Israeli Mom

Blogging away on IsraeliMom.org

2008-05-19T17:50:00.001+03:00

Already have 3 posts down, so I guess it's official now! Please do join me at IsraeliMom.org and read about the last holiday (with some pictures) and the next one!

Moving to a new domain name

2008-05-16T22:38:00.003+03:00

It's almost two years since I started this blog, and I feel that it's time to move forward and move to my own domain name and hosting. I just bought IsraeliMom.org (the .com is taken, although not in use, and the current owner doesn't want to sell it :( ). I am excited about the move, as it means I'll be able to use Wordpress with a bunch of plug-ins which I like. Nothing against blogger/blogspot - I think it's a wonderful free platform and highly recommend it to anyone seeking a free blogging service.

Lots to post about, but I prefer to wait till we're at the new place. Hopefully IsraeliMom.org will be up and running within a few days! I'll still post here every now and again to refer folks to the new place. Hope to see everyone there!

Some more Thoughts about the Conflict

2008-05-10T20:26:00.001+03:00

Warning - another long post ahead! I have these thoughts running through my head, resonating and developing, and I'd like to share them here.

I truly believe that in order to change things and arrive at a solid foundation for peace, we have to learn to accept each other narratives. A narrative isn't necessarily "historical truth" if there is even such a thing. Yes, many events are documented, and I have a lot of respect for history as a discipline, but in the end of the day, we can go on arguing forever, because each side will pick the events that best suit their narrative, emphasize some events, and ignore or play down others. It's not an unimportant debate, the historical one, but it has to be done with a mind to reach the other side, teach them about our narrative, and learn theirs, with an aim of reaching a stage where we can acknowledge and respect the other side's narrative.

I respect the Palestinian narrative of the Naqbe. Yes, those villages were destroyed in the war, and it was a national tragedy of huge proportions. In the Palestinian narrative, they were driven away from their land by force by the Zionists. It's a narrative of pain and longing and one which I acknowledge and would like to work with in the future.

The Zionist narrative of the very same events is a different one. It's not myths to be put down and erased, IMO. It deserves its place in the joint space we're trying to build here, just as much as the Palestinian narrative deserves its own space. It's a narrative of a people who were (in their own feelings, as legitimate as those of any others) on the verge of extinction. Of people who lived under the fear of being slaughtered by their Palestinian neighbors (as has happened to Jews living in Hebron for example, and in other places). It's a narrative of a group of people dedicated to establishing a free national home for their people, just like the Palestinians are looking to do for themselves now. People dedicated, at least on the ideological level, to concepts of democracy, socialism and development of the land, along their neighbors (talking about the mainstream Zionism of that time, and to some extent up until now). I could go on, but I'll stop here. My point is that both sides should try and see both sides of the story, or we'll never get anywhere. I am opening my mind and my heart to the story of the Naqbe, to the Palestinian narrative. I think it should be taught in Israeli schools and hopefully that will happen someday. I agree that mainstream Zionists are not familiar enough with it, and thus many do not empathize enough with the pain of it. We have a lot to work on (not much of a surprise, eh? ;) ).

At the same time, I think Palestinians, those living inside of Israel, those living in the territories, and just anyone who right now is anti-Zionists, should maybe take the time to open their own minds and hearts too to the Zionist narrative. Get to know it, get to know us, because unless we do that, war will continue.

I'll end with something from the seminar in Givat Haviva (long post, I know - don't shoot me please!). We were fortunate to have a Palestinian older gentleman tell us his personal story of the Naqbe. His name was Adnan, or Abu Hussam, and he told the story of his village of Lajun in what we know today as Emek Yizrael. As it happens, they were never actually driven out per se, but ran away as refugees in the middle of the night after the Arab armies withdrew from their area. What touched me the most, was his story of this then 6-7 years old boy, scared out of his wits, riding a donkey in the middle of the night, and hearing the bullets flying over his head. I have a son who's the same age now, and it broke my heart. I think more Israelis should hear stories like this more often. At the same time, it made me think of my grandmother, who lived in the town of Holon, pregnant with my dad in her belly, and taking care of a 2 years old baby (my aunt), and being fired at every night, by Arabs in nearby villages. Just as scary, just as tragic, just as real. It also made me think of my other grandfather, at the same age, running through the markets of Tunisia, with his injured mother, slashed in her leg by Arabs in an outbreak of riots against Jews. Again, just as scary, just as tragic, just as real.

You see, war is always a tragedy, and no side has a monopoly on heartache. Let's listen to both stories, with respect, with empathy and with a willingness to change the future (the near future too), so that these stories don't repeat as often.

Naqbe-Independece Day Seminar - First Impressions

2008-05-08T18:53:00.004+03:00

It's the 60th Independence Day in Israel today. Been a bit of a strange one for me this year, having attended the joint Israeli-Palestinian, or Arab-Jewish, or whatever you'd like to call it, meeting/seminar or whatever you'd like to call that...

It will take some time for me to digest what I've seen and heard, I think. So, these are just first impressions, really. In fact, I'll focus on just describing what went on, I think, just tell what I experienced.

We arrived at Givat Haviva yesterday, my parents-in-law and myself, yesterday at 2PM. A quiet day, Memorial Day in Israel, a day when Israelis take time to remember those who have lost their lives in our many wars. It's always a quiet sad day, with sad songs on the radio and nothing but Memorial programs on TV (not that I dare watch any of them - way too painful). So, four hours are the sirens were blowing for two minutes in memory of the fallen soldiers, we arrived at the Kibbutz.

People were hanging around one of the main halls there (they have quite a few places there, since the Kibbutz specializes in courses and seminars). People of all ages, Arabs, Jews and others too. Some children running around too. We signed up at the entrance and went into the hall, where there were mattresses and pillows on the floor, and plastic chairs all around. A musician was playing sad and beautiful music on a clarinet.

After a while, people entered the room and the first session begun. It was led by two people, an Arab man, Jamal, and a Jewish woman, Michal. The whole event was in Hebrew, by the way, with speakers in Arabic translated into Hebrew. They did apologize for that, sort of, and explained that it was a technical thing.

There was quite a long opening talk, where the organizers thanked us all profusely for coming, and took time to emphasize how difficult it is for people of both sides to make this step, this hugely unpopular step for many outside the room, and try to spend the Naqbe Day/Independence Day together, sharing our experiences.

The main theme of the whole seminar, as explained by the speakers, was to listen to each other's pain, to listen to each other's stories, without judging and without guilt too. I really liked that approach, as expressed there and then. The idea was to listen and not to argue. Not to focus on historical fact, and argue about which event was real and which was not, but just show empathy and make room for the other side's narrative. Solutions were not to be discussed either - a rather feminine outlook, I guess, of solving conflict by listening and showing empathy.

I liked that notion a lot, and it was actually why I came in the first place. I will say here and now that I feel that the seminar did not fully achieve its goal, at least not during the time I was there (I did not stay till the end). I felt that while the Palestinian narrative, the personal, emotional one, was well delivered, no room was given for the Zionist narrative of the same events. I am not talking about historical facts either, just about emotions and human experiences from the time. I think a Palestinian acceptance, not in the sense of agreement, just as acknowledgment, of the Zionist narrative is just as crucial as a Zionist acceptance of the Palestinian narrative.

The next session was a lecture by an Israeli left-wing historian, Dr. Yair Boimel, about the Zionist-Palestinian conflict (his definition btw, which I really liked). It was absolutely fascinating and delivered in a very professional, well balanced way, and with some humor too (more on that later). His lecture went by the premise that history is shaped by decisions made by human beings. Be them politicians or ordinary people, it's actions which people chose to make that shaped our history.

Dr. Boimel then went on to review the various points of disputes and dilemmas through out the history of the Zionist-Palestinian conflict from 1800 till today, reviewing decisions on both sides and essentially pointing out how they were decisions, and not something forced on any side. I liked both the thesis presented and the wealth of solid information provided during the lecture. It was an eye opener on some points, even.

Next on the evening's agenda was a joint Memorial Service, which turned out to be pretty much a Memorial Service for the Naqbe. Now, having grown up in a mainstream Zionist environment, the Naqbe, as a concept, was something we learned about fairly recently, about a decade ago. In that sense, I have a lot to learn, and it's what I came to experience too. To listen and show empathy to a national trauma experienced by "the other side".

I had no problem with that part of the evening. My problem was with the lack of balance. The evening was made up of two personal stories. The first was a moving tale of an elderly Palestinian gentleman, whose family ran away from their village in the Galille, lost their homes and became refugees because of the war. It was told in Arabic (and I was surprised to see that I could understand at least half of what he said without the translation), and brought a very personal childhood story of one person. Highly effective and moving, and the kind of story I would like to see more Israelis exposed to.

The second story, I expected to be the story of an Israeli/Jewish person who lived through the same war, and would come to tell about the fear of annihilation, about refugees from the holocaust facing destruction again, about fighting and losing your friends and dear ones to the war, and then the joy of being saved and gaining independence. Instead, we had a Jewish-Israeli person of the right age, who came to tell us again about the Naqbe experienced by the Palestinians. Basically, telling us how he had witnessed the bulldozers destroying the empty villages near where he had lived and building new neighborhoods there, and then talking about the denial the Israelis live in, and the guilt we should be feeling. Not very constructive, I felt, and definitely not a story to evoke emotions of empathy and sharing.

Next was a peaceful and quite moving ceremony. The clarinet was playing a sad tune, and a circle of unlit candles was placed in the middle of the room. People were invited to come forward and light a candle in memory of someone who was killed, or a community destroyed or anything else that they wanted to bring up. It was again, personal and a place of empathy and joint sorrow. Palestinians lit candles for people they knew who were killed in war, of their late parents who became refugees. Jews lit candles for people killed in wars and terror attacks, and also for family members who died in the holocaust. The children of Gaza were mentioned more than once, by both sides (unfortunately, the children of Sderot killed by Kassams were not mentioned...).

I think this post is getting long enough, so I'll describe the next day in another post. Time to get back to earth, clean the house, clean the kids, feed them and tuck them into bed. Back to the normal life of a mom - in the hope for normal lives for moms, dads, kids and everyone else in our region.

A few more pictures from Passover

2008-05-06T16:44:00.006+03:00

A quick post today, just uploading a few more pictures from our Passover holiday to share with family and friends.

From a short hike we took near Zikhron Ya'acov's Hanadiv Gardens. I posted more pictures from the gardens themselves here. That's me and Ron there, resting near the ancient Roman Villa (great location for a villa btw, right on top of the Carmel Mt. with a great view of the Mediterranean!)

Next two pictures are from the Air Force museum near Be'er Sheva. It was a hot day, but the kids enjoyed the planes.

I really like this picture of the boys with the pelicans. It was taken in the Monkey Forest Park in Yodfat in the Galillee. The boys decided that the Pelicans were brothers, so they posed next to them.

So much for the pictures. In a about ten minutes from now the sirens are going to go off marking the beginning of the Memorial Day. Tomorrow is the Memorial Day itself, and then tomorrow evening, the country switches into celebration mode and the Independence Day celebrations begin. Mega celebrations this year, since it's the 60th Independence Day.

As if the mixture of grief and celebrations tomorrow wasn't enough, things will be even more complicated tomorrow, as I'll be going to the Arab-Jewish seminar that will discuss those events along with the Palestinian Naqba. I wonder what it will be like, keeping an open mind for now. I will definitely report when I'm back.

Holocaust Day - Some Thoughts

2008-05-01T11:10:00.003+03:00

It's the Holocaust Memorial Day here today. The sirens went off about an hour ago, to mark two minutes of silence in memory of those who died in the Holocaust. I can't stand listening to any more holocaust stories, so my radio is tuned on Galgalatz where they only serve music. Sad music, Hebrew songs only, but still better than those stories.

Like most people of my generation, third generation to the Holocaust, I think we've been handed down our own version of post traumatic stress syndrome from the Holocaust. We've been exposed to so many survivor stories at school, some directly, some through movies. I recall one particularly traumatic seminar, in high school, where they sent us for three days away from home in some holocaust research institute where we got lecture after lecture, movie after movie, about the subject. Lots of Nazi propaganda too, to the extent that I distinctly recall how I felt disgusted by all these Jews in the movies. Felt awfully weird, knowing I belong to that minority - that effective those movies were.

I think only in recent years, since having children of my own, did I realize just how traumatizing this exposure to the horrors of the holocaust was. I don't even want to get into the historical uniqueness of the holocaust, I don't think it really matters on the personal level. In the end of the day, people exposed to such conditions get scarred, mentally. It's what post traumatic stress is all about. The experience of the holocaust is just a very very extreme form of that stress, but it's essentially the same type of stress in every war, of any situation where you and your family are facing mortal peril, really. It's been burnt into our mental retinas, in a way, growing up in Israel. And it keeps coming back, in various ways. That underlying sense, that your world could come apart, and you'll be thrown, helpless, into a storm of war that will wipe off your children, yourself, anyone dear to you.

Sigh. Not much more to say. For myself, I try to shelter my kids from those stories, for as long as I can. Not an easy task here, but they do spare the kindergarten kids, so they're safe for now. I think I won't let them go to any holocaust seminar when they grow up though.

In between Holidays and Memorial Days

2008-04-29T11:45:00.007+03:00

I swear, there's not a week without some festivity, holiday or memorial day in this country. The long Passover vacation has finally ended, whew! We survived! And even managed to have some fun with the kids too. I have quite a bunch of pictures to post too, and will start with that today.

This week we'll be marking the Holocaust Memorial Day, and next week it's the Memorial Day for those killed during their military service, followed right away by our 60th Independence Day. Never a dull moment! I'm going to have a different kind of Independence Day though. There's a joint seminar of Arabs and Jews taking place on that day, where participants will be talking about the events of 1948 from their very different perspectives.

This is about Israeli citizens, not Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza, but those Palestinians/Arabs (not sure how they wish to define themselves) who live with us and form 20% of the population of the State of Israel. I realize they have a very different angle on what happened back then, not celebrating the Independence Day, but rather having their own Memorial Day for the Naqba. I am curious about that, actually, and I want to learn more. I have never been to such a seminar before, and I'm both curious and apprehensive. I will write a separate post about it, I hope, before I leave, with my own thoughts and expectations. Should be interesting to compare afterwards.

Ok, I mentioned Passover pictures, so I'll start with the first batch of pictures from the Seder itself -

We celebrated the Seder at my brother-in-law's place in Neta'im. It's just about over an hour away from here, and we were afraid it might take double the time with the Seder traffic, but we got lucky, and it didn't take that long after all. Still, Dan napped on the way, which was a good idea. Grandpa Amos didn't mind being his pillow either -

We actually arrived early, so could enjoy my SIL's table decor for a while.

Can't have a Seder without Matzh -

Wouldn't that be a weird plate to be having as one of the guests? Good thing it's the central Seder plate, with the six elements of the Seder Plate. I found a link explaining it all on Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passover_Seder#Seder_Plate

Just because it's kosher and you can't have any dough, doesn't mean you don't get fabulous cakes!

Happy Passover!

2008-04-20T07:53:00.002+03:00

Just a quick note to officially say Happy Passover! We've had the Seder night last night, and I'll post some pictures soon. Looks like a busy day ahead of us, with bringing my 6 yo son back home from my Mom's, along with my niece, and then possibly heading out to visit family in the Lower Galilee. Hey, the camera is back from China, so there will be pictures posted!

Four Glasses of Whine for Passover

2008-04-16T17:30:00.002+03:00

On the Eve of the Seder, when families get together to celebrate Passover, everyone shares four small glasses of wine, as part of the detailed and rather structured evening routine. You have to read the story of Moses and co. and how he got the Israelites out of Egypt, and while at it, there are certain breaks in the reading where you add a special blessing and have a glass of wine along with it.

Well, I'm in a whining mood today, with the Seder approaching, so I here are my Passover Whines -

1. Why on earth do teachers need time off an entire week before the holiday itself? We end up with two and a half weeks of spring holiday here which is way too much for kids aged 4 and 6. What's more it's way way way too much for their mothers!

2. How come dads still get to go to work during those weeks? Not everyone has a holiday, but us work-from-home-moms don't have much of a choice.

3. What's up with driving in traffic jams for hours on end for the Passover feast? IsraeliDad and myself announced that we'll be staying home this year, celebrating in peace with our kids here. You won't imagine how many phone calls we've had pleading with us to spare the children and let them enjoy a real Passover feast with the family. We turned down my mom, my dad (they're divorced) and a brother-in-law and felt very proud of ourselves... only to be dragged to the furthest Seder in the family, as my much loved parents-in-law want to go there but prefer not to do the driving themselves. So, wish us luck on Saturday, and let's hope it'll be less than 5 hours on the road.

And a fourth whine? Well, only three from me today. I'm in a desperate housewife mood, but let's face it, all is well here and other than a bunch of hyperactive kids driving me a bit crazy this afternoon (hey, friends come over!), I'm ok.

Too Many Holidays in This Country

2008-04-14T11:38:00.002+03:00

I guess you have to be a parent to fully appreciate just how bad it is. Hardly any work time left, with life moving along from one long school vacation to another... It's Passover this time, with two and a half weeks of having to entertain the kids.

The religious holiday is next week, but apparently school teachers need more time off work to do their spring cleaning or something. With IsraeliDad still working this week, at least on some days, I am left with not too much available work time. Good thing my parents-in-law came back from their trip to China yesterday, so they take the kids over to their place for some of the day (or rather, the kids go there on their own, since we share the same backyard).

Holiday plans are still vague. One of the major problems is that there are way too many Israelis in an overcrowded country. That means every possible place will be packed full of families and kids. It's starting already, as we noticed trying to find a parking place in a busy shopping center on Friday. I am not sure how come there are so many people in all places at all times. You'd think if everyone goes to one place, then surely some place has to be empty at the same place? Not like they're all in the country even. I bet Turkey is full of Israelis this time of year and Cyprus as well. Not to mention the hordes of Israelis always traveling in India, the Far East and South America. Europe too. I know some people can't believe there are only 7 million of us. I guess Israelis occupy a large space wherever they are?

The Major Drill in Two Days

2008-04-06T13:01:00.003+03:00

Had I known this was going to be such big news, I'd have posted about the drill last week... I'm sorry, but when I heard that Lebanon's army and the HA are ordered into full alert, I had to laugh. I double checked the date to make sure it's not April's Fool still. It wasn't. And on the news, I just heard Olmert trying to reassure Syria and Lebanon that Israeli is not planning a full attack and this is just a civilian drill.

Well, let me add my own reassurance. Being as my son is in the drill, I ought to know. I had to brief Ron about this, as the kindergarten teachers asked us to do so in a letter. See, the drill is for my six year old son and his friends. It's for them to practice hearing the sirens and going into the sheltered room in their kindergarten. Trust me, Ron isn't about to cross the border into any neighboring country. He's not even allowed to cross the street where we live without parental supervision, so there.

We've always had such drills too, when I was a kid. I think lots of people have been through them, all over the world, nothing too spectacular about them, really. I'm not sure how this turned into an attack on Syria or Lebanon exactly, but honestly, the very thought is just ridiculous. April's Fool Day is supposed to be just a day, not an entire month, right?

Happy Purim!

2008-03-21T18:59:00.004+02:00

The days of Purim are upon us once more. With two boys here at home, it's most definitely Super Heroes days!

Dan's kindergarten went with a Native American theme, but at home, he was all over the Power Rangers. Ron actually wanted the very same Spiderman costume that he had last year. It still fit him, surprisingly enough!

We had another cause for celebration, with my brother and his lovely wife and two daughters arriving from England yesterday. We all met at our place today for lunch. In our crowded little house, that means hanging out outdoors, in the patio and on the lawn. It was very hot, but we opened up the inflatable pool and the kids had a blast in there. Not too many pictures from today, I'm afraid. My in-laws left the country last night, traveling to China for 3 weeks and they took the camera with them. I did manage to catch a few from my brother's camera and upload them here, and just had to share this one -

It's my youngest niece, Noah in the arms of her proud dad. Isn't she simply irresitable? I am so lucky to have four totally gorgeous nieces and I wish I had pictures of them all for this post!

Spring Time in Israel Pictures

2008-03-16T09:02:00.014+02:00

It is most certainly Spring here! And IsraeliDad prepared himself with a sharp and very short crew cut. Good thing Ron was around and up for the task!

He absolutely loved cutting his dad's hair, as you can see. And don't worry, we did, ummm, fix the results a bit later.

Our backyard is all green these days. Lots of sunny days to enjoy it too and it's definitely not too hot yet. You actually do need a long-sleeve sweater most days to enjoy the outdoors. The lawn bounced back from the frostbite and Dan is enjoying it right here -

And this is what it looks like beyond the lawn. All green, the oak trees blooming and spring is all around! Not a well groomed backyard, and that is an understatement, but for myself, I like the natural look.

All over Israel, everything is in bloom and looking absolutely fabulous. We try to make the most of each sunny day and get out with the kids. Here are some pics from yesterday, when we had a nice picnic and a walk in a small forest near Megido (the Biblical Armageddon).

Ron sure was enjoying himself!

Back home... tired and happy!

America, Here We Come!

2008-03-06T10:45:00.002+02:00

Hey, what do you know, two posts in one week! Is IsraeliMom coming out of her winter hibernation period? Only time will tell ;)

All is well here, working away on projects and taking care of family matters. My father went through a heart procedure yesterday and had 3 arteries unblocked by the doctors. They said he was very close to a heart attack. We are so grateful for our wonderful public health system. He was treated by the best professor in the country, his appointment was scheduled withing days of the initial checkup, and it was all for free and covered by the national health insurance program!

The other latest exciting news is that we have ourselves a VISA to the US! We've been in touch with an American company for the past several weeks over some business matters. Since the option of us traveling was raised, we figured it was time to get a VISA. Getting a traveler's VISA to the US isn't that easy anymore. We started the process two months ago and paid a total of over $200 per person for it. Here's what our morning looked like yesterday -

We arrived in Tel Aviv early in the morning, since we had an appointment scheduled in the embassy for an interview at 10 am. We had to get ID picture ready first. That is not as simple as you may think, since the US embassy requires 5cm by 5cm pictures that are not the standard size here in Israel. There are other rules to the pictures too. The white background, I can see why. The fact that they want you to have your ears showing in the picture was a bit baffling, but the most surprising thing for me was that you're not allowed to smile for the picture... I guess they like serious people only in America?

With pictures in hand, receipts for the money we paid and pre-filled forms, we arrived at the embassy on time. The forms are fascinating in their own right. They actually ask you directly if you happen to be a terrorist and intend to carry our terror activities in the US. Well, fortunately, we're not terrorist and don't intend to blow up America, so that part was easy enough.

So, at the embassy we arrived, awaiting our interview with the consul, imagining some nice fancy office where we would be seated promptly, perhaps offered some refreshments even, and chat with the consul about our lives. As per the recommendations on the embassy's website, we brought papers and documents about our lives and our business. It sounded like the USA was taking a genuine interest in us, which I guess can be considered flattering.

