09:54:00.000+02:00

I promised myself I would write again before I went back to misrad hapnim

but I went yesterday. and in the middle of finishing all the paperwork to become a temporary resident, I asked the woman behind the desk why they don’t give work visas anymore.

“what do you mean we don’t give work visas?”
“well, I came in a month ago looking for a work visa, which I was told wasn’t an option. I could chose between aliyah and residency.”
“hang on one second.”

(she goes into the back room for several minutes.)

“it was just a short period of time that we stopped giving work visas. we give them now. you don’t want to become a resident?”
“no, not really.”
“well why didn’t you tell me??”

and 145 shekels later, I received a multiple-entry work visa good until December 2007.

my 14 or so months in Israel on a series of 5 3-month tourist visas was a pretty good run. and im actually about to leave for a month in morocco on december 12^th, which is over a week before my most recent 3-month would have visa expired. so I would have been good to go. and then good to come back in January when I could have acquired yet another tourist visa upon entry.

and since I don’t yet have a job that wants to pay me legally in shekels (my morocco gig offers under-the-table dollars), there was still no real substantive reason for me to do all this hoop jumping. but I haven’t given up hope.

i’m thinking with all the millions of dollars going into the benny sela (escaped serial rapist and israel’s most famous refugee) search (a massive search effort, which puts the osama bin laden hunt to shame), there could be work available at with the police force.

2006-11-05T17:24:00.000+02:00

song of temporary residency, part I

the day started off too good to be true. the security guards were the friendliest I’ve ever seen, the signs in the building were clearly marked and despite my skepticism, the phone call I made over a month ago asking about the procedure to apply for a work visa had in fact put my name on a list thereby assigning me an appointment.

and on the bus I had been given a youth bus pass, meaning 51 shekels for 20 rides instead of 41 sheks for a meager 10 trips, giving me a strong sense that today was my day to beat the system and take the Israeli bureaucracy down (never mind being mildly offended that the bus driver so definitively assumed me to be under 18 that he handed me the kids’ pass and change for my 100 shekel bill without even asking).

regardless, I arrived at misrad hapnim (the infamous ministry of interior) in good spirits, which rose even higher when I saw no trace of the horned, fire-breathing monsters which I had understood would be there to greet all those who had dared come in request of government aid. I found my way upstairs, followed the signs marked “visas” and located the guard armed with a clipboard and today’s list of appointments who confirmed that I was, indeed, marked down for 10:30am. but, since time is relative, he told me to instead wait until my number, 56, was called. it was 10am and the electronic ticker hanging from the ceiling read 31 in bold red lights. luckily, along with the jumble of documents in my bag, I had packed an old edition of The New Yorker magazine.

as I read about the prep school King Abdullah is building in Jordan, I noted that the demographic breakdown of the room was similar to that in the area around the central bus station; fitting, since most the foreign workers in tel aviv (philippino, thai, west african) live in that neighborhood. however, there also seemed to be a disproportioned number of russian speakers, probably a result of the fact that a good number of the russians in israel were considered jewish enough to get here, but not enough to receive full citizenship benefits.

the numbers ticked by slowly and a little before noon, it was my turn. i sat down and told the woman across the desk that I wanted a work visa. she calmly replied that as of 2 weeks ago, the ministry of interior no longer issues work visas. today’s options (for me as a jew) are aliyah or temporary residency status - good for one year and renewable for up to 3. so residency it is. but of course, this requires paperwork.

I filled out all the sheets she handed me, while she photocopied my passport and sponsor letters and pulled up background information on the computer (your mother last visited in august, yes?). i left the building empty handed and now I have to come back in a month with more documents (birth certificate, parent’s ketuba (marriage contract) and my 2^nd grade report card). so stay tuned as the saga continues.

2006-10-31T12:58:00.000+02:00

song of ascent

literally "to rise up," aliyah refers to the return of diaspora jews to the homeland, and in colloquial usage, implies taking Israeli citizenship. i've found that after living here on a series of 3-month tourist visas for over a year, pressure from israeli friends, relatives, jewish agency representatives and taxi drivers to "make aliyah" has dramatically increased.

why everyone is so eager for me to ascend in regards to my nationality status is a little baffling. I'll admit, there are some oft unseen advantages to travel post-aliyah (americans must purchase a $20 tourist visa to enter turkey, while israeli passport holders get in free), but in general, its not wise to wave an Israeli passport throughout most of this region.

so for those who are unaware of my broader mid-east travel dreams, aliyah does promise some substantial benefits including tax breaks and even cold, hard cash from the government. yes, if you are jewish, they will pay you to become a citizen.

but my citizenship is not something i am willing to take lightly and it seems that the more people ask me if i'm intending to make aliyah, the more adamantly i respond in the negative.

i have, however, accepted that spending another year on tourist visas (as much fun as it was to leave and re-enter the country every three months), is not the most viable option. and i have high hopes that my current internship at haaretz.com will soon blossom into a staff writer position and in this spirit of optimism, im proactively trying to get legal permission to be employed.

in this process of applying for a work visa, i've been met with responses of near-disgust, asking, "why dont you just make aliyah?" but i cant imagine that the bureaucratic process for citizenship is that much better than the maze of hoops one must jump through for the work visa. this coming sunday i will brave the wrath of misrad hapnim (ministry of the interior) for the first time in hopes of receiving a said visa. and i think i have my paper work in order; passport, passport photos, letter from an employer that wants to hire me, letter from a rabbi attesting to my jewishness, 140 shekels, a thank you note to ari lucas for posting a comment and 4 pairs of crocs in different colors.

2006-10-09T20:41:00.000+02:00

the joys of unemployed nomadism

almost two weeks back in israel and ive spent a lot of time fielding questions about what i am doing here/why i came back. these questions come from friends, family and people i meet, and from myself.

i have several answers and a skeleton of a plan, but I don’t really feel like sharing right now, baroor?

what I will say is that speaking of reasons for being in the middle east, im here in order to go to north africa. yes, apparently im going to morocco in december. after being told the program was already overstaffed and overloaded, i received a follow-up emailing two days later asking if i wish to return from casablanca to tel aviv on a day other than dec. 25th when the group takes off. i remain slightly skeptical, but if anyone wants to make tentative plans to travel in morocco december 25th to january 11th, yalla.

2006-08-15T17:03:00.000+03:00

back to the motherland

in solidarity with the refugees returning to their homes in southern lebanon and northern israel yesterday, i too returned to my place of birth after the delicately brokered ceasefire went into effect monday morning. while I’m planning on making my stay in the states temporary, i hope that they will be able to stay for good, in safety and peace.

2006-08-03T14:54:00.000+03:00

sounds in tel aviv-jaffa on erev tisha b’av:

-waiters sweeping and stacking chairs; secular cafes closing early against their will
-na na nachmanites chanting on the tayelet (beach promenade), trying to remind the tel aviv population to mourn the destruction of the first and second temples
-explosion of a suspicious object by the bomb squad in front of the david intercontinental hotel
-ace of base’s “all that she wants” blasting from an old white subaru, with four young men singing along at the top of their lungs

slogans from protest against the war outside the american embassy

(translated from hebrew and/or arabic)
yes, yes to peace; no, no to war
we wont kill or be killed in the service of the united states
in beirut and in the towns, children want to live
in gaza and in sderot, children want to live
jews and arabs refuse to be enemies

(in english)
1,2,3,4 we don’t want your fucking war

posters held at counter-protest across the street

(translated from hebrew)
children in the north want to sleep
mothers in the north want safety
nas-ra-llah, hiz-bla-bla

2006-07-30T11:10:00.000+03:00

“crazy to go north at a time like this”

24 hours after canceling the sadaka reut volunteer work camp, we decided we couldn’t end the year on such a depressing low note, so we invited the seminar participants to come back for the weekend and help us put on a revised “end of the year” event, which took place last saturday night.

the event was revised to give it a degree of relevancy and appropriateness given the backdrop of current events in the region. also due to current events, several musical acts dropped out on their own. some presented understandable reasons, such as individuals from the north who did not want to leave their homes, although I was infinitely disappointed to learn I would not get to hear mc ward’s oft imitated anthem, “ana arabe, arabe, arabe” (i am arab, arab, arab). other groups offered less credible excuses; an act from bat yam (the city touching jaffa’s southern border) reportedly remarked, “it was crazy to go north [to jaffa] at a time like this.” some of the more cynical crowd at the office speculated that perhaps they meant it was crazy to participate in an arab-jewish event at a time like this.

nonetheless, the event went on in the courtyard of the arab-hebrew theater in the old city of yafo drawing a respectable crowd, a number of bands, messages of peace/against the war.and performance art suitable to be a final project in one of the classes annie took at brown.

and despite the daily barrages of rockets landing across northern israel, all of my friends in yafo who hail from the north keep inviting me, completely seriously, to come home with them. some offer me the possibility to sit on the roof, smoke nargila and watch for falling katyushas. others promise that their part of the north actually exists within a impenetrable bubble.

for now im sticking south of haifa, mainly in yafo and tel aviv, where life, for the most, part goes on as usual. but you can sit on the beach and watch the near-constant flow of helicopters flying back and forth, lebanon to gaza, rafah to beirut.

