"יורד מזמינות"

I'm having a new experience now. Most of my friends have already had this sometime during the war, but not me. Yossi's phone is disconnected until further notice.

Generally in war you want to keep your phone off so it can't be tracked. When the army first went into Gaza all the soldiers left their phones back in Israel and got them back when they came out. But since Yossi never left Israel he's had his phone the whole time - like at the beginning he was on the Lebanese border, so sometimes he didn't have reception, but most of the time I could reach him. Sometimes he was offline for a few hours at a time because they had some mission or activity, but it usually lasted less than a day. Then we he was in Gaza in the summer the IDF already had a proper base there so soldiers could keep their phones.

Now, for the first time, he's offline. It's been three days and it seems like it'll be at least a few more days, possibly weeks. For lots of my friends this was the experience at the beginning of the war. It must have been awful. In a weird way I'm ok with it - it's like it's out of my hands. No news is good news, I guess? What sucks is that the kids can't call him, and I know that for Lavi it's been really hard.

Then this morning I got a message from Yossi's friend from miluim, saying that he saw him and he looks good, and gave me a message from Yossi that he's doing ok and he loves me. Along with a picture - and he really does look good! And so now I'm not sure how I feel? Like, it's good to get a message, makes me feel like people care, and it's a relief to get good news. But now it's like, well how long will it be before I hear from him again?

Abba's Phone

Yossi has been offline since yesterday. I knew it was coming but I didn't explain it to the kids. Anyway today I took Lavi to pick up a package that Yossi ordered a while ago, and Lavi says, "Imma we should buy electricity for Abba!"

Me: What do you mean?

Lavi: We should buy him electricity so he can charge his phone at night and have battery in the morning.

I might have said "that's a really good idea!" But all I was thinking was how fucked up it is that my husband is away at war and the kids can't call him.

Dear Malcolm Gladwell

So Malcolm Gladwell has a podcast about Americans who have received the national medal of honor, and he tells war stories of bravery. And at the end of each episode he asks that if the listeners know a veteran they should send stories of bravery (and if you don't know a veteran you can send a story of a time bravery was contagious in your life). So I have lots of stories to tell.

Dear Malcolm,

I'm Alina, 34 years old, Israel. I've really been enjoying your podcast "Medal of Honor: stories of courage." As you probably know, my country has been at war for a year. It's discouraging and all-consuming, and listening to your podcast helps me keep a sense proportion because it's a reminder that all wars eventually end. It also makes me wonder what stories you'll tell about this war when you talk about it in twenty years. What will be the famous stories? Which stories will become movies? What events will become the 'untold' stories?

I'm writing because I know a veteran - my grandfather, Jack Halpert (who we called Zaidy) - who was an American Marine and fought in Japan in WWII. He passed away in 2003. He fought on Iwo Jima and had lots of war stories but I've only heard some of them. Anyway I have a story my grandmother told me from after the war: after Zaidy came home, he would meet up with his army buddies every so often - they became very close, as comrades do. Once he was at a bar with one of them (my grandmother couldn't remember his name, just the everyone called him "Junior"). The place was packed but they managed to get a seat at the bar, and at some point a man tapped Zaidy on the shoulder - the man couldn't reach the bar because the place was so busy so he handed Zaidy some cash and asked if Zaidy could please order him a beer, which he did of course. It happened to be a black man, and Junior was horrified that Zaidy would buy a beer for a black man. Junior left the bar and Zaidy never saw him again.

I don't know if that's a story of courage, but it's a story of humanity and it makes me proud to be the granddaughter of a man who saw all people as equal.

I was interested in the conversation with Meredith, which you added at the end of the season. It's interesting that you talk about war stories like something old and distant, but the truth is that people are people and the stories that happened then could easily happen now. Once many years ago I was fortunate to get invited to the Marine Corps Birthday Ball in Tel Aviv (every November the US Marines celebrate the establishment of the Marine Corps and have parties all over the world wherever Marines are stationed. I was in the IDF at the time serving in the foreign relations unit so I got an invite, it was pretty exciting). At the event an officer1 talked about twice in recent history when Americans went running to the recruitment offices - Pearl Harbor and 9/11. I'm sure if you asked any American before 9/11 if today, in 2001, seventeen-year-olds would be willing and able to go to war, they would laugh and say something about "today's spoiled kids." But those spoiled kids went, because people do crazy things when they meet crazy circumstances. And if the US suffered another attack today in 2024, people would go.

