It's Monday, I think....

My mom went home; she arrived safely. Yesterday we were everywhere: Yad Vashem where the children's memorial is not to be missed: moving, shocking, breathtaking, scary, awful, amazing. There is only small comfort at Yad Vashem, that you are on Israeli soil, in Jerusalem, and that these 1.5 million children are being forever remembered in a Jewish Jerusalem. We also visited the Valley of the Communities which is one of the more effective, to my mind, artworks/commemorations of the Shoah. It, roughly, mimics a map of Europe with the names of every city and town in which Jews were killed during the war. The size of the town/city's name is in proportion to the numbers killed.

Yad Vashem is currently under construction; it is being upgraded to deal with the tremendous demand for information about the Shoah. One thing that I noticed here in Israel lately is, even with all of its problems, it continues to lose symbols of its once pioneer culture. For example (and not that this is bad) the Foreign Ministry moved out of shacks!!! and into its new headquarters; Ben Gurion, no third world airport, is building a new airport near the current one; Tel Aviv has its share of ramshackle buildings but also gleaming high rises; etc.

On my way home from dinner last Erev Shabbat (the night of yet another pigua, this time against yeshiva students in the West Bank sitting down for Shabbat meal) I ran into some Americans who had visited Hebron earlier in the week. One made the argument (which I've heard many times) that we've been in Hebron forever and. . .we need to stay there. I asked him what was different about our historical past and today. Okay, we were in Hebron then. But today, the facts are in on the ground: he (and I) were standing in JEWISH Jerusalem, the capital of the state of Israel. In my humble opinion, our continuity is not best served on where we have historically been (and today are in small numbers defended by large groups of soldiers), but rather must strengthen the country, and have strong and secure borders. To the gentleman who said "Hebron is ours" I responded: yes, we've had a historic presence there...but do you want to be the next mother who hears the knock on the door telling her that her son has died? There is a Jewish state for people to live in now; they don't have to live in the middle of one and a half million Palestinians, defended by Israeli youngsters (18-22).

You should see the soldiers, kids really. I always feel proud of them and feel for their parents. Thankfully the cell phone craze that has hit the world has been embraced here...parents will readily tell you that they don't turn off the phone because they have a kid in the army...and we knowingly respond with a head nod. It's understood that the comfort of a phone call is vital, for both parent and child.

One thing that the Army does here is take its soldiers to its cultural and political sites. Yesterday at Yad Vashem there were several groups of soldiers; there was another group in the old city of Jaffa.

Our trip to Tel Aviv yesterday took us to the spot where Yitzhak Rabin lost his life. It remains profoundly moving; I can't help but wonder if the downward spiral Israel has been in didn't begin the evening of November 4, 1995 when the murderer not only killed a man, but killed hope.

I took my mother to Ben Gurion...she did one of the things I hate the most: leave Israel and not know when you'll return. I love the Salvador Dali menora that is lit up outside of the arrivals hall. I was happy that my mom had a good visit here, and that she was able to get home safely. . .and I loved the fact that, at least until June, I took her to my local airport.

Finally, one other note: I've been reading (for two months, that's how busy I am) O Jerusalem. . . I was just reading about the siege of Jerusalem in 1948 when Jews here were on the verge of starvation; there was no flour, no water. Today our Hebrew class took a tour of our local market to work on learning the Hebrew words for things. . .When we passed the shelves filled with flour, I couldn't help but think about those brave people in 1948 who went to heroic lengths to get food to Jerusalem against unbelievable odds. . .And today I can just waltz in, buy what I need, and eat and be satisfied.

Yom Rev-ee-ee, Tuesday

Twas the day before Xmas and all through the land,
Everything was moving, no bell ringer hands.
The tinsel is elsewhere, on somebody's tree,
In Israel, JNF breathes free.

There may be Xmas somewhere around,
But to my teachers it makes bearly a sound,
The homework they give with great glee,
Saying in January you wil be free.

So onward dasher, donner and vixen,
But Israel is a place you'll be eighty-sixen,
I'll keep on workin' and studying Torah,
And maybe tomorrow I'll dance the hora,
Celebrating the joy this Xmas Day
that being in Israel has brought my way.

Yom Rishon, Sunday

Just capped off my birthday celebration with an UNBELIEVABLE dinner at Yonatan and Helen's. Helen and I share the same birthday, so it was an intimate evening with great wine, people and food. I'm glad I get invited to Jerusalem's best table.

I spent my birthday learning in the morning: Hebrew, Bible, Tefilla. Lunch was at the King David Hotel. The afternoon I spent working on my homework and studying. It's still cold here. . .

Tomorrow I will read Torah for the first time in Jerusalem and only the second time in my life; I will be taking a Torah cantillation course next semester from Cantor Feffer (which I'm looking forward to taking!)