2006-07-18T12:59:00.000+03:00

prepare for war: evacuate the bombshelter

all year I sort of treated our bombshelter-turned-office as a joke. it is kind of funny to think that the municipality rents out its shelters all over the city at economical rates. the last time the shelters were used was during the first gulf war, 15 years ago. and I personally never thought it would give us much protection considering how much it leaked during the winter rains.

there is a catch that comes with the cheap rent; a small clause that allows the municipality to give renting occupants of their bombshelters 4 hours notice to vacate if for any reason the city may need them. when the second gulf war didn’t warrant this action, I think most people thought it would never happen.

but now the katyushas are falling all over the north; hitting haifa, afula and other places people never expected, like palestinian population centers within israel. enough to make the threat of iranian-made rockets with 200 km range (sufficient to reach tel aviv) seem like a feasible threat. and enough for the municipality to give us that 4 hour warning early Sunday afternoon.

no time would have been a good time, but the notice probably couldn’t come at a worse time for us- four days into a five day activism seminar for 24 jewish and palestinian israeli teens from all of the country. and the day before the continuation of the seminar, a 5 day volunteer work camp which would bring another 30-40 teenagers and dozens of other volunteers to Jaffa to work on projects ranging from renovating schools to painting murals to running a local day camp for arab and jewish kids.

the news sent us into panic mode and we frantically called a staff meeting where we made the painful decision to cancel the camp we had been devoting all our time and energy to for the past 2 months and to send the seminar kids home on monday morning, a decision from which we are still reeling. we held two follow up staff meetings to rethink the decision (one which lasted until 3am) where tears, exhaustion, confused emotions and regret hung heavy around the circle.

clearly had we been in lebanon, where the death toll has surpassed 200, many of them civilians, or even in northern israel, the decision would have been simpler. but in tel aviv-yafo, life goes on as normal making the cancellation seem bizarre. last night we all went out for the beers and silliness that were supposed to happen next week. and after 8 hours of moving on sunday, our office sits empty, waiting to be used for something.

2006-07-05T00:48:00.000+03:00

definitely not beer pong, we’re talking ‘bout beirut

what will happen if I call lebanon? will the shin bet or the mossad come knock down my door? or will my name just go on a list somewhere and wait quietly until it ambushes me at the airport on my way out or back in? i think I’ve been reading too much sayed kashua and his paranoid tone has rubbed off.

is it better to call from a land line? or will it be ok from my cell phone? could I fool them all by calling from a pay phone? someone told me a story recently about problems caused by calling arab countries from cell phones. she called down to Sinai one evening to make a reservation at a beach-side hut, a ritual of many Israelis who engage in an annual reverse exodus. sinai, a region that may have been returned to egyptian governmental control, is still under some sort of israeli tourist occupation (that is, when they aren’t scared off by terrorism). but the morning after making this call, she went to make a regular, local call from her cell phone and got an automated message that her phone service had been suspended and she could not make out-going calls.

bewildered, she called the phone company, who informed her that unprecedented calls to arab countries are earmarked as potential stolen phones and service is automatically discontinued (we could discuss the racist implications of this at a later date). after providing the proper identification numbers, she was able to prove that her phone was not stolen, and her service was restored.

but that was egypt, now I’m talking about lebanon. lebanon, where there isn’t anything resembling a pretense of peace between the two governments. lebanon, a country you are not allowed to enter if your passport contains evidence of a visit to the zionist entity that doesnt really exist. and coming into israel with proof of time in lebanon will require answers to many questions beyond the traditional "where did you pack your suitcase?" and lebanon, where a segment of the border is inaptly named “the good fence.” if “good” means hatred and that the only people who think about crossing are hizballah and the israeli army, then sure.

so say I make the phone call, and no one knocks down my door, and my name doesn’t get put on the black list of those to hassle at the check-in counter, then what? then maybe I start asking the next round of questions beginning with, is the naked run rule in effect? i mean, what will happen if I go to beirut?

2006-06-30T19:47:00.000+03:00

no need for weather reports

we haven’t felt a drop of rain since april. the only things raining down have been qassams on one side and shells on the other.

i usually take the news in stride. its sort of necessary thanks to the dismal amount of positive news in the world these days, let alone in this troubled region i currently reside in. but reading the news the past few days has left me feeling pretty uneasy.

the low-grade war on the gaza-israel border has been escalating for some time now. barrages of homespun, qassam rockets fall daily on the Israeli town of sderot; nerve-racking and dangerous for the residents, but lacking accuracy they rarely cause damage or injury. in response, israel sends showers of “targeted” shellings (which often seem to be equally inaccurate) aimed at terrorist leaders and qassam launch sites in the gaza strip. but they have managed to kill several dozen palestinians civilians and destroy gaza’s only power plant, as well as hitting some (but not all) of the intended targets.

then came the attack on an army post just outside of the strip which left 2 israeli soldiers dead and one kidnapped somewhere in the depths of gaza’s slums and refugee camps. i’m impressed they’ve been able to keep him hidden in such a small place. i once stood on a small, small hill just east of gaza and was amazed at how easy it was to look over the entire territory and spot the sea. they call it a strip for a reason.

my apprehension was augmented after dozens of palestinian lawmakers and ministers from all major west bank cities and east jerusalem were arrested by israeli forces. future negotiations between current administrations (if they were ever going to happen in the first place) will be most likely be impeded by the fact that one government arrested the other en masse.

in light of all these activities, i agreed to join some friends from work at a demonstration against the IDF actions in gaza (which have not only killed civilians, but also cut off power, fuel and water to much of the strip). while the demonstration itself wasn’t much to mention, it certainly brought some interesting characters together. one man, with a grin so goofy I was convinced he had to be American, carried a sign stating, “aleeza olmert: you make coffee every morning for a war criminal.” numa, my roommate’s dog, made an appearance, making him probably the most politically active canine around. we also saw the israeli tanks amassed near the border and heard the sky shaking with explosions, just an hour drive from my house. although its still unsettling, back in yafo on a quiet friday evening, i feel almost worlds away and im back to wondering why it cant rain to break the humidity.

2006-06-12T16:46:00.000+03:00

Birthwrong

Co-authored by Annie and Hannah, freelance BDH columnists

Birthright Israel recently rescinded the admission of David Ben-Goldberg to the free 10-day program when they learned of his intent to extend his stay in Israel for the purpose of joining the Japanese Sumo Wrestler weeklong "Fellowship and Peace" tour.

Ben-Goldberg, a student at Brandeis University, was shocked and outraged to learn of his expulsion from the trip. The Jewish Studies and Japanese History major had been spending all of his evenings and weekends preparing for the excursion. He had recently achieved the status of yokozuna, the highest rank for a wrestler, at the Waltham Sumo Wrestling Institute.

Birthright first became suspicious of Ben-Goldberg's plans when he requested two seats and six extra-carb meals for his complimentary El-Al flight. Birthright representatives confirmed that his removal from the program was part of a broader policy to prevent participants from "exploiting the free plane ticket to further 'non-Jewish causes.'" International director of marketing for Birthright elaborated that, "it is not in our agenda to help people find programs that aim to strengthen the claims of other ethnic groups."

"I just wanted to see the other side. Another perspective," said Ben-Goldberg, who is unable to see his own toes due to his massive stomach. "Also, Sumo wrestlers have many things in common with Jews," he asserted. "For example, during the holidays, Haredi men eat approximately the same number of calories as Sumo wrestlers. Also, without wrestling, there would be no Jews. Jacob, our patriarch, wrestled with an angel. And that's how he became Israel. Wrestling is totally the new Zionism."

A defiant Ben-Goldberg continued, "And it's not like I'm that Brown student who went to Gaza or wherever because he heard they had the best hummus. Besides, if the sumos kidnapped me and took me back to their sadogatake (stable), it would be like a dream come true." Ben-Goldberg is now trying to raise money to join the Sumo mission on his own.

2006-05-19T15:32:00.000+03:00

Dear Malev Hungarian Airlines,

This past Monday, May 15th 2006, I was scheduled to fly at 8:20pm on flight MA753 from Copenhagen to Budapest, connecting to flight MA214 to Tel Aviv, where I had come from on May 10th. I just had enjoyed 5 lovely days in Copenhagen, as well as a pleasant 9 hours in your home country.

My journey from the Holyland began in Budapest where I was privileged to find possibly the only restaurant in all of Hungary that serves tofu and my traveling companions visited the world renowned, “Las Vegas Casino.” Your fine airline then brought us (the Holylanders- Israeli National Ultimate Frisbee Champions) to Wonderful Copenhagen (both the city and the ultimate frisbee tournament) where we took in the sites and beers of the city when we weren’t getting our asses whooped by stronger, taller, blonder, Nordic ultimate teams. I actually ditched the Israeli men’s team and found a German women’s team in need of extra players. Although they didn’t believe me that my mom and brother are blond, they took me in and taught me the word “punkte.”