I've been thinking a lot about the concept of courage this past year, because wars produce thousands of courageous moments. And still, people are people. I have many family members, friends, and neighbors in various combat units but I don't see them as heroes. I see them as devoted fathers and husbands who come home and immediately take the kids out to the park. Vulnerable people just like all of us.

As always, thank you for your fascinating insights,

Alina

In my mind

 In my mind I have conversations with the podcasts I listen to. Like, people say interesting things and I want to respond!

So this week I wrote to Adam Grant ("ReThinking"), because he used an example about Israel in a recent episode (an interview with Trevor Noah about context). It wasn't really about Israel, it was about the context of a tweet he wrote at the beginning of the war.

Next I want to write to Malcolm Gladwell, because he has a podcast about war heroes and I have lots to say about that!

I also want to make a reel for Shai Daviadi responding to his podcast "Here I Am." He actually suggested on Instagram that people respond with reels - I guess it boosts his exposure, which I'm happy to do. I just have to write out what I want to say.

Jewish Lightening Round

 In his new podcast, Prof. Shai Davidai does a lightning round at the end of every episode, and I want a go at answering his questions:

1. What is one thing people don't know about you?
• I get terrible anxiety, but it only really started when Lavi was born in 2019 so I haven't ever dealt with it properly.
2. What is one thing people don't know about the Jews?
• I live among Jews so I don't know what "people" think. Maybe people don't know our cultural history? Secular Jews might not even know. Judaism has two thousand years of history, literature, food, philosophy, music... It's a really fascinating and rich culture.
3. What's your favorite curse?
• Fuckeddy-fuck-fuck. I think I heard someone say that at summer camp when I was fifteen, like they were excited to be away from home and curse as much as they wanted, and I sort of adopted it. I hardly say it out loud, just to myself.
4. When was the last time you cried?
• In the shower the other day. Just a bit. I was overwhelmed by anxiety and kept thinking about how I'm failing my kids with every decision I make.
5. If you could have anyone over for shabbat dinner, from any time in history, who would it be?
• Good question. I have to think about that. Someone who's met lots of people of different sorts. Like Malcolm Gladwell or something.
6. Favorite holiday?
• I mean, Hanukka? It's the yummiest.
7. Least favorite holiday?
• Hmm the ones I spend at my in-laws?
8. When do you feel safest?
• It used to be my parents' house, but I was there on Oct 7th and all day long we could hear explosions, and it's been going on ever since. So not so safe anymore. Maybe now it's my own bedroom? When Yossi is home sleeping next to me.
9. When do you feel least safe?
• Driving on the highway, when I see suspicious things in the sky? Like trails that could only be left by rockets, or planes flying in the wrong direction. Knowing that if something falls on the road there's nothing I can do.
10. What gives you hope?
• The Israeli people. When I meet Israelis I get confident that we're going to be ok, because there are so many wonderful people here and this isn't just going to disappear. 

Anxiety is weird

On the one hand, I'm perfectly fine right now. I'm safe in my home, my family is here, I have food and water. I even have a bomb shelter equipped with some food, a first aid kit, and a battery-powered radio that can also charge phones.

On the other hand, we're fighting a war on six fronts (seven? I've lost count), it's violent and horrible and it's only getting worse. We're losing allies. We're going to lose sovereignty, and then what?

I'm thankful to be Canadian, at least I have somewhere to go.

What's actually stopping me from getting on a plane right now?

• Budget? Well, that's something that we can take care of
• The kids have camp? So what, they can leave
• Yossi has work? He can work from anywhere
• I have a beautiful new home that I'm putting so much effort into? Shame
• Lavi has tonsil surgery booked? We can do that in Canada. Also physio and everything else.

I really need some hope and optimism right now.

Father's Day 2024

 Nothing I can do will be enough to express my gratitude to Yossi on this year's father's day.