Well, welcome to the real world. On the pavement, outside the embassy's walls, we meet the first representative, a nice Israeli security guy, telling us that you're not allowed to bring anything inside. Not even your cell phone or a pen. There's a service where you can deposit your belongings (yes, another small fee goes into the American treasury - I am pretty sure I paid any outstanding debts Israel has to America yesterday). Once ready, forms in hand, we were told to stand on a queue. Outside, in the sun, no shade, on the pavement. At least it wasn't raining! You stand there waiting, and when you finally reach the head of the line, you are asked to move forward, in groups of five, to the next queue, where something weird happens - a different security guy wants to see your palms and then touches them with some piece of paper. No explanations given, and it is a rather weird procedure. I can only guess they're checking for traces of explosives? Well, anything to make the waiting time more interesting!

Finally, it's time for us to enter the gates of the embassy! We walk inside and are asked to take off any metal objects, belts, jewelry, anything and go through the metal detector. From there, no line in the middle, we move on to another room where our belongings now go through their own routine of detectors and we receive them on the other end of the machine. Finally, we're all done and go into the next gate, hoping this is finally where we get to see the consul. Wrong. We're not even within the building yet and we just moved on into another queue! A longer queue this time, and finally we're in the shade.

20 minutes later, after being entertained by yet another embassy guy explaining more about the forms and checking to see that we all have the right ones, we finally walk into the building.... right into the mega-queue... A much longer one this one, and less ordered, since people stop on the way to fix things with their forms and attach their pictures to them, but at least we're indoors and it's air conditioned.

After another half an hour or so, it's finally our turn and we go to booth number 7, where a rather impatient and rude man takes our fingerprints. He wasn't very happy with mine, for some reason or other, and I had to follow his instructions carefully and have some substance sprayed on my hands to get the fingerprints right. Well, finally, that small torture is over and, yup, we're back on another queue! A shorter one now, which brings us to a nice American lady who is there to verify that the finger prints that had been taken minutes before are really ours. No idea why this extra step, but I guess those fingerprints are very important.

Finally, we're on the last queue, this one for the much awaited interview with the consul! So much for fancy chairs and refreshments lol. The interview is held with us standing in front of yet another booth. Apparently there are several consuls and they just chain-interview applicants. Our consul lady was very nice and friendly, and our application was approved within minutes and finally, after paying yet one more small fee, we were out of there!

If you haven't fallen asleep by now, reading my lengthy description, I admire you. It was long to go through and made us think of what the Palestinians have to go through daily in their dealings with the Israeli soldiers at various bureaucratic intersections, or just making their way from one roadblock to another. Obviously, what they go through is 100 times worse. No air condition and no kind American consuls at any point. Instead, they have to face some bored and often scared kid in uniform, who hates being there, and couldn't care less about showing any manners. Honestly, if I had to go through the same, I would start an Intifada myself quickly enough. Nothing is more annoying to me than standing in lines and being treated rudely by some jerk on the other side. I can't imagine what it's like being treated like the Palestinians are, in such rough conditions and on a daily basis too. Sigh. The word humiliating only begins to describe what it must feel like.

Ok, I am straying into politics again and this post is getting way way too long as it is. Time to wrap things up and get back to work!

Spring is Here!

2008-03-04T14:43:00.002+02:00

We've planted Paulownia trees just before winter time. They shed their leaves petty quickly, and we've had to remind people that those sticks are actually trees, so please not to break them down. I wasn't even sure if they're still alive or not, but a couple of them are beginning to show the tips of new buds! And the oak trees, oh my - some of them are covered with fresh green buds - absolutely gorgeous! And yes, I will be taking some pictures ;)

I wish the people of this region will take a deep breath and take a few minutes to look around. For me, the eternal cycle of nature is a sign of our own transience as human beings, and as peoples as well. I was thinking the other day about what it means for me to be Jewish. I am not religious, even an atheist, but I belong to the Jewish people. Being Jewish is more than a religion, it's more than an ethnic group too. Above all, for me, it's a matter of belonging to a cultural group with a joint national awareness that has existed for literally thousands of years. And still, looking at nature around me, I am reminded how thousands of years aren't really that much in the overall earth timetable. Trees and insects around me have been around for much longer, and I suspect they will be for much longer after the human race is gone. Isn't it a shame that people get so busy with killing each other that they fail to see that?

A bit of a silly post today, I know. Just a flitting thought running through my mind, having just walked inside from a glorious sunny day. Wishing peace to the people of the region.

Is it March already?

2008-02-29T08:27:00.002+02:00

Where did the time fly? Ok, quite a lot of if was literally eaten by bugs. Seems like there's a world epidemic, judging by my online friends and acquaintances and it has hit our household too! The kids started it early February, and the past couple of weeks it was parents time, ack.

Not too many family outings to report this time, alas. We were operating on survival mode pretty much... I think we're doing better though, so looking forward to the next few weeks. It's spring time here, pretty much, and everything is absolutely beautiful, green and dotted with flowers. I promise to take lots of pictures. Hey, even our backyard looks gorgeous in the wild garden part of it!

On the national level, things aren't as good. With the rockets from Gaza moving in some more, the town of Ashkelon is now within range, so we have a few more tens of thousands of people living in fear now. This time, we have family in the line of fire, so we're keeping our fingers crossed for you, Oren and Leslie!

And yes, I'm only too aware of Israel's activities against the Palestinians, and the casualties on the other side. Can I say that to this mom, the whole situation is beyond absurd by now? People shooting at each other like crazy, for no apparent reason, as far as I can tell. Well, sure, they have a long list of reasons, mainly stating that "they started it! we're just retaliating/defending ourselves/trying to make them stop etc etc". Meanwhile, so many children on both sides have been hurt, killed or maimed, or lost their dads in this stupid war. Sigh.

Anyway, I still try not to listen to the news too much. It's become way too frustrating. I try to focus on working on my online projects, you can join me for some of them at my new forums - www.sitenurery.com so check in when you can ;)

2008-02-01T11:54:00.000+02:00

I can't believe it's been 2 weeks since my last post here - even more than that! I really do mean to post more often, but life just takes over and other things hog up my time. Now is a good example, as I have to be outta here in 5 minutes. It's being snowing in some parts of Israel and we're taking the kids up to the Golan Heights to see some snow.

Wanted to share a few pics from our excursion from last week. It was a lovely day, despite the forecast predicting a storm ahead, so we canceled kindergarten for the day, packed up the kids and headed out.

First stop was in the Museum of the Armor Corps. Very militaristic, I know, but hey, I got two boys aged 4 and 6 here and they're going through the super heros and soldiers phase. They were thrilled, especially since we had an older boy with us who has actually driven and fired tanks like that before (he's 37 years old btw and their dad, in case anyone was wondering).

After that we went to see a very special carstic cave with stalagmites and stalactites. A very special place, one of a kind in Israe. Gotta rush out of here within seconds, so just let me throw the pics up. Enjoy!

Freezing Over Here

2008-01-14T16:21:00.000+02:00

Sorry, can't think of a better title for today, or for this entire week. My memory was never very good, I admit, but I find it hard to recall a much colder week. I believe it's some sort of a freak weather front from Russia? that's what I heard anyway. Just very very cold air hitting the country. No rain, clear sunny sky, just cold. Our lawn was covered in frost several times already this week, and it's making it turn yellow :(

Here's a picture of our frost covered lawn. Keep in mind we're talking dry days and nights, so it's not a lot of frost but it's cold frost.

Anyway, cold as it is, we do get out and about and I have a couple of movies to share today. Edited by IsraeliDad (quickly edited, I might add, with no proofreading done on the subtitles...), the first one is a bit embarrassing...

If you're done laughing at my bovine adventures, here's a nice short clip of our visit to the edge of Israel. The Western North tip, on the border between Israel, Lebanon and the Mediterranean -

Merry Christmas Everyone!

2007-12-24T18:41:00.000+02:00

Well, those who celebrate it anyway ;)

It's a regular Monday at our household, with IsraeliDad away on reserve duties :(

We will be celebrating tomorrow, with my sister-in-law (she's English turned Israeli and still celebrates Christmas). We've been celebrating every year, pretty much, over the past few years, since I have not one but two English SIL's! My kids are well familiar with Santa and the tree by now. They don't get any presents, but they still enjoy the decorations.

Not much else happening around these parts. I've been busy with work and life, as usual. Got a new project that I'm working on, where I need to be writing lots of texts and tutorials. You can actually join me there if you like, since the site is actually a board - www.sitenursery.com

My goal with Site Nursery is to provide a place for people who are interested in web publishing to come and learn the basics in a friendly and supportive atmosphere. It's about how you can make money from web publishing, which isn't that easy anymore but can still be immensely rewarding (and I don't mean that in the strictly financial sense either). This project is aimed at total beginners, so don't be shy and join in with any questions you may have, or just browse through the tutorials I already listed.

Belated Happy Hannuka

2007-12-12T08:17:00.000+02:00

Haven't posted for a while. It's the last day of the Hannuka holiday here and we had a busy week with the kids at home, meeting friends and family. Not complaining, all is well, and we enjoyed our social activities, but I didn't have too much computer time.

The kids had a blast lighting candles every night. Here's a picture from the candle lighting of the fourth night. You can see only 4 candles in the Menorah, along with the Shamash (the candle which we use to light the other candles with - you don't count that one, but you leave it, higher up than the others, in the Menorah). We spent the evening with friends, and Ron and Dan has a special guest too! The sweet little girl next to Ron there is my niece Sheeran who stayed over with us that weekend. Note that bawl of Hannuka donuts - wasn't a single one left by the end of the evening (I didn't even have a bite, honestly!)

The next day we took the kids to the movies, all three of them. The car ride was a bit crowded but lots of fun, as we were singing Hanuka songs along the way.

We then went to visit my brother's family, to get little Sheeran back home. I absolutely loved this picture of Ron and Sheeran's little sister, Noah. Yes, Noah is a girl's name in Hebrew (spelled and pronounced differently than the biblical Noah).

A couple of days later, IsraeliDad, Dan and myself went on a day trip with some friends. Ron stayed at home because he wasn't feeling too well (he was fine later on, no worries). We visited an organic goat farm near Jerusalem where they produce local cheeses. They have their own website, it anyone's interested: http://harharuach.com/ There's a page in English there, but unfortunately it doesn't have a link to their nice picture gallery.

Here are Dan and ID right before our tour of the farm -

We absolutely loved the little baby goats -

The next destination was the caves of Beit Govrin
where we toured the special bell caves and spent a nice time crawling through the caves. Some of them are fairly large, actually, as you can see here, but they form an intricate network of caves with some nice passages where you squeeze from one cave to another.

These are all manmade caves, dug approximately three thousand years ago and include some neat features like the authentic oil presser within the caves -

Dan had a nice time being quite the tourist there, and there were a couple of times when we had to chase him through the caves to find out where he went to -

We did lots of other stuff during Hanuka too. I have a bunch of pics and movies to download from my camera and will post them soon, I hope.

More Pictures! This time from the Carmel Mt. and Golan Heights

2007-11-28T07:54:00.000+02:00

These pictures aren't fresh out of the oven, but I thought they were still worth sharing. The first set is of pictures taken last week, during a rainy day we had here. We traveled with our guest, Doris, to shop for souvenirs in the Druze village on the Carmel Mountain, Dalyat El Carmel. We also went up to the Carmelite Monastery there, where we encountered a magnificent full rainbow all over the valley!

Not easy to take good pictures of a rainbow! Trust me, it was very impressive.

We were standing on the roof of the Monastery, which is a great observation point, from which you can see all the way to Nazareth, Haifa and more, if the visibility is good. It was a rainy day though, but as you can see, Dan was making the most of it!

I thought this stature of Elijah the prophet looked quite impressive standing motionless in the wind -

A few days later, the weather cleared and we headed north on a sunny Saturday morning to visit the family (IsraeliDad's brother and his family) in the Golan Heights. For some reason, non-Israelis seem to have this image of the Golan Heights as a war zone. While it most certainly was a war zone in the past (well, during the wars, basically), it's actually probably one of the safest areas to tour in Israel. I couldn't resist taking a snapshot of the "Beware of the Mines" sign though :) Nothing to worry about, they're well fenced and aren't all over the place.

This is what the houses in the Kibbutz where our family lives look like. Charming and very peaceful -

A kibbutz is always a great place for kids to hang around. While we were having lunch at the communal dining room, Ron and Dan were just having fun checking the local insects or something.

The good thing about these trips this time of the year as that as soon as we hit the road going back home, the two rascals fall asleep in the car:

And before we part... a major event here this week - Ron lost his firth baby tooth! Congratulations, Sweetie, you're growing up!

Visit to Jerusalem - The Movie

2007-11-23T19:20:00.000+02:00

I said I'd post the movie clips I took when visiting Jerusalem last week, so here goes. This is just a quick edit job I did, nothing fancy. Comments are welcome, good or bad, I'm curious to see what people think of this format.

The "movie" depicts parts of our visit to Jerusalem and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where according to tradition, Jesus Christ was laid to rest and was buried.

Pictures from Jerusalem

2007-11-20T21:01:00.001+02:00

Finally downloaded the pictures from our visit to Jerusalem on Sunday, with Budd and Doris. Some nice pictures, I think, so sharing them here today. Be warned - picture heavy post today. My apologies to those on dial-up!

We started our tour with a panoramic view over the Old City from the observation point at "Armon Ha'Natziv". Check out the golden mosque in the middle - that's the Dome of the Rock.

Another part of Jerusalem from the same place:

IsraeliDad and myself posing ;)

The view from another place, where you can see the desert of Judea (the Dead Sea is in that direction as well)

We visited the Wailing Wall, and this is what it looks like from the women's side (women and men are separated when approaching the Wall.

Inside the Old city, walking in the alleys of the bazaar:

We walked to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where according to tradition, Jesus was laid to rest and buried. This is us talking at the entrance of the Church. Being a Sunday, the place was full of people, especially pilgrims.

We joined a line of pilgrims inside to see the Tomb of Christ. We had to stand in the line for almost an hour, and eventually Doris and myself entered and were lead by one of the priest into this tiny room. This is what the entrance to the room looks like -

You have to really mind your head as you have to bend over to get inside. Once inside, most people get down to their knees anyway (although I had no problem standing up inside and I'm 5'11''). Inside you have a small space, which you share with 4-5 other people who were let inside on the same round. There's a marble plate, with some candles and dozens of incense lamps hanging from above. Naturally, the people entering are extremely moved. Watching these pilgrims lay their hands on the Tomb of Jesus was quite a sight. Here's a picture of the tomb itself:

I really loved the atmosphere of the church. Something very authentic and medieval about the place. Lots of incense and chanting all the time (it being Sunday afternoon, there were services performed by various Churches, one after the other). Here are a couple of pictures from the Church, where you can hopefully get a sense of the dark medieval feeling -

If you look closely, the monks there are actually carrying light bulbs... so much for medieval authenticity ;)

Outside the church, we strolled through the market some more. It was so colorful and the visuals so enticing, I can't help but share a few pics here:

By the time we walked out of the Old City it was getting dark. I managed to take this pretty picture of the Walls of the City and the Tower of David -

We ended up walking through this lovely arcade, filled with very modern shop, back to the car and back home:

Whew, lots of pictures! If you made it so far, wait for the next post where I plan on sharing a clip or two from our day in Jerusalem. I took some nice movies, inside the church too, where you can hear the chanting and get some more visuals.

Happy Birthday Dan!

2007-11-19T21:43:00.000+02:00

Our Dan turned 4 and we threw him a little family party here on Saturday. Finally downloaded the pics, and thought I'd share them here. We had brunch on the patio, with about 20 family members and close friends, including two guests from the US, the lovely Budd and Doris.

Some of the guests out in the patio. Note the glorious weather we had (unlike the rain today). That's my mom giving my younger brother a back rub there.

Dan, the birthday boy, checking out the gifts. He got tons of very cool stuff, covering every super hero out there including Sonic the Hedgehog (a favorite of his).

My mom made him a collection of toy cars and dinosaurs, all in a large box with a hole cut into it. He had to keep reaching with his hand inside and took out more and more toys. Both boys loved it, as you can see ;)

As per the birthday boy's request, IsraeliDad made him a cake with Tails on it (Tails is another character from his favorite tv show - Sonic the Hedgehog...):

The small buffet, which included my famous spinach and broccoli quiche, potato salad, artichoke salad, local pastries called bourekas (filled with potato mash), cheeses and specialty breads, vine leaves filled with rice, a big green salad and a plate of vegetable sticks... Later on, another huge salad and a pot of stew were added as well. Yup... way too much food!

Our New Lawn

2007-11-13T21:10:00.000+02:00

We've put in a new lawn a few weeks ago, and finally we're allowed to actually step on it! Thought I'd share a few pictures here :)

Doesn't look like a very large lawn there, I know lol. It really isn't a big lawn, but it is a bit larger than that patch on the other sides ;) I just really liked the pics because the kids were so excited about mowing the grass. So, here's a better view of the house and lawn -

I think the green really adds. Makes the house look very "suburban" to me, if that makes sense. Not a bad thing either... Feeling quite suburban this week anyway, lots of work, taking care of the kids, nothing very exciting happening...

Out with the Kids

2007-11-04T10:07:00.001+02:00

Not a long post today, just sharing a couple of videos from our digital camera. Out on the town with the kids.

First one was taken on Thursday. We went to Netanya, where my mom lives, to watch the fireworks. The fireworks show was this publicity stunt pulled by a major cell phone company in Israel in honor of their 3 millionth customer. They said they would "light up" the sky all over Israel, in cities and towns across the country at exactly the same time. Our kids absolutely love fireworks, so we decided to go. Just before the fireworks began, we strolled in the park and watched some roller skaters.

The second video is mostly for Hebrew speakers. It's about a minute long interview with Ron and Dan, over a kiddie airplane at the mall. Dan there is explaining how they're flying to Africa to save the eskimoes (yes, he means the Inuits, still using the non-PC terms here...). Ron is talking about the problem with fuel and they both end up parachuting out of the plane.

Back to Posting!

2007-10-30T21:31:00.000+02:00

Finally, my summer hiatus is over :D

Yes, I did take longer than I said I would, but my husband says I'm excellent at finding excuses, so here's mine. We had the holidays here, right after the summer vacation. By holidays, I mean Rosh Hashana (New Year's) followed closely by Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) and Sukkot (No idea if it has a name in English, but it's one long holiday with 8 days off school for the kids!).

I took a few more weeks to bounce back into normal life, get my work projects in order and so on, and here I am, back to posting!

Not even sure where to pick it up... One thing I should say right ahead, I pretty much distanced myself from most things political. I hardly keep track of the news these days, and I definitely stay away from political boards. Not even sure why, I think I OD'ed on politics last year, and maybe I need a break.

I think I'll make this post with lots of pictures, really, just show what life here looks like these days and mention some of our activities. Let's start with the two in-house rascals, Ron and Dan.

They both started new kindergartens this year. Ron is at the kindergarten which belongs to the democratic school in Pardes Hana. A new school, set up this year, promoting the values of democracy in theory and in practice. I'll elaborate about it in some future post. Dan, the younger fella, is at a local Hari Krishna kindergarten. Yes, that's the Indian sect. There is a group of Israeli Hari Krishna followers living not too far from our town and they set up a kindergarten in a nearby kibbutz. They don't preach or teach their religion or philosophy there. They simply provide a wonderful kindergarten, peaceful and loving, where the kids practice yoga as well as play. Dan absolutely loves the place, and so do we!

As you can see in this picture, they're both very cheerful and happy to model their new Superman shirts and respective Batman and Spiderman shoes. We have reached the age of Super Heros, so Superman, Batman and Spiderman are practically family members these days.

As for DH and me, we're doing well and focusing on promoting the home business and working out. Working out is a huge theme in our lives these days. I've taken up running and am doing a good job with it. I started from being able to run maybe 200 meters and am now at just over 3 kilometers, working my way up to 5km! I also lost quite a bit of weight, about 15kg (just over 30lbs), in the past 4-5 months. I won't say I'm slim yet, but I'm definitely much much more fit. We've also started what we hope will turn into a new tradition of weekend hikes. Last Friday we went to a nearby nature reserve. There and back, it was a good 15km hike, and we didn't take it too slowly either. Net walking time must have been around 3 hours. It was lots of fun though! So, here's a couple of pictures from that trip -

That's it for now, hope to be posting more regularly from now on. Thanks to all of those who stuck around!

Summer Hiatus

2007-07-14T16:44:00.000+03:00

I am so out of touch with current events in the region, or in the world, and enjoying it so far! Just a quick update on our lives here. Let's see, it's hot but air conditioning works just fine, all over our home and in the car too, so it's tolerable. I am taking time off the swimming pool due to an ear infection and a slight cold too. I skipped my exercise twice this week because of that, but overall I think I did pretty well, considering I am not too well.

Oh, it's my birthday today! I guess that's newsworthy enough :D We're not doing anything special for it though. We had a great time today, visiting the local Hari Krishna folks in their kindergarten. They had an open day and invited us over. We spent a while doing crafts and Ron and me made this cute miniature raft with a little man made of clay sitting there and sailing away. Everyone was really impressed with it, until they found out it was done by a 35 years old and not a 5 years old :D

By the way, I am only 35 in earth years. I have decided to switch to Martian years from now on. A year on Mars has 686 days in it. Which I think makes me about 17 years old. Being a Martian has the added benefit of reducing my weight to a third of what it is here on earth. In other words, I am really an anorexic. I just have issues with the local G force on this blue planet here ;)

Gotta run now, time to feed the little earthlings here!

Long Days of Summer

2007-06-30T18:53:00.000+03:00

Putting politics aside for a while. It's almost too hot to think this week. We try to stay indoors (where it's air conditioned) but life requires us to leave the house every now and again, sigh.

Actually, IsraeliDad and myself stick to our workout routine quite well, I think! It's alternating between gym practice and the swimming pool still! We also take the kids to the pool as often as possible (2-3 times a week), so there's some added swimming practice for us there as well.

Sun, sea and fun. Enjoy summertime everyone!

Visions for the Future

2007-06-27T14:38:00.001+03:00

I have been entangled in a couple of interesting debates in online forums/groups about the vision for the end of the Arab-Israeli conflict. One person has very eloquently presented us with a picture of future Israel as a bi-national state from the sea to the Jordan, inclusive of all its citizens, Jews and Arabs alike. On another board, an Arab member mentioned he does not see a distinction between Israel before 1967 and after - it is all occupied land for him and he will fight to have it all released and turned into a pluralistic democratic state with equal rights to all.