If you thought things couldn’t get any better than this Malev, you thought wrong. Denmark happens to be home to Illums Bolighus, “a Mecca for people of all ages interested in designs,” aka shopping for the rich and famous. And while strolling down the Stroget in Copenhagen we ran into former US president Bill Clinton exiting the store, who shook my hand and waved to the throngs of Danes and tourists who gathered to watch him walk to his car.

After all the fun and excitement, we were tired and sunburned (it may have been colder, but we enjoyed daylight until nearly 10pm) and I was ready to go home. With my teammates, I arrived at the airport nearly 3 hours before our flight and went through check-in quickly, with no problems. We then had ample time to spend waiting in the “family area” of the airport, which was complete with giant ball pit; perfect for practicing layouts and making friends with non-english speaking children. After some good fun we headed to the boarding gate and just minutes before the flight was scheduled to take-off, I handed the agent my boarding pass and became an illegal immigrant and suspected terrorist (probably due to my non-scandanavian looks).

She asked me if I had a visa to Israel or a return flight to the United States, the country of my citizenship. I replied that I am eligible to receive a 3-month tourist visa at the airport in Tel Aviv, and my plane ticket back to the US was in Israel because why would I bring it with me to Denmark? The agent placed a phone call and then told me that I could not board the plane as it was Israeli policy not to allow tourists to enter without a visa or a return plane ticket and Malev risked a large fine if I flew to Israel and was then turned away by the Israeli authorities.

I offered to sign a contract promising to take financial responsibility as well as give Malev my first born son and 4 dunams of my orange orchards if I was turned away, but the agent refused and also refused to let me speak to the manager. I asked if I could call my travel agent and give her my flight number for my flight back to the US, if I could call the embassy, if I could call my pushy grandfather, but she told me there was no way I could be on this flight and I could call whomever I want, after the flight took off.

After the flight left, she continued to be of no help. Detained in Denmark, I found a place to sleep and the next morning arranged to have a very convincing fax of a fax of a fax of my return plane to ticket to the US sent to Malev in Copenhagen. I was given permission to fly, but forced to pay Malev 1220 Danish Kroner (approximately $208) to change my flight.

While I understand it is within the right of Malev Airlines to refuse me travel without the proper paperwork, I believe Malev is at fault for the way I was treated. (For example, had I been informed at the check-in desk that I needed proof of my return ticket; I would have had ample time to get a copy of said ticket faxed to Denmark before the flight took off.) Therefore, Malev should take responsibility for the $208 ticket charge, the expenses of an extra night in Copenhagen, a lost day of work, a missed fireworks display in Tel Aviv, extensive emotional damage as an international refugee, 40 acres and a mule. Please consider my request for reparations with due respect.

Sincerely,
Unhappy European Traveler

2006-04-28T12:05:00.000+03:00

who’s going to pay for the therapy?

my living/working circumstances have gotten me involved in a joint-custody situation. numa’s parents had a wonderful, loving relationship but when he was at the tender age of not-quite-1, they split up. both stayed in yafo and neither was ready to relinquished custody of their beloved blondy.

without the aid of the courts, they reached a mutual time-share agreement. so for the past 6 months, numa has lived with his father (my roommate) and every morning his mother (my co-worker and friend) picks him up and brings him to the office to spend the day with him. at the end of each day, she brings him back home (to my apartment) where he spends the night with dad. occasionally, they ask me to be the middle man and take him to/from work/the apartment. now, at a year and half, numa appears healthy and adjusted. he often barks at small children, but I don’t think that’s anyone’s fault. and no matter how you cut it, I spend a whole lot of time with a very large canine, especially for someone who grew up in a dog-unfriendly household.

2006-04-11T08:12:00.000+03:00

israeli committee against home wrecking

volunteerism abroad begs a host of questions: who are you helping? are you actually helping? why did you come half way across the world to deal with problems that aren’t your own? why aren’t you dealing with the problems in your home community? is it your place to be here?

due to the “situation” (as some like to call it) in israel/palestine, this is a hot spot for internationals seeking to volunteer, work, help, bear witness, etc. i’ve grappled with many of the above questions throughout my time here, and I think I’ve found relatively satisfactory answers (at least for myself and my colleagues).

other volunteers are perhaps not so positively integrated into their host organizations and communities. one such woman, hailing from the netherlands, is currently working for an organization in ramallah. looking to “get away” for the weekend, she made her way to tel aviv and found herself the guest at the home of a friend of mine where she explained to him how her break was much needed.

“things have been weird with my organization…and I cant really go to their protests anymore. first a small gas bomb exploded near my legs and I have some bad burns…and also, I’ve been seeing a palestinian man, which is sort of against the policy of the organization and that has been causing some problems.”

“just wait until his family finds out, then you might see real problems!” my friend commented.

“yea…I’ve asked him to start saving money to buy a second house…and soon he plans on telling his wife and 5 kids…”

my friend and I conferred, and decided, that if she really has to break ties with her current organization, but truly feels committed to the cause of helping the palestinian people, she could seek work elsewhere. we suggest she looks into the israeli committee against house demolitions (ICAHD),* since home wrecking is perhaps the newest form of demolition.

*ICAHD is an actual organization, which does admirable work to oppose demolition of palestinian homes as well as rebuild those which have been demolished. i don’t mean to belittle their work through this mockery, which is aimed at the expense of the dutch woman.

2006-03-15T19:29:00.000+02:00

ahlan wa sahlan fi ramallah

“unbuckle your seatbelts,” came the instruction from the driver’s seat. despite the meandering roads rolling up and down the hills and the smattering of potholes across the streets, as we pulled into the village on the outskirts of ramallah, we didn’t want to look like the obvious outsiders. so seatbelts came undone, music volume went up and the traces of hebrew, that often pepper palestinian arabic within israel, disappeared.

on our way to a meeting about a potential partnership between students at israeli and palestinian universities, we took the “back roads,” entering the west bank via a road leading to a jewish settlement and winding our way through small palestinian villages to avoid major checkpoints. we stopped in modi’in illit, a relatively new haredi (ulta-orthodox) settlement built just over the green line, to use an atm. the sun was setting as we entered the west bank and the hills were glowing. but the generic blocks of stacked housing in parallel rows on the hillside seemed superficially imposed and characterless, unable to absorb the fading light. after receiving puzzled looks and cash, we sped out of the town and on our way.

a while back a preliminary meeting occurred at tel aviv university to discuss goals and ideas for this israeli-palestinian student project. currently, no formal framework exists for communication or cooperation between students at israeli and palestinian institutions. this night was intended to be a continuation of that meeting, an incorporation of students from bir zeit university, just outside of ramallah. the original plan was to bring jewish and palestinian israeli students from tel aviv, but the bit zeit group requested a palestinian-only meeting. i put on my american hat and joined the 3 palestinian israelis representing the tel aviv half of the partnership at a café in ramallah, an area israeli citizens (unless in uniform) technically aren’t allowed to enter.

from what I understood of the meeting (combined with what was translated to me afterwards), the bir zeit students are interested in creating this partnership, but mainly to connect the ’48 palestinians (those within israel) with the ’67 palestinians (those in the territories), not to work with jewish israelis. the tel aviv delegation worked hard to convince them that a jewish-palestinian partnership is also important and beneficial, and to assuage their fears of being seen by their peers as “collaborators” for dealing with israelis. eventually they reached some sort of linguistic compromise; a project for uniting palestinians at israeli and palestinian institutions, that will also include jewish students. we set a date for a joint activity, which will hopefully be only the beginning of a larger process.

the meeting ended, but the night went on with more talking, joking, a partial tour of the city, reunions of old friends, tea, coffee and even beer. i couldn’t tell if I was being paranoid or not, but i felt like one man eyed me suspiciously when they introduced me as an american volunteer. amidst both light-hearted and serious banter, i found myself seated next to him around the lively table. i struggled to understand the arabic that whizzed around me and answer questions directed at me. then he turned to me and said, “i know you are jewish.”

i gave a timid smile and small nod of acceptance.
“i knew it when I first saw you.”
again, I had nothing to say.
“ahlan wa sahlan (welcome)”
another smile and nod.
“ahlan wa sahlan bik,” he prompted.
“ahlan wa sahlan bik.”

as the night continued, my arabic skills further declined, but we kept up the energy until we realized it was past midnight and we had a long windy way back to jaffa. the drive that would be 45 minutes if we could use main roads and not deal with checkpoints, would instead take twice that. after navigating back through the same narrow village roads we came on, we cruised down a steep hill which would reconnect us with the “settler road” and a low security checkpoint back into israel, we came into the light of an israeli police jeep. we had just refastened our seatbelts, but that wasn’t why they pulled us over.