So about 15 minutes left in the 40th birthday. . . on to the next phase!

Motzei Shabbat, Saturday evening

Shabbat was windy, rainy and cold here in Jerusalem...it was great to walk outside and smell the freshness...In the Jewish liturgy we pray for rain this time of year and when it rains here it really is miraculous. Nine centimeters more are in the Kinneret, but it is still five meters below what Israel calls the "red line." In other words, more rain, please!!!

I remain the consummate weather wimp. Friday was a day for cleaning and cooking for Shabbat, with the help of my mother. Friday night was dinner at my mentor Naamah's home with her family; today at the synagogue at school my mother and I were called up together for an aliyah to the Torah; our first time together and her first in Israel! It was a very moving moment for us, and afterwards Rabbi Feinberg made a beautiful blessing, even involking the memory of my father.

My place this afternoon was Grand Central...my friend Adam B. from LA is staying here; he's a sophomore at Berkeley; my mom was here; and two of my guests stayed on throught the afternoon through Havdalah. Mind you, this is only a two room spread.

Tonight it was back to the homework, working on an essay about Vichy France (nasty, nasty, nasty people they were) and on a Hebrew essay, plus rehearsing for a Torah reading on Monday. In three minutes, Israeli time, my 40th birthday officially begins.

And I'll be entering it practicing my Torah reading. . .

Yom Hamishi, Thursday night

Shalom! Just got back from a FABULOUS party with my wonderful friends here in Israel. And...today I went to Beit Agnon, the home of Israel's Nobel Prize winning author Shai Agnon. Let me tell you without any hesitation that it is a most holy place! When I was at Independence Hall in Tel Aviv and again today in Beit Agnon, I have got to say that these are holy places....because these are places where the Jewish people live!

It was wonderful spending this birthday celebration tonight with so many special friends, people who in a short time have grown to mean so much to me. It's funny: I read an article in the LA Times today about how home prices are skyrocketing in LA and felt a pang, for about 30 seconds, about what my house must be worth today...but then I thought about what I'm doing here, and realized that it, b'emet, is priceless.

Another thought: today in Yossi's Mikra (bible) class he again pointed out some interesting items about the development of the Biblical narrative. I won't go into details here, but suffice to say, it was amazing, and tied-in with my Hebrew class, it was truly, as we say in Hebrew, ma sh' who meeyohead...something special. This is an incredible program.

Time for bed. Lalia tov m'Yerushaliym where we may get snow, although we will, for sure, get rain tomorrow!

Yom Re-ve-ee, Wednesday

I finally figured out that they weren't kidding when they said that this was a graduate school, a seminary and a professional school all rolled into one! (Not a dessert topping, though. . .) As we rapidly approach the end of the semester, you just begin to wonder: how the heck do I do it all? Not much time these days for serious deep studies of any one particular thing, just trying to keep up with the daily homework and then the assignments that are due at the end of the semester. Fortunately there is only one final for my kitah (my cohort!)

Today we were in the new city of Modiin and visited a community center that has children's day care, nursery school, kindergarten, synagogue, and programming...in other words, a JCC with Israeli flair! It's great! The woman who built it all from scratch is an inspiration.

My mother joined us for the trip today; she also sat in on a few classes yesterday so she's getting a taste of what's up...

Tomorrow night we're doing a birthday party at school for me...if you're reading this in Jerusalem and I haven't spoken to you about it, you are, of course, invited to come...

Well, back to pouring Hebrew vocab into my short-term memory so that I can repeat it on a test tomorrow....Good thing I like this language!!!

Yom Shlishi, Tuesday

I can't stand it!!!! In less than six months my year in Israel program will be done! How could that be? I just got here!!! I'm incredibly busy..my mom is here and we're gearing up to celebrate the big 4-0. School remains absolutely wonderful, albeit slightly overwhelming; this a short entry right now...

One more thing: a radio station is going off the air for the evening and it is playing Israel's national anthem, which never fails to give me a chill down my spine. . . here are the worlds in transliteration and translation. I encourage you to, if you don't know it, learn it and find a way to hear the music. It's quite moving. . .and the author of the text is the great uncle or step uncle or something of one of my classmates!!!!

HATIKVAH

Text: Naphtali Herz Imbar

Kol od baleivav p’nima
Nefesh Y’hudi homiya
Ul’fa’atei, mizrach kadima
Ayin l’tzion tzofia

Od lo avda tikvatenu
Hatikvah sh’not alpayim
Lih’yot am chofshi b’artzenu
Eretz tzion Virushalayim.
Lih’yot am chofshi b’artzenu
Eretz tzion Virushalayim.


translation:

As long as deep in the heart,
The soul of a Jew yearns,
And towards the East
An eye looks to Zion,

Our hope is not yet lost,
The hope of two thousand years,
To be a free people in our land,
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.
To be a free people in our land,
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.

