At the recommendation of a friend, I took Julie Salamon’s book, Hospital, with me to Jerusalem this summer. And just finishing it now, I have to say how appreciative I am of that recommendation. I realized, among many things, that I am an allegorical reader–meaning, when I read a text, I will often […]
Finally went to see the Real Time exhibit at the Israel Museum yesterday. As dark and apocalyptic as the show is, it also emanates a kind of hopefulness. Though that may seem counter-intuitive, held up against two other exhibits at the Israel Museum–both the eternally interesting Shrine of the Book (Isaiah’s Scroll, Light […]
We traveled down to the Negev today, to Sde Boker, the desert settlement that David Ben Gurion created for himself toward the end of his life as he imagined the next frontier of Jewish life in the Land of Israel. Last year the heat in Sde Boker was oppressive but this year it was […]
A cafe on Palmach.
Two Americans, drinking coffee on a lazy Monday afternoon. He, with a small kippah fashionably tilted on one side of his head; she, with a head covering of recent vintage, complaining humorously that wearing this is hot in the summer.
They start talking about the Holocaust and whether it’s unique. […]
Worth a view, despite the total embarrassment of the heckling that Obama received at the Kotel early this morning:
By the way, I picked this up off of Huffington Post, courtesy of CBE member Rachel Weiner. The article included Obama’s interesting quote:
“It was rowdier than the last time I was there, you know?” Obama told […]
With Obama in Israel today, a couple editorials worth reading today:
Maureen Dowd in today’s NYT and Bradley Burston in Haaretz.
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A word on yesterday’s terror attack in downtown Jerusalem near the King David Hotel.
1. Within moments of the attack, word spread not by radio and not by television but by cellphones and handheld devices. […]
I am one of those Zionists who doesn’t feel a particular need to heroically criticize Israel for its actions–whatever they may be. There are plenty of Israelis who do it better than I ever could and they do it from here–with their citizenship being the tool for repair. I, on the other hand, […]
“Let Zion and her cities lament like a woman in the pangs of birth and like a young woman girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth.” So sang Shaanan Street of Hadag Nachash on Saturday night in Jerusalem, ushering in not only the new week but the 3 week period mourning on […]
A great bakery and cafes open most of the day on Friday would do wonders for the observance or celebration of Shabbat back home in Brooklyn.
After running into a friend early on Friday–he too had a bundle of newspapers in his arms, ready for Shabbat, and looking relaxed already–we caught up on life, […]
“B’seder, Yalla, Bye”
Those three words–Hebrew, Arabic, English–stand as the three pillars of justification for why the Israeli writer Etgar Keret loves to write in Hebrew. The way we say goodbye, he told the Fellows, is an indication of the world we live in and the flexibility of our language.
The classic Jewish diad between the […]