2006-03-07T15:05:00.000+02:00

you cant go back to constantinople

but you can spend a weekend in istanbul

2006-03-07T14:43:00.000+02:00

and you can go back to high school

planning began months ago for the sadaka reut year opening arab-jewish youth seminar. some meetings and preparations seemed normal and expected: finding a place, hiring buses, recruiting kids from the youth groups, writing workshops, etc. other preparatory discussions caught me a bit off-guard: 20 minutes debating whether or not the high school kids can drink during the seminar (no), another 20 minutes on if they can smoke cigarettes (yes), then 15 on whether or not they can smoke nargila (yes), and finally whether or not we should give them a curfew/time they have to be in their rooms (no).

but despite the lack of rules which are normally imposed on american high school kids, the seminar ran smoothly and successfully (so what if a bunch of the kids stayed up all night smoking nargila and hanging out? hey, there was even a staff member hanging out and smoking with them). and during the day, the kids (except for a couple who were falling asleep in their seats) participated in workshops about getting to know each other, identity and social change.

unlike my model bi-lingual meeting where everyone understood both languages, the weekend involved lots of translation, which may have been redundant for many of the palestinian israelis, but was quite necessary for the 2 girls from east jerusalem who spoke no hebrew/the jews in their discussion group who spoke no arabic. regardless of language, there was definitely communication and fun had, so much so that our educational directors wanted to remind everyone at the end of the weekend that this kind of encounter is not a normal occurence and they are completely right. these things, which for those involved are easy to take for granted, dont happen nearly often enough.

2006-02-28T12:38:00.000+02:00

oh yes, wait a minute mr. postman

mail works differently here. while there is still a mailman that walks around and delivers mail daily (except with saturday rather than sunday as the day of rest), said mailman's job is only to deliver. anything you want sent must be brought to the post office, making mail duty one of the least desirable chores in our office (who wants to wait in a line every day?).

i tried to explain to someone how in the states, the mailman who delivers the mail also picks up outgoing mail. apparently, this model makes too much sense for Israelis who seem to pride themselves on convoluted bureaucracy (i.e my experience at the bank).

march 1st is the deadline of a very important grant application. yesterday, february 27th, i came back from 4 days in istanbul straight into the madness of getting this application together and to washington d.c. in less than 48 hours. it was written, but a couple sections needed editing and working with our wheezing printing we struggled to manually print double-sided. then the original copies of the many forms, attachments, booklets, and the proposal itself had to be assembled in the correct order, as well as 9 copies of everything.

around 6pm we finished this and began our next challenge: getting these several kilograms of paper across the atlantic. by this time, the post office was closed so we began to look into fedex options. when fedex quoted an estimated price of $200, i began looking into flight options. i found a flight for $489 to washington which would have allowed me to hand-deliver the application (and perhaps visit some friends) but you had to buy the ticket 3 days in advance (and that price must have been before taxes).

so back to fedex. unlike the normal postman, they said they would come pick up the package between 8pm and 11pm. no one wanted to be sitting in the office until 11pm, so being such good problem solvers, we found an excellent solution: we gave them the address of a pub in tel aviv and celebrated with beers while waiting for the mailman to arrive. the fedex man almost joined us for a round, but he had other pickups to make.

2006-02-16T00:31:00.000+02:00

“and I don't care that you're bowlegged and I don't care that you're bilingual”

last night I attended what I would consider to be a model bilingual meeting. everyone had at least a basic understanding of both languages spoken, so rather than repeating everything spoken in 2 languages, every person spoke in whichever language he/she felt most comfortable in. it was refreshing to be in an environment where everyone’s fluency was enough to understand both languages so that people could speak freely in their mother-tongues, yet still be understood by the entire group. additionally, there was pizza and cookies making it a model meeting regardless of lingualism.

however, this was no sadaka reut hebrew-arabic staff meeting, it was a holylanders ultimate team meeting and the languages were hebrew and english.

at sadaka reut staff meetings no one pretends that there is a pretense of bilingualism. since my hebrew is the weakest of anyone around the table, we uni-lingually go about business in hebrew, trying to make the meeting as quick and painless as possible. sometimes at more ”formal” events like board meetings and the organization’s annual “general assembly,” introductions and welcomes will occur in both hebrew and arabic, but as soon as its time to get down to the nuts and bolts, everyone switches into the dominant common language.

everyday i find myself more frustrated with my deteriorated arabic skills and more convinced that I need to invest significant time and energy into learning this language. i don’t think it’s the fault of any individual jewish israelis that they weren’t raised bilingually with arabic. yet, even though all the jews in the office are working on learning arabic, they are a long way off from being able to conduct a bilingual staff meeting. and as much as the people I work with, both jewish and arab, believe in equality and bi-national cooperation, ive spent a good deal of time wondering; in a bi-national society, can you have equality without bilingualism?

2006-01-29T12:46:00.000+02:00

hamas to the izzo

in december 2003 (over 2 years ago), I wrote a paper about the multifaceted allure of hamas for a class, ‘islam and politics in the modern world.’ the following is my conclusion:

“The Structural Power of Hamas and its Implications

Because militant Islamist groups develop due to the weakness of the ruling government, there isn’t a force strong enough to subjugate them when they reach an extremely powerful position, such as Hamas has. But as of the mid 1990s “the PNA had not yet forwarded any sort of program for national reconstruction and development”¹and since then it does not appear that they have made any significant progress. The void left by the Palestinian National Authority’s lack of action is almost inevitably going to be filled by Hamas or other radical groups. However, Hamas cannot be written off as a purely radical terrorist organization because “radical Islamist groups tend not to have a clear program of what they want to achieve.”² Hamas has clearly stated what it wants; a Palestinian state in all the waqf lands of Palestine, which are inherently Islamic property and cannot be surrendered, and therefore, this necessitates the destruction of Israel. Additionally, Hamas has proven that it can provide education and other services necessary to run a state, which strengthens its agenda even more. It is the fact that Hamas adeptly combines extremist actions with more moderate tendencies that make it such a dangerous organization. While “radical Islamists pose a security threat to the state,” a potentially larger menace comes from “moderate Islamists, who have begun to negotiate a space for themselves in the political process, pose the threat of an eventual transfer of power, of major change in the established order.”³ Hamas encompasses both of these dangers as it simultaneously acts out in violent terrorism against Israel and at the same time destabilizes the already fragile Palestinian Authority. To counter the strength of Hamas, a powerful government must be in place that can finance institutions and education, provide services, such as healthcare and offer a hopeful outlook for the future of the Palestinian people.”

hamas has now accomplished (pretty much peacefully and democratically) the transfer of power in the PA. no one else appeared as an alternative so hamas became the powerful government. now, the world is split on whether to forgive them for their terrorist history in hopes of finding a partner for peace or to cut them off from aid and international politics if they refuse to change their charter and practices.

i don’t know whats going to happen, i don’t think anyone knows. i do know that change is long overdue (on both the israeli and palestinian sides) and I can only hope that this development jump starts something. and I hope that the something is not more violence, a retaliatory right-wing israeli government after the march elections and/or an increasingly hopeless outlook for the future of the palestinian people.

¹Connell, Dan. “Palestine on the Edge: Crisis in the National Movement.” Middle East Report, No.194/195, Odds against Peace (May-Aug., 1995): 6-9.

² Ghadbian, Najib. Democratization and the Islamist Challenge in the Arab World. Colorado: Westview Press, 1997.

³ Ghadbian, Najib.

2006-01-18T13:01:00.000+02:00

move to east jerusalem, vote for pedro?

when i first met samar and her two daughters almost 4 years ago, they were living in haifa. it was nearly two years into the intifada, despite illness and many other setbacks, my grandparents were still focusing all of their energy on getting their dream to build a camp for middle eastern kids (israeli, palestinian, jordanian, etc) with life-threatening diseases (a la paul newman's "hole in the wall gang"camp) off the ground. through these efforts they had met samar, a palestinian israeli woman, and recruited her to be both a member of their board and their new friend. in my grandmother’s personal quest for peace and coexistence, she suggested i go spend the weekend with them since her daughters are about my age. my grandmother is hard to disagree with so off i went.

samar has since remarried and relocated to bir nabala, a neighborhood in east jerusalem. her husband, a native east jerusalemite, grew up under jordanian control. in may 1967 he left his jordanian controlled city to attend university in beirut. in june 1967 the israelis gained control of the west bank and east jerusalem. it was over 25 years before he was able to return to his hometown. in the post-oslo era, as an educated and successful economist, he was allowed back to help build palestinian infrastructure. despite the necessity of such brain power in palestinian society, the israeli authorities gave him "temporary resident" status in the city of his birth, pretty much one step above my tourist visa. every six months he hopes someone will be kind enough to renew it.