I know this will sound anti-feminist, but I think we've reached a point where fathers are the ones carrying the whole load again. Like we've come full circle. I know this isn't true for everyone, but in my marriage *he* does most of the work.

Full time job (gets paid more than me), and also home with the kids. Pick-up, drop-off, dinner, bath time, bedtime, going to the park. Cooking meals (he's a better cook than me), washing dishes, taking out the garbage. Calling the carpenter, setting the smart-home apps, calling the contractor, ordering furniture. And not to mention war. Going off to fight in a fucking war, bullets, missiles, watching people get injured, trauma, all around horrific experiences. Risking his life because he's a soldier and that's what you do.

Other fathers are great I'm sure, but no one else comes close.

Shadow of War

I've been thinking a lot about my great grandmother who was living in Berlin when WWII broke out. I wonder what her experience was like and if mine is similar?

I always learned about the war knowing that my great grandfather was in Poland when it started, and then he eventually travelled to Canada through Japan and met up with his wife and daughter Eva (my grandmother) in Vancouver in 1945. Six years. I know they were in touch, but how often? When they weren't in touch, how did my great grandmother feel? Did my grandmother know what was going on? Did she miss her father? 

When the war started I'm sure that people in Berlin felt safe. Germany invaded Poland, so the war was happening in Poland. Berlin was fine. Sure, there was antisemitism, but no one thought it would be physically unsafe for Jews to go on living in Germany. I'm sure it was scary to know that there was a war, but they all probably thought it wouldn't last long. And then as Germany invaded more and more countries and other countries started fighting back it probably got scarier. But people couldn't believe that there would be another big war so soon after the Great War -- it was still fresh in most people's memory! Just like most people today remember 9/11 very well. And even once it became clear that this was a world war, I'm sure no one thought it would go on for so long. People probably had an idea in their mind that it would be less than four years, because the last war lasted four years and this can't possibly be worse than that!

Imagine how anxious my great grandmother must have been. Her partner was on the run. At some point she decided to move to London with my grandmother. What made her decide to move? How bad do things have to get before you decide to leave your home and your partner and go to a foreign country? How often were they in touch then? Did she accept that she had to parent alone? Did she have support from family or a community? I'm sure she never imagined that it would be six years before she'd be reunited with her husband. That's a long time to hold your breath. How did she cope? I bet she felt guilty about leaving him, about taking her daughter away from home. And when they left London for Vancouver that could not have been an easy decision to make. Did she think she'd move back to Berlin one day? Back to London? Did she mean to leave Europe forever? And when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, did she feel safe in Vancouver?

It's one thing to look at the outcome, at how they all survived and built themselves a beautiful life in Vancouver, but what about the process? Living with this much uncertainly is horrible, sometimes it's like I can't breathe.

And what about me? Do I stay here in Israel with the kids? Might they be safer somewhere else? I couldn't possibly leave Yossi here, but every time I think about European Jews in the holocaust I wonder why they didn't just leave? Eventually it was too late to leave, they were trapped in ghettos or else other countries just wouldn't take them in, but at the beginning of the war they could still leave and they chose to stay. Now I understand why. We have a beautiful new house that holds so much hope for the future, but not if it's going to be bombed or attacked. We live right next to the security fence, which until eight months ago wasn't a problem but now it's very worrying. Are we the next Nir Oz? Do we need to fear rockets from Surif?

So I put myself in my great grandmother's shoes and I wonder if I have the courage to do what she did. Maybe everything will be fine and my family will stay here and still survive this? What about my marriage? I never thought I'd have to ask myself these questions.

Sinwar's Plan

 A lot of people are trying to guess what Sinwar's plan was. I think lots of those theories are correct. So what was his plan?

First of all, we know his goal. It's to end the Jewish sovereignty of Israel. It's the purest form of anti-Zionism; like he doesn't want the state of Israel to exist as a sovereign entity at all. And he's patient -- he knows it might not happen right away, but it's still his goal.

