Worse than Jewish

Thursday night, the Israeli opera performed its rendition of Bizet's "Carmen" at Hayarkon Park. 70,000 culture enthusiasts came to watch poor Corporal Don Jose choose to defect for the love of a cigarette factory girl, only to get dumped for Escamillo the bull-fighter.

The performance was splendid. Rinat Shaham was both intense and precise in the title role. It was as though the open air inspired her to be a more powerful, charismatic Carmen that the one she was at the Tel-Aviv Opera House. Mayor Ron Huldai acted as the evening's MC. While sets were replaced between acts, he filled the audience up on the plot, some which became a little blurry due to cuts and omissions.

Huldai also gave some background on the opera but did not go into analysis and criticism. Thus a very crucial aspect of Carmen did not come up that evening in the park: the fact that it's a work full of ethnic prejudice.

Carmen is based on a novella by Prosper Mérimée. In the prose text, Don Jose is recounting his misadventures to a prison cell-mate. "I should never have gone with such a woman," he tells him. "After all, we all know her kind."

"Is she Jewish?" asks the cell mate.

"Worse," says Don Jose, "She's a Gypsy."

۞

For me as a Jew, it's almost calming to hear that the Roma were considered "worse" than us in Mérimée's 19th century Europe. They certainly are considered "worse" these days. In contemporary Scandinavia, for example, I found that disdain toward the Roma is largely acceptable and may be voiced freely, while antisemitism certainly isn't. Why is that so? Both ethnicities burned shoulder to shoulder in Auschwitz, did they not?

They did, but the Romani historical foundations and political lobbies were never very effective or efficient. This is partially how come French President Nicolas Sarkozy could this week announce his plan to deport all Romas without proper French documents.

Sarkozy, his Minister of the interior, Brice Hortefeux, and the Secretary of State of European Affairs, Pierre Lellouche, claim that French is swamped by Roma who moved in from the most recent EU members in the Balkans, that this had caused a culmination in theft and drug trade.

I don't doubt that Roma culture tolerates petty crime far more than mainstream European culture does, but Sarkozy has far greater thieves to worry about: corporate thieves who steal in a day more that what a Roma settlement would steal in a decade. Besides, even if the Roma are involved in crime, there is no greater crime than to reinforce a damaging stigma placed on a community and deem this community unwanted.

۞

It's sad to see this taking place in France. French Roma are known for being progressive and open. Traveling in rural France I often received lifts from Gypsies, pitched my tent among their trailers in Sts. Maries de la Mer, spoke to them and learned of their world.

Of all Roma societies, this is the one most welcoming to the non-ethnic Roma traveler, providing an alternative for those who couldn't take the burdon of mainstream French life. It's also open to the world - French Manouche Gypsies were the first to integrate western pop music into their musical repertoire. Modern Jazz would be unthinkable without the blessed influence of Django Reinhardt, pictured above.

French Roma had a modernizing influence on their Spanish neighbors and would doubtlessly have a similar effect on Balkan newcomers. By singling those newcomers out, Sarkouzy is causing great damage to their French brethren. He is identifying Gypsies in general as thieves, drug dealers and a burden on society. Worse than Jews? Much worse.

Is it any surprise that this is happening in the one European country where the Roma have become most integrated? The Jewish community of Weimar Germany was more modern and culturally assimilated than any other in Europe. Rather than embrace this, the Germans perceived the Jews as a threat and acted accordingly.

Europeans have portrayed the Roma as a treacherous woman who would pick your wallet or your heart, whichever she gets her hands on first. Gypsies have always been taken for a threat, so legislation against them is almost inevitable, but it is tragic and disgusting nonetheless.

۞

I can't really conclude this without a word about the semi-nomadic people of this land. This passing week. 1,300 Israeli policemen arrived at dawn to the Bedouine village of Al-Arakib, evacuated its hundreds of residents and demolished it entirely. Al -Arakib, a shanty town north of Beer-Sheva, had existed since before the founding of the state of Israel, but it's located within a ring of land around the city which the state wishes to preserve as "Bedouine free".

45 houses were demolished in the village, which means hundreds of homeless souls. The Israeli press paid minimal attention to the event. In the two largest newspapers it recieved no mention at all. In place of Al-Arakib, the Jewish national fund intends to plant a grove of pine.

Crying for Krung Thep

I spent the day in Hebron, with its soldiers in full combat gear, barbed wire fences and tense atmosphere. Often, despite the dry clime and complete lack of seafood, my mind wandered to another city with its own soldiers, fences and tension, Bangkok.

It's not exactly ironic or surprising that Bangkok is in flames. I was there about ten months ago for a short spell and constanly thought to myself: this place is explosive. What will it look like when it combusts? I got the answer this morning. The front page of Yedioth Aharonot presented a startling image: the Central World Plaza shopping center on fire. Formarly this enormous mall was known as the "World Trade Center", another one bites the dust.