i was set to have lunch at their home on a saturday afternoon- take a taxi to the checkpoint, cross by foot and then another taxi to their house. through a mix up with keys, saturday morning I found myself locked into my mom’s temporary apartment (“the president’s residence” at hebrew union college). stocked with plenty of food and drink, new yorker magazines and a rooftop view of the old city walls, its far from the worst place to be locked in. still, I called to say I might be late for lunch. forty minutes later, I called again to let them know I got out and was on way and samar joked, “now you can better appreciate your freedom.”

samar has learned to appreciate her freedom. living in haifa with israeli citizenship, travel was relatively easy. now on the outskirts of east jerusalem, freedom of movement is increasingly limited. no matter which direction you go (into israel proper or the occupied territories) you have to cross a checkpoint. when she first moved to bir nabala, her office was in nearby ramallah. but since the separation wall went up, the commute became too difficult.

a year had passed since my last visit to their home and I struck by the new walls that had popped up around the neighborhood (not just the separation barrier). one of samar’s daughters, who had showed me around haifa over 4 years ago, is now a student at hebrew university’s mt scopus campus, less than 10km (which is even less in miles if I knew how to do the conversion) from their home. door to door, her commute to class takes an hour.

at lunch (as with many lunches in this region), the conversation turned to politics. next wednesday much of the palestinian population, including many east jerusalem residents, will go to the polls to vote in parliamentary elections. hamas has made a historic decision to take part in these elections and is expected to win a significant number of seats.

then in a couple months, israelis will go to the polls. as a temporary resident, samar’s husband certainly won’t be voting, but he claims it doesn’t bother him since he believes there are no potential leaders ready to talk about genuine peace. he isn’t the only one. a lot of people i know who are eligible to vote in the upcoming elections don’t know who to vote for (not that they knew before sharon’s stroke either). and speaking of sharon, he has all but faded from the news. i think the public started to realize that there are more important events going on in the world after this report appeared in haaretz.com last week:

“Among the ways in which physicians hoped to stimulate Sharon's senses Tuesday is to place a plate of shawarma, the sliced meat dish said to be the prime minister's favorite, close enough for him to smell it.”

2006-01-04T14:51:00.000+02:00

2006 check in.

the past couple weeks have been full of visitors as the north american/christian world takes vacation. not the case here, I found myself at work as usual in the bomb shelter office on sunday morning, christmas day. however since the barrage of visitors began, I have taken a good number of vacation days in order to accompany friends to the flea market, junk market, art market, food market and humus market. ok, there isn’t a humus market, but if there was we would be there and since there isn’t, we traveled to akko (2 hours up the coast by train), supposedly the only city that can rival yafo with its humus. the humus was pure goodness but I was even more enamored by the charm of akko’s living, breathing, old walled city which is neither like disneyland-esque old jerusalem nor the yupi artisan colony of yafo’s oldest quarters. thinking about moving north? check.

new years here is called sylvester. my roommate and I threw a rocking party on saturday night complete with campus-dance worthy christmas lights and beirut on our rooftop (yes, the weather was kind enough to permit an outdoor new years party). they don’t sell red solo cups in Israel, but I was able to strike a deal with some guys who run a juice stand which had similar-sized, durable, neon yellow plastic cups. lebanese-israeli cultural exchange? check.

after months of being the only girl playing ultimate with the holylanders, I brought charlotte and talya to practice. the boys might have been just as excited as I was to have some more ponytails on the field. sadly, practice was cut short when a face-to-elbow collision broke one guy’s nose. (remember when I broke charlotte’s hand?) regardless, disco inferno meets holylanders? check.

after 3 more trips to the bank, i received one of the two check books that i ordered. does it matter that my name is written as ana weitzer? not according to the ever helpful bank workers. checks? check.

2005-12-23T19:04:00.000+02:00

we built this city on rock and roll and ideology

the lewis clan is in town. annie’s parents know the cousins of the wife of the mayor of ariel, who insisted that they come on a private tour of his city (and they invited me to tag alone). ariel is a city of 18,000, established in 1978 in the heart of samaria. samaria is the northern part of the west bank, making ariel one of the largest jewish settlements in the occupied territories.

our tour guide has not only been the mayor for 25 years (now his full time job), he was a founder of the settlement when is was just a collection of tents on a hill top (something that might now be considered an illegal outpost, but was sanctioned, and even encouraged by the Israeli government at the time). he is a secular ideologue with a lot of vision. it is one of the leading cities for immigrant absorption (approximately half the population arrived recently from russia), houses a college with 10,000 students (mostly commuters) and plans are in the works to expand the settlement to 60,000 residents.

no stranger to tours and publicity, he had many rehearsed lines. he talked to us non-stop for 2 hours, both in the modest city hall and while driving us around the sausage shaped settlement. as a politician, he answered very few of our questions. besides the fact that he and I don’t see eye-to-eye on many issues, I was also irritated by the condescending tone he used and the assumptions he made about us as american jews. granted, I may not fit the typical american or jewish american mold.

his main point seemed to be to show us that the citizens of ariel are not gun-carrying, bible-thumping, black-hatted, arab haters who throw dirty diapers and beat up palestinian olive harvesters. but rather, they are normal people, who a have a modern town, with tourism, advanced technology and industry and his city is shaped like a hot dog because they took care never to steal a single olive tree from palestinian owned land. he insists that they are not occupiers because he legally owns the land his house is built on. and despite his pride in being a secular mayor of a largely secularly city, he referenced abraham’s biblical purchase of land in hebron as another reason why this land belongs to him and the jewish people.

whether or not he calls himself an occupier, he knows exactly what his presence in the west bank implies. he spelled it out for us in his own words: “I established this city to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state” and, “I am not an obstacle to peace, I am an obstacle to a Palestinian state.”

he went on to explain that the major west bank palestinian towns should be incorporated as part of Jordan, while ariel and the other major jewish settlements should be annexed to Israel and gaza should be given back to egypt. maybe news is slow to make it to samaria, but im pretty sure that offer isn’t really on the table. then again, I guess to be the mayor of a major settlement, you have to be ready to ignore international opinion.

2005-12-14T12:11:00.000+02:00

it might have been easier to claim citizenship

than to open a checking account as a foreigner.*

after over a month of paying sovereign bank’s $5 fee every time i withdrew money from an international atm and to assist the process of paying rent in shekels, i decided it was time to open an israeli bank account. i inquired with several israelis as to which was best and was told that other than bank hapoalim (which is apparently evil), just pick the one closest to your house.

this advice brought me to bank discount. my first trip there involved waiting in approximately a bazillion lines for a total of nearly 2 hours, but i left successfully with empty bank account and promises that in less than a week I could get an atm card and checks. several days after making arrangements to transfer money into my new account I returned to the bank to see if the transfer had come through and if I could pick up my new atm card and checks.

after again waiting in several lines to find the appropriate people, i learned the money had come through, but, “you didn’t order the card and checks? you have to order them!” apparently, these perks aren’t automatic.

so i waited in one line to order the atm card and a second line for the checks. the atm request went seemingly well, but I had no such luck in the checks line.

“hi, i’d like to order checks.”
“account number and id please”
“61…”
“61? is this a foreigner account?”
“yes, i’m not israeli.”
“oh, I don’t know if I can do this, and see here, this paper says that your account cant get checks.”
“but I need checks, i have to pay rent.”
“maybe you should talk to the manager. the desk over there.”

the manager informed me that because i am a foreigner and they don’t “know me” they cant yet trust me with checks. “use the account a bit, then come back and maybe we can do it.”

fast forward one month: after receiving my atm card and pre-chosen pin code (no, you don’t get to pick your own), i used my bank account multiple times, withdrawing the daily maximum of 600 NIS at the minor fee of 1.25 shekels. it was time, i decided, to return to my quest for checks (i now owed my roommate 3 months of rent).

“hi, i opened an account a while back, i’d like to order checks.”
“account number and id?.”
“61…”
“61? is this a foreigner account?”
“yes.”
“micki, this girl has a foreigner account, can we order checks for her?”
“yes, yes, just take her first born child and 4 dunams of her orange orchards.”
“but I don’t grow oranges…”
“ok, fine. come back in 3 days to pick up the checks.”

it was too simple, i knew it. instead of 3 days, i gave them a week. at least by this point I knew which line to wait in.

“hi, i ordered checks last week, can I pick them up?”
“account number and id?.”
“61…”
“61? a foreigner account? oh no, those checks wont be ready for at least another week. and maybe you should call before you come back, because really we don’t know how long it will take.”

so in sum, nearly 2 months after opening my account, i have a very patient and understanding roommate but no checks. for more tales of israeli bureaucracy, refer to adler’s blog.

[*note: this statement only holds true for me as a jew. if I were, lets say, a palestinian from east jerusalem it would be easier to build a bank out of toothpicks and yogurt than to get citizenship.]