He knows he can't achieve that with weapons alone, so what can he do? Well first, if enough countries join him in the war then he might have enough weapons. He can join Hizballah, Iran, and the Houthis, who all have the same goal. Thankfully many other Arab nations who used to have that goal, don't anymore. So we're relatively lucky there. But still, it worked for him. They all joined. But as of May they aren't using their full power, so what will it take to make them use all their power against Israel? Maybe the part he didn't anticipate was Biden's "Don't" speech. Biden knew exactly was Sinwar wants and that speech was probably the smartest thing he could do.

*Just to be clear - I think many people around the world thought that Oct 7 was about the Palestinians. We Israelis knew that it was part of a much bigger picture, but it wasn't clear to everyone (it still isn't). So I'm really glad Biden caught on right away.

But say Hamas can't get rid of Israel with war alone, where does the plan go from here? Well to get rid of Israel they'd have to delegitimize the country completely. Turns out there are lots of ways to delegitimize a country, and unfortunately they're all underway.

1. World opinion. Well this one's easy - just show pictures of suffering Gazans on the news. Horrific numbers of civilian deaths. Let social media do the rest. As Netanyahu put it: "for Hamas, civilian deaths aren't a tragedy -- they're a strategy."

2. Legal action. Get Israel leadership to be charged with breaking international law. If the war is unlawful, Israel loses its credibility. Hamas can help further this cause by making sure that civilians die -- they can build bases and offices underneath hospitals, for instance, or stop food and water from getting to refugees.

3. Isolation. This one is on its way too. At first the USA was right here with us, but as time goes on we're losing the support of our biggest ally. Most of Europe is still on our side, but even that won't last forever. At this point there are protests all over American campuses and it looks like the American society is more split than ever. It's only a matter of time until things get violent, and if America has a civil war then it's going to forget about Israel.

4. Israeli civil war. It doesn't even have to be a war, just enough of a divide that the country basically falls apart. Hamas doesn't have to lift a finger, this might happen on its own.

Once they achieve all that, maybe some Iranian nuke can finish us off, and maybe it won't have to.

I think that's where we're going. I want to be optimistic but it's getting really really hard. I know exactly what Sinwar's plan was and it's going even better than he imagined.

Media Bias

I just find it so fascinating, and I want to talk to someone about it - like this article for example, published on CNN on October 12th:

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/10/12/middleeast/gaza-airstrikes-warnings-invs/

The facts are all true (as far as I know), and yet it reads like Israel is a powerful opressor and Gazans are weak and helpless. I wonder if the readers ask themselves questions while they read the article?

It says that there are tunnels for Hamas but the civilians have no bomb shelters - couldn't Hamas build shelters with the same concrete used for tunnels? Couldn't Hamas build a warning system?

According to the article, Israeli military is responsible for warning Gazans of incoming bombs. They get a phone call. A "rare" phone call. Is that the problem? That it's "rare"? Is the problem that it comes from the Israeli military? Are armies supposed to give warning when they bomb?

I'm not saying it's fun to get a call telling you that your house it going to be bombed. It's not. It's like when Hamas announces that they're going to shoot rockets at 6pm. You don't think "aw thanks for the heads up!".. It feels more like your boss telling you "we need to talk" and scheduling a meeting for the next day.

Gaza should have a warning system and bomb shelters, that's what a responsible government does.

The Hamas Charter

Hey echo chamber! How many pro-Palestinians do you think have actually read the Hamas charter?

https://www.palestine-studies.org/sites/default/files/attachments/jps-articles/2538093.pdf

Like, I lead a fairly conservative life but my world view is liberal and usually I relate to the liberal way of thinking. But right now I can't for the life of me relate to the language used by the liberal West. 

Here's just one quote from the Hamas charter:

"The initiatives conflict, what are called "Peaceful Solutions" and "International Conferences" to solve the Palestinian problem. As far as the ideology of the Islamic Resistance Movement isconcerned, giving up any part of Palestine is like giving up part of its religion. The nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its religion, in that it educates its members, and they perform Jihad to raise the banner of Allah over their nation."

Tell me more about how the Palestinian leadership is interested in a two-state solution..?

New Years Resolutions

 So Hamas fired rockets at midnight on New Years. What's their goal? Most of the rockets don't kill or injure anyone, just scare the hell out of everybody and create all sorts of fun PTSD. It's sick.