The idea of the bi-national state is one that has been on my mind since Khaled's visit. I never felt comfortable with it, and had a difficult time pinpointing why. In theory, it has this ring of a wonderful utopian idea. The easy answer to its promoters was, "it's just not going to work". The Israelis aren't ready, the Palestinians aren't ready - no way for it to work on the ground. I have been thinking more about it, and here are some more thoughts - by no means final. They do touch deeper strata though, at least to me.

They go back to what makes this my home.

This is my home because I am part of this unique cultural phenomenon of the Israeli Zionist Jewish State. Lots of adjectives and they all count.

I know that for many Arabs, Zionism (and maybe Israeli too) sounds like a cuss word... to get this out of the way: I am not any more proud of some things done in the name of Zionism, then they are proud of any single thing done in the name of Islam or the Arab nation. Yet, just like they are still proud of their heritage as a whole, I do consider myself a proud Zionist and a proud Israeli.

Values that I hold dear and see as part of Zionism include secularism (even atheism), science, pluralism, socialism (another dirty word to some...), enterprise, improvisation, activism and many more. These represent Zionist Israel to me. This, along with a rich culture of music, writing, art, movies that simply doesn't exist elsewhere. It's not a Jewish culture, although it has strong Jewish roots, obviously. It's a mix of things that I will leave to people like profession Oz Almog to analyse, as he does it so much better than me. I will say that though - it's a non-minority culture, and in that sense it is different from Diaspora Jewish culture.

Granted, there is a constant internal struggle in Israel to maintain that identity. Like many other societies, Israel's is ever changing. I belong to the part that wants to push (back?) towards a secular, science oriented, socialistic, compassionate, humanistic and democratic Zionist State.

In my vision of Israel, essentially the vision of the Israeli Zionist left wing, there will be no racism, no discrimination based on religion or ethnic group. In my vision, Israel withdraws from the West Bank and the Golan Heights and lives alongside with its friendly neighbors, with close ties of cooperation in the fields of science, industry, economy, health and culture. The only question that remains in my mind is, do we have partners for that vision on the other side of the border. The jury is still out on that one, as far as I'm concerned.

My point is, I don't want a bi-national state if it means I lose my identity. I don't want to be "a Jew" in a non-Jewish state either. Judaism is very much part of the national character of my country, and I want to retain that cultural uniqueness. Moreover, as a Jew, I do not want to be a minority in my country. If you offer me a solution which means I become an ethnic minority again, you are in essence indeed throwing me into to the sea, because it will no longer matter whether I live here or in Europe or America.

To be fair to Khaled's idea, he did also talk about a con-federation or EU kind of model, where each part retains its own cultural and ethnic character, but there's economic cooperation, right of passage to all and so on. That solution I can live with, but not the bi-national state one.

Local Version of Hope

2007-06-21T08:40:00.000+03:00

The more I interact with people online, learning to see this conflict from various perspectives, the more I realize how difficult it is. I mean, it's complex enough to try and see it from the Israeli perspective... learning what it looks like through the eyes of other people is truly enlightening in that respect. I think that cultural exchanges can be a good way of letting others see what it's like on our side. Well, maybe. Or it might just confuse you more ;)

Enough blabbing, I'll try and keep this one short(er). I want to share a song today, a popular rap song, no less by a rapper named "Subliminal". Plays on the Israeli radio stations daily, at least on the one I listen to - Galgalatz, a military radio station that has little to do with the military and is mostly involved with fighting traffic accidents (one of those things you need live here to understand, I guess).

Here are the lyrics, in my own simplistic translation - my apologies to the writers, it does sounds better in Hebrew, especially with the music. Video clip will be embedded below, if I can get it to work. Please don't take these are representing my own personal political views. To me, more than anything, this song shows the confusion in Israeli society. The mix of wanting peace, wanting to remain militarily strong and secure, getting sick of wars and death, and just ending up being confused but still hopeful. The name of the song is "Hope", which is also the name of the Zionist national anthem: HaTikva, literally meaning "The Hope".

I saw how they went
Too many of them never returned
Friends said goodbye, homes were broken,
Tears were shed by families,
Young people, flowers that will never bloom,
The hope (HaTikva) in our minds, love in our souls,
The dream in our spirit, so forever we shall continue.

Gone is the silence, sounds of war again,
Another soldier returns wrapped up in the national flag,
Blood and a tear absorbed in the soil,
Another shocked mother, left only with a picture,
I lock the hope in my heart, a strong people won't break,
Because the SOB who will stop Israel wasn't born yet.

Give me the hope to accept what there is not,
The strength to change what there is.

Let us continue, life is ahead,
It's not too late, tomorrow is a brand new day,
The dream will die if we lose the hope,
So reach your hands for love.

You promised us a dove, we see an eagle in the sky,
Brother, the poisonous stinging nettle is not the olive branch,
Living like a dream, everyone talking about peace,
but they keep shooting, pulling the trigger,
In a world of terror attacks, innocent people still talk,
Living in an illusion of justice, they increase the gap in the people.

Going thruogh daily madness to survive,
Don't want to live to fight,
The Sub fights to live,
Planting hope, setting in roots,
Protecting the dream with my body, to stop it from shattering,
Enough, enough of pain, enough of drama
It's been over a year that the land bleeds and not sleeps, and why

Give me the hope to accept what there is not,
The courage to try and fix it.

Let us continue, life is ahead...

God, give me the hope to accept what there is not,
Give me the strength to change what there is,
Give me the courage to try and fix the world.

Sounds confused and ambivalent? It does to me, but in that I think it is not a bad reflection of Israeli society at this point in time. Anyway, here's the video, if I can manage to embed it here -

OD'ing on Politics and a little story

2007-06-18T19:21:00.000+03:00

I have been spending way too much time lately on political boards and email groups... sigh, about to take a break, I think, or hope, before I seriously OD on it all.

It is soooo frustrating too. I feel like I'm this sort of bridge between people from both sides of the fence, and it's not a nice feeling, it sometimes includes feeling stepped over ;) I come back to IsraeliDad and other Israelis here, recounting things I hear on the boards from Arab fellow posters. I get bombarded with accusations to the other sides... I go to the boards, and get bombarded back with accusations about Israel... Here's the interesting bit, the people I talk to here, and the people I "talk" to online, are the pro-peace ones, on both sides. The moderates. Very upsetting, I mean, if we can't get the moderates to see eye to eye, then how on earth are we going to get to a stable agreement that will somehow put the extremists at bay?

As far as I can see, there is just so much mistrust on both sides. So many mis-perceptions, based on some fact and plenty of interpretations (derived from the initial mistrust). Here's a story I sometimes read to my kids here. The short, very short version of it, it is beautifully written in Hebrew by a well-known Israeli author here, Ephraim Sidon. The story is called "Uzo and Muzo from the village of Kakaruzo".

Uzo and Muzo were two loving brothers that grew up together in their peaceful village. One day they fight over some silly thing. First words, then some punches, and they solemnly declare they will never speak to each other again. What's more, they build a wall, right in the middle of the house. They no longer see each other ever since. When they bring their brides home, they are asked about the wall and reply saying a terribly person lives on the other side, and to never ever as much as look over the wall. Same tale is told to their sons, who in their turn tell it to their own sons and so on. As generations pass, the tale gets darker. The person is gradually transformed to a horrible man eating monster that lives on the other side of the wall. Nobody dare take a look, it's too risky.

Then one day, a young child from one of the sides gets really curious. His mom goes out for a while, and he can no longer resist temptation. He desperately wants to take just a quick look at the horrible monster. He pulls up a ladder and climbs up to take a look at the other side of the wall. Lo and behold! On the other side he sees a little girl! He calls out to her, anxious, telling her to hurry up, climb over back to the right side of the wall! The monster could come back and get her any minute! The little girl is just as shocked to see him, telling him to stop playing around and hurry down to her side - doesn't he know there's a terrible man eating monster on the side of the wall from where he just showed up?

After some frantic calls, they finally realize the amazing truth. There is no monster! On both sides there are only people! Amazed at the revelation, the little boy goes down on the girl's side and comes to visit her family. Her dad faints right into the soup when he learns the boy is "from the other side". Finally, they all head up towards the wall. Meantime, on the boy's side, his family are looking for him, realizing in terror that he has crossed over... The two families meet on top of the wall. Within days, after learning the truth, the wall is brought down and people on both sides are united. The little boy and girl end up marrying btw. And as the families sit together, they shake their heads in amazement at how stupid they were all these years, not to realize it's only people just like them on the other side of the wall.

Nice story, don't you think? I'll stop with that for now. Been meaning to post this one for a while. I think about it often when I keep crossing the wall in the virtual realms of the Internet, trying to convince people on both sides that there is no monster on the other side...

Is there such a thing as EVIL in politics?

2007-06-13T14:59:00.000+03:00

Wow, I haven't posted in five days. It seems longer from here, I swear. Been working out like crazy, almost everyday, and spending the rest of the day either sleeping it off or the regular family/work routine.

I did find some time (not too much) for some political banter via emails and boards. Something occurred to me that I thought was worth posting about. I see the word "evil" used in connection with the current American government and it bothers me. Now, to make it clear, I am not a supporter of the current American President. I think he's done a lot of damage to the Middle East and probably elsewhere as well. However, can a government, any government (even the neo-cons!) be evil?

I can actually see how individuals can be evil. I am not talking about doing something that is hurtful, violent, "bad", but actually being evil. It's a psycho-pathological issue to me. Some people take joy in hurting others and exist for that end. Fortunately, they are uncommon and when they act by their sick drives they are hopefully locked away in some mental institution where they belong.

But whole governments/regimes/countries/societies? I think some people use the phrase "evil" too lightly there. What bothers me the most is that these are the exact words used by Bush and co. The "Evil Axis" is comprised of "Evil" countries and entities. According to them, some countries are evil in those very simplistic biblical (or comics - take your choice) terminology. Apparently, to the neo-cons, Iran is "Evil", Syria is "Evil", the Hezbulla is definitely "Evil", not to mention Dr Evil himself - Osama Bin Ladden who leads a whole secret evil empire from his hiding place.

I think that coloring any group of people as evil is wrong. I think Bush and co. are wrong to be doing this. By the same token, I think some of my leftie friends are wrong for coloring the American government as "evil". Governments are usually stupid, not evil. Maybe I spent too many years within "the establishment" lol, but I absolutely will not accept the conspiratorial theories of a group of people sitting together and thinking up "evil" plans. It just doesn't work like that. They may do horrible things, for sure, but they have some logic in which these actions are meant to serve some kind of good. The same is true for Al Kaida even. It's even true, dare I say it, for the Nazi regime.

We can and should question their world view and argue against it. But I think we shouldn't take the easy route out and label them as "evil" or "bad" guys. The world is more complicated than that and life just isn't a comics book... Trying to put yourself in the other side's position, trying to learn their logic, however thwarted it may seem to you, is the only way to move forward with some sort of bridge building process. It's the only way to somehow get the other side to change its views, at least soften them, and prevent more bloodshed.

Dona Nobis Pacem

2007-06-06T07:11:00.000+03:00

I was invited to join in a special bloggers initiative where bloggers from all over the world will be posting with the same title today: Dona Nobis Pacem, which means "Give Us Peace".

I am not sure who is supposed to give it to us, and I have a feeling a little bit of activism might be needed along the way, but I liked the gesture, so I am raising my banner today to "Dona Nobis Pacem".

Thanks Mimi for asking me to join in!

New Israelis

2007-06-03T07:39:00.000+03:00

Saw this in the "morning e-papers" - Israel is Our Home

This article brings the story of the children of foreign workers, born and bred in Israel to non-Jewish parents who came to this country as illegal (or sometimes legal) workers. People from countries like Nigeria, Thailand, and the Philippines. From the article:

Recently the Ministry of Interior ran a campaign granting citizenship to the children of foreign workers. To be eligible, the ministry

stated, they had to be under the age of 18, and must have arrived in Israel before the age of 14. They need to have resided in Israel for at least five years and their parents must be in the country legally. The ministry expected 12 000 families to storm the offices asking for permanent citizenship, but only 800 families applied. Almost half of the applications were denied.

I've been meaning to say a word or two about the Israeli Law of Return for a while now, and this is a good chance to say it. I think it's appalling. I think it's terrible that someone can get into this country, get an automatic citizenship plus benefits just because he is Jewish. He doesn't even have to be a believing Jew, or share any beliefs or ideals with me - all that it takes for him to prove his "Jewishness" is some documents showing that his mother, or even his mother's mother were Jewish. That's about it. He can be a no good criminal with zero morals and the worst character imaginable with a record of God knows what, and he will be entered, given a citizenship, courses in Hebrew, money and grants.

Then you have these wonderful people from the Philippines or Nigeria. We all know them - they work in Israel. My grandfather has a (legal) caregiver from the Philippines. We used to have a wonderful guy from Nigeria working for us in housekeeping back when we used to live in Tel Aviv. Wonderful people, both of them. I would preferred to see them receive citizenship here, and be able to live a respectable life. I don't care if they are Jewish or not. All I ask is for them to learn and then commit themselves to the core values of this country, the way I see them. To the the Declaration of Independence (our closest equivalent to a constitution in many respects) which says that Israel "will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture;"

Anyone who is willing to sign on to that is more than welcome to share this country with me. I don't care if they are Christian, Muslim or Jewish. I do expect them to accept the other parts of the Declaration, the ones dealing with the unique Jewish identity of this country, but that, in my opinion should not be too difficult to live with. Just like immigrants from all over the world live with "With God We Trust" on the American dollar (be them atheists or pagan), or with Sunday being the holy day on any Western country. There are unique cultural characteristics to every country. Israel differs from many by taking hers from Judaism rather than from other religions. This should not mean enforcing any religion on anyone, just living with cultural characteristics that should never be allowed to infringe on basic human rights. If you can live with that, I for one would welcome you here for generations to come.

So, for what it's worth, I strongly believe the Ministry of Interior should stop putting up hurdles in front of these people. If they wish to join us and share our lives here, we should welcome them, Jewish or not. We should feel secure enough within this country's Jewish identity element by now - I think I am - to allow others to join in and help us create a richer, more culturally and ethnically diverse society.

On a more personal note -
We had a lovely weekend here (yes, alas, it is over by Sunday morning). Swimming in the pool on Friday morning, playing a session of multi-player computer games in the evening (the grownups, yes, not the kids), then just taking it easy through out Saturday (which means some work hours for me but that's ok) and then a movie in the end - The third part of Pirates of the Caribbeans. Can't say we care for the movie too much... It was way too long (I was tired to begin with), too many sub-plots and too much "weirdness" all in all. Then again, comfy seats and popcorn, so not too bad either.

Shutting Down Metalks.com

2007-05-30T17:55:00.000+03:00

Just a short note to let everyone know that the forums we started on www.metalks.com in the summer are about to be shut down completely. I sent out an email to all registered users, but thought I might as well post it here.

I found similar forums at Shalom-Salaam.net
They are fairly active, whereas Metalks has been closed for public posting for a while now. So, seeing as there was no point in keeping it online, I'll be taking it offline permanently soon enough. If you want to take a final look before it disappears, head over today or tomorrow. It will probably not be with us come Saturday :)

Keeping My Head Above the Water

2007-05-29T17:37:00.000+03:00

Or rather, getting it into the water, actually.

I had my first swimming lesson today! I wasn't even sure if I could be taught how to swim. Actually, I'm still not sure! I am not very athletic and have some issues with multi-tasking different parts of my body... I decided to take up swimming, or try to, as part of an ongoing weight loss effort. IsraeliDad had this theory that swimming would be safer for me, and I would be less inclined to hurt myself while swimming. Well, that remains to be seen. So far, after one single lesson, I already feel pain all over!

I actually made some progress with making the right moves. I surprised myself by getting along fine with the whole "head under water" issue even. The main problem at this point is this: I manage to push myself into the pool and start my swim, get through the first set of moves, with my head still underwater.

Then comes the scary part. After you have performed one set of movements with your legs first and arms next, you're supposed to elegantly lift your head above the water surface, not too high, open your mouth in a swift burst of air to prevent water from dribbling in, then take in air and submerse your head again for the next set.

Well, by the time I get to the point when I'm allowed to take my head out of the water, I am very much in need of oxygen. I don't think I am looking very elegant at that moment either. My main focus is on getting some air in and I lift my head way too high for it. My body then responds by sinking lower into the water, and my head tends to follow (they are attached after all!). Of course, I had totally forgot bout that sophisticated mouth opening thing and have quite a lot of chlorine enriched water in my mouth by now. By the time my head sinks back in, I am choking and totally forget about my next set of movements anyway.... I usually just come to a halt, stopping in the middle of the pool, getting some precious air into the system while coughing some water out. I am not at all sure an objective observer would call my current style of swimming elegant, or even effective :p

My good friend Steve told me that the most important thing in swimming is not to panic. Well, I'm sorry, but when I can't breathe, I tend to panic, I guess. I'm not even sure if it's panic per se. I'm too busy thinking about oxygen to define my exact state of mind at that exact moment.

Anyway, my instructor has not given up hope. I think she thought I did well, and as I said, I think I did do fairly well, at least compared to what I had initially feared - that I wouldn't be able to keep my head under water and blow those bubbles.

Well, they say we all originated from swimming creatures and it's just a matter of allowing your body time to remember. I am counting on that and going for the full swimming adventure. We're about to get a membership to a good swimming pool in a nearby kibbutz and start practicing tomorrow morning!

Been a Busy Weekend and some more

2007-05-27T22:14:00.000+03:00

Whew, lovely and busy weekend over here. Thursday evening we got a phone call from IsraeliDad's eldest brother. He was having a great time with guests from abroad who were heading south, and suggested that we meet them. We always like meeting new people from different countries, so we jumped at the offer.

The next day two lovely couples arrived - Karen and Graham from New Zealand and Tom and Liz from Canada. All four of them sailing around the world in their yachts, no less. They were on shore for a change, touring Israel by car and getting to see places. They had set anchor in the Ashkelon harbor, where they met another one of hubby's brothers - who lives on a boat himself, along with his Missus. He apparently told them that no tour of Israel would be complete without meeting our zany family ;)

We had a wonderful time with our guests. As they arrived on Friday, we sat by the bonfire and just talked for hours. Fascinating people, with cool tales from their travels around the world. They were interested in our take on "the situation" in the Middle East, but I have to say, it was certainly refreshing to talk to people who were very neutral all in all. Their interest was purely intellectual, and it was obvious that they were not emotionally invested in this conflict. Nice to see that our problems here are not the focus of every person on the globe :p

The next day, we had a nice Israeli breakfast outside, in the shade of our oak trees. Then out we went, with guests and kids and visited the beautiful Ceasaria. Beautifully reconstructed, the place is truly a gem, showing you the history of the place, and through it of the whole region.

Signing off for tonight, it has been a long day, away from home (had to go to Tel Aviv on business), and I very nearly had a migraine (have to blog about it in my migraine blog too!). Here are some pictures from the weekend -

Breakfast outdoors

The ancient harbor of Ceasaria (destroyed in earthquakes over a thousand years ago)

Walking in the ruined (and reconstructed Ceasaria)

Recipe of the Day - A Palestinian State within 3 years

2007-05-24T07:24:00.000+03:00

Following my last post... I thought I'd be a good mom and add a recipe! It's real simple and contains only two stages - but it has a cooking time of probably 2-3 years.

Here's a recipe for an independent Palestinian State within 3 years:
1. Halt any violent activity towards Israel - terror attacks, qassam rockets, stone throwing, anything.

2. Arrange mass peaceful demonstrations. Send children to the borders, holding flowers and olive branches. Get the media to cover that. Do that en mass, constantly, repeatedly. Hold rallies with speakers calling out for peace. Smother Israelis with love, and show that to the world.

Within weeks, if not days, you'll have Israel at the negotiations table. You'll have to keep this up for months, even years. The non-violent part needs to remain forever, of course. You'll have your own State, prosperous and peaceful - within a few years.

My Palestinian friends, keep shooting the rockets and you are shooting them at yourself. You will bring only more devastation to your people both in the short term and long term. The Palestinians have one way of "beating" Israel in this game and getting their Palestinian State. You could have have your own Independent State several years ago and they can have it within a short number of years even now. The only road towards that is non-violent struggle.

Voices from Gaza

2007-05-24T07:05:00.000+03:00

Deb left a comment here a few days ago with a link to a blog by Dr Mona El Farra. I have been reading her blog (and commenting! I can't keep my mouth shut, as some may have noticed...). I think that many Israelis, myself included, are hungry for communications with the people living in Gaza. Gaza has become this black hole for Israelis, from which rockets are being fired and no one understands why. For peace seeking Israelis, Gaza was supposed to be some sort of a test case to the mantra we kept chanting all these years. To borrow from singer David Broza: "It's going to be ok, just get out of the occupied territories". Well, we got out of part of the occupied territories and it's not really ok, is it? Sigh. A blow to the peace process, a blow to the Israeli left wing, and Israelis can't even see why.

Having spent a while discussing this with Arabs (mostly online), I can see some different perspectives now. None of them really explains to me why the Palestinians are lobbing rockets at us. I sense a lot of anger, born out of sheer despair, at the horrible living conditions of hundreds of thousands of civilians crowded together. They blame Israel with a blockade, while at the same time constantly striving and succeeding even, in importing arms into Gaza.

What bothers me most, is the implicit support of the Kassam attacks by ordinary Palestinians living in Gaza. I hope I'm wrong there and that they don't support it, but I don't see any outright condemnation either. The Kassams are bad for Palestinians - not for Israelis. True, only a few causalities in Israeli from over 4,500 rockets lobbed into our territory. Why throw them then? You get zero military achievement, in terms of causalities (if this is even a military acheivement in its own...). You won't get Israel to stop any undesired policy that way, will you? How is that going to convince Israel to lift the blockade? As an Israeli, a mother, a human being, shuddering at the living conditions in Gaza, let me tell you, I do not want my government to allow Gaza open borders and trade. Convince me first that you won't be using the first opportunity given to get yourselves armed to the teeth with much more advanced rockets that will cause my country much more damage.

Personally, I advocate carefully monitored shipments into Gaza, from any side. Yes, call me patronizing, but I want either the Israeli Navy or some very thorough and effective international force to monitor any shipment going into Gaza. Food and medicine should be allowed in but I want to keep long-range rockets out. Will the Palestinians accept that? or will we get jumped on for "humiliating" them again? Too many issues of national pride involved I'm afraid...

Celebrating Shavuot

2007-05-22T20:15:00.000+03:00

IsraeliDad says that yesterday's post was way too long... So, not too much verbiage today, and more visuals. Sharing pictures from the celebration of Shavuot in kindergarten and then our visit to Netanya today where we encountered some armed militia fighters... armed to the teeth with water guns!