2005-12-01T09:28:00.000+02:00

"balls to walls"

officially, fuad is a resident of beit jala, a community in the west bank. he graciously served us tea at the abandoned building next to his home as he described how his property, on the outskirts of his west bank town, has recently been incorporated as part of israeli-controlled east jerusalem through the construction of the separation barrier, while the rest of his town has been fenced off. the concrete wall prevents him from accessing his community, relatives, friends, children’s school and more. he has a piece of paper permitting him entry into israel (from which regular beit jala residents are prohibited) but it can still take hours, or even an entire night to cross the checkpoint.

(i have no digital camera- diagrams will have to suffice)

earlier this week b’tselem (http://www.btselem.org/English/index.asp), an israeli human rights organization, took the staff and volunteers from my office (sadaka reut) on a tour of the “separation barrier” that israel is in the process of building. despite everything I had seen, heard and read about the wall, seeing this much of it all at once was almost like being punched in the face, or perhaps, like watching thousands of palestinians get punched in the face.

some historical background: in june, 1967 israel gained control over the west bank, including east jerusalem (as well as gaza, the golan heights and the sinai peninsula). in order to procure jerusalem as the "eternal and undivided" capital of the jewish state, east jerusalem was annexed to the state of israel while the rest of the west bank remained offically occupied territory. despite this drastic effort, east jerusalem remains the desired capital of the palestinian people and the city remains (at least socially, culturally, and economically) immensely divided. trash collection occurs regularly only in west jerusalem and other jewish neighborhoods. arab east jerusalemites are ever so privileged to have the status of permanent residents (not citizens) of israel. and as a permanent resident, one should expect to be denied building permits, even when diaspora jews are allowed to build apartment complexes in the middle of east jerusalem arab neighborhoods. we drank more tea in the legal portion of abu said’s home. the second floor that is under construction for his son is illegal, but he thought it more likely go unnoticed by the authorities than a whole new structure.

in this tiny country, land and demographics are of the utmost importance to politics. the wall is carefully winding its way around the fringes of jerusalem in what comes off as a last ditch effort to assert territorial control. it’s the political equivalent of an animal peeing to mark its territory.

its hard to dispute the fact that israel has security concerns and under the guise of defense, the government claims to be building this complex structure of concrete walls, watchtowers, fences and barbed wire, to keep out terrorists. but watching the fence twist and turn in peculiar patterns (with little regard for the green line or the communities through which it passes) makes it fairly obvious that this barrier is about more than security.

interestingly enough, half of the residents of abu dis are a security concern to the state of israel, while their neighbors on the west side of town are not. the abu dis portion of the wall has been featured on international news because it literally divides the community in two, leaving a small hole in the fence, guarded by israeli soldiers as the only place people can cross to carry on their lives. it is tagged with graffiti: “seattle/india/ireland/etc supports palestine,” “from warsaw ghetto to abu dis ghetto” and the ever clever, “balls to walls.”

the community of sheikh sayeed may soon meet a similar fate. we spoke with some of its residents who told us they considered their community to be a neighborhood of jebel mukaber, which is considered by israel as part of jerusalem. however, unlike their j.m. neighbors, residents of the sheikh sayeed village do not have blue identity cards giving them the elusive “permanent resident” status because some imaginary line has deemed those in sheikh sayeed as residents of the palestinian authority. so to the west lies what israel sees as jerusalem and to the east the landscape plummets into a deep wadi with no roads out. the intended route for the separation fence is about to cut the village of sheikh sayeed off from the rest of jebel mukaber, which for all intents and purposes will turn it into a 2,000 person ghetto. in this case, even geography is against the palestinians.

this security fence is not an apartheid wall (i believe this conflict is too unique to appropriate terms from elsewhere), but it is definitely wronging an entire population. and if im still reeling from the tour, I cant even imagine how they feel.

2005-11-23T22:57:00.000+02:00

i can gather all the news i need on the weather report

actually, that’s a lie. israeli politics are going wild this week. sharon has decided to leave likud and form a new party bringing the country to early elections (probably in march). and peretz, the new underdog labor leader with his socially conscious politics, certainly brings a different flavor to the standard poo-poo platter of israeli prime minister candidates. early elections seem to have become a trend here over the past decade or so. it adds to the atmosphere of political (social, economic) instability but perhaps its better than having just one fool in charge for 8 years. regardless, political analysis is not my field of expertise, so suffice it to say, i’m waiting to see what this change in the wind will bring.

up north, not far from where i spent last weekend visiting cousins, the fragile 5-month calm between hezbollah in southern lebanon and the israeli army ended in rocket fire and retaliations- a reminder that quiet is not peace and that whoever is elected will have his hands full.

on a much lighter note, while i am generally happy and busy in this crazy land, there are moments (possibly exacerbated by feasts of turkey and brown-bashing on foxnews) when i hanker for certain people and places of times past. it may be that hearing from friends across oceans only fuels my nostalgia, but it is worth it and their words are worth sharing. here is a collection of favorite excepts from recent emails that have made me nearly pee my pants:

“the guys in the office are listening to ace of base right now. and singing along. oh man. if it isn't bollywood music then it's usher and if it isn't usher, it's ace of base.”

“Thank you for the weather report, Weatherwoman Hannah. It helped indeed. Basically I'll bring my lederhosen and be good to go.”

“by the way, the sex in this Congressional office is great, but it's mostly with people who have medicare issues. The illegal immigrants are usually snorting crack with the office pet (a turtle named max).”

“Napoleon Dynamite is such a funny movie. When I first saw it, I was like "what the heck is funny about these stupid people," but it kind of revolves in your mind again and again and every time you remember something from it, it just cracks you up. I think we should talk about one day when we are stoned.”

“i think there are squirrels in our roof - maybe raccoons, and i'm pretty sure they stole my new toothbrush.”

“speaking of brown, matt recently got his yearbook, and it is great! the pictures of everybody are SO UNBELIEVABLY BAD!! i don't think i saw one good picture of any of our friends, at least in the back part with all the portraits. i foresee a future moment, when i am being celebrated at the end of a staggering successful government career, and at the height of the party as the speeches are being made in my honor in the fancy 5-star hotel ballroom, someone (probably you) starts into a what-he-was-like-then power point show of my life, and my brown university year book portrait gets plastered up onto the screen, 50 times larger than life, and that moment will be the worst moment of my entire life, worse than when my wife leaves me, worse than when i am personally responsible for a miscalculation that starts a bloody war. having people see my yearbook picture will be the worst moment.”

these quotes are anonymous because they were replicated without permission and they may or may not be taken out of context. if you’re not quoted and think you should be, then maybe you should write me more emails. and a prize for anyone who can correctly identify all of the authors.

2005-11-21T12:22:00.000+02:00

in lieu of words, some belated pictures (courtesy of other people's digital cameras) from jordan.

2005-11-09T10:01:00.000+02:00

recruitment

on a windy monday morning i woke up at the crack of dawn. literally, the sky outside my window went from dark to light during the 15 minutes it took me to drag myself out of bed, throw on some clothes and pack my wallet, notebook and an apple in a bag.

at 6am i was waiting at the bus stop with zohar, fareed and hassan. 3 buses and 2.5 hours later we had met up with renana and arrived at the denmark high school in west jerusalem where the weather was rainy and cold. the security guard at the gate of the school made us wait, shivering in our wet shoes, while he eyed fareed and hassan with suspicion and radioed the office to see if we had permission to be admitted.

once given this security clearance we entered the school where we were ushered into the teachers lounge to dry off, warm up and be warned that there are some difficult students/classes. when zohar noted that the soda machine in the hallway was protected by iron bars, we started to wonder what kind of kids we were about to meet.

these 4 (out of 6) commune volunteers were on a routine recruitment trip to talk to high school students around the country about sadaka reut and try to enlist potential participants for the arab-jewish youth groups, and i had tagged alone for the ride. after 15 or so minutes in the teachers lounge the 9 o’clock song rang (israeli schools get little ditties rather than bells) and it was time for us to give our shpiel in the classrooms.

originally on the phone, we had been told we could talk to 12 classes- all of the 9^th, 10^th and 11^th graders. but once we were there they remembered monday is a bad day schedule-wise and actually, there were only a few classes available. in the end we spoke to just 3 classes, received a decent dose of high school student bravado mostly in the form of snide or sarcastic comments, watched one kid get kicked out of class and got the name and phone number of one young man (out of almost 50 students we spoke to) who was possibly interested in joining the jerusalem arab-jewish dialogue group.

just over an hour after our arrival at the school, we left and began making our way back to yafo on another 3 buses. we treated ourselves to pastries at the central bus station and by noon we were back in the office. even two days later, im still not really sure how to evaluate the success of the trip.

now that the holidays (jewish and muslim) are over, things have kicked into overdrive at work. in addition to recruitment trips all over the country, some projects are actually starting and everyone is planning and programming in a frenzy. my work at al-rabita finally began this week as well and i am co-teaching an english class designed to help high school students prepare for their bagrut (matriculation exams). the other teacher is going to take care of grammar and that fun stuff so i get to do conversation and be the token american. the program is sponsored by the u.s. embassy and it is supposed to cover american “culture and values” in addition to language. so somehow ive ended up working (albeit indirectly) for the government.

and speaking of americans, bill clinton is scheduled to speak this saturday at kikar rabin (rabin square) in tel aviv as part of country-wide commemorations for the 10^th anniversary of rabin’s assassination. i dont think this country ever rests.