Anyway I had this crazy idea to make goals for myself for the new year, maybe if I list them here I can focus on getting them done. Because these past few months have made me rethink a lot of what I want from life. My priorities have shifted I guess? Like, my job isn't interesting, that's for sure, and I don't really care because an interesting job really isn't important when you're at war. But also there are truly important things I could be doing with my time, so maybe I should try to do those?

* Diversity: I should work on creating diversity in the workplace and in the army. That would really benefit Israeli society. Women and men, a variety of races, ages, religious views. It's so important.

* Programming: this goal is more personal. I just really need to properly learn C++.

* Sex education: I'm convinced that better sex education would make the world a better place all around. By sex-ed I mean everything from how fertility works, sex and pleasure, contraception, biology in general, sexual orientation, gender identity, consent, relationships and how to recognize red flags in a partner or in yourself. It's not just a lecture you give to teenagers, right? It's a full class that starts in elementry school and goes all throughout high school. I know that conservative societies will have a hard time with it, so the content can be made to fit whatever the society is willing to accept - as long as the information taught is true. For instance, there's no reason that girls shouldn't be taught the basics of fertility awareness even in the most traditional communities.

"If Hamas were out in the battle fields then Israel could kill them, but if Hamas violates the laws of war then Israel has to give them immunity"

Just something I heard on the Unholy podcast. It's crazy that it's true.

 "If Hamas were out in the battle fields then Israel could kill them, but if Hamas violates the laws of war then Israel has to give them immunity."

Not crazy?

What does it mean to have a "reservist" army?

Israel sees military casualties differently from the rest of the world. Other countries see military deaths as less problematic, but we see each soldier as an individual and to us its no different from civilian casualties.

Listen to a few minutes of "Unholy" where Jonathan describes this phenomenon (from 22:18 for about two minutes):

The reason for this is the fact that our army service is mandatory and that the majority of the army is reserve forces.

October 7th

I wanted to write down my experience on that horrible day, because one day we'll want to look back and understand what happened and people's experiences are how we're going to remember the story. 

7:30

My mom woke me up. We were living with my parents because we hadn't moved into the new house yet. We got the keys in mid-September but the house still needed work. I was sleeping in my old room with Yuvali and Yossi slept down the hall with Lavi in Ari's old room. That worked for us, because Yuval still wakes up at night and this way Yossi and Lavi can get a good night sleep.

My mom came into my room all nervous, saying she was hearing booms and there seemed to be rockets shooting all over the country, and she wanted us to be awake and downstairs in case we needed to go to the mamad. Immediately my heart started beating fast and my stomach felt like was tied in a knot. My parents live in a valley so they hear rockets and interceptions from all over, it's very nerve wracking. I took Yuvali downstairs and Yossi and Lavi came down too. It was chag so my phone was off, I turned it on and put on the news and learned that Hamas had infiltrated the Gaza border, but it wasn't clear how many terrorists and where they were. Hamas were shooting rockets all over the country. Bubby was sleeping in the mamad and Mommy wasn't sure whether to wake her up - it's not Bubby's first time being in Israel with rockets, unfortunately, but we knew it would make her nervous.

Around 8:30 she came out and just when Mommy was about to say something we had our first siren and we all went into the mamad. Abba came back from shul, he had gone to vatikin so he could be home with the kids when we went later.

It was simchat torah, and Yaira, Mom, and myself had planned to go to Levana davening at Brenda's house, which started at 8:30. I got dressed and decided to go - Yossi stayed home with the kids. I got to Brenda's around 9:00, luckily she lives right across the street, and Yaira and Kedem were already there. So were a few other women. I looked at Yaira and tried to make a face that says "well, this is shitty." We tried to have a normal davening, but there were a few sirens. Talli Rosenbaum stood outside just to make sure we would hear the sirens when they happened. Brenda's mamad light was off so I turned it on and said "oops".. Anyway I thought I was funny :) It was just so surreal. We even danced for hakafot, it sort of worked. I went back home in between - I was going to read the haftara, which is the beginning of Yehoshua, and I was really nervous about it. Yossi said he got a message from his miluim and they were waiting for instructions.