Yom Hamishi, Thursday

Shalom! Another long week (at least as far as class is concerned) is drawing to a close...and now it's just homework time! Very exciting! On Wednesday we had a trip to several places around Israel, sponsored by the United Jewish Communities, the umbrella organization of Jewish Federations in the US. It was a bit of a hard sell, or at least that's how many of my colleagues perceived the day. We stayed overnight in Netanya at the Park Hotel, the site of the bombing during Pesach that killed 29 people celebrating Seder. The dining room is nearly rebuilt, although the hotel itself could use a little renovation. . .still, it has a great view of the water. It was eerie being there; there's a memorial candle burning in the lobby and a sign in the dining room itself with a map of where it all took place.

Moving on from there we went to Hadera (a city near the seam line, near a Palestinian city) that has seen much terrorism. There we met with various students from Ethiopia and other countries. The principal of the school said in the past 20 months the school has lost five former students, a sister of a student, and a pair of parents to terroism. Then on to Kfar Saba site of a recent attack at a mall that killed a couple of people; you may remember that Kfar Saba is the site of an attack earlier in the year that killed a grandmother and her grandchild. In Kfar Saba we visited an absorbtion center for new immigrants that are between the ages of 18-35. Then we headed south to Ashdod where after lunch we met with Jews from the Caucasus Mountain area. Finally we were home and, at least judging from how I was feeling and how the others looked, were pretty tired. We've seen much of Israel this fall, and right now we're also feeling the pressure to do our academic work as well. And as I said, while the content of the day was important, it felt, at times, like a Federation mission to Israel.

Academically it was a good week. The class in Biblical Grammer and Bible is really fantastic; today our teacher, Yossi, demonstrated how the writers of the Tanach (Bible) took phraseology directly from other cultures in the area. It's too complicated to go into here, but suffice to say, go out and learn Hebrew and then you'll see the text through new eyes. Don't believe the English translations, either; now that I can scratch my way through some of the Hebrew it really demonstrates that the translation is a disservice. Really. If you want to look at a translation that tries to replicate the candence of the Hebrew, check out Everett Fox's translation.

The semester ends in early January and I only have one final. In the interim I have to write one research paper and another paper on prayer. I'm also leading part of the morning service on Monday and reading Torah the following week. In the interim I'm celebrating my 40th birthday on the 22nd!

So, it's 10:30 in the evening...I'm going to practice my Torah portion and then head to bed. . .Tomorrow's another day and Shabbat begins at 4 p.m.! (Did you know the reason why there are two "b's" in Shabbat has to do with Hebrew grammar? It's a three letter word in Hebrew, but there's a dot in the bet in the middle which has the effect of signaling that there were once two letters.)

Laila Tov and to all a good night. . .

Yom Shani
Monday Night

It is windy here. And cooling down. . . guess they really do get a winter here in Jerusalem. The election season is underway; today is the Labor Party primary. The Likud has already picked its list. I don't think there's going to be much change in the government of Israel after the election and certainly no radical change in any of its policies.

School is in full gear again. I'm busy, in addition to my regular work load, preparing for leading part of the Monday morning service next week and reading Torah the week after. I'm also researching a paper for historyon Vichy, France and working on a project for liturgy.

One of the main things you notice here is that there is class on Dec. 25 and Jan. 1...in fact, there are no Xmas decorations or music anywhere!!! What a change from what I'm used to in the USA. Of course the big December event coming up is my 40th birthday (and my friend Helen is turning ???? on the same day. . . ) Hard to believe that the big day is right around the corner....And mom's arriving on Saturday night for her first ever trip to Israel (dress warmly for Jerusalem!)

Until next time. . .

I want to encourage everyone to stay informed beyond what they read in the mainstream media about what's going on in this part of the world; one way to do this is to visit, regularly, www.memri.org. Memri translates Arab communications into English so that we can see what's being broadcast/said/transmitted to the Moslem world. To give you an idea, here is a posting from this week announcing Al-Qa'ida coming to the Palestinian situation, supporting a solution of the total destruction of the state of Israel:

The Establishment of the Palestinian Branch of Al-Qa'ida Vowing Allegiance to bin Laden

In the same forum, a reader, Abu Banan, posted an announcement of the establishment of "the Islamic Al-Qa'ida Organization in Palestine."(10) The announcement read:

"...Brothers in Islam: From the land of the Night Journey and the Ascension to Heaven, we announce to the Islamic nation the establishment of the Islamic Al-Qa'ida Organization in Palestine, which will serve as a powerful basis for restoring the rights of our Arab and Islamic people in Palestine, [and] will defeat the Zionist Jewish invaders [and] return them to the place from whence they came. We declare that the squadrons of our martyrs will strike with all their strength at the Zionist and American arrogance in the region, and that the blood of our men in Palestine, in Afghanistan, and in Kashmir will [not] be shed unavenged..."