2005-10-30T16:57:00.000+02:00

breaking and making news

last wednesday's suicide bombing in hadera, killing five shoppers at the market, marked the first attack inside israel since my arrival 7 weeks ago. it sparked a serious of retaliations by the israeli army aimed at terrorists, but not always accurately. in one such attack, a targeted assassination against a terrorist cell leader killed the target as well as six others, three of which were identified by the israeli army as islamic jihad operatives, meaning the other three were civilians. and although politicians on both sides pledge and vow to crackdown on terrorist groups, anger and frustration on both sides intensifies.

slightly further east, iran's president echoed old sentiments to destroy israel on their national al-quds (jerusalem) day. and just outside of al-quds, as the IDF works to beef up existing road blocks, create new check points and limit palestinian movement throughout the west bank, thousands of muslims were denied entry to the city where they wanted to go pray at the al-aqsa mosque for the last friday of ramadan. while its not fair to quantify or equalize these events, its hard not to see hints of "an eye for an eye" sentiments in this biblical land.

yet daily life continues, almost without missing a beat, here on this side of the green line. my roommate and his dog finally moved in last week. we've spent many hours breaking down, carrying and assembling furniture (at least he has some), scrubbing floors and pulling plants out of our shower drain (actually i watched amir do that one), but the apartment is starting to come together. next week will we take on the roof and then hopefully be ready to have a housewarming party.

at work, i joined the arab-jewish post-high school volunteer commune members for a session about public and media relations. we discussed our personal reasons for working at sadaka reut and thought about how to explain what we do to those outside the organization. appropriately timed, the whole office was then interviewed for a potential article about the commune in the maariv newspaper.

i find it fascinating to hear the commune members talk about why they chose to join this unique project and how their families feel about this decision at a time when these polarized communities rarely meet, let alone live together. these exemplary young adults, not only share an apartment, but in their efforts to act as a "model of coexistence," they also spend their days working together - as volunteers in the sadaka reut office and various community projects throughout the city and as arab-jewish youth group facilitators throughout the country. while the unraveling of the fragile "ceasefire" fuels hostility and segregation for many, it only strengthens the resolve of these young people to continue working for peace, tolerance and equality. i hope their story, and others like it, continue to make news, to remind readers that not all news is bad news.

2005-10-24T20:54:00.000+02:00

to amman and back

jordanian cars might as well not have blinkers. they use their horns to indicate everything- passing, turning, about to ram into the back of your truck, etc. but someone how i traveled all over the country and returned in safety.

overwhelmed by the barrage of jewish holidays in israel, three friends (annie, ben and moshe) and i escaped to spend the week of sukkot in jordan, where we were instead greeted by an abundance of ramadan which forced us into partial observance due to the inavailabity of food during daylight hours. we began our journey in the south, crossing at the eilat-aqaba border and venturing into the breathtaking protected desert area of wadi rum. although 80% of jordan is desert, this was really the dessert of the deserts. for an non-negotiable price of 35 jordanian dinars we rode a land rover into wadi rum with our driver mahmoud who guided us through the beautiful rock formations jutting up from flat rocky plains and smooth pink sand dunes, watched the sunset and slept at a faux bedouin campsite where we dined on "bedouin barbeque"- food cooked over coals while buried deep in the sand. dinner was extra delicious since we had complete our first (of many) days without lunch.

the next morning we accidentally slept through sunrise, but woke up in time to hike back to the wadi rum village before the sun got too strong. as we entered the town, the call to pray began. i expected to hear the voice of a lone muezzin in this tiny bedouin village, but suddenly the air was filled with the chant and i was reminded of the rabat medina surrounded by the cacophony of dozens of competing muezzins from nearly every corner. then i realized there was only one voice, but it was brilliantly echoed and magnified by the sharp rock cliffs on either side of the village. ben almost converted on the spot.

from there we traveled to the petra, an famous ancient nabatean city and archaeological site whose excavations have been under the direction of former brown professor martha joukowsky. though for everyone who did not take archeology of anatolia with martha, petra is probably better known as the set for the final scene in indiana jones. we were lucky enough to watch the movie at our hostel where it is selected "by consensus" as the film of choice every night. our hostel also provided a lovely buffet dinner and my first (of many) marriage proposals of the week. i told ahmed i was still young and not ready for marriage and he replied, "ok, tomorrow?"

after petra, we hit up amman. while its certainly no cairo, it is still a crowded, polluted, bustling, not so touristy city of 2 million (almost half the population of jordan). a brother of a colleague of moshe's father wanted to show us around the city and brought us to the "mecca mall" where we gawked at the men in kafiyas browsing at timberland and sipping lattes at starbucks. i didnt buy anything there, but i did purchase some bootlegged sex and the city dvds in the dirtier, cheaper downtown area near our hotel.

amman also made us more aware about our identities as american jews who currently live in israel. petra was crawling with israelis (as well as hordes of europeans) and many vendors and men offering donkey rides even mistook our semitic looks and casual dress as israeli and spoke to us in hebrew. but not so many israelis (or americans) make it to amman which led moshe to become matt and annie to become canadian.

i thoroughly enjoyed jordanian arabic, its much easier to understand than moroccan or palestinian. but i dont think i could ever feel as comfortable, especially as a woman, in amman as i did in rabat. upon arrival in yafo (after 6.5 hours and 7 different vehicles) we immediately went and enjoyed eating vegetables and drinking beer in public in the middle of the day.

2005-10-12T20:09:00.000+02:00

30 Sderot Yerushalayim

is the address of my new apartment. i live above a fancy french restaurant named alhambra (yes, I also thought that it was in spain) and a newly opened macolet (convenience store), which does not stock ginger ale or oatmeal, the two things i was interested in yesterday. sderot yerushalayim (jerusalem boulevard) is the main street in yafo, which means it is a bit noisy as buses, trucks and cars make their way at all hours, but my apartment is on the third floor and my bedroom window opens to a side street so it isnt so bad. and in exchange for the noise, i get the convenience factor of being close to innumerous macolets and other stores that should serve almost all of my needs, ranging from a refrigerator to soy milk.

i am also a 5 minute walk from shuk hapishpushim (the flea market), 10 minutes from the yafo beach, 15 minutes from work and 20 minutes from some cool areas in south tel aviv. even more exciting (for me at least) is that it is part of one of the truly mixed neighborhoods in the city (or the country) and in the span of one block it is unusual not to hear both hebrew and arabic (and maybe even some russian, but almost never english). and to top it all off, our large living room opens up to an even larger roof which overlooks the tops of the trees (mostly palm) that line the center island of our boulevard.

amir and his dog, numa, will be my roommates. thanks to my father's influence, i dont normally like dogs, but this one is very nice. i met amir through the people i work with at sadaka reut, he works for a computer company in tel aviv, has already set up our internet and in general seems great. right after i came back from a wonderful, relaxing rosh hashana on my cousins kibbutz in the north (complete with explorations of the golan led by my knowledgeable cousin eitan, onion gathering in the fields, lunch in a druze town and eating fresh figs and pomegranates straight from the trees) we signed a year-long lease on october 6 and dropped off some of our stuff. then he went back to jerusalem where he has been living and i went to hertzeliya, a northern suburb of tel aviv, for a beach ultimate frisbee tournament.

this tournament made up for missing wildwood this summer, but definitely had a different flavor. for one, ultimate is a very new sport in israel so it was much smaller with only 9 teams. another significant difference was that there was a dj who played techno music at an obnoxiously loud volume throughout all games and breaks. mike buff was also there and tried to organize a boat race, but without success. still, it was a fun weekend.

now, i am in jerusalem for yom kippor. the streets this evening were filled with people in white clothes, children on bikes and after sunset, not a car in sight. the whole environment felt a little unreal, but beautiful and peaceful at the same time. since it is still ramadan, tomorrow a large majority of both sides of this city will be fasting (but not me because i am recovering from strep throat and taking antibiotics). and if i remember correctly, the words for fast in hebrew and arabic are quite similar.

on friday amir is planning on moving into the apartment so i will go back to yafo to help him unload, move couches, clean the floors and buy a fridge. and then hopefully i will really be able to begin my life in yafo.