I don't know how I got through davening. Aviad drove over with Gefen. Around 11:00 Yossi called me out of Brenda's house and signaled that he was leaving. All I could say was "Yos." I mean, what do you say when your husband gets an emergency call to go to war? He drove out to the new house to get his things, then came back and left me the car because he had a ride up north.

I did read Yehoshua, but couldn't concentrate on it. Davening went on so long, it was almost noon and we hadn't even done musaf yet. Steve Ganot came home and locked the door, there were rumors that terrorists could be anywhere. We decided to stop the service and all went home.

I couldn't eat. I tried to keep calm around the kids. Kedem and Lavi put their toys in the mamad and spent most of the day playing in there. At some point in the afternoon I had coffee and that helped me relax a bit. I was getting whatsapp messages from the city of Beit Shemesh and from the Moatza with Homefront Command updates, basically telling us to stay near a mamad and download the Pikud HaOref app. Aviad was glued to his phone, but I stopped looking at the news. He sat on the deck outside and I went to talk to him, and he just said "it's bad." Yaira and I kept pretending to be normal for the kids.

As the day went on we saw more people from the neighborhood drive off - everyone was being called to miluim. We heard planes all day long, and more booms. We tried to stay indoors but did go out to the deck, the weather was beautiful, the contrast was so strange. I was worrying about Yossi. The Vocalocity whatsapp group was buzzing too, people checking in with each other, one of the guys said that his husband's family were trapped in their mamad in Ofakim with terrorists in the streets.

In the evening we started to hear numbers. First they were saying there were 60 people killed, then 100, then the numbers started to rise. Only later did they mention the Nova music festival, hundreds more killed. We knew there were hostages taken to Gaza, and we knew that people were still held hostage in their homes. How does an army (or country) deal with these sort of hostage situations? It looked like Hamas had invaded Israel and was present in quite a few cities, and looters were coming in, stealing things, and taking it all back into Gaza. It would be a few days before we'd learn exactly what happened.

I tried to stay in touch with Yossi. He was headed up north to Amiad, which is the base where he usually does his miluim. The plan was for his guys to replace the soldiers there so they could be sent down south. He got his gear and weapon but they stayed on the base for a while, they didn't really know what to do. 

On Sunday they sent him to some outpost on the Lebanese border. Hizballah were trying to infiltrate and they were shooting anti-tank missiles and soldiers on the border. That was the scariest part. Are they going to join the war? Is Iran going to join? Is this WWIII? Sunday night Yossi wrote that he wouldn't be available for a few hours. He wasn't back online until late Monday morning and I couldn't concentrate on anything until I knew he was safe. He kept using words like "אירוע" and "פעילות" which to me just means that he's in danger. Later he told me that they had to do some sort of ambush all night, but they weren't really prepared for it - he hadn't calibrated his weapon and they didn't have proper gear. And that's the other thing - the IDF is smart and knows how to handle almost any situation, but if you make stupid decisions then people get killed, and doing an ambush without a calibrated weapon is a stupid decision. So Yossi and his guys were lucky.

Schools were immediately cancelled. Aviad was called up on Sunday. I was supposed to go back to work on October 9th, which I did, but I worked from home and actually did no work at all. I had one meeting with my boss, that's it.

Bubby was supposed to stay in Israel for two more weeks but she managed to get a flight for Friday. In the meantime she was amazing with the kids! She played with Lavi and watched Yuval, and while Yaira and her kids were over she entertained them for hours. Lavi and Kedem really enjoyed playing together which was excellent for me because I wasn't really functioning. Mommy's tours were cancelled of course, so she spent her time cooking for soldiers and for us. Abba's base was closed to civilians so he spent his time at our new house installing the air conditioning and doing other work.

Best I could do was try to work on the house. Things move slowly because the Palestinians aren't working so there's no construction, and other suppliers are short-staffed because people are in miluim.

That was the first week.

Things you might not know about Israel if you've never lived here

These things are obvious to me but I wonder how many of them would surprise the average European or American?