Dan and some friends there, checking out the "Tene"'s. Tene means basket, I think. It means a basket that you fill with fruit and vegetable and adorn with some greenery and bring to the Shavuot celebrations. These are supposed to be the first fruit and vegetables of the season. Well, our Tenne's had mainly avocados and lemons, and I can't say they were the first of the year. However, they were indeed from out own garden (ok, ok, backyard...).

The parents were pleasantly occupied with making nice head bands/crowns from straw with flowers strewn in. Very peaceful scene, with everyone wearing white and working away.

Ron and Dan with their flower crowns.

We had a nice time singing together. The kids did all they could not to totally ruin the party and some of them got into the singing nicely (not my kids though...)

These kids, armed to the teeth with water guns, were only a few of the water warriors swarming through the streets of Netanya when we got there today. The local custom is to have water wars. Looks like things have changed dramatically from our childhood water balloons (who had balloons even, we used plain old nylon bags :p) . These kids have the latest technology with huge rifles and ammunition tanks on their backs!

In a feat of true investigating journalism, I bravely went out of the car and asked a few of them to pose for the camera. We later got sprayed nicely, but fortunately while in the car with the windows rolled up!

So much for our Shavuot. It's been fun so far and we may continue tomorrow as well. Happy Shavuot to all who celebrate.

Parenting in Gaza

2007-05-21T12:22:00.000+03:00

We were lying in bed last night, talking about this and that, about our kids mostly. A jet fighter came flying over hour house. Not unusual in Israel - jet fighters and helicopters fly over our house everyday, some days worse than others when they're running some exercise or whatever. Triggered some interesting conversation between IsraeliDad and myself.

Earlier that day we went to the gym together. We don't get to watch TV too much here at home. We only get one channel here (broke free from the cables about a year ago), and we don't have much time for it anyway. At the gym, they have screens in front of the treadmills, so this is our chance at catching some programs.

I think that the public TV channels are required by law to dedicate a certain number of hours a day for broadcasts in Arabic. These broadcasts are never on prime time though. I guess it could be argued that with the majority of viewers being Hebrew speakers, there's no point in placing these shows during prime time. Still, I think it creates a kind of a cultural ghetto, since no one really watches TV during the hours to which the Arabic programs have been relegated. Well, no one except us when we march on the treadmill! With my newly acquired political awareness, I am fascinated by these shows. I honestly do think that they should be moved to prime time. There are subtitles in Hebrew anyway, and it will do nobody no harm to listen to some Arabic, and more importantly, to listen to the point of view of Arab speakers.

These shows cover a variety of topics. Many discuss social and cultural issues, revealing aspects in the culture of what we usually call "Israeli Arabs", or as they call it "Israeli Palestinians". The politics is always there, and for a good reason too. Yesterday, we watched two very interesting shows (think of all the exercise accomplished!)

The first show was an interview by leading journalist Rafik Halabi (he's a Druze and you'll find a lot by him and about him if you Google his name). This is a series really, of which I have been fortunate enough to watch more than one episode. He was interviewing Salem Jubran, an Arab intellectual, author and poet. Wonderful interview. I'd vote for him as for Prime Minister. Such a wonderfully balanced view of the world, addressing the shades of gray in both Arab and Jewish societies in Israel. Very critical of the Israeli government and regime, yet so positive about the country as a whole, and about the chances of peace here. Not overly optimistic, just positive. I found a few pages with his writing, or interviews with him. Posting them here for now - I hope to refer to some topics presented there in future posts -
A pleasant flight - for Arabs too

A Bridge For Happiness

The second show was about the current situation in Gaza. The Arab presenter had a panel of four - two of them Palestinians (from East Jerusalem and the West Bank) and two Israelis. The show was all in Arabic. There was a surprising consensus reached and a sad one at that. They all agreed that it's up to the Palestinians at this point to get a hold of themselves, stop the fighting among themselves and work towards strengthening their elected leadership. No one was very optimistic there. The Israelis (a journalist and a scholar) explained how the way things are going, Israel is more than likely to be dragged into Gaza, maybe even sooner or later. He said how the IDF would have no choice but to finally march into Gaza and re-occupy the place.

The Palestinian journalist (it was the well known journalist and human rights activist Bassem Eid) replied saying how this would be a grave mistake. That an Israeli invasion would only cause harm and make Palestinians escalate the struggle on their end. Well, not that we don't know that. It's just that, like the Israeli journalist explained to him, in the end of the day the IDF is committed to protecting Israel, and simply can't avoid action in response to the rockets.

If I may elaborate on that point. The IDF is called the Israeli Defense Forces for a reason. When rockets are lobbed at Israel, it's in the IDF's calling to stop the rockets from being fired. No one is saying that the IDF is inactive btw, only that things may come to the point, not very far from now where the IDF will have on other means of fighting the rockets other than walking into Gaza and disarming the Palestinians, house by house if necessary. It will be an ugly bloodshed for both sides. Nobody is looking forward to that, and everyone knows this will come at a heavy price to both Palestinians and Israelis.

What would be the price? To the Palestinians this could be a terrible terrible blow in terms of both civilian and armed militia casualties, the first simply because there will be heavy fighting going on on their territory in a heavily populated area. To Israel, the cost is likely to be in casualties on the part of the IDF. The Israeli public is very intolerant of IDF casualties. People call the soldiers "our children", which they are after all, in a society where you still have compulsory military service at the age of 18. However, they are soldiers, and when the choice is between civilians being bombed in Sderot or IDF soldiers killed while defending them, at some point, the government will opt for the second. It is what the army is there for, as tragic as it is for the families of the soldiers.

Most likely, the heaviest price will be shared by Israelis and Palestinians alike: the ultimate blow to the peace process in the form of the IDF re-conquering Gaza. The lesson of that in Israeli eyes, government and citizens alike, is likely to be that the Palestinians cannot be trusted with their own sovereignty. They are still too fragmented and still operating as tribes and "Hamulas", unable to form national institutions of their own. Obviously, fingers will be pointed at Israel for somehow "not allowing" these institutions to form. I wonder how many Arabs will have the courage to lay at least part of the blame on the Palestinians themselves?

So much for yesterday's time of relaxation at the gym... and as you can see ID and myself spent a while discussing this.

Fast forward to our night time, lying in bed, listening to the jet fighters. We talked about how awful it must be to be lying in one's bed in Gaza tonight, not too far away from where we live, with your children sleeping, just like ours, listening to jet fighters flying over your head. How unbearable it must be for those Palestinians mothers and fathers to have to raise their children with that constant fear for their very lives, and how awful for the children. Every now and again we are shown Palestinians mothers on the news, saying the most horrible things, about how they wish their children would die as "Shaeeds" in the struggle against Israel. I refuse to believe that there are no sane Palestinians in Gaza who just want their children to grow up, healthy and happy, same as we do here.

My heart goes out to these families over there. And yes, also to the Jewish parents in Sderot, who right now raise their children under the constant thread of Qassam rockets. It's terrible on both sides. I know that there are many initiatives right now within Israel to help the families of Sderot, in essence evacuate the children out of the war zone at least temporarily. I wish there was something similar done for the children of Gaza. There is something terrible about taking children away from their families, but I think that it would still be the right thing to do, to get them out and find them hosting families for now. Naive, I know, and not about to be performed by any organization. What a shame....

Holiday Preparations

2007-05-20T11:29:00.000+03:00

We have way way too many holidays in Israel. Passover was a huge challenge with it's weeks of school holiday (we were fortunate to have to weather just one week, since our kids are still in kindergarten). Then Independence Day (which is almost two days of holiday, being preceded by Memorial Day). And now, within weeks, it's Shavuot...

You can read all about that holiday and its origins here. Today and tomorrow is time to work on the "Tene", a fancy basket for each one of the kids, nicely decorated with whatever, and filled with fruit and vegetable. If only the kids would eat the fruit and vegetables... but I guess keeping up with Jewish traditions is good enough ;)

So, leaving now to go buy some nice baskets, as well as fruit and vegetables to put inside... I'll post some pics when they're ready :)

Our Day in the Golan Heights

2007-05-18T22:38:00.000+03:00

Almost sneaking out of the house in the morning for this one, we packed the kids in the car and drove to the demonstration in the Golan Heights. Of course, we can't really keep any secrets in the family, so we ended up telling my in-laws where we went later that evening. During the morning we still kept it hushed down though.

The kids were never told we're going to a demonstration, let alone about what. We feel they're too young for that, so to them this was just a day out.

We left earlier than needed, so on the way to the Golan Heights we made the mandatory stop at Golani Junction at their MacDonald's branch. Now, Golani junction isn't named after the Golan, but after one of the IDF's brigades. It's usually a place where soldiers gather, on the way back and from their deployments up in the North, and also families like ours traveling. It's also a local attraction for the region's locals, namely you see quite a few Druze and Arabs there as well. The staff is always mixed, as far as I can tell, with both Arabs and Jews serving in all positions.

We got a kiddie meal (with the toy!), and a bowl of the latest local dish served at the big M - a finely chopped, freshly prepared Mediterranean salad, seasoned with olive oil, lemon juice, mint and parsley - yummy and very healthy! The kids spent a while playing at the indoors playground there, while IsraeliDad and myself sat nearby reading the paper. So far, the day was proving to be a huge success ;)

We drove on northward, me looking at the view, thinking how sad this whole deal was. Such a beautiful place, populated by beautiful people, dreamers and visionaries that wanted to make a home for their family in a very special place. Unlike the West Bank (let alone Gaza), the Golan is sparsely populated and was so during 1967 as well.

At last, we reached the designated meeting point, at Ein Zivan junction. No less than six police cars and vans were waiting for us there, and seemed rather pleased to finally see someone looking for the demonstration. They weren't making a political statement, just bored, saying not too many other people had shown up. They told us the rally itself is held further along the road, in the tourist observation point located across the border from the Syrian town of Kuneitra.

The place itself is beautiful (as is the rest of the Golan Heights), with a great outlook on the views of Syria, right across from the UN camp in the demilitarized zone between the two countries. The weather was nice, and we spent a nice hour or so, listening to speeches. The two more prominent speakers were Israeli author Sami Michael and Israeli poet Roni Somek. Their heartfelt speeches addressed one simple point, which was the message of the rally: Let's respond to the Syrian signals and engage in a dialogue. At no point did anyone even mention the withdrawal from the Golan Heights directly. At most, there was a vague reference to the price of peace (mentioning that it was heavy, but not as heavy as the price of war).

I was slightly disappointed when one of the speakers tried some low scare tactics, saying that if we don't head towards peace with Syria now, we'll have war with Syria under a year. He went on to say that we won't be able to stand at that very place, because rockets will be falling on the Golan Heights. I thought this to be a very unlikely scenario... The point I would have made instead is that unless we enter negotiations with the Syrians, there is more than likely going to be another war with the Hezbulla.

As you can see from this picture, the demonstration wasn't exactly crowded. IsraeliDad is there, trying to get the boys to sit "in the shade" (there wasn't much of it, obviously). It was a very peaceful event - the bored policemen never even got close. There was quite a lot of press there, it almost looked like you had more journalists and photographers than actual participants. Then again, this demonstration wasn't advertised anywhere that we could see, and unless you happen to be on certain mailing lists, you wouldn't even know it took place. We are not actually ON those mailing lists either, but were forwarded a copy by friends. Funnily enough, the people on those lists were mostly the kind of people who won't come to such a demonstration because it's taking place "in occupied territory"...

We stayed there for about an hour, then headed south again as it was over. It felt strange, going past the Kibbutz where my brother-in-law lives, but we thought it would be way too awkward to visit under the circumstances. We never even told them we were going, as per the request of my parents-in-law. Sigh.

On the way back, we stopped for a nice lunch in a semi-famous Arab restaurant called "Yunes". We had a very good time there, with the hospitable staff generously talking us into buying less food, rather than more! Now, there's a refreshing approach in a restaurant!

The food itself was excellent. The parents kept to
Hummus and a selection of salads, while the kids had their all time favorite - meats on sticks aka Shish-kebab (aka locally as shishlik). They were taught a few Arab words by the kind waiter who really enjoyed them (and them him as well!) . All in all, we had a great time there, with a lovely "on the house" finale of black Arab coffee, sweet cakes, fresh apples and dates. As perfect as can be, and not very expensive either.

Sitting here typing and listening to the news... We focused on the north today, but Israel's hot front is down south today, with a constant barrage of rockets from Gaza into the town Sderot, along with constant IDF attacks into Gaza. Looks like things are escalating quickly. I did read today that Hammas is doing this intentionally, attempting to drag Israel into a direct conflict. I also read how Shimon Peres said this week that Israel will not have its policy dictated by the Hammas, meaning we won't attack just because they are provoking. Well, looks like attack we do, and I guess now it remains to see just how severely.

It seems pretty clear though, that unless the Palestinians come to their senses in Gaza, the government will have little choice but to increase the attack, maybe even going all the way with a ground attack, literally taking Gaza over again. It's a question of public opinion more than anything. People are too short sighted to see the outcome - they just want the government to do something - anything - to stop the rockets.

On a personal level, I am worried that IsraeliDad may be called in again, for who knows how long, in case things escalate on the Southern front. I sure hope things won't come to that... and not just for my own personal selfish motives either.

Peace Mongering Among "Pro-Israelis"

2007-05-16T10:34:00.000+03:00

Thank for the term Peace Mongering Khaled! I sure felt like one these past few days lol. I get this urge to reach out, listen to others and debate things. I sometimes hope that the Internet may help bring people together, maybe help us listen, see other perspectives, get in touch with people with different points of view, learning from others. I still think that is possible, especially witn one-on-one encounters or on very well moderated boards. Otherwise, the other side of Internet discussions rises its ugly head.

I have experienced that only too well over the past 24 hours... I joined a board that declared itself to be "Pro-Israel" and "Pro-America". Now, some of the people posting there are good people, and there were a few posts in threads where I participated that were insightful and well written. I also got a nice PM from one of the moderators. That about ends the positive things I have to say about that board. It didn't take more than two or three members to make me physically ill at the extent of hatred. They reminded me of the fanatic Muslims on the Iranian boards. Calling out to make parking lots of Gaza and Lebanon... not much different than the Syrian poster on the Muslim board rejoicing over the mental image of a chemical attack on Tel Aviv.

The amazing thing is how extremists fail to see that they are mirror image of each other. A Jewish extremist is just like a Muslim one. The exact kind of distorted view of the world in black and white. The same de-humanization and demonization of the other side too. So similar and so blind to one another.

Similar style too, who would have guessed? Say something they disagree with and they go off a tangent right away, calling you every name in their book. I guess demonization becomes a habit after a while lol. It was actually quite funny to begin with. Check out this thread here. It struck me as funny, in the weird sense of the word, to have my support of Israel questioned, my contribution and willingness to "pay the cost" brought into this. Like I was some outsider looking into something that has nothing to do with it. Me, born and bred here, living here, serving this country in the military, raising my kids here...

There's a part of me that wants to move away from these kind of people (Jews or Arabs). Like IsraeliDad says, they're just nuts, so why deal with that? It's disgusting and not good for one's health. I keep telling him that we can't afford to ignore the extremists, because they are the ones who will end up dragging us all into more wars. In the end, it's us that pay the price, not just them (them as well, sometimes, but looks like they don't mind killing and dying like we do). I can and did put a couple of members there on "Ignore" - I'm just not sure we can all afford to do that irl.

Sigh, very frustrating indeed. And just in case there's anyone from "over there" reading this blog here... I doubt that I'll be back often. From time to time, maybe, but not too often. Too easy to get sucked in into that dark hole. Anyway, I wanted to say that my post here does not refer to everyone who posted there in threads where I participated. There are some sane people posting on that board as well... just too many psychos that are allowed to go on preaching their hatred. I can only stomach so much of that in any given period of time ;)

Finally, the Right Statement from Olmert

2007-05-15T16:18:00.000+03:00

Olmert says he's ready to talk peace with Arab World

When I was growing up, seeking peace was supposed to be the standard Israeli policy, or so we were told. Common wisdom was that Israel was always reaching out to its enemies and calling for peace. Sadat is immensely popular in Israel to this day, for being the first Arab leader to finally "accept" our offers and show up to talk peace.

I'm not sure when the change took place. How come our government is so peace-shy these days that it takes a special declaration by the Prime Minister to just say that we are "willing" to talk? I expect my government to make clear at all times that Israel is not just "willing" to discuss peace, but is actively seeking peace. Of course, they do actually have to actively seek peace, not just by declarations but by initiating meetings, talks and confidence building measures. We can't afford to "be willing" (let alone to be unwilling!) - peace is in Israel's best interest, first and foremost. If we don't push towards peace, we'll be pushed into war. I know which I prefer.

Entering Dialogues Again

2007-05-14T09:55:00.000+03:00

I have been browsing around yesterday and came across an Iranian board in English. The board is geared pretty much towards Iran's defense/military issues. Having read through a few threads, I couldn't help myself and had to sign up and join in the discussions. Well, as can be expected, I think I have close to 20 posts under my wings in under 24 hours :p

An interesting mix of people on that board, and an interesting mix of views. One thing that I found fascinating is something I already noted about before. Reading through people's perceptions of their country's perspective security issues, we are all so self-focused in the end. Looks like everyone feels they are surrounded by enemies - well and maybe they are. Everyone in this region seems to fear their neighbors.

Growing up in "Zionist" Israel the motto for us was "Israel is a small land surrounded by enemies". No one really discussed how these "enemies" see the world around them, but we had just always assumed that these enemies were all united, since they apparently had a common goal (destroying us, of course!) It is rather surprising to see that our "enemies" are far from being united. Not only do they have their own quarrels among themselves, it does seem to be like destroying us isn't always their top priority after all!

I'm an Auntie Again!

2007-05-13T20:38:00.000+03:00

Introducing Noah, who was born two days ago to my brother. I absolutely adore this photo, where you can see his large hand and this sweet tiny sleeping baby. Welcome to the world Noah!

Thoughts about Parenthood

2007-05-13T10:36:00.000+03:00

Sunday, the day of rest for so many people in the Western World... For us, the start of the new week, with the kids back in kindergarten.

We went out last night, IsraeliDad and myself. Nothing fancy, just coffee and a salad at a coffee shop, but a well needed talk too. We discussed the way our children are raised and finished with some very concrete resolutions. We actually have these talks every now and again, with us deciding to run a tighter ship around here. This time, the UN resolutions for our household include censorship of movies, taking violent Spiderman/Superman catroons off the DVD menu. They also include a general tighter limit on the number of TV hours the kids will be allowed. Now, the problem is that we would need to actually entertain the kids during the no-DVD hours. A daunting prospect, to be honest. A large part of our conversation dealt with ways in which we can keep them happy and pleasantly occupied without the DVD.

We later went over to my mom's to pick up the kids (she was minding them while we were out), and we talked to her about the subject. Funny, we feel, and my mom agrees, that when we were kids, there was less of an issue of "what to do with the kids". We were just there,growing up, doing our thing. When school/kindergarten was over, we would come back home and hang out with friends, or by ourselves. Television broadcasts were very limited in Israel of the 1970's. We had maybe 2-3 hours of boring black-and-white programs a day. We didn't even watch all of it, as most of it was rather boring and "educational". What we did watch can definitely be titled as "mostly harmless" (to borrow from the late Douglas Adams there). What did we do then? Well, as far as I can remember, I spent a lot of time just hanging outside in our backyard watching the snails lol. When I was a little bit older, I used to go to friends or they would come over. My parents never had to "drive" us anywhere. We didn't even own a car (my dad would get "half" a truck from the IDF, so we had a car half of the days).

IsraeliDad maintains that our life was simply boring back then. He says we shouldn't subject our kids to those levels of boredom lol. Me? I just want them out of harm's way and growing up safely and as happy as possible. I am not at all sure that the constant stream of stimuli thrown at them by life is that good. Then again, can we have children today grow up the same way we grew up in the '70's? With today's world around them, the TV, the computer, the overall noise level of gadgets, cars, shows, theme parks... can the innocence of those days possibly be regained?

We'll have to find the right balance I guess. Parenthood is such a huge responsiblity... sigh.

Makes me more politically aware too. I keep thinking how much energy we have to invest into rearing our offspring. Then they grow up, join the army, and their precious lives, into which you've poured so much, are at the hands of people like Peretz and Olmert. IsraeliDad has been reading the Vinograd Report in detail (that's the recently published report of the Vinograd Committee which analyzes the way Israel's leadership handled the war in Lebanon over the summer). Listening to him telling me about the lack of professionalism and sheer irresponsibility really makes me sad, frustrated and worried about my own babies who will be joining the army in under 15 years :(

Talking to the Elders of the Tribe

2007-05-11T19:10:00.000+03:00

Let me start by noting that so far, we're still planning on joining the demonstration on the Golan Heights. Turns out we had the dates wrong, so it's next Friday (May 18th) and not this one. Hence, today's post is not related to the demonstration.

Have had a crowded second half to this week so far, topped with a lovely (or not so lovely) migraine last night. I think I'll start a new blog here on this account just to record my migraines, so as not to clutter up this space.

Three days ago, my mother came to visit us and brought my grandfather along with her. My grandpa is 78 years old and lives in Netanya. He was born in Tunisia, in a town called Gabes and came to Israel by himself as a teenager. He went on his journey back in 1947, out of pure old idealistic Zionism. He was a member of a Zionist youth member and came to Israel to build the State of the Jews where his religious family always said home was. He didn't make it in that year.

He was only 18 but had a nice girlfriend already! They planned on coming together on the same ship. A few weeks before their ship was supposed to leave, they were called to come help prepare another ship of Jewish immigrants (since they were both in the Zionist youth movement). My grandfather got busy helping settle the immigrants in the ship. Suddenly, local police forces appeared and the boat had to sail right away. His girlfriend managed to get off the boat, but it was too late for him, and so he sailed to "Palestine" a few weeks ahead of time.

As they approached the beaches of Palestina, they were surrounded by British boats. My grandfather loves telling that story of how four huge British Navy ships surrounded the tiny boat and almost crushed her. They were escorted to Cyprus and put in a refugee camp there. A few weeks later, his girlfriend arrived at Cyprus. Same story, different ship. A year later, still in Cyprus, they got married. Then the State of Israel was established and they came over, finally as legal immigrants. Shortly afterwards, my mother was born, while they were living in a local refugee camp (Ma'abara).

Well, I have heard this story more than once before. This time, sitting with my grandpa by our dining table, I asked him about other things. I asked what made them come to Israel to begin with. What made them leave Tunisia and what did they leave behind. My grandpa was only too happy to share his boyhood memories. For him, the reason for leaving Tunisia was simple. They had been living in fear and feeling persecuted. I have heard so often about how Jews and Arabs lived well together in Arab countries, that my grandfather's recollections surprised me a little.

He described in detail the day when his mother was attacked by Arabs in the marketplace (left with a huge scar on her leg where they knifed her). Then he talked about how as soon as the Nazis invaded, the Arabs would volunteer to walk with the Nazi soldiers and point out the Jews to them. The encounter would end with some humiliating public kicking only at that point (although later on, men in the family were already sent to camps set up by the Nazis in Tunisia).