"Islamic Al-Qa'ida in Palestine joins its voice with the voices of the mujahideen in Palestine in its resistance to the partial and submissive solutions, and will accept nothing but the full liberation of the Palestinian land. Similarly, we call to the mujahideen in the Al-Nusseirat camp in the Gaza Strip to immediately stop the fighting between Hamas and the people of the Palestinian Authority, because these deeds serve only the murderous Jews, the Great Satans. From the land of the Night Journey we again declare a vow of allegiance to the Emir of the mujahideen, the leader Osama bin Laden, by means of whom Allah strengthened the Nation of Islam."

"Brothers in Islam: The Jihad against the [camp of] heresy and its regimes and symbols has arrived. The mujahideen of the Nation must rid themselves of the regimes of heresy and deception in our Arab countries. We call on our brothers in Islam in Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia to attack the American interests and the heretical institutions of apostasy [i.e. the regimes of these countries]. Allah willing, we will be the victors!"

"Death to the Jews and Zionism; strength to Allah, Allah is great, and victory to Islam!"

Yom Hamishi, December 5, Thursday

Back in Jerusalem.  So many thoughts, so many things to write.  First of all a big thanks to those of you who have written to me at laman100@yahoo.com and let me know that you're reading the journal.  It's great to get feedback.

Second I just got back from an amazing week+ in the "South of France" (how I love to say that!) thanks to my good friend Ida in Seattle (she took care of the ground expenses, including lodging!)  It was wonderful to experience such a beautiful part of the world.

Having said that, I am delighted to be back in Israel. This morning as I saw the lights approach at 2:30 I got incredibly excited; and as I went through Ben Gurion, I did it like a real Israeli:  first through passport, second at duty-free, first through customs!  All without using elbows.  Yuval came and picked-me up early in the morning which was great.  The flight was uneventful; a small jet from Nice to Rome and an Airbus A-321 from Rome to Tel Aviv, via Larnaca.  Now this stop was interesting. Apparently Alitalia crews do not stay overnight in Israel because of the situation.  So they stop in Larnaca to drop off one crew and pick-up another, head on to Tel Aviv, drop us off, pick-up the folks going to Milan and get back in the air.  Coincidentally today the Israeli government is banning its airlines from flying in or out of Larnaca for security reasons.  (see it on the haaretzdaily.com website). 

Being out of Israel and hearing what happened in Kenya was devastating; anger doesn't begin to describe my feelings about what happened .  If the world doesn't wake up to the fight that Israel is in, it will continue to be on the receiving end of terrorism around the globe.  There can be no distinction between so-called "legitimate" terrorism (as some call what the Palestinians are doing) and "illegitimate" such as Al-Queda, Huessein and all.  Terroism is terrorism.

I had an incredibly frustrating conversation, if you want to call it that, with a woman in a store in St. Paul de Vence this week, a small hill village outside of where I was staying.  She kept saying that it was Sharon's fault and that we had to have a political solution.  I kept asking her who Israel should be talking to; she said Arafat; I said as long as Arafat was blowing up our children he would be the last person Israel would deal with.  I left her frustrated about the French attitude toward Israel until the next day when I met a wonderful woman in a museum who walked around with me to chat and as I was leaving, knowing that I'm living in Israel, said, "Good luck in your country." 

In the Rome airport, when I started to speak Hebrew with someone who would be going on to Israel, and then a few other people joined in...we had all been on the Nice leg, and in one way or another, all in cognito...none of us were speaking Hebrew or had any outward signs of our Jewishness.  Interestingly, one man, on the Rome to Tel Aviv flight, took his "tztitzit" out (ritual fringes) and removed his baseball cap to show a kippah (head covering).  In the Nice airport, I had them pegged for effite rich Italians...boy was *I* wrong. 

Last Shabbat I head the pleasure of spending time with the rabbi of the small Masorti congregation in Nice, followed by lunch at his house and an afternoon snooze.  Wonderful people.  We spoke in Hebrew because, well, its our lingua franca.  Just like in days of old in Europe when Jews could use Yiddish as a common currency to speak to Jews from all regions, today we can use Hebrew the same way.  It really is amazingly unifying. 

Other highlights of the trip:  the Matisse Museum, the Magreheit Foundation Museum, Vence, food, food, food, sleeping, reading four books, relaxing, and looking forward to returning to Israel. 

Now it's Friday morning...had trouble posting this yesterday. Went to a wonderful Hanukkah party at the home of my tefilla teacher, Rabbi Rachel Sabath and her new husband, Ofir (who is a rabbinic student in the Israeli program!) Nice way to reenter Israel.

This morning it's life at it's most mundane after the high life of France: laundry, shopping, homework, cleaning, catching up. I was asked so many times how we live here...and this morning's the answer. You just do.