• Work week starts on Sunday. We work Sunday through Thursday, and then the weekend is Friday-Saturday. This makes sense, because Saturday is the Jewish day of rest and Friday is the Muslim day of rest, and Israel is mostly Jewish and Muslim. There are Christians here too of course, and their schools and community centers operate Mon-Fri, but for all other purposes Sunday is the first day of the week.
• Every house, apartment, and public building built since 1991 has a bomb shelter in it called a "mamad." It looks like a regular room but the walls are solid concrete, the door is made of steel and has a hermetic seal around it, and if there's a window then it has a steel cover that you have to close in the event of a war. (*Turns out Switzerland has these too, which is funny because they haven't fought a war in over a hundred years.) Most of the time it's just used as a regular room, but you're supposed to have some emergency supplies in it in case you have to stay there for a while - so we keep bottled water and some snacks there, and should probably have a first aid kit and maybe an extra phone charger. In 2003 we all kept our gas masks there too.
• The IDF is a conscription army, which means that every Israeli over the age of 18 must serve for 2-3 years (as long as the country is in danger, but this has been the case since the country was founded in 1948). There are exemptions of course, but the vast majority of Israelis do some sort of army service right out of highschool. It's not all combat, right? There are plenty of desk jobs and there's even an Education Corps (which is a fascinating topic altogether). I have lots to say about what this does to a society (for better or for worse), maybe for a different post.
  
• Israel is very proud of its agriculture. Main exports include oranges and other citrus fruits and we have a successful wine industry. This is pretty cool considering that almost half the area of Israel is desert (definition for desert: an area that gets less than 200 mm of precipitation per year). Still, a lot of our fruits and vegetables are imported - I guess for financial reasons.
• Israel's official language is Hebrew, but street signs and official documents usually include Hebrew, Arabic, and English.
• German engineering. The building style in Israel is similar to European building, specifically German. Also, lots of words used in construction are German. The reason has to do with the German immigrants who came here at the beginning of the 20th century and brought the construction industry with them. In fact the Technion University, which is a prestigious engineering school in Haifa, originally taught all its classes in German. (Fun fact, that's why the Hebrew University is called the "Hebrew" university - because it was the first university in Israel to teach in the Hebrew language.) 

I'm sure I'll think of others. I'll keep adding.

Tiktok

Ok in my last post (just now, actually) I wrote about Tiktok. I'll be honest - I don't have a tiktok account and I don't know much about it so I really shouldn't have an opinion. But I'll tell you what I do know: tiktok aims to get an emotional response from its users just like any social media platform. Short videos aren't there to make you think, they're there to make you angry or to make you buy something. It takes a lot to argue with a video. So you watch some video about the middle east or the Jews or Palestine and you feel like you understand the subject enough to have an opinion. Then you see more videos like it and you're convinced that your opinion is correct. It's just no way to get an education :|

The Giver

Remember "The Giver" by Lois Lowry? I read it many years ago, probably for school. I might have gone back to read it again at some point. At the time I thought it was about how utopia can't exist - like, the message is that a perfect society isn't really perfect.

But I was thinking about it and I realized it's a different message. It's about the memories. The Giver's job is basically to hold on to all the memories of the bad things so that history doesn't repeat itself. And I think that's missing from today's tiktok-educated Gen-Z. Someone on Facebook pointed out that older people tend to be pro-Israel and young people are pro-Palestinian. I didn't ask where she puts the line between young and old.

It reminded me of another thing I heard once, something like "if you're not a socialist when you're young, you have no heart; if you're not a capitalist when you're old, you have no brain." I don't think this quote has to be taken literally but I like the point about how people's opinions change as they get older and learn more about the world. (Maybe the point is that young people are more fueled by emotion?)

So which is it? Are older people pro-Israel because they have more knowledge and experience? Is it because they remember the intifada or 9/11 and know what terrorism is like? Were they always pro-Israel? Or is it an age thing, did their opinions change as they got older and the young people just aren't there yet?

Going back to Gen-Z's, it's not only them. There are lots of lucky people in the world who really don't know terrorism and war, and they really don't understand just how shitty a situation can be. They're busy trying to find a "good guy" and a "bad guy," an "oppressor" and a "victim." One foreign reporter (on the BBC maybe?) asked if trading three Palestinian prisoners for one Israeli hostage means that Israel thinks that Palestinian lives are worth less than Israeli lives. I mean, WTF? Does she have any idea how negotiations work? Like, she actually thinks that Israel decided on a whim how that hostage deal would look?