In short, he explained, there was no question in the minds of the Jews living in his community that they had to leave, and the sooner the better. Even before the establishment of the State of Israel, many left and tried breaking into the then Palestina as illegal immigrants. During the 19'50s and 1960's most of the Jews left, about half of them to France and the other half to Israel.

Well, I asked, did your family have any property back there? Did they manage to sell it before they joined you here (in the early Fifties). Well, that got a nice laugh from my Grandpa... He said no one in their right mind would buy property off the Jews. People would say, "Why should we buy from you? You have to leave anyway, and you're going to leave it to us for free, so why should we pay?". So, they left it all behind. The house he grew up in, the whole neighborhood, was simply given up, as the Jews were driven out. Actually, what he lamented the most was the public buildings. I got to listen to a long description of the community synagogue, and other community buildings, where my Grandfather had spent many days as a child, being the son of a Rabbi.

Why bring up this story now? I'm not sure really. I guess Khaled's recent visit made me think more about those historical times. Learning more about the wrongdoings of Zionism, made me curious about our side as well. I always knew that my family, especially on my mother's side, lived in what was basically refugee camps for a few years before they were given proper housing. I never really bothered to ask why, and why didn't they have enough money to buy their own place right away.

This story, to me, isn't about pointing fingers or laying the blame on one side or another. To me it shows just how complicated history is and how the violent times of the previous century effected so many people adversely. Things we read about in history books, were life changing events for people a few generations before us, and I felt it was necessary for me to tell this tale here, while my grandfather is still with us.

A Political Friday on the Horizon

2007-05-08T08:52:00.000+03:00

Looks like we may be able to make it to the demonstration in the Golan Heights on Friday after all! Our nephew's Bar Mitzva party is going to be on Saturday and the demonstration is on Friday.

It's a huge deal for us here, frankly. I am not sure which of my family members are reading my blog, but I know that for some of them, the fact that we will be going to this demonstration is heartbreaking. You see, we will be calling for the government of Israel to launch peace talks with Syria. Such peace talks, in all likelihood, will involve discussions and at some point, if peace is achieved, implementation of an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. ID's older brother lives there with his wife and four children. It's been their home ever since 1979. They live in a beautiful flourishing kibbutz there, which they have literally built with their own hands. They have turned their hill there from a barren pile of rocks and thorny weed into a gorgeous green and prosperous kibbutz, where social ideals still reign. Their four children were born there. Their oldest daughter is in her early twenties, their youngest is a teenager. For these kids, that is their home and there is no other. Should they be made to leave, it will literally devastate their lives. Unlike the settlers in the West Bank, they are not oppressing any local population. They live a peaceful life there, growing apples, cherries and cows and tending to their gardens and landscaping.

So, you see, we will not be telling them about going to this demonstration. For us to be supporting peace talks with Syria, in essence supporting a withdrawal from the Golan Heights would be too painful to discuss probably. I hope the kids won't talk too much, as we will be seeing them on the weekend, sigh. It won't be a happy demonstration for us, in that respect. The price to be paid is too close to home in this case.

And yet, we still believe whole heartedly, that as beautiful as the Golan is, and as admirable as the kibbutzim there are, preventing the next war with Lebanon is what really counts. I truly believe that a peace agreement with Syria is the only way to solve the Lebanon problem for Israel. Moreover, I believe that entering negotiations with Syria, in good faith on both sides, might be the only way to prevent the war currently looking on the regional horizon. Everyone talking about a war with Lebanon again, maybe in the summer. They're talking like it's inevitable, based on declaration constantly made by the heads of Hezbulla. I truly believe that negotiations with Syria may be the only thing that can stop this.

I confess, I don't care much for hummus in Damascus. A warm and mutually hospitable peace is not my agenda. Frankly, between my family's well being and hummus, I opt for the first. But this isn't what negotiations and peace with Syria is about. It's about stabilizing the region, in particularly defusing the threat by the HA. It will affect more than the north too. It will be a blow to extremists all over the region, showing them that Syria is leaving the "Axis of Evil" and joining forces with the moderates. It may pave the way later on for negotiations with the Hammas as well.

In short, this is about preventing war. Now and later. It's about preventing more soldiers and civilians from being killed in pointless wars, this year and in future years. That is the only thing that is worth uprooting people from their homes, if it comes down to that.

And it may not even come to that. Negotiations are just that - we can discuss the future of the settlers and the settlements. Negotiations in themselves will be a stabilizing factor, and as such should be entered into as soon as feasibly possible. Hope to be reporting from the demonstration on the weekend.

Back to Work

2007-05-05T08:42:00.000+03:00

Gradually getting depoliticized again lol (thanks for the OD, Khaled!)

Been spending the last week trying to scrape out more work time. I have tons of online projects that I'm playing with atm, and they each require time. IsraeliDad plays an online RPG (Role play Game) called World of Warcraft (you may have heard of it, it's more or less the number one online game at the moment). While many wives complain that they have become World of Warcraft widows, I try not to complain too much, as I certainly understand his addiction. "I just have to play some, I have a new character I'm working on", or "Just half an hour more, I'm about to make it to the next level", are common quotes from him these days. In a sense my work is the same. I am addicted to creating websites for revenue, and all I need is just half an hour more to create another blog, or an hour to learn a new skill, and trying real hard to make it to the next level in daily revenue, or maybe even open up a new revenue channel. So many challenges, so little time!

At least I'm lucky in having ID take care of the boring aspects of managing the business. He's the one in charge of book keeping and other such tedious red tape tasks. He did try the web publishing roles too, but he just doesn't have the bug, I guess.

One of my latest tasks in my game is building a chain of hub pages over at HubPages.com. I only did a few, but one of them might be of interest to anyone reading this and thinking, "hmmmm maybe I could do this too?" You don't need to have any web publishing skills, no need to buy domains or web hosting. All you need is to get your own hub pages, promote them and make some money. It won't make you rich, but if you like this kind of game, you could develop it later on. Check out my articles -

Home Business Recipe using Hub Pages

Choosing A Topic for your HubPage

By the way, I hope you like the new layout. The old one didn't show up properly on Firefox, and I felt like a change anyway. It was either a haircut or a new template to my blog ;)

Thoughts Following Khaled's Visit

2007-05-01T14:32:00.000+03:00

It's been a bit of a weird day here so far. I got back into bed after sending the kids off to kindergarten. Woke up more or less on time to go pick them up. They're resting in their bedroom now (ok, ok, watching a DVD, sue me... it does mean they're in bed!) and I finally have a few minutes for coffee and reflections.

We stayed up late last night here, sitting around the table with Khaled, my dear father-in-law, our friends Arnon and Deb, and IsraeliDad and myself. We just talked and talked and talked, until it was time for Khaled to go catch his train and go to the airport. At some points, we reflected on the visit, at others, we discussed possible solutions for the future, and there were times (quite a few) where we dragged ourselves back to one of the historic debates that were so common along the visit.

I learned a lot during this visit. I have learned a lot from Khaled before the visit as well (as he put is so eloquently, "I have been exposed to his poison before..." ;)), but somehow going through the debates again along with others helped me see some things more clearly. The one thing that stuck on my mind the most relates to the historical aspects of the conflict but is very significant for understanding the current situation and coming up with solutions as well. It is the huge difference between the respective narratives of each side. There we are, facing an ocean of historical facts (and those are more than enough btw, no need to come up with tales and fantasies on top of that..), and each side seems to pick up their own pieces of the colorful rubble and create their own narrative from that. Every point of the conflict, as far back as we went, we discovered that we mostly agree on the facts, yet come up with different interpretations to them. A different story, or history, is created by each side.

What's more, these being such emotional issues at core, it is all too easy to get upset, shake your head in disbelief at the other's "fantastic and ludicrous tale", and give up on it. In many ways, it is so much easier to hold on to your familiar comfy fortress of views and just disregard the other side's perspective. Of course, by sticking to your own narrative, the only way to explain the other side's behavior is by saying that they are either stupid, cruel, out go get you/your land, or all of the above together. Any settlement you achieve within this mindset is going to be extremely fragile, obviously.

Well, I think we can be proud of not going that route during Khaled's visit. There was genuine interest in each other's perspectives and narratives. We spent hours talking and simply explaining the logic's behind each side's actions. When you're on that side, what you do seems only too clear. You know why you're doing it, and you assume that the other side (the stupid and evil side) understands your thinking as well. They only respond the way they do because, well, they are evil and stupid, duh. Explaining intentions and thoughts behind each side's actions went a long long way with us. Be it the Six-Day-War, the Wye Plantation Talks, the Intifada, the way the IDF treats Palestinians, the boycott on the peace with Israel by the Egyptian elites... the list goes on and on and on. Every topic we touched, I think we managed to cover some ground in dispelling the notions of "stupid and evil" and going on to actually understanding each side better. I hope Khaled feels something like that about Israel and its policies, I know we have made great progress when it comes to understanding the Arab positions on so many topics. The reason we were able to do that? because we became friends, I think. We shared meals, chit-chat, road trips. There was zero hostility, and it enabled us to move forward with this loaded dialogue and actually listen.

So... where do we take it from here? Is there something to be gained from this visit, other than a great friendship formed across borders? I believe so. It may take a while for things to sink between us. We need to ferment now, then we'll see, maybe. I am not delusional enough to think that the small circle here is going to break new grounds - we will probably not be the one to bring everlasting peace to the planet... There are many people around these parts making more serious efforts in that direction too (read Khaled's blog to find out more about them).

For me, the visit motivated me even further to reach out, learn more about our neighbors, talk to people, and maybe get active again with the concept of getting people from both sides to get to know each other. As human beings first, forming online friendships even, and then as representatives of a different narrative. One that can co-exist with ours, perhaps without the need to settle things through an armed conflict.

Politics and Family

2007-04-29T14:32:00.000+03:00

So often family issues come in the way of any form of political activism. We were talking about it here, IsraeliDad and myself, wondering whether we should get more active and actually "do something". When we were younger we used to participate in left-wing demonstrations every now and again. The last one we went to, we already had one baby and carried him along with is. It seems like there are fewer large demonstrations being held nowadays. I guess part of it is a reflection on the morale of the Israeli left wing. There was a wave of euphoria when Barak went to Washington and offered what was seen as a very progressive offer by Israel. By the same token, hopes were crashed when Arafat failed to respond to that offer. I realize that this is a game of perception. I won't even go into that argument here (I have discussed this in
detail with Khaled on his site here).

Bottom line, is that the Israeli moderate left-wing has taken a major blow and I'm not sure it's on the recovery just yet. I don't recall any huge demonstrations in the past few years. We finally got an email this week, inviting us for a demonstration calling our Prime Minister to move forward and initiate official negotiations with Syria, regardless of what the Americans will say. It's meant to be a journey up to the Golan Heights, where families will drive up to the border carrying posters calling for peace with Syria. We really wanted to go to that one, but unfortunately we have a Bar Mitzva on the same day... So, there you go. Family engagements come in the way again. It's pretty much an emblem of my life in general. Any political awareness is usually pushed aside by the mundane tasks of raising a family. And on this note I have to leave now, my son needs a change of clothes here.

Recovering from a mild cold...

2007-04-26T10:21:00.000+03:00

Too much talking politics probably, I came down with a cold yesterday. I'm better today, but not a lot to post on really. Khaled left yesterday morning, on his way to Jerusalem and then the West Bank. I feel a bit OD'ed on politics atm, so no long post here today. Don't get me wrong, it's a fascinating visit so far, and we're enjoying every minute. We've tried to get quite a few of our family members/friends to meet Khaled and the one word they keep coming up with after meeting him is "fascinating". It's good, I guess. Good for us to see things from a totally different perspective. We don't argue a lot over facts (well, ok, a little), but it's interesting to see how two different narratives have evolved around the same facts. Each side chooses to emphasize some aspects and ignore others.

The bottom line for me so far? (or is it too Israeli to be looking for a bottom line? ;)) Well, Khaled and ourselves, despite our different opinions on some things, could easily reach peace in the Middle East. A warm kind of peace too, with friendships forming across borders. We could live in a confederation even. Unfortunately, I still think that Khaled is in the minority in the Arab world. Here in Israel, people like here may not be in the majority either (about 50/50 at this point, I think). It is encouraging for us to see that likeminded people do exist in the countries around us. Would we be enough to reach not only peace, but a viable Middle East, liberal, advanced, progressive, where human and civil rights are adhered to? Will the Middle East be the next European Union? or did this visit make us delusional?

Anyway, read on on Khaled's blog. I know I do!

http://without-a-roadmap.blogspot.com/

Zionism 101 - Day 2 of the Visit

2007-04-23T14:54:00.000+03:00

If there's one theme that keeps coming up in our conversations during Khaled's visit it's the different versions to history out there. Don't get the wrong impression, we don't actually spent too much time arguing about facts - for one thing we do mostly agree on the facts, for another thing, when we disagree we usually agree that it's not that important. All the same, it's fascinating for me to see how the same facts can be construed into such essentially different historical narratives. It sometimes takes someone who looks at the same facts from a totally different angle to help you see that, I guess.

Yesterday's visit to the museum of the Palmach was prime example. I have been to this museum several times before. As I warned Khaled prior to his visit, this place gives you a hardcore Zionist experience, telling the tale of the war of 1948 from the Zionist perspective. All the same, it never fails to move me and my family when we visit there. Granted, the exhibition is well thought out and planned to pull at the heart strings. We can see as much by ourselves. The story is told through the eyes of a group of Palmach members, and you can't help but like these young men and women, with their very human feelings of love, fear, humor. When several of them get killed during the war, it's heartbreaking. Like a good soap opera, if you like. Still, as I said, it's effective...

When Dovale (one of the characters) talks about how he saved his little sister from the concentration camp in the end of the war and brought her into the country aboard the Exodus, and how painful it was for her to be sent out to another fenced camp after having walked on the soil of the Land of Israel for only 20 meters, it breaks my heart, Sorry. The fact that we were visiting there during the Eve of the Memorial Day only added to this. I had to reign in the tears, not wanting to make a fool of myself in front of the group of young tank guides (all women) which we were assigned to go the tour with. If those teenaged girls managed to keep a stiff upper lip, I figured I should as well. There was only so much I could do though, by the end I was crying. Sue me.

So, we're walking out of the museum, and asking our guest how he found the museum. To our great disappointment, Khaled showed no inclination to join the IDF and fight for the cause alongside our wonderful people. He actually, ummmm, found the exhibition to be well carried out but quite biased and one-sided, or as he put it, "propaganda". So, there you have it, I have seen this several times, and it never actually occurred to me that the Arab side isn't really represented in the exhibition. In fact, there isn't too much animosity or hostility towards Arabs there. The Arabs, other than in their role as the military forces against which we've had to fight, simply aren't there. Through out the years prior to 1947, the storyline relates to the Nazis and the British, and to internal fights within the Jewish settlers. Arabs? What Arabs?

I digress into an analysis of the exhibition here, but I'm using it as an illustration of something that I am seeing through out the visit so far. It's a positive thing, it's what I had hoped for, in a way. A fresh perspective for us, a well as a way to show our perspective to Khaled. Some things we seem to be taking for granted here, and it's always good to have someone rattle your ideological cage and make you think.

So... back to the descriptive account of our day. We came back from Tel Aviv and went through shopping center to get some groceries for dinner, then headed back home. The kids were being looked after by my dear mother-in-law and were all excited to see us. It took longer than expected to get dinner going, but we managed to do that eventually. The fact that IsraeliDad here decided to join his father in another hot air balloon escapade wasn't very helpful either... They didn't fly aboard one, but they flew a small one up the air. It flew further than expected, sending ID running after it through town. We still don't know where it landed, but apparently no huge fire registered in the vicinity.

Solving the Conflict

2007-04-22T08:29:00.000+03:00

Khaled has arrived yesterday, woohoo! We were a bit concerned about how he would make it through the airport, but it didn't take as long as we feared it might. He only went through 4 investigators lol and then a chatty and friendly can driver too.

I met Khaled as he arrived and showed him to his room. We talked for a few minutes and since it was almost 4 AM, we figured it might be best for him to catch some sleep. Unfortunately, at 6:30, my five years old son was knocking at his door with a somewhat earlier than expected wake-up call ;) He did go back to sleep after that, so we were assured (Khaled, not my son, who was rather embarrassed later on by the episode, but easily appeased with some yummy Belgian chocolate!).

Breakfast took longer than expected, as we got into some fairly interesting conversation with our guest. My parents-in-law, my husband, myself and our guest of honor, with a constant hum of the kids in the background, we got talking, learning more about each other, and of course, discussing history as well as the current state of affairs in the Middle East. I can see how the fresh new perspective does bring the debate into life. We finally decided it was time to get up from the table and take a look at the Zionist State, all dressed up in blue and white flags. Today it's the Eve of Memorial Day here, going into a very sad day tomorrow which then switches abruptly into the celebrations of the Independence Day tomorrow evening. Everywhere is filled with flags, and even Khaled himself travel led with my father in law with two prominent Israeli flags proudly waving on the car roof lol We need to take a picture of that, makes it look like a formal visit indeed. Following them in our car, we actually chuckled and wondered what it might feel like for us, traveling in a neighboring country and being driven around with say, the Palestinian or Syrian or Iranian flag waving above our head at all times.

Our destination was the nearby kibbutz of Ein Shemer where they run a small tourist attraction called The Old Courtyard. It tells the story of the early settlers of the kibbutz, from long before the establishment of the State of Israel. In essence, giving you the Zionist "pioneers" ethos, with all of its cross stitched Russian shirts glory. We spent some time there, watching a short movie about life there in early times and looking over the exhibits. My kids were a bit disappointed, as they came mainly for "the movie" expecting the latest entertainment, Walt Disney style, the only got a "boring" 15 minutes presentation in English. I hope Khaled enjoyed it more than they did lol.

Back to the house to a small feast of homemade cooking by my dear mother-in-law. It's hard to describe this visit without the soundtrack really, of incessant talking on both sides. Before, throughout and after the meal, there is just an endless and very pleasant stream of questions, answers, views and ideas. One of the topics that came up was the experience of Jews who used to live in Arab countries, at which point I suggested that we go up and meet my grandfather, an elderly gentleman of Tunisian origin. And so, off we went to visit him and my mother and sister, in the town of Netanya.

The meeting proved to be hilarious. My grandpa finally had a chance to practice his Tunisian Arabic. His mother tongue, but he had not used it much for the past sixty years! An entertaining exchange of words went on, with him and Khaled comparing Egyptian and Tunisian dialects, mixing everything heavily with French as well. I was surprised to see just how easy it was for me to follow the conversation. My very limited knowledge of Arabic went well with the accents and dialects used and even the French part, went in well. I guess growing up listening to Tunisian Arabic and Tunisian French at my grandparents home, and also watching the famous "Egyptian" movie on Fridays on TV... something sunk in after all!

We decided to do a short tour of Netanya. A favorite destination for both French-Jewish tourists with a beautiful promenade by the seaside. My sister joined us and we walked around, and ended up in a nice restaurant which I used to frequent with my family while growing up. The restaurant is co-owned by Arabs and Jews and we were fortunate to have the Arab co-owner approach us. He did not only take our orders, but also had a nice exchange with Khaled. It was clear that he was very curious about this guest from Egypt, a first for him there in the restaurant. He came back several times, sharing his views on things, with Khaled in Arabic, with us in Hebrew and with both in English sometimes as well.

We finally headed back home, after picking up two sleeping children from my mom who had been baby sitting them for the evening. We nearly solved the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on the way back, but some hurdles are still left. I am sure we'll go through them today! A solution by the end of the visit? I can't guarantee anything at this point. I will say though, that I am certain that if everyone can just talk like we're doing here constantly, in a such a friendly way, this conflict would indeed have a much better chance at ending, sooner than later too.

More to come in the next few days - I'll keep ya all posted! You can and should read Khaled's version of things in his blog dedicated specifically to this vist -
http://without-a-roadmap.blogspot.com/

An Exciting Visit and Some Other Thoughts

2007-04-13T14:58:00.000+03:00

Posting this during a short break in between preparing a small feast for this evening... We're expecting a very special visitor here within a week's time. It's Khaled Diab, aka DiabolicalIdea on the Metalks.com forums. We still have some activity over there, but out of the public eye, in a private forum which essentially includes the former staff members there. Khaled and myself have also had some interesting exchanges over the past few weeks, posted on his site here -
Exchange of Friendly Fire

I am very excited about this visit. The general plan is to turn Khaled into a true Zionist and a bearer of the new gospel to his fellow Arabs across the Middle East. Well, no, not really :p Actually, until I started Metalks, I had no idea that Zionism was such a loaded concept. It was the most natural thing in the world to me. Sure, I'm an Israeli and Jewish, therefore, I'm a Zionist. Simple, really. Nothing to ponder over for too long. When I grew up, I even assumed that all Jews were Zionists. I was somewhat shocked, to tell the truth, when confronted with what some people thought about Zionism. Turned out that for many people around the world, we're this brutal, violent and scary entity. Who knew. I always thought we were supportive of social justice and peace among the nations. Who could possible have anything against Zionism? and this is only a slight exaggeration btw, from what it felt like - that discrepancy between my own perception of Zionism, and that of others.

In a way, I am looking forward to seeing my country through Khaled's eyes, and showing him what it looks like to us. I think this can be an enlightening experience, for both of us. I am sure it will be for me. I will post more as we go along, and I know that Khaled will do the same on his blog. Best place to catch Khaled and his thoughts are on his site: diabolicdigest.net.

On another topic, I just wanted to note here, for all to see, and for future generations... I still think that my government is making a HUGE mistake nowdays. Syria is coming forward, albeit hesitantly, with a peace offering of sorts. I expect Israel to embrace that and jump on the opportunity. You have to be blind not to see that this is our best, and maybe even our only, chance at solving the Hezbulla problem. Peace with Syria, in effect blockading Hezbulla, is the only effective measure there. We're missing on that, and I'm afraid we might be heading for round 2 of the war as well, judging by the tunes coming from the HA in Beirut...

I can see two reasons why Olmert doesn't grab the opportunity. Ok, maybe three. The first, is that him and his advisers are complete idiots and don't see the situation which is very clear to me - that this is the way to bring down HA. No military solution will achieve that. Why get dragged into a second round of pointless fighting that will only bring on more tragedy on the Lebanese people and on Israel? Now, assuming that they're not complete morons, and can see as much, I can see two things possibly holding Olmert back:
1. The Americans saying they don't want us to talk to Syria, it being part of the axis of evil (I think that's the term?). Personally, I think it's appaling that our PM will sacrifice the lives of our soldiers and of civilians in both countries to appease the Americans. The price is too high.
2. Internal Political hurdles. Namely, the right-wing parties will resign from the government, possibly bringing down the coalition. That indeed is a huge problem. I think this is where the left needs to step in and assure Olmert of a political blanket.