2005-10-05T00:35:00.000+03:00

rosh hashamadan

as ive mentioned before, the office where i work (sadaka reut) is in an old bombshelter. although the air is a little stale, ive found a comfort zone in this basement. it creates a safe little bubble, yet a bubble which extends beyond the concrete walls.

the night before the beginnings of rosh hashana and ramadan (which happen to coincide this year) the six members of the post-high school arab-jewish volunteer commune hosted a party to celebrate the arrival of these holidays before everyone scattered to be with their families. it was a candlelit, potluck dinner on a beautiful rooftop in yafo. we climbed up into the almost magical setting using a clunky wooden ladder and passed the food through a circular hole cut into the ceiling. dinner was delicious and complete with wine (which the muslims partook in, but insisted was for rosh hashana, not ramadan).

as we ate, drank and laughed together (jews, muslims and christians), i almost forgot my anger and frustration of last weekend in west jerusalem when i further internalized how invisible the arab community is to many israeli jews. questionnaires filled out by jewish high school students in preparation for a sadaka reut workshop on identity, tolerance and dialogue reported that only 30% of the students had ever met an arab. and while trying to figure out how to get to lunch on saturday, annie and i realized that the arab community is so far from the consciousness of so many west jerusalem residents that even streets in east jerusalem don't exist on the map of jerusalem which she purchased to help get her directionally-impaired self around the city. (for more on this, read annie's eloquent blog).

even before the map realization, annie mentioned that she feels like jerusalem is like an amusement park while tel aviv is more organic. i thought she was crazy- tel aviv, with its skyscrapers and traffic, is about as organic as metal jungle gym. but last weekend, during a walk through west jerusalem's map-marked streets, invisibly roped-off from the "do not enter" portions of the city, we returned to the discussion and i understood what she meant. and while perhaps this theme park of a city with its segregated neighborhoods creates a safety bubble for many of its residents, it challenges me and my beliefs to the core.

the wonderful space that i have found in yafo, which is not roped-off by the physical borders of the bombshelter or even the city, represents, for me, optimistic possibilities about what the future of this region could be. however, the safety and comfort created for me in this small, unique, diverse community, makes it even more difficult to step outside of it and experience the attitudes and opinions that pervade throughout the majority of the country.

yet despite my many frustrations, i still feel at home in many places here. and although my grandparents commented on the irony that after 35 years of living in israel largely without their children and grandchildren my family and i will all be here for significant portions of this year, it is really almost coming full circle more than ironic, because they laid the foundations for my relationships and homes in this country. without them, i may still be ringing in the jewish new year in the shadow of the golan on kibbutz amir, but with distance relatives, not with close cousins who ive grown up with. i certainly wouldnt have been offered a place to stay in hertzeliya for my beach frisbee tournament this weekend before i even had a chance to ask. and if not for them, i might not have even had the interest and commitment to finding peace for this region that brought me here in the first place.

for this year i hope we all find new comfort zones, expand old ones and try to find the places where they overlap with others. to do this we must try to step beyond the boundaries of what feels safe, into unknown, and sometimes even unseen, territory, in order to find common ground. wishing everyone a shana tovah and a ramadan karim.

2005-09-29T19:27:00.000+03:00

the real world: jaffa

imagine this- six strangers (3 arab, 3 jewish) picked to live in a house, volunteer in non-profits, youth groups and community organizations around the country and maybe have a couple hours of their lives taped (if some happens to have a video camera). but unlike mtv's version, the past 4 seasons stayed in the same house. this years season is moving to a new house, but it wasnt ready in time so they spent their first three weeks in the old "commune." they moved out this week, leaving behind 4 years and 3 weeks worth of dirt, junk and colorful paint on walls, which had to be taken care of before turning the key over to the ed-like landlord.

no, this is not where i am living, but it is one of the main programs of Sadaka Reut: "one year of life for coexistence," a leadership program for 6-8 high school graduates. so really, its not that much like the real world at all, but i cant help but make the comparison. and this scenario is quite real; a good part of my week was devoted to scrubbing, scraping, painting and cleaning the walls and floors of this house. it was tiring work, but a good bonding experience and i feel like i know the six volunteers much better now that we've cleaned the grime off a house together.

on my housing front- i did find an apartment this week. but unfortunately i cant move in for another week so my vagabonding will continue. at least i have some great friends who've graciously shared their beds, couches, towels, kitchens and even underwear with me over the past 2.5 weeks. despite the wonderful hospitality, its been really frustrating not having a place of my own. i've started to create a life for myself (complete with work, friends, ultimate frisbee with the 'holylanders,' and oom kalthoum tribute concerts) and a home is the only thing missing. but it does feel better at least knowing there is a definite end date to my nomadic days.

other than that, i still stumble over clumsy hebrew words that i know i know, but my speaking and understanding are both improving every day. its been harder than i hoped to practice arabic. i catch a lot of words, but just cant get a grasp on the dialectical differences. that too will come with time, i hope.

annie is planning on joining me in tel aviv tonight for a healthy dose of secular israeli living. last weekend i got to see her and adler and their new place in jerusalem. i'm sure i will return soon for more of the holy, "belly button," city. but for now, i'm feeling really good about my decision to be in jaffa and anxiously counting down the days until i can say goodbye to 40+ minute bus rides and move into my sweet apartment (details soon to come).

2005-09-23T12:17:00.000+03:00

what does mixed city really mean?

jaffa is considered to be a "mixed city" and statistically it is just that. of its roughly 50,000 citzens, 20,000 are arab and 30,000 are jewish. it is divided into neighborhoods, most of which have a more arab or jewish character, but they are somewhat interspersed. however, its not quite ready to be a poster-city for coexistence.

for example, a conversation i had with a landlady yesterday (roughly translated from my broken hebrew):

"hi, i'm responding to the ad about the apartment, can i come look at it today?"
"sure, actually i have two apartments you can see. but there are arabs in the building."
"ok."
"that doesn't bother you?"

i arrived at the building to find a sign posted on the front door that rat poison had been used on the premises. rats and their poison (as well as the near-condemned condition of the building) do happen to bother me and had she mentioned that on the phone i might have declined to see the place.

her attitude came in sharp contrast to the optimistic and inspiring sadaka reut annual report, which describes numerous successes of joint arab-jewish youth groups participating in community service projects. so im reminded that there is a long way to go, even in this so-called "mixed" city.

2005-09-21T18:23:00.000+03:00

feeling safe in the bombshelter

its hard to believe ive only been here a week. my apartment seach has continued, but still no success. and im only a little bitter that annie and adler found a great place with a balcony on their second day of looking.

after very little deliberation, i decided to work at both organizations (really, i can do whatever i want with this fellowship). i got a really good vibe from both meetings so now i am working on figuring out how i will divide my time between the two, and within each organization, which specific projects i will get involved with.

this week i started at Sadaka Reut with some office work (down in the bombshelter office), which will be part of my job at both places due to my stellar english skills. at least they are good for something in these hebrew-arabic circles that im frequenting. ive been given the task of proofing the 50 page annual report which describes in detail all of the individual projects and is very interesting. but also sometimes challenging and frustrating to edit because it was written by a non-native english speaker. some changes are easy: thirstiest anniversary was clearly meant to be thirtieth, but other times its a lot harder to discern the meaning of a sentence or paragraph.

my other projects will probably include some english tutoring gigs- one at an Arab elementary school sponsored by Al-Rabitta and another at a youth center for high school dropouts and students who are considered at risk for dropping out. hopefully as my language skills progress i will be able to get involved in other things too. and i want to make sure i dont spend too much time in the windowless basement.

but the sun is hot, the ocean is warm and i've gotten to spend some time at the beach.

2005-09-14T20:20:00.000+03:00

shalom aleychem wa'aleykum salaam

while my apartment hunt has been unsuccessful, my job search has been much more promising. granted, I had the advantage of emailing with organizations all summer. however, I am still pleased to find that the people at the office do not include a crazy chain-smoking woman who tells me if the police come I have to pretend I don't live there, a bartender named momo whose pimped-out place is advertised "for someone who wants to live in style," or a woman who has 5 puppies and their poop all over her porch.

i did find at Reut-Sadaka (which means friendship in Hebrew and Arabic), some really wonderful, enthusiastic people who are dedicated to promoting equality and tolerance between Arabs and Jews in Israel. their office is located in an old bomb shelter in a public garden in Jaffa (not for safety reasons but because it was a gift from the Tel Aviv municipality). they run multiple programs ranging from afternoon jewish-arab youth groups, to a "commune" of post-high schoolers who live and volunteer together at the organization, to community outreach and programming for the city of Jaffa. Jaffa is a historical port city with a relatively mixed population and I'm leaning towards living there if the right apartment ever shows up.

the second organization that i might also work for is called Al-Rabitta, or the League for the Arabs of Jaffa. I've been in touch with them and have a meeting with them tomorrow and assuming it goes well I will work part time at both places. this fellowship is a win-win situation. its good for the organizations because they get a volunteer and great for me because these aren't real interviews since its hard to turn down someone who will work for free.

2005-09-03T09:08:00.000+03:00

Just over a week until I leave for ten months of social justice. Hopefully what exactly that means will become clearer soon. But for now, I guess its time to start my 2nd blog.