I don't really care much for all the luxury goods that were burned, but the sheer magnitude of the mall and its location at the very bustling heart of the city both give an idea of how really violent the situation in Bangkok is. I can't help but weep for it, pray for its recovery and nostaligcally post a few of the photos I took there on better days.

Tigers

Normally it's exceedingly easy to find lifts to Paris on the Dover-Calais ferry. This time it was impossible. No one was going our way, or if they did, their cars were packed, or they didn't want to pick up hitchers. We were pretty sure we'd have to put the 82 Euros into the train, which is bit depressing at this point in our low budget trip. Only the high speed TGV trains run between Paris and Calais and the prices are unreasonable.

Then, as we were being embraced by the concrete jetty arms of the continent, somebody said yes. They were two dark skinned men, Londoners on their way directly to Paris. On their dashboard was nestled a little, multi-armed Hindu god. Itka and I began a Hebrew guessing game, spelling terms that would betray our topic.

"It's pretty obvious which subcontinent they're from," she said.

"Yes, but they could also be from S-r-i L-a-n-k-a, for example, or B-e-n-g-l-a D-e-s-h. Though most people from S-r-i L-a-n-k-a are Buddhists, and people from B-e-n-g-l-a D-e-s-h are usually Muslim and don't really look like this. By their looks I would guess that they're T-a-m-i-l-s."

"That's good. I've always been a fan of t-i-g-e-r-s."

The car deck was opened and we disembarked into the French night. The driver and his friend needed some help navigating onto the relevant autoroute, so we began chatting and actually asked them where they were from.

"Sri Lanka," said the driver, "You know Tamil Tigers?"

"It's my favorite guerrilla army," Itka told them.

"We are Tamil Tigers," said the other man, and, perhaps in order to sound not in the least threatening, added: "You should know that Tamil Tigers are always serious, Tamil Tigers never smoke, never drink." in a split second Tamil Tigers also stopped being Itka's favorite guerrilla army. Sic transit gloria mundi. She later admitted she anyway favored them mostly thanks to their sexy name.

The pair handed us a CD of militant Tiger songs. On the cover was an image of the Tigers' mustachioed leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, in camouflage gear. They then played it for us - Indian Music with a snare drum.

These fellows were no simple fans. They were hardcore. The way the man at the shotgun said "we are Tamil Tigers" made it clear that being Tigers and caring for their organization was, if not their 9 to 5, at least a major occupation for both. The LTTE, mind you, is considered a terrorist organization in both Britain and France. During the 20th century, the Tigers have carried more suicide bombings than all Islamic terrorist groups combined. problem is that their foes, the Sri Lankan government and army, are not any better, and they are recognized as a sovereign state. "I'm very sorry about what your people are going through right now," I said, "I know most of the north was taken over and the press is not allowed to enter and report, there must be slaughters going on."

"Yes," said the driver, "but we kill more than 200 Sri Lankan soldiers each day."

Outside, along the nocturnal highway, signs were advertising historical attractions in the region, mostly pretty castles. We stopped at a service station and were treated to two cans of Red Bull by the driver and his friend. It was hard to believe, while traveling this excellent highway, that Northen Sri Lanka even exists, but it's almost equally hard to believe that when in Southern Sri Lanka. I remember having a pleasant "Lion" beer at a beach-front cafe in Rathgama, just south of Colombo. With me was a Dutch journalist who made it across the lines. He showed me photos of another world, a funerary world, one in which our ferry from Dover somehow briefly docked.

Big News

This is the clock at which I was staring last night.

It showed the time in Washington DC, but not that the times are a-changing. It did not show where the American night was heading. We had to wait for morning to learn that.

It's morning at last.

A is

A is for art

A pile of cobblestones on the floor of a museum, each imprinted with the words: "weapon of the proletariat".

B is for birds

A huge flock of geese forms the contour of a clipper ship in the evening sky above Jerusalem's Mouristan square. The fountain is working once more, kids kick a football against an old stone wall.

C is for cancer

My friend G. stands by his macchinetta, making both of us ridiculously strong coffee that is to keep me awake for much of the night. "Mann tracht on gott lacht," he says in Yiddish. "man plans and god laughs."

He has a long scar along his throat from the removal of his thyroid gland. At first I don't know how to relate to his experience, then I remember that I have gone through a divorce. "Not really comparable, but I guess we're both going through the things that make up life."

"Yeah, grown up stuff," he says.

D is for Downtown Lover

Back in my life? maybe yes, maybe no. The other day she was in a taxi, about to get off. The driver saw a guy hailing a cab by the corner and asked if she would mind him picking that guy up. She didn't mind, nor look to see who it was.