Why is none of this happening? Beats me. To be honest, I don't have too much time to watch the news or read the papers. I just hope someone gets it somewhere in this country and realizes that now's the time to act.

Busy Times

2007-03-21T10:00:00.000+02:00

Someone asked me the other day if I still blog on IsraeliMom about the politics of the Middle East. Ha! Like I even have the time to watch the news (or read them online even). My contact with that aspect of life is limited to the occasional news bulletin on the radio when I'm in the car. I think there's a general strike going on today? lol, ok, I don't pay too much attention to the news ;)

I started working out properly again this week, after a six weeks long relapse due to a muscle injury. I'll try and blog about this in my weight loss blog which has been neglected as well, due to the same reason. Now, back to 2 hours a day, four times a week of working out, along with trying to spend time with the kids, and actually trying to work too, my days just seem to fly by.

We've been really busy lately with trying to find the right kindergarten arrangement for next year for the two munchkins here. We've checked every school and pre-school in the area, and registered at 4-5 of them so far. It's fairly complicated, really. Lots of options, very different from one another, and we can't be sure of being accepted anywhere at this stage, so we just keep trying for them all. Right now, the kids go to a Waldorf/Steiner kind of kindergarten. The staff is absolutely wonderful and overall it's a nice and peaceful place, perfect for small children. The problem is, that as the kids grow, we feel that the Waldorf approach does not allow them the kind of intellectual stimuli which they want and we feel they deserve. According to the Waldorf Guru, someone called Rudolph Steiner, kids shouldn't begin their intellectual development before the age of seven. I am probably oversimplifying what he said, but the bottom line is that when a kid asks science related questions, he doesn't get any answers and is redirected elsewhere. We feel this is no longer right for our eldest son, so we're looking for another system for now.

Actually, the leading candidate at this point is the Arab-Jewish school with their nice kindergarten. It's located in an Arab village, about 15 minutes away from here (driving). It has a good kindergarten, with a good ratio of staff to kids. Half of the staff (and half of the kids) are Arabs, and half are Jewish. Actually, the political setting makes little difference to us, we just liked the place, and it comes at a good price too. We feel it's as good as any private kindergarten we can find here, and it only costs around $100 a month per kid (as opposed to $400-$500 for a private kindergarten). The only snag is that they may not be able to take in both kids, and we are a bit reluctant about separating them at this point. We're waiting for their reply now, which should be in within the coming few weeks.

Then, there's work. Just lots and lots of work with new projects always zooming around in my head. My flagship site, TheCatSite.com is growing and requires regular maintenance. I am grateful for having such a wonderful and experienced team there that practically runs the place, but even so, it requires a lot of TLC and behind the scenes work, to keep everything running. I also have a slew of smaller sites, which I struggle to keep going, in terms of constant development and promotion. I tried something new today, actually, building a page in Squidoo.com around one of my sites. We'll see how it goes. You can see it here: My Squidoo Blackberry Reviews Page and if you have a Squidoo account, please do give me some nice ratings ;)

That's it for today. Will try and check in back soon.

A Belated Purim Update

2007-03-12T14:59:00.000+02:00

I can't even blame it on the time it takes to develop the Purim pictures... It's all digital these days, so we had them right away. Still, it's almost two weeks later, and here I am blogging about our Purim experiences. I did make a mid-year resolution to try and update this blog more often. We feel it's good for us to put a little record of our daily lives in writing. Sharing it is an added bonus, since it's nice to get those comments and responses from people all over the world. So, there, I intend on going for at least weekly posts from now on. Who knows, might get more often than that too ;)

This one is just a recap of Purim, really. We had two super-heros here at home, Mr Incredible (Dan) and Spiderman, no less. Our kids visit a Waldorf kindergarten (a-la Steiner), and we were asked to avoid "scary" costumes. They asked for flowers, fairies, animals and such, but this being Purim, they ended up having two spidermans, a cowboy and almost a Mr Incredible too. The almost Mr Incredible was our Dan, who was down with a fever just in time for Purim. He even got to the point of wearing his costume in the morning, we thought we'd take him to see the other kids in costumes then back home, but he felt so lousy, he actually asked to get out of the costume and stay at home... So, here are one Mr Increidble, just before he went back to bed, and a couple of Spidermen, the taller one is Ron -

That was on Friday. Sunday, Dan was feeling only a little bit better (he's perfectly ok now, btw, it was just one of those bugs, just a fever, essentially for 4-5 days, then some coughing and a runny nose), so we decided to join my mom and take a walk in Netanya. They have a nice shopping street there, with no cars and they were having a carnival of sorts held. Now, Netanya is famous for many things in Israel, among them as being a favorite destination for suicide bombers. Going there for a heavily crowded event is always a bit scary... but you go anyway, so we went anyway :p

They actually closed the area and had fairly tight security arrangements, allowing people in only through checkpoints. Here's the one we got in through -

It's not easy checking a huge crowd where all kids and quite a few adults come in dressed up. The place itself had lots of cops, paramedics and even people who were marked as "Security Observers", most likely volunteers, they looked about hi-school age, just standing there and keeping watch for anything or anyone suspicious. We sat down for some ice cream and I just had to take a picture of the nice gathering in front of us -

I have to say, I don't actually think there's anything uniquely Israeli about that. I am sure any European city with a similar gathering would have security forces all over the place. It was just something I noted as being different from when I was a kid. Back then security wasn't as tight, but then again, terrorists didn't use to blow themselves up in the middle of busy crowds back then.

Anyway, the whole thing was really nice. Lots and lots of kids in costumes, my own kids included, with everyone going ooooo and aaaaaah over other people's costumes lol. Here's a nice family we met on the way, where the adults and all of the kids all dressed up -

I'll finish with those. I'll probably post again rather sooner than later, with some fun pics from our recent amusement park adventure!

Some Fun in the Snow!

2007-02-17T11:40:00.000+02:00

We got back from a nice short getaway up in the north of Israel.

My brother-in-law, who lives with his family in a kibbutz in the Golan Heights, called us on Wednesday and said the weather forcast said a storm was coming, possibly with some snow too at their place. His idea was for us to pack up the kids and just go there, maybe catch some snow. The kids were beyond excited, so the next day, storm already rolling, we drove through it up to the Golan Heights.

It was a lot of fun, although it did not snow anywhere around the kibbutz. Still always nice to visit there :) It's such a lovely place and always good for a nice dose of cold European-style weather during winter. It was foggy and cloudy, just like I like it lol. I thought I'd share some pics here.

Here's my three years old Dan at the front of my in-laws' house:

As you can see, the houses are all the same, it being a kibbutz, but everyone can do whatever they want with their "patch". My BIL, Uri, turned the front of his house into two ponds connected with a kind of a bridge made from three grates. To get into the house, you walk over the grate with the fish swimming under you. Pretty cool! The kids really loved feeding the fish, as you can see here -

We had at least two meals at their splendid communal dining room here. The food is absolutely superb. People do have their own kitchens at home nowdays, but this kibbutz still keeps up withthe tradition of communal meals and has an excellent in-house chef too ;)

We couldn't very well go without seeing some snow though. The kids were so into it by then, we simply had to let them see some. So, on Friday morning we drove north from the kibbutz and up the Hermon mountain towards the ski resort at the top. We could see snow only a few hundreds of yards before the gates of the resort, and waited there for a few minutes, wondering if we should go inside or not. We decided to see how the kids would react to the snow first and let them out of the car to play with the snow by the road there. They had a lot of fun for five minutes lol, then they started getting wet from the melted snow and all of the sudden it was, "mom! I'm freezing! Let's get back to the car now!" lol. Good thing we didn't get tickets, we just shoved them back into the car and turned up the heat to defrost them a little and drove back to the kibbutz.

Here are some pictures of the happy snow times -

My New Friend in Gaza

2007-02-11T20:36:00.000+02:00

Strange are the ways of the Internet. And wonderful too, in a sense.

I am listed in the Skype directory, I think. I'm not even sure how I'm listed, all I know is that every now and again a Skype window pops up. I usually ignore these people, simply because I'm busy and don't have time to chat. I often take a look at the profile first, just out of curiosity. A week ago, such a Skype window popped up and me. The location showed "Palestinian Authority". I had a few minutes on my hands, so figured I'd say hello.

The young man on the other side tried Arabic first but switched to English when I said I can't read Arabic that well. He was from Gaza, his name was Jihad. When he realized he had stumbled upon an Israeli he went, "ohhhhhhhh, you must have me." And so our dialogue began. Now, Jihad is a 19 years old student and an avid supporter of Hammas, the kind that opposes to Israel in every way, and is certain that Allah intends for the whole of Israel, not just the West Bank or Gaza, to be under Palestinian control. To him, it's the will of God, not something that is even debatable. He loathes the PLO and admires the Hammas. He gets his news from Hammas resources and says he won't even check on international news sites because they are all "controlled by America" and hence prejudiced against Israel. He even justifies suicide bombers as freedom fighters.

It's a fascinating dialogue, to both of us. He says he never realized there were Jews in Israel that want peace and is fairly surprised. We talk almost daily, not always for very long. Surprisingly enough, we are reaching some common ground sometimes. I won't go into details, out of respect to the privacy of our chats, but just wanted to report here about this little dialogue that we have forming, between two people that are only 100 km's away from each other, yet are worlds apart in so many ways. It is a surprisingly friendly dialogue too. We call each other brothers by now (well, technically my husband and him call each other brothers lol), in a very Middle Eastern way. We've got mutual invitations open to each other and the common word in our conversation is Inshalla (God's willing) - Inshalla, someday Jihad will come here to play tennis with my hubby, and will take us down to visit the vegetable fields near his home...

School Worries

2007-01-23T07:10:00.000+02:00

Last few weeks our family has been hit by the flu. At least I think it was the flu, I'm never sure what's the difference between the common cold and "The Flu". Dan started it with a week of fever and feeling run down, complaining of stomach pain mostly, but also coughing nicely. In the middle of that, I had my episode of ongoing fever, headaches, sore throat, pain all over for five days. The day that Dan was feeling better, Ron came down with it, and is still not 100% well. My husband had it easiest (good thing he's not reading this, for a man any cold is an acute case of tuberculosis).

So, finally, looks like the four of us are all relatively fine, with the occasional coughing orchestra shaking the house, nothing worse. Now we're back to our main project these days, finding the right school for Ron. Ron turns five in exactly five days, so we are actually looking for a pre-school for next year, but prefer to find one that is attached to a school, where he can graduate smoothly from pre-school and into school.

One of the options currently on the agenda is the local Arab-Jewish school. I have posted about this unique project before, but we actually went visiting there on Sunday (a work day here). We spent a while in the pre-school to see what it's like. The Jewish caregivers (GANENET) were both away sick (this flu is a proper epidemic this year), but we met the two Arab ones, and they were absolutely lovely. We arranged the visit with one of them prior to coming, and our general impression with her is extremely positive. A young woman, soft spoken and she seems to be very loving and caring towards the children, which is all we're looking for, essentially.

Watching the children together was odd. Imagine a group of twenty-something children, aged four to six, about half of which are Arabs and half Jewish. The Jewish children don't speak Arabic and the Arab children don't speak Hebrew. So now you get the adults trying to manage them all in both languages. When we were there, they were having a music lesson. A Jewish lady, we later found out was a volunteer and not part of the staff, who didn't know Arabic, was trying to get them to play along to music and play some musical games together. She would explain the instructions in Hebrew, then wait for the Arab caregivers to translate it into Arabic. Whenever she needed to say something to an Arab kid, she needed help. Now, I'm not actually sure about the regular staff, I do hope they are all bi-lingual, at least to some extent. I have to say that the Arabic, the way it was used with these kids, was fairly simple, and even we managed to follow most of what was being said there. It was still interesting to watch and definitely a good example of the unique challenge this system faces. It was moving too, in a sense. Watching these people try so hard to bring down the barriers and provide young children with the kind of experience of "the other side", that we ourselves never experienced. Something so simple, yet so challenging, and who knows, maybe it would work too?

Anyway, we still have a long way to do here, checking on a few other schools. We'll be going back to the Arab-Jewish school as well, for a more detailed talk with the staff and learning more about this project. My main concern at this point is the distance. It's only 15 minutes or so from our home, by car, but the school ride obviously takes longer, having to pick up children across town. I am not sure Ron isn't too young to travel on his own in the school ride for over an hour everyday. I guess we'll see though. I'll try and post more as we explore other options and more about the Arab-Jewish school too.

Closing Down Metalks

2007-01-02T08:26:00.000+02:00

A bit of a sad day for me, but it had to be done. I closed down Metalks.com today. My strange vision of creating a place for people of the Middle East to talk to each other online didn't really work out I guess.

I take the blame here. Didn't have enough time to properly nurture that particular project. Frankly, I hadn't thought it would be so time consuming, and definitely not for the reasons it was. I figured I knew a lot about forums management, but forums take some toughness, some rules and discipline, as well as a lot of TLC. I found myself walking on eggshells as forum owner and admin, not sure where to draw the lines. We found ourselves wasting hours on trying to manage threads on weird subjects such as the protocols of the Elders of Zion and such nonesense, instead of trying to nurture the forum and bring in more people from the Middle East into the discussion. In retrospect, perhaps a more stern approach, simply forbidding some topics from being discussed at that stage, would have been more productive.

There was also a problem with not enough people from the Middle East participating. And those that were seemed to be mostly from Israel. I could easily "summon" in more Israelis. Israelis are chatty by nature, and I knew all I had to do was post on some political boards in Israel to get new participants. I held back, as I wanted a more balanced mix to the boards. I spent a while emailing Arab/Muslim/Middle East bloggers with little results. Yes, we did have some absolutely wonderful "recruits" that way, but overall, 90% of Arab bloggers either didn't reply, replied rudely, or just said thanks but never showed up on the board.

On the positive note, I have met and made friends with some wonderful people. Some of them I met as commenters here on this blog first, then got to know them better at Metalks. I have learned a lot about the people on "the other side". Thank you Amir, Jean, Khaled, Jad, and all of the other wonderful people who helped me learn so much about people living in what is officially "enemy countries". I still hope to meet someday, here or in neutral territory :)

And a big thanks to all of the moderators (the above included ;)! You guys (and gals) were wonderful to work with - thank you so much!

And who knows, Metalks may open again. I am keeping the domain, keeping the forum installs, just closing the gates, having cleaned up the dust (i.e. spam threads). If anyone wants to help with this project, give input or feedback, just comment here or email me.

The Syrian Peace Talks

2006-12-20T14:55:00.000+02:00

Things seem pretty confusing at this point, so what I am writing here in this post is just the way they reflect to this average Isralei mom. I mean, I will be the first to admit that I just don't have the time to follow the news properly. But, my husband gave me a quick update on the way to the amusement park a couple of days ago (it's the Hannuka holiday, so we try to spend the week having fun with the little ones). So, basically it looks like there are news that Syria is tyring to approach Israel, offering to start peace negotiations with no preliminary conditions. And apparently, Olmert is replying in the negative.

Now, I have heard Olmert in the past, explaining on national TV why he thinks talks with Syria is a bad idea. According to what he said, Syria remains a "bad" state, or a rouge state if you like, part of the famous Bushian axis of evil or whatnot. So, he figures negotiations with Syria can't really lead anywhere, because Syria actively supports Hezbulla and Hammas, i.e. the bad terrorists, and therefore, any negotiaions are bound to fail. He is afraid that once negotiations explode, this very event is likely to start a war in our region. I now hear he has an additional argument, that the US and Europe say we shouldn't talk to the Syrians (for the same reasons).

Now, IMO, Olmert is making a big big mistake. I'm sorry, but nothing justified missing an opportunity for peace talks with Syria. Nothing does. I don't care what any other country tells us. I don't care who Assad supports. The whole Hezbulla/Hammas issue is just the kind of thing which should be discussed within the framework of negotiations. Finally, a chance to actually try and sort things out. Give Syria a ladder to get off the tall tree which they climbed. Give them back the Golan Heights, as a demilitarized zone, and make Assad's day in terms of national pride. Then, from that position, he can maybe cut off his ties with Iran and the terrorist groups. What a terrible blow this will be to Hezbulla and Hammas! Cutting off their weapon supplies route from Iran! What a great opportunity for the moderate Palestinians to finally weaken Hammas and take over their government and bring their people closer to their own State and peace too!

There is one country I know will not be happy about this. That is Lebanon of course. From what I gather, most Lebanese hate Syria because Syria thinks of Lebanon as part of the Greater Syria. I'm not an expert, but from what little talks I've had with Syrians (online of course), I take it it's a commonly shared view over there. One Syrian I talked to said something along the lines of "let's split Lebanon between us, Israel can have the south, we'll take the north". I was shocked by the way he said it, just so matter of fact. lol took a while for me to convince him that we have zero interest in taking over any part of Lebanon whatsoever. However, if this is how Syria and the Syrians see Lebanon, then I can certainly see why the Lebanese would fear a peace agreement between Syrian and Israel, something that might strengthern Syria greatly in the long run. I think this is the reason why France objects to Israel-Syrian peace talks too? not sure about that last statement, but this is what I've heard.

Well, to my Lebanese friends I can only say, again, that Israel does not want any part of Lebanon. We want a safe and peaceful border, that's all. And peace between Israel and Syria, and weakening the HA can bring us all closer to that. Who knows, following Syria, maybe Lebanon itself will enter negotiations with Israel and reach a peace agreement?

I was born back when Israel had peace with no Arab country. We grew up dreaming of peace with our neighbors. We have acheived that with Egypt and Jordan. The very thought of maybe, just maybe, reaching a state of peace with all neighboring countries sends shivers down my spine, for real. I so hope that our government will find the courage to take this historical step and negotiate with Syria.

I could go on and on with my rant, but I really need to go now. Got back from the gym not too long ago and I need a good long shower. What was I doing in the gym? well, try my new weight loss blog to see ;)

An Interesting Meeting

2006-12-14T08:39:00.000+02:00

We had an interesting meeting yesterday at MacDonald's. You can say a lot of bad things about that place but IMO it makes for a great place to meet other families with kids - international too. A couple of years ago, standing in the line at the big M, we met a wonderful family from South Korea. We got really close with them, and spend a great 2 weeks getting to know them and travelling across Israel with them.

Anyway, fast forward to yesterday... We finish having our meal, then head over to the indoors play area there, which is really nice, with tunnels and things. I sit there with my husband, and our kids (now aged 3 and almost-5) take their shoes off and get inside, not to be seen again for a while lol. No other kids there at that point, but a few minutes later, a father and his two kids show up. They're Arabs and I notice how his boys are the same age as ours. I asked him, and indeed they were 3 and 5 (and totally sweet too!). So, they get inside and the three of us are sitting there, playing with our cell phones (another international trait, I guess).

A few minutes later, my five years old, Ron, gets out of some tunnel and approaches us. "Mom, can you teach me some English please?". I figure he must have gotten real bored inside, and is looking for some attention.

"English? now? wouldn't it be better for you to play inside now?"

"But, mom, there's a boy inside and he's blocking my tunnel. I tried telling him to move, but he only knows English".

At which all three adults started laughing. You see, he couldn't even tell the difference between Arabic and English. So, the nice dad next to us tried teaching my son how to ask the kid to move, in Arabic. Quite a challenge for my boy, but by then all kids crawled out to see what the fuss was all about lol.

So we kept sitting there, the kids went back inside, and we started talking. It was a fascinating talk and it made me think about how distant we are, and how little we know about each other, when they live only 20 minutes away from where we do. There was a lot of curiosity, on both sides. About the simple things, about who we were and who they are. About what it's like living in an Arab village and a Jewish town. And also just about what it's like raising two boys of these ages.

We tried getting the boys to play together, but his sons don't know Hebrew, and our sons don't know Arabic and while they were smiling and generally friendly, there was no way for them to actually play together, due to language barriers.

Amazing, really. A family, a mirror image of our own family in some ways. The mom joined us later on btw. A mom and a dad and two boys. Eating out at MacDonald's, shopping for clothes for the kids. Living but 20 minutes apart, yes we know so little about each other's respective lives...

One thing that came up and was a prominent subject was the new Arab-Jewish school that is actually located where they live. It's a complicated issue, and one I plan on addressing in a seperate post. We are currently looking into schools, especially ones with kindergartens attached to them and this one is one of the schools are are looking into. Big issue though, lots of implications.

Meanwhile, I'll leave you with a link to the Arab-Jewish co-education Center.

Here I am again

2006-11-22T22:29:00.000+02:00

Thanks for all those who asked. I have to say that as much as the last war has shaken my little world and made me realize I still live in the Middle East, it didn't take long for me to get back into my regional autism again... I work online, with people from all over the world. It's pretty easy for me to skip the news (actually, I hardly watch them nowdays), not read the newspapers, and pretend that we live in Switzerland or somewhere else nice and peaceful.

The weather is absolutely glorious here these days. Nice sunny days, everything is green from recent rainfalls, perfect temperature, not too hot, not too cold. Yes, if you ask me, I'll tell you that there is trouble in Gaza and problems in Lebanon, but I confess, most of it does not manage to pierce the bubble of my daily life. I am too busy looking after my kids, my home, my work, to pay too much attention to all of that. I'm not proud in that, just reflecting on where I am right now. The forums that we started during the war - Metalks.com - have all but died. I check in every couple of weeks, the place is a graveyard. Sad, really. I was really hoping to bring together the moderates, to talk and get to know each other. I have made some friends there too. But we all got busy again, and new constructive people didn't come along and it's gone for now.

Funny how this post turned into an epilogue of sorts. I didn't mean it to, actually. I decided to keep blogging here, share my life, as an Israeli mom. I may actually start a spinoff blog soon, just to focus on my weight loss plan, which is a central issue in my life at the moment. But I will also check in here and just blog, about me, my family, my life.

For now, Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate. It's good night from here...

The School Year Started Yesterday

2006-09-02T16:43:00.000+03:00

Since both of my boys are in kindergarten, they are being re-introduced to it gradually... a couple of hours a day for the first few days. I guess we shouldn't complain. I mean, can you imagine six hours of actual work time on my computer all at once? I would probably be in a state of shock. So, they are taking it easy on me, and not letting me get back to working full time :P

Some major changes in our household starting this month. My husband is leaving his current place of employment after 18 years. He will be spending a lot of time at home with me and we still haven't decided whether he starts a new job or stays at home and helps me maintain and develop the web publishing business. The plan right now is for him to take a part-time job outside the house, help me with the business by putting in a few hours every week, and spend the rest of the time with the kids. Either way, changes are always stressful and we are hoping for a smooth adjustment over here.