The point is that if you want to have a strong opinion about war, you actually need to understand war. Tiktok needs a Giver.

War Thoughts, November 29th, 2023

 Some messy thoughts I've had in no particular order:

- I just want this war to be over and for Yossi to come home. That's really all. I know that we need to get rid of Hamas so they never terrorize us again, but the price of losing soldiers now feels too great. I *know* I'm wrong, and that if we don't fight now we'll lose even more lives later, but it's just like in economics: losing soldiers I know now feels like a greater cost than losing some random Israelis later. I don't want to say it out loud because it's horrible, but that's how I feel.

- I keep reading about Israelis (my friends on Facebook) trying to do "hasbara," right? And the reason we think that's important is because we're all convinced that if only the world saw the truth they would know that Israel is the good guy. Of course I can't stand behind that sentence, right? "Truth?" There's no truth, only perspectives and narratives. "Good Guy?" There's no good guy, just a very complicated situation and a bunch of people who want to stay alive. But we're so convinced that hasbara is important.

Anyway I realized why it's important to me. It's because I need for people to see the complexity. I don't need people to think that Israel can do no wrong, I just can't stand it when people are so biased and don't see it: like when one woman writes that Hamas kidnapping children is "debatable" but Israel helping to bring incubators into Shifa hospital is "propaganda." Like, if Hamas do horrible things it's somehow excusable but if Israel does something good it probably has bad intentions. I mean, I get it. We all do the same thing with people we like or dislike. But it's actually not ok.

- Two things that I actually do believe to be true:
1. If a situation looks black and white, like there's an obvious right and wrong, then you're probably not seeing the whole picture. (The only situation I can think of that's only wrong is domestic violence.)
2. People see themselves as victims. Individuals and groups.

More Media

We're in the same boat. The Israelis and the Palestinians, both trying to win over world opinion, both failing miserably, both certain that everyone is against them, and both probably right to think so.
See, because Israelis are monsters. Palestinians are sub-human.

Israelis are racist monsters who want nothing other than to terrorize, occupy and kill anyone who isn't Jewish. Almost like Nazi Germany. Our goal is to take over the world by means of war and violence. Our policies are based on racism and discrimination and religion. This is what the world is seeing, and this is what our PR is trying to fix. (I'm only half exaggerating, by the way - I wouldn't be surprised if people actually felt this way. I mean, I feel this way about extreme Islamic organizations, so it's possible for a person to believe that this is true.) So Israel realized this and started working on improving our image in the eyes of the world. I believe we're doing a good job so far, judging by the support we seem to be getting from various world leaders.

Palestinians are sub-human, lead by a leadership that they are incapable of fighting against. They cannot 'show restraint,' or at least nobody expects them to. They are victims unable to fend for themselves, their world views are primitive. I have seen many leaders call on Israel to stop the fighting, but when addressing Hamas they do so in third person, as if not expecting them to really hear. And the Palestinians need to fight this image if they want respect from world leaders. Palestinians from Gaza need to write letters defending their cause, or at the very least make noise when they see that Hamas is using obvious lies in the media.
I'll give an example - when the three boys were kidnapped, there was a photo going viral of an Israeli soldier smiling next to two Palestinian prisoners. The photo claimed to be of one of the boys - one who is 16 years old, and definitly not a soldier. So on one of the Gaza Facebook pages someone had commented on the photo "This photo is not the kidnapped boy. If you respect youselves, remove this photo. Your cause is just, you don't need to lie," and yet the photo was never removed. The feeling I get from that is that there is no one to talk to on the Palestinian side. That I cannot have an intelligent conversation with a Palestinian. So I'm waiting for them to fight this image and to convince me that they are worthy humans with whom I can negotiate.
I guess part if me just wishes that instead of trying to foil Israel's PR efforts, the Palestinians would put the same efforts into making themselves look good, too. Israel has been fighting a media war and so far it is winning, it just doesn't seem right that the Palestinians are so far behind.