Breaking away from his previous workplace, we also bought our first owned car on Thursday! We now have our own Hyundai Accent!! It's second-hand and three years old but we're thrilled with getting it :)

Don't be looking for any exciting political news on this post today. I don't remember the last time I watched the news. With the war over, I tend to look away from those things and re-focus on my family and household. I now get my share of daily politics from the Middle East Talks forums , which I find to be absolutely fascinating. We have a house guest over for the weekend as well, a lovely young man from the US of America. His name is Jack, and he's from New Mexico. Born and bred in the USA, he's a student of Arabic and speaks Arabic fluently! He is on his way back home from a six months stay in Egypt, and is choke-full of information and stories. We are having some very interesting talks at the dinner table (breakfast and lunch tables too lol). He was at an Israeli-Arab village with my father-in-law this morning, visiting a friend of my father-in-law and chatting away for a while. I have to go now, see what the plans for the rest of the day are. We may be going to visit Ceasaria with Jack, and maybe finishing it off with an evening swim in the warm water of the Mediterranean. Have a great weekend everyone and a good week after that!

More of a mom than a blogger this week

2006-08-26T18:09:00.000+03:00

The last week of the summer vacation... counting the days now. I get so little time to work nowdays. Sigh. At least their dad is home, and spends a lot of time with them. He is on his last week of his current place of work, then off to seek new adventures, career wise. We'll see how this goes.

I have to say, the new Middle East forums are taking up a large chunk of whatever computer time I do find. It's quite addictive, obviously not just for me lol, we just went over 1,000 posts already in a relatively short time. I find it very interesting to view things from new perspectives. Sure, sometimes those perspectives are so foreign to mine, that it can be almost frustrating. Also, people feeding from different sources of information can be challenging. Thankfully, there are still some relatively objective resources online, for us to compare notes every now and again. I am still looking forward to getting more people from the Middle East involved. We have quite a large number of Americans, Europeans and even Australians. All are very welcome and add a lot to the discussions, but I was hoping for some direct dialogue between people from the Middle East themselves.... so, if you have some "Middle Easterners" in your contact list, please drop them a word about our new hangout - http://www.metalks.com !

The New Middle East Forums

2006-08-19T11:43:00.000+03:00

I've been asked by a fellow blogger to tell some more about METalks.com - the Middle East Forums that I launched a few days ago. So... here goes...

A bit about the forums themselves. So far, we have only two forums, one for political/ideological kind of threads, and another for social interaction/fun threads. We have 27 members as of right now, and growing daily. Members are from around the globe, many from the Middle East. It is actually not easy placing them on the map, as some are originally from the Middle East, now living elsewhere.

The site staff currently consists of myself and two others: JeanSouc and Janjo. Jean is Lebanese, living in Paris, and Janjo is Iranian and living in the UK. Both of them I met through this blog here, as they commented about posts I made. I always enjoyed their comments and their ability to keep things polite and even friendly, despite major disagreements with other commenters. I felt the would make great team members at a site like METalks.com and I still do!

So, what is METalks.com about? I want it to be a platform to allow people of the Middle East a place to interact and create some sort of positive dialogue. The emphasis here is certainly on the positive. I don't think we need yet another place where people will bicker, fight and insult each other. I want a place where opinions can be expressed, yet an overall respectful tone be maintained.

I also want to bring together those voices of the Middle East that call for peace, human rights, democracy and the associated values. Being an online forum, I realize that we're going to have all kinds of people joining, not all of them necessarily promoting those ideals, yet I hope that we will be able to create a strong community where diverse opinions can be heard, discussions can be held and yet a general line be maintained promoting these ideas, at least by the site's staff and core posters.

I was looking for such boards before and couldn't find quite what I needed. Some nice initiatives out there simply didn't have the right platform, IMO. I felt that these forums deserved some investments, in the form of their own domain name, a proper software and appropriate hosting. Hey, I guess it's the webmaster in me ;)

We are working things out as we go along. These days we are seeing our first threads where moderator intervention is actually needed. I bring with me six years of experience managing large forums, so hopefully that will help. There will be bumps along the road, of that I am sure, but I also hope that a strong and valuable community will be formed, where people of the Middle East will learn to actually know each other and, well, Talk!

Why not join us at www.metalks.com ?

Lebanese Army finally deploying

2006-08-17T10:32:00.000+03:00

I wonder how this looks to an outsider. Two militaries, very peacefully switching positions. The Israeli tanks moving south, as the Lebanese tanks take their place. If there's anyone in Lebanon, or out of it, that still believes that Israel has any plans or wishes in regards to Lebanese soil (or water), I hope that these pictures show them how wrong they were. Israelis don't want to occupy Lebanon. Never did. Not for land, not for water, not for anything.

I hope Lebanon grabs the chance it's been given and make the most of it. This is their chance to finally get rid of the Iranian de-facto occupation of the South and reclaim their land. Current decision to allow Hezbulla to stay, and armed at that, even if their weapons are concealed, doesn't look very promising. I hope this is only phase one. I hope that the Lebanese government will have the sense to gradually and thoughtfully, yet decidedly and not too slowly, disarm the Hezbulla and take real control over the region.

He's back!!!!

2006-08-15T08:47:00.000+03:00

After more than four weeks (seasoned with a couple of short home leaves of a few hours each), my dear man is back home!!! He surprised us this morning and just showed up at the door, looking extremely tired, his face covered with stubble, but very very happy to see us.

Our yonger son, aged two and a half, woke up first, and was very hesitant about this man that suddenly showed up... It took a few minutes of convincing that this is actually is his dad and he is back for good lol Then we woke up the older kid, aged four and half. He was thrilled.

I haven't even checked the news yet this morning. For now, all the news I needed is right here :)

Ceasefire Holding On So Far

2006-08-14T13:35:00.000+03:00

Like most people here, I check on the news as often as I can this morning. Is it really over? Is the ceasefire still in place? IDF officials have said the the ceasefire is "fragile", and we all hope we won't hear the sound of shattering glass today...

So far, so good. There has been an incident earlier this morning, but looks like it's been contained. Just an isolated incident where, according to Israeli sources, a Hezbulla gunman shot at an IDF force.

Keeping our fingers crossed here. The kids are anxious to see their daddy back home. They've been told that the war ended today. "So, Mom, did we beat the enemy?", my 4 years old son asked. Good question. I told him that the enemy and us decided to stop shooting at each other, so that the dads can get back home. Told him everyone was tired of the war. He was happy enough with this answer. Now, they want to know why daddy isn't home already. I told them the army is waiting to make sure that everyone plays by the rules and that the enemy really did stop fighting.

lol, not trying to offer any of the above as sophisticated commentary here. This is what I explained to a 4.5 year old kid, that's all ;)

On another note, I am looking for interesting blogs from the Middle East. I want to focus on the ones that promote peace and sanity in this region, not war mongerers. I want to start a blog reviewing other blogs and recommending the ones that I like. If you know of any, they can be your own, please either comment here or email me - israelimom@gmail.com. Cheers.

Crazy last day?

2006-08-13T20:01:00.000+03:00

How strange. Since yesterday, everyone's been counting down to the ceasefire (supposedly tomorrow morning). At the same time the IDF tripled its forces in Lebanon and Hezbulla seems to be firing eveything they can at us. It's strange, to say the least.

Yesterday afternoon, when both Israel and Hezbulla had announced that they agree to the UN's proposal, my sons were thrilled. We told them that the war will soon be over and daddy will be back home. We decided to celebrate by doing a small "BBQ". That means we lit a small bonefire and I made them some hot dogs at home and let them eat them on a stick by the fire. As we were sitting there, singing songs, the choppers began flying above. Flying in formations, they kept coming and coming, heading north. We knew something big was going on, as dozens of helicopters flew over. My sons were jumping happily and waving "at the pilots". The adults were worried, wondering who on board the aircraft will be coming back home in a coffin :( We heard later that evening that Israel had indeed expanded the operation. Dozens of soldiers already killed, probably some of them were indeed in the helicopters flying over our heads. How tragic. To lose a dear one when the sides have already decided on a ceasefire.

Then today, Nassaralla, joining in on this crazy race to "prove we won" just before the ceasefire, seems to be shooting everything he has left in his arsenal. Record number of rockets landed on Israel today, huge damage all over the north, coming close to where I live again, as well. I was taking my walk this afternoon, when my mom phoned me, in panic, saying I need to get back home and be with the kids, since the Hezbulla are going crazy on us today and shooting their long range rockets again. I tried to explain to her that they are as likely to hit our home, as they are to hit me during the walk :P

It's like in those horror movies really. You think the monster is dead, but then, at the last minute, the ugly monster of war raises its head for a final bite. My heart goes out to everyone affected, on both sides of the border. Stay safe everyone, hang in there for just a bit longer, and hopefully this will be behind us tomorrow.

Peace to all.

Oh, and if you are looking for a dose of something positive, hop over to the new Middle East Talks forums!

Introducing METalks.com - the Middle East Talks Forum

2006-08-13T08:58:00.000+03:00

I've been toying with this idea for a while now, as some of you already know, and last night I decided to take the plunge. I set up new forums to carry out discussions about the Middle East. Everyone is welcome, only please read what I had already posted there. No rules are set in stone as of yet, but I do intend on keeping Metalks.com a friendly place. The idea is to promote communication and build bridges, not to spew hatred and feel all superior.

Everyone is welcome, from any place in the world. It shoud be a place to ask questions, talk and exchange views. Politely please :)

So, just head over to www.metalks.com, register for your account (it's free, of course) and start posting. Either reply to my threads or start one of your own. Let's get talking :)

A Ceasefire seems closer than ever

2006-08-12T18:17:00.000+03:00

I was happy a few minutes ago, as I've been told that Nassaralla has basically accepted the UN's terms for the ceasefire. Very surprised, I think, but pleasantly so (if that word can be used in the same sentence with this guy...). Then I read the full quote from his speech -
Hizbullah leader, Hasan Nasrallah, said in a speech broadcast on Hizbullah's television network al-Manar that "if a date for halting all hostile operations is agreed upon, Hizbullah will uphold this decision."

Well... not sure if he really does accept all of the terms. But at least we may have a ceasefire during which things might be negotiated further. The Hebrew version of that piece of news did say that Nassaralla has accepted the UN resolution. It just seems a bit odd to me. Too much like wishful thinking.

Israel, on its part, supports and accepts the UN resolution and I guess a truce will come into effect as soon as Nassaralla will say the same. The official Lebanon also supports the UN resolution.

For now, though, the fighting continutes. The IDF seems to be making huge progress within Lebanon with some impressive operations being carried out yesterday and today. Some are already revealed, others were only hinted at. I guess the IDF will try and make the most from everyday now, before the ceasefire is declared, making life even harder for the Hezbulla and making sure that when the UN soldiers arrive, they will have an easier time.

Buffet and Hezbulla

2006-08-12T15:25:00.000+03:00

The following piece was forwarded to me in an email from a friend. I am not sure who wrote it, but I think a lot of it is spot on, so I am re-publishing it here.

Warren Buffett. The most important thing you need to know about Israel today and how it has performed so far in the war with Hezbollah is Warren Buffett.Say what? Well, the most talked-about story in Israel, before Hezbollah started this war, was the fact that on May 5, Mr. Buffett, the Berkshire Hathaway chairman and the world’s most successful investor, bought an 80 percent stake in the privately held Israeli precision tools company, Iscar Metalworking, for $4 billion — Mr. Buffett’s first purchase of a company outside America. According to BusinessWeek, as a result of the deal, Iscar’s owners were “likely to pay about $1 billion in capital gains taxes into the Israeli government’s coffers — an unexpected windfall. With the Israeli budget already running a $2 billion surplus, the government is considering slashing value-added tax by one percentage point to 15 percent.”In May, Israeli papers were filled with pages about how cool it was that Israel had produced a cutting-edge company that Warren Buffett wanted to buy. It was being discussed everywhere, pushing the Tel Aviv stock exchange to an all-time high.That is where Israel’s head was on the eve of this war — and it explains something I sensed when I visited Israel shortly after the fighting started. Nobody wanted this war, and nobody was prepared for it. Look closely at pictures of Israeli soldiers from Lebanon. There is no enthusiasm in their faces, and certainly no triumphalism. Their expressions tell the whole story: “I just don’t want to be doing this — another war with the Arabs.”
\n Israeli soldiers were napping when this war started — that’s why they got ambushed — for the very best reasons: They have so much more to do with their lives, and they live in a society that empowers and enables them to do it. (Unfortunately, the Buffett company is in northern Israel and had to be temporarily closed because of rocket attacks.)\n Young Israelis dream of being inventors, and their role models are the Israeli innovators who made it to the Nasdaq. Hezbollah youth dream of being martyrs, and their role models are Islamic militants who made it to the Next World. Israel spent the last six years preparing for Warren Buffett, while Hezbollah spent the last six years preparing for this war.\n “Israel was not prepared for this war,” said the Israeli political theorist Yaron Ezrahi. “It came upon us like the crash of a meteorite. ... The whole focus of debate in the country before this war was on withdrawal.” The Israeli Army had just taken on its own extremists, the settlers in Gaza, and removed them against their will, added Mr. Ezrahi, “and the country had just elected for the first time a prime minister who promised voters to unilaterally withdraw from the West Bank in return for nothing.”\n In the end, Israel will do whatever it has to do to prevail. But what is so troubling for Israelis is that this war is about nothing and everything. That is, Israel got out of Lebanon, and yet Hezbollah keeps coming. It is all about Hezbollah’s need to justify its existence and Iran’s need for a distraction.\n What is doubly sad is that Lebanon was getting its act together. Rafik Hariri, the former prime minister, represented a whole new type of Arab leader — one who rose to power by being a builder and an entrepreneur. He understood that Lebanon, freed of Syria, was a country whose youth had the energy and skill to compete anywhere. He thought Lebanon could again be a model of how Arabs can embrace modernity. But Mr. Hariri was murdered, allegedly by Syria, and now Lebanon’s democracy is being murdered by Hezbollah. Once again, in the Arab world, the past buries the future."

Israeli soldiers were napping when this war started — that’s why they got ambushed — for the very best reasons: They have so much more to do with their lives, and they live in a society that empowers and enables them to do it. (Unfortunately, the Buffett company is in northern Israel and had to be temporarily closed because of rocket attacks.)Young Israelis dream of being inventors, and their role models are the Israeli innovators who made it to the Nasdaq. Hezbollah youth dream of being martyrs, and their role models are Islamic militants who made it to the Next World. Israel spent the last six years preparing for Warren Buffett, while Hezbollah spent the last six years preparing for this war.“Israel was not prepared for this war,” said the Israeli political theorist Yaron Ezrahi. “It came upon us like the crash of a meteorite. ... The whole focus of debate in the country before this war was on withdrawal.” The Israeli Army had just taken on its own extremists, the settlers in Gaza, and removed them against their will, added Mr. Ezrahi, “and the country had just elected for the first time a prime minister who promised voters to unilaterally withdraw from the West Bank in return for nothing.”In the end, Israel will do whatever it has to do to prevail. But what is so troubling for Israelis is that this war is about nothing and everything. That is, Israel got out of Lebanon, and yet Hezbollah keeps coming. It is all about Hezbollah’s need to justify its existence and Iran’s need for a distraction.What is doubly sad is that Lebanon was getting its act together. Rafik Hariri, the former prime minister, represented a whole new type of Arab leader — one who rose to power by being a builder and an entrepreneur. He understood that Lebanon, freed of Syria, was a country whose youth had the energy and skill to compete anywhere. He thought Lebanon could again be a model of how Arabs can embrace modernity. But Mr. Hariri was murdered, allegedly by Syria, and now Lebanon’s democracy is being murdered by Hezbollah. Once again, in the Arab world, the past buries the future.

Israel mustn’t get sucked into that same grave. Israel needs to get a cease-fire and an international force into south Lebanon — and get out. Israel can’t defeat Hezbollah, it can only hurt it enough to make it think twice about ever doing this again — and it has pretty much done that. It must not destroy any more of Lebanon, which is going to still be its neighbor when the guns fall silent.\n Israel wins when Warren Buffett’s company there is fully back in business — not when Nasrallah is out of business. Because that will only happen, not by war, but when Arabs wake up and realize that he is just another fraud, just another Nasser, whose strategy would condemn the flower of Arab youth — who deserve and need so much better — to another decade of making potato chips, not microchips. Nasrallah can win in the long run only if he can condemn the flower of Israel’s youth to the same fate. Don’t let it happen, Israel.

Our Defense Minister Isn't Very Popular today...

2006-08-10T20:55:00.000+03:00

Amir Peretz is showing his dovish tendencies again by declaring that diplomatic efforts to curb fighting must be exhausted before expansion of military operation in Lebanon. I just returned home and I can tell you people all over are saying the government should let the military move forward and get this business over with. The feeling is that the IDF is holding back, not using its full power and the result is the continuing erosion of our military and civilians alike. Soldiers are killed everyday, and as I mentioned before, this in Israel is as bad, sometimes even worse, than when civilians get killed (funny, I know, but there you have it).

I just hope the diplomatic efforts will move forward in full speed. I always prefer peace to war, there is not a question there. If there's a chance of acheiving Israel's goal (basically, disarming Heabulla or moving them away from the border) by using diplomacy, then I'm all for it. However, if we find out that this is not even possible, then maybe holding back and waiting will only cause more suffering on both sides.

On another note, a mom and her five year old son were killed today from katyusha rockets in Israel. The younger brother is severly wounded. Read about it here and note how you won't see any carbonated or torn bodies in the article, only pretty pictures of how the mom and sweet boy should be remembered.

One more thing...

2006-08-09T23:04:00.000+03:00

Reading Nasseralla's response to the latest developments. The usual propaganda and all, but one thing bothered me -

In a televised speech, Hassan Nasrallah said Israeli attacks had not weakened its rocket capabilities and called on the Arab residents of Haifa to quit the Israeli city to avoid being hurt by the guerrilla group's barrages.

Why does he only call for the Arab residents to leave? Why does he differentiate between Arab blood and Jewish blood? Goes to show just how much value he puts on human life. Seems like he's perfectly ok with Jewish children being hit by his rockets after all. So much for pretending to be a legitimate "military".

Widening Military Operations

2006-08-09T22:35:00.000+03:00

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3288819,00.html
Looks like military operation on the ground is going to get more intensive. According to the government's decision Israel has five goals -

Israel is working towards five chief goals, which were noted in the cabinet decision:

The return of the kidnapped soldiers with no preconditions;

an immediate halt to all Hizbullah terror activity against Israel and Israeli targets, including ceasing rocket and missile attacks on Israel;

the full implementation of Security Council resolution 1559;

the deployment of an effective international force along the Lebanon-Israeli border for the length of the Blue Line;

and the prevention of Hizbullah rearmament and its regaining operational capabilities, mainly by preventing weapons transfer to Lebanon from Syrian and Iran.

At this point, I just wonder what does it all mean and how long this is going to take. I want my life back, and I'm sure there are numerous families, on both sides of the border who feel the same (and yes, most of them have it far worse than I do). My younger son has been waking up for the past two days crying, calling out for his daddy. I hug him and kiss him, but he keeps crying for daddy. Sigh. I hope this thing ends soon. I seriously have anything more clever than that to say about this war today.

On the Face :: Putting things in perspective

2006-08-08T13:51:00.000+03:00

Remember the picture of the little Israeli girls drawing on artillery shells? Caused an uproar a couple of weeks ago. Check out this wonderful piece - you will learn not only about that picture, but about the power of the pictures and how their meaning can be manipulated so easily.

On the Face :: Putting things in perspective: http://ontheface.blogware.com/blog/_trackback/2142505

Civilian vs. Military casualties

2006-08-07T20:38:00.000+03:00

I often see how the international media refers to civilian casualties differently then military casualties. Yes, I agree, in the crazy "rules" of war, one wants to make the distinction between "legitimate" targets such, i.e. soldiers, and illegetimate targets, i.e. civilians.

This issue has been on my mind for a while now. I think it should be noted that Israeli society is extremely sensitive to the loss of life, be them civilians or soldiers. People here break apart when they hear of soldiers being killed. We lost dozens of soldiers already in the current war. My heart goes out to the families.

Maybe it's the fact that we have little choice on whether or not to become soldiers. When a young man or woman turns 18, they join the military. Compulsory military service is one of the things that make Israeli society so special. It means that when you hear of a soldier being killed, you know it could have just as easily been your son, brother, husband or father (the same goes for women, though the majority of combat soldiers are male, so I'm using the male form here).

The IDF is known as the people's army. This means not only that it's there to serve the people, but also that it is comprised from the same people that make up the nation. These soldiers are not blood-thirsty. They are not indoctrinized to be blood-thirsty either. They are regular men and women, who did not ask to fight, yet once called in, they will do anything to protect their country and will give up their life for that.

In honor of our humane and compassionate soldiers, I want to share a few pictures that I got via email today. The title of the email was "the pictures that the international media won't show you". I am dedicating these pictures to my personal soldier up in the north right now, my sweet dear man, my war hating officer, who used to give candy to Palestinian children and comfort them when performing his hateful military duties in the territories. Take care, Sweetie, stay safe and come back home soon - we miss you so much!

Highest number of Israeli civilian casualties in a single day so far

2006-08-06T15:20:00.000+03:00

At least 10 people killed in a katyusha rocket attack. Why the high number of casualties? well, people are getting fed up of sitting in shelters and being to go outside. Then it's just a question of luck, or lack of. I won't be cynical as to say I hope this pleases the people who were looking for proportionality. It only pleases some people, and that's not unexpected either. To me, this just proves the point I was trying to make before, that at least part of the reason for the discrepancy in the numbers of civilian casualties is due to the fact that the Israeli homefront is better prepared. The shelters, secured rooms and the fact that many civilians just left the area (evacuees, rather than refugees, though that is very much a matter of definition), were all contributing factors in keeping the numbers relatively low. Three weeks into the war, people are beginning to get tired of it all.

Visiting my father yesterday afternoon, in a nearby Kibbutz, I happened to overhear a family that came to stay there. They were from Haifa and were explaining to their hosts why they think it's time for them to go back home. Just missing home, is what it boils down to. There's a limit to how long people are willing to stay away from home with relatives and friends.

I think we may witness more casualties on the Israeli side, now that people are beginning to re-populate the north. Along with that, we'll also see growing pressure on our government to speed up the fighting and "finish the business". It's doable too. Going faster means using more brute force. It means more casualties for our military, and also more civilians hurt on the other side. Then again, given a few more days like today, with so many civilian casualties on the Israeli side, and our government may just be forced towards that direction.

This all relates to the question I see around quite often. How come we're still "not winning", after three weeks of massive fighting. Well, I've said it before and I'll say it again - we are winning. Slowly. Not a dramatic victory. It's not the Six Day War again. This is different, a slow war against sneaky guerilla fighters hiding in trenches. We'll win this one, moving forward one mile at a time. The more we move on, the more rockets we will get launched at Israel. Hezbulla still has many of them and they won't stop launching them until we get them down to their knees. Which we will. It's just going to take some time.

On another note - did you see the doctored picture on Reuters?
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3286966,00.html
Incredible that such a leading news agency would let this kind of picture get published. Makes you wonder who their sources really are and how reliable they are.

Maybe? perhaps? A chance at a possible light in the end of the tunnel?

2006-08-05T21:57:00.000+03:00

US, France reach deal on Israel-Hizbullah resolution

The United States and France agreed Saturday on a draft UN Security Council resolution that calls for an end to the fighting between Israel and the Lebanese terror group Hizbullah , but would allow Israel to defend itself if attacked, officials said.

Of course, there is the tiny issue of the Hezbulla actually agreeing ;) Many people here had the gut reaction of "France again?!?", figuring that if France is involved this has to be a bad resolution for Israel. I actually think it's a great resolution, on paper, I just don't see Hezbulla agreeing to these terms, if indeed they include demilitarizing the zone from the border to the Litani river as the Hebrew version of the article claims. I wonder if someone in the UN is really naive enough to think that it will be that easy to disarm the Hezbulla?

Also, the Hezbulla's response has already arrived, as cryptic as ever -

Hezbollah cabinet minister Mohammed Fneish said the guerrilla group would stop fighting when Israel ended its bombardment of Lebanon and withdrew its troops."Israel is the aggressor. When the Israeli aggression stops, Hezbollah simply will cease fire on the condition that no Israeli soldier remains inside Lebanese land," he said.

Since they were the ones to launch rockets and mortar shells at us out of the blue on July 12, not to mention break into Israeli territory, killing and kidnapping solidiers, I'm not really sure what this response means. My only thought is that he's referring to the Sheba farms? In which case, it's amazing that they would bring this disaster over the Lebanese people for some measly pieace of land that Israel doesn't even claim to own...

Anyway, I am dubious about the new initiative, but I can't help but hoping that this will somehow work and bring this crazy war to an end. Speaking for myself and my family, and the close people around us, I can say that Israelis are prepared for a long and costly war, but it doesn't mean that we want it. My father-in-law put it nicely today. He said Israel is now the spearhead in the fight against radical Islam. It's no fun being the spearhead, as this is the part that gets eroded the most, but looks like we may be left with no choice...

Rockets landed in my town

2006-08-04T18:08:00.000+03:00

Was about to post about just another day here... just as I was typing, I hear one blast, and then another one, a few seconds later. Pretty loud, made the windows shake.

I had just returned home from my evening walk, pushing my two and a half yo son in the stroller. I was listening to some music on my MP3 player, when suddenly a car pulls over next to me. "Excuse me, Ma'am, did you just hear the sirens?". I said I didn't, and he pointed at the headphones and smiled lol.

We get back home, I get Dan his dinner then put a DVD in the player for him and head for the shower. On my way, I stop by the computer of course, and thought I'd add a post here in the blog. While I was typing away, the two blasts went off. Wasn't sure what to make of them at first, but a few minutes later my brother-in-law came over to ask if we were ok. Apparently, the sirens went off about a minute prior to that, but we didn't hear them here (we're on the edge of town). So we relized these were indeed rockets.

Not to give away the exact location, but later reports on the radio and TV said these were two rockets, landing at the most southern point to date, and that happened to be two miles away from our home.

I need to go now, finally get that shower and tuck in my kid, he's waiting for his bedtime story. His older brother came home as well (having spent the day with my parents) and is already asleep in bed. Good night everyone!

More War News

2006-08-03T21:57:00.000+03:00

Bad day here in Israel... Eight civilians killed in rocket attacks on the North, and another three soldiers killed in the fighting in Lebanon.

The reason for the heavy toll of casualties (dozens of people injured, some quite badly), is that many people got tired of staying in shelters/with their relatives. I guess they're be going back soon enough, but... this can't go on for much longer.

One of the commenters here, Jad, asked how can it be that after three weeks of fighting the Hezbulla's rockets firing abilities seem unfazed. Well, hardly surprising really. We are dealing with thousands of launchers, carefully hidden in woods and among buildings. And here's the surprising part... you're not going to like it, but there are many voices here in the Israeli public calling for Israel to finally pull its weight and "really" bomb South Lebanon...

I guess this takes some explaining. You see, the Qana village incident isn't the norm. Generally speaking, when the IDF knows that there are civilians in a building they avoid firing at it. Yes, I realize that close to 1000 Lebanese have been killed, but considering the amount of explosives the IDF dropped on Lebanon this isn't that high a number. Some people here feel that our attempt at maintaining moral standards is bogging us down and preventing us from winning this war. That burning down Southern Lebanon (the word Naplam comes up a lot in talkbacks) is the only solution to stopping them from shooting at us.

Now, before I get jumped on, let me make it very clear that I do not support this view. I don't think anything justifies knowingly hurting civilians. Ever. I do see that we have a problem here, but my view is that we have to stick to conventional fighting, i.e. use our troops (at a higher price in terms of casualties for our military) to gradually take over the South of Lebanon and uproot Hezbulla out of there. However, this is going to take time... maybe a long time too.

The only other way I can see of ending this sooner (and with fewer casualties on both sides), is for the international community to step in and actively intervene, including sending in military forces (I'm talking NATO forces, not just UN peacekeepers or observers), which would really take over and establish a demilitarized zone in the south. Not seeing any chance of that happening any time soon though. Sigh, I guess the fighting will continue.

Hezbulla manipulating the IDF into attacking non-Shiite villages

2006-08-03T16:17:00.000+03:00

Bliss Street Journal - The Blog: The Siege of Mari

I have read this in several blogs by now. Very disturbing.... Looks like the Hezbulla is fighting local people in Druze and Christian villages in South Lebanon so they can position their launchers there. The people try to fight back, but the Hezbulla terrorizes them out of the village, or just into submission. Looks like this is a tactic by now. I guess they prefer to use non-Muslim Lebanese as their human shields.

Back to fighting...

2006-08-02T16:51:00.000+03:00

I posted yesterday saying that I doubt Nassaralla can really stop launching rockets at us. He proved me right today, by launching over 70 of them and counting... Quite a few people injured, at least one man killed.

Some interesting tidbits in the news here today.

Same as with the Scuds of the first Gulf War, some Palestinians are so overjoyed by the Katyusha attacks that they are celebrating them in song and dance. Well, looks like some of them almost got to see it up-close, as apparently some of the long-range rockets launched at Israel last Wednesday crossed the lines over to the Western Bank. Apparently, they don't mind:
The Fatah member related that local residents cheered when they heard the rocket fall and saw the resulting flames. “Even if it were to fall on our heads, it wouldn’t have spoiled our joy. All of us here are praying for Hizbullah’s success and victory," he said.

Another thing about the Qana incident. Rumors here are that the Hezbulla housed invalid children in the building, to create maximum effect in world public opinion. They set them up as bait, then launched from next to the building and took the launcher back inside, knowing the IDF will shoot at it. I have to say, this seems a bit too diabloic even for me. I am not at all sure this is true. That said, the following article makes it quite clear that they were focused on making the maximum gain from the whole set. Looks pretty cold hearted, cynical and calculated use of dead children's bodies. I used to think it was just poor taste (in Israel, we avoid showing dead bodies of people who were hurt in terror attacks, out of respect to the dead and their families). Looks now like it was more than the usual display of poor taste though -
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3284546,00.html

Looks like we have a few more weeks of war ahead of us

2006-08-01T22:36:00.000+03:00

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3284769,00.html

Interestingly enough, in the Grapes of Wrath operation back in 1996, the first Qana incident was enough to bring about a ceasefire. Looks like this time things are different. However, I think Hezbulla is doing the right thing (I know, weird combination of words there Hezbulla & "right thing"), by not shooting rockets into Israel anymore. If they continue doing this, Israel's ability to carry on with this war on Lebanese soil will be weakened overtime, both in terms of world public opinion and in terms of internal support.

IMO, it's not the two kidnapped soldiers that are driving Israel forward, at least not in terms of public opinion here in Israel. It's the constant shelling of civilian settlements in the north that propelled the Israeli response. Take that away and, personally, I doubt that Israel will be able to maintain support for the war for more than a few weeks. Though of course, who knows if Nassaralla can continue with his new policy... I bet he's itching to fire those promised Zilzals at Tel Aviv.

Ceasefire in Place

2006-07-31T08:21:00.000+03:00

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283905,00.html

Nothing unexpected there. The Qana scenario was bound to happen (please, don't read this as any disrespect to the people killed there), including the inevitable ceasefire following that. It's why I thought we should have gone with the UN's offer for a ceasefire 3 days ago. Such a shame that so many people had to die in order for this to happen. I blame the Israeli government here for being so short sighted. Hopefully, Lebanon and the UN will get their act together and use the ceasefire to really evacuate people. I have to say though that I somehow doubt they will. The UN is good for talking, I am not at all sure they can actually do something on the ground :( If I could I would drive over there myself, support old folks and carry children in my arms, just to help those families get away from them. They were given 48 hours and the clock is ticking. I hope that the Lebanese government, the army and just regular Lebanese citizens are doing whatever they can to help evacuate civilians. If I were a Lebanese today, I would get into my car and drive south, to help get at least one famliy out of there. I hope they are doing just that...

Interesting Facts About the Building

2006-07-31T00:28:00.000+03:00

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283816,00.html
VIDEO - An IDF investigation has found that the building in Qana struck by the Air Force fell around eight hours after being hit by the IDF.

"The attack on the structure in the Qana village took place between midnight and one in the morning. The gap between the timing of the collapse of the building and the time of the strike on it is unclear," Brigadier General Amir Eshel, Head of the Air Force Headquarters told journalists at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, following the incidents at Qana.

Note that they offer explanations but don't have any definitive answers. General Eshel did not come forward with any accusations, all he's saying is that there's something strange here.

I will add this to the list of weird things. If the building gets hit at 1 AM, how come the people inside don't just leave the place? Your building gets hit by a bomb and you just go on sleeping? Also, please... how can you live there, with children, and still allow HA people store explosives in your village and launch rockets from there? It's beyond me.

It's Kfar Qana all over again...

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

And at the same place too, at the village of Qana... sheer tragedy for the poor people living there :( my heart goes out to the poor civilians, esepcially the children.

The Hezbulla did it in the very same way too. They launched rockets from next to the building then ran inside... hoping, I guess, for the IDF to attack the building. And sure enough, as leaflets had been showered on Qana telling people to evacuate, the IAF assumed the building was empty of civilians and attacked.

No words will help those children whose bodies are burried in the rubble... There's a special place in hell (with no virgins either) for the Hezbulla people who launched rockets from that building, knowing fully well they will be tracked down and shot at, dooming dozens of children to horrible death.

Interesting Article

2006-07-30T00:42:00.000+03:00

I think he sums up the Israeli moral dilemma pretty well.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283206,00.html

What's wiser: To suffer the slaughter of our best fighters to prevent the slaughter of civilians in rural south Lebanon and be the most moral army in the world, or to erase villages used as Hizbullah terror motels, save the blood of our sons and be considered less moral?

What's wiser: To act with limited forces and in doing so extend the war’s duration, the number of rockets being fired at us and the number of civilian casualties, or to use lethal force, feel less moral and establish deterrence?

Today's Developments - No Ceasefire on the horizon

2006-07-29T21:56:00.000+03:00

Israel has rejected an UN call for a 72 hours long ceasefire, to be used for humanitarian purposes. I have to say, I object to that decision. It's been one thing that's been on my mind for over a week now. I thought that Israeli should even initiate such a ceasefire, lasting 2-3 days, during which all civilians should evacuate the South of Lebanon, with the help of humanitarian organizations. I figured, it this is done, then we can really use full fire power on the areas controlled by Hizbulla, as no civilians would still be there.

I can understand the official Israeli position. They say that we are now providing refugees with humanitarian corridors, through which they can safely leave the area. The idea is that a general ceasefire would allow the Hezbulla to re-organize and have more trucks full of ammunition and military supplies come over from across the Syrian border. With humanitarian corridors, you get a greater measurement of supervising who's moving along the corridors, hopefully with some UN monitoring as well.

I still think the full ceasefire was a better idea. For one thing, I think it will make evacuation easier on people, and encourage them to leave the area. For another, seems to me, once you give them 3 days to evacuate civilians, especially if it's the official responsibility of the UN, then you leave the area open for a real military engagement, something that would allow our forces greater freedom of operation. I have to say though, I'm in a minority here, at least from the comments I read in Israeli news sites. Looks like most people here view the UN's offer as yet another stunt to allow Hezbulla to get more and more rockets.

On a different note, Nasralla gave another speech today. Looks like the guy really likes us lol. I have to say though, his judgement of the Israeli spirit can't be more wrong. Morale here is actually getting higher, in the military and out of it. People realize that this is a long term war, but that as with any war, we can't lose, it simply isn't an option. Lebanese people describe how this war is bringing them together as a people. The same thing is happening here... people get together and get stronger. The general feeling in the public is that the IDF isn't using its force to the full... and people are calling out for more use of force, to bring the Hezbulla fighters out of their holes, tunnels and bunkers.

The Israeli Refugees

2006-07-29T09:55:00.000+03:00

I've been meaning to blog about this for a while now, and I got a nice reminder this morning.
I keep reading about the Lebanese refugees, people displaced from their homes, evacuated north. We have our own share of refugees, although we call them evacuees. See, living under constant shelling isn't much fun on this side of the border either, so people, particualrly families with children, have moved south. Many just went over to "visit" friends and family, but some found homes to stay at via internet sites and organizations set up for that purpose.

Apparently, some have been left without place to go to, and set up a camp site in a nearby town. My parents in law just drove over to offer a place in their home to one of the families. I doubt that there will be many people left in tents there. I actually wonder if there are any left for them to pick up. I know that the Lebanese people are also coming together in their time of woe, helping their own refugees and taking them into the Christian neighborhoods (though not sure if they are actually hosted in people's homes). Just thought I'd mention our own refugees/evacuees issue here.

So, who's war is it anyway?

2006-07-27T21:37:00.000+03:00

I read an interesting article in one of our leading newspaper (it was actually on paper, lol, so no link). The interviews yet one more expert on the war and he said something interesting. He said the current match between Israel and the Hezbulla is like this football match with two teams playing but many spectators watching. He referred to the current crisis as an episode in an ongoing fight between fundamental Islamists and the Western world. He mentioned that the outcome will be crucial for many other countries and organizations, including Hammas, Iran and Al Qaeida, as well as radical Muslims in Europe.

This made me think, how this fight we're fighting now isn't just for Israel. Don't mean this to sound too vehement, but it could influence people the world over. I can see several circles here, starting with the sane Muslims of our region (people out there who don't want to live under an ultra religious regime). Next in line would be Europe. Can you imagine the next riots in France if the Hezbulla is perceived as victorious? Can you hear the words of the Imams all over Europe, drawing young Muslims in and telling them that the path of armed resistance has been rewarded by their God?

In this light, I find it hard to understand the European position in this crisis. Sympathy to the inocent victims is one thing. I actually share that. My heart hurts for the children and for the inoncent civilians caught in the line of fire. However, giving in to the Hezbulla's demands and pressuring Israel to stop before Hezbulla is defeated seems to be not in the best interest of Europe. Can't they see that this will end not only with more people hurt in our region, but also in building up radical Islam all over the world, something that should concern Europeans more than anyone else.

Taking Time off Tonight

2006-07-26T21:31:00.000+03:00

Great news, for me at least. Hubby got an unexpected leave, and he's back home, just for tonight. I am taking time off the computer this evening. Had some thoughts for posts for tonight, but everything will wait for tomorrow!

Waiting for Today to Unfold

2006-07-26T08:45:00.000+03:00

Nassaralla made some interesting promises yesterday. Apparently he has given the order for his people to launch rockets at points to the south of Haifa. Well, I guess it's "let's see what you've got, Nassy". The threat has been in the air for so long, I wonder how much there is to it. I noticed he didn't specifically say Tel Aviv. I guess launching his long-range Zilzals is out of the question (too easy to detect prior to launch), so let's see if he's got anything else interesting.

Another pearl of wisdom from his latest interview -
Nasrallah said his organization was ready to discuss an end to the fighting, but the dignity and national interest of Lebanon was what he termed a "red line," a reference to the heavy Israeli bombing and ground assaults on the country.

I think it's been long established the the national interest of Lebanon was either not on his mind when he launched recent attacks, or that his interpretation of that is quite different from that of most sane Lebanese people. That leaves us with the issue of dignity and honor. I've been wondering for a while what will be the point where Israel can stop the fighting, having reached a victory. What will be the tangible form of such a victory. In other words, what will make Hezbulla and its allies understand that they have indeed been defeated. I guess the answer lies within this dignity issue. I know, not very tangible after all. Thinking aloud here, I would be interested to hear some responses from people. What would be considered an ultimate blow to the Hezbulla? what would make them realize they have been brought down to their knees? to realize that attacking Israel is an exercise in futility that should never be tried again? Is it really a matter of physically killing every Hezbulla fighter and destroying every launcher? or is there a point before that where we will make them realize they have lost this war?

Personal Reflection on The War

2006-07-25T21:32:00.000+03:00

I started a post about the reasons for the war, but I still have too much of a headache to deal with that right now. So... if you're looking for a political kind of post, either move on to another blog or come back tomorrow (hopefully, I'll be feeling better by then). Today, I just want to blog about my personal feelings regarding this war. What an average thirtysomething old Israeli mom is feeling right now, for what it's worth. Be warned, I am recovering frm a migraine, so not very focused and bound to ramble...

I returned home today with my two kids. We spent the night in the Golan Heights visiting my husband. He managed to get a few hours away from base and came over to spend the night with us in the Kibbutz where we stayed. We all slept there in his brother's family's home. The original plan was to spend the night in one of the nice B&B units they have on the Kibbutz, but these were all taken up by I guess should be called Israeli refugees, though we call them evacuees.

Anyhow, I had this migraine coming up from yesterday morning. My special painkillers (designed for horses, no less) helped to some extent and saved me from a full blown migraine, but I just had this throbbing pain in my head, some nausea and a dry mouth (a side effect of the painkillers), all of which meant I was just lying there awake, through out the night listening to the constant artillery shells shooting from our side of the borders into Lebanon. It made me think about this whole absurd situation that we have landed in.

I was born in 1972. When I was just over one year old, the '73 war broke out and my dad was called into his reserve post. He stayed there for many weeks, until the war was over. I grew up with the story of how they took me and drove with me, as a baby, to see dad at the post, because he couldn't return home. Yesterday, thirty four years later, I was doing the same thing with my children. Taking them to see their dad posted away in an actual war.

See, this may come as a surprise to some people who live outside of Israel, but for my generation the early thirty-something people, this is our first actual war. We were way too young to remember the big war of '73. The first Lebanon war is a vague memory - all I recall is that the TV kept showing our soldiers from the front saying hi to their moms and wives back home. And then they started getting killed and everyone was real sad. I was 10 back then. Then it turned into this war of attrition that lasted a long while, but no longer effected our daily lives. Then, there's the Gulf War in '91. Exciting times, no doubt. I could write a whole post about my memories from back then, sirens, sealed rooms, gas masks. Huge fun (not). Very scary. But that wasn't really our war. It was far away from here, and while our lives were disrupted to the limit, it was still America's war - not ours.

This one is different now. It was very sudden and unpredicted (at least for us civilians - not sure what our intelligence services predicted). It started out as this massive katyusha attacks on the norther border towns, breaking six peaceful years there. It was disappointing, but we still didn't realize just how bad this is going to be. I mean, it has happened before, rockets on our northern border, but it usually stopped after a day or two. This time, it went on, then intensified, then increased in range to cover a major city like Haifa.

Next thing I know, I was sitting with a tired husband (a military man) in our living room, and he got this phone call telling him he is now officially called in for his reserve post (different then his regular one at times of peace). When I saw him pack his bag for a long stay, not knowing when he'll be back, then it hit me. We're at war. A real war. Like the ones my parents went through when I was a baby. Like the one we grew up being told will never happen again. That kind of war, where they call in the army and young soldiers get killed daily.

Seeing my husband again yesterday, in field uniform, tired, carrying an M-16, hugging our children and drinking in those few precious hours we had together brought about these thoughts. Sitting there with him, on a mound of earth, just outside the base where he was positioned, listening to the artillery thundering in the background and explaning to our kids what the racket was all about, why daddy has to carry a gun, and most of all, why he's not coming back home anytime soon... I guess to some people this may seem like what they had assumed was a natural Israeli existence. Let me tell you it is very much not the case.

Until two weeks ago, when that Shi'ite guy with the funny hat went crazy, we lived a perfectly normal life. I used to nag my husband everyday to come back home early, cause the kids need to see him. When he would say he was busy at work, I would reply curtly, "please, what's the big deal? is there a war going on?" lol, he reminded me of this last night, when we were lying in bed together, whispering to each other, not to wake up the kids sleeping on matresses next to us. Yup, there's a war going on.

Up in the North

2006-07-24T20:58:00.000+03:00

On a spur of a moment decision, we headed north this afternoon. I am posting this from my brother-in-law's house in the Golan Heights. As you know, my husband is stationed in the North, and with no leaves on the horizon, we just miss him too much (and him us). He called this afternoon and said he is around the Golan Heights for the day and we decided to get together. I packed the kids, and another BIL (thank God, four of them around) and we drove up north. I guess some people might think it's a bit irresponsible. I know my mom would (she doesn't know we're here - I'll tell her tomorrow when we get back). But, I figured the odds of being hit by a missile were slim (the Golan Heights is relatively quiet) and it's good for the kids to see their dad.

You can easily tell when you drive up the Galille when you enter the missile range. Fewer vehicles on the road. Many of them military vehicles carrying supplies and ammunition. Once you reach the area of Sefad and north of it, the sky turns a darker shade with smoke. Kiryat Shmona is surrounded by quite a few fires in the fields and we could see the airplanes flying over to put them out.

We only got to spend half an hour with my husband. He waited for us in the gates of the base where he is stationed this evening. The kids were all over him (ok ok, so was I). We just sat outside, on the dry earth, listening to the constant artillery blasts in the background, talking and hugging. It was well worth it to me. With any luck, I get to see him again tonight, later in the night when he's done with his duties. His plan is to come over here to where we stay and spend the night (or what's left of it) with us. He will leave at dawn, so I doubt the kids will see much of him.

It was funny, coming here, driving along familiar roads (we often drive up here on holidays) and noting all the towns and settlements along the way where rockets hit over the past few weeks. The route takes us through Kiryat Shmona, Rosh Pina, Sefad, Nazareth and more... Tomorrow I will be heading back home. Depending on some issues here, I may be driving home alone with the kids. I'll be more than happy to be back safe at home, I can tell you as much.

See you all there!