E is for eventide

"The night, it has a thousend eyes / the day has only one," quoth the poet. The sexy time of day is not a time of day, and it is crawling into the streets outside my window as I write.

F is for freedom

Walking up Ben-Yehuda St. after two days of hard work, bumping into an aquiantance and pulling him into the Mersend for a cuppa. The afternoon is vast. Roni rolls in on roller blades, posting posters for a poetry event. Kamer pops in, wearing one of his grandpa swaters. I want to interview him on radio Tuesday night, when I'll be studio commentator on the U.S. elections (late late on Galatz Radio). Omer appears with a copy of Haaretz and an easy smile. Obama this, Obama that, Then we all fly away to other places.

G is for gusts of wind

More of those are soon to come.

H is for Mitch Hedberg

"I used to do drugs. I still do, but I used to, too."

I is for the Indigo Girls

Dorky though it is, I've had "Mystery", "Ghost" and "Galileo" playing in my head for a month now.

J is for Jewification of Jaffa

A major issue I have with the current mayor's policies (at least with his crew's), and especially now before the municipal elections. In Israel the term Jewification is considered legitimate. The idea: populating areas that have Arab majorities with as many Jews as possible, in order to "claim" them.

When looking for apartments in Jaffa you will often hear the agent saying: "currently there are many Arabs here, but we're working hard to Jewify the neighborhood and there have already been positive developements aplenty."

K is for kites

The Kite vendor at Charles Clore Park is tying a few samples of his merchendise to a metal railing. There's something both gloomy and hip about watching an elderly, disheveld man flying numerous jolly dragons at once.

L is for love

M is for McCain

Not a bad chap, it seems, but not the sharpest POW in the pencilbox either.

N is for new book project

Still confidential.

O is for Obama

I was there when it started: Democratic national convention, Boston 2004. The Illinois delegation, right by my booth, was going crazy. Obama gave the famous "thin boy with a funny name" speech. Only clinton spoke better.

P is for Park Slope

Where my Friend Erika is sitting and chatting with me right now, making me miss the world once again.

Q is for queers

For a while I knew no one in Tel Aviv who was gay. This is changing, to my delight. There's a sense of humor and an approach to the world that only gay people have. Lose sight of the their society and you lose more then one color in the day to day existance.

R is for Lou Reed

Who is in the city tonight, performing before luckier people that I.

S is for scarves

Girls in autumn look so lovely.

T is for Togo

I'm showing a group of Togolese visitors around the country these days. Took them to the "Jerusalem Hotel" in Sheikh Jarah, had coffee and a cigarette, listened to their chat, realized the Togolese are the cutest people in the world.

U is for Unicum

This liquor I brought from Hungary has to be the nastiest tasting thing on earth, yet I'm finishing the bottle at high speed. Things that taste like medicine are highly marketable early in the flu season.

V is for Vicky Cristina Barcelona

I've been told it's fantastic. If anyone wants to join me for it, let me know.

W is for bad memories

Such bad memories.

X is for xi

I miss scrabble. This Downtown Lover thing had better work out.

Y is for Yad Vashem

Walking out of the long corridor of the Jerusalem Holocaust Museum, I have to wait by the railing of a balcony, overlooking a cluster of forested hills, for a member of our party still inside. Consequently, I spend ten minutes looking at the faces of the people coming out. Each one of them has learned something new and it shows in their eyes. I can't help but admire the corridor and those responsible for filling it with life and with death.

They even kept the whole "everything's fine now that we have our own country" bit in the end distinctly subdued and minimal. It's there, but not so badly. I hate when the Holocaust is presented as nothing more than a sad prologue to the heroic Zionist story. Yad Vashem remains dignified.

Z is for ZZZZZZ

Gotta take a nap now. There's so much life going on, it's tiring, and the Unicum doesn't help perk me up (turns out it's no medicine). See y'all in morning light.

It Don't Mean a Thing if it Ain't Got That Swing

When I was first visiting Finland in the 1990s, Marti Ahtisaari was the country's president. He lived, as do all Finnish presidents, in the shadow of the mighty U. K. Kekkonen - the country's mythical leader. The most you could say about the man then was that he was a fine president though by no means a Kekkonen.

Later Ahtisaari joined the U.N. and began to attract different attention, angry attention. I recall that every involvement in Israel - Palestine - Lebanon questions brought him a lot of bad press here. He was unyielding, critical, active, not exactly what you'd expect from a U.N. officer. We just wanted them to wear their blue caps and let us run our wars. Marti wasn't into that.

Ahtisaari was not very strongly involved in this region. Yesterday he was awarded the Novel peace prize, namely for achievements made in Kosovo, Namibia and Indonesia. I can only imagine how mean he had to be in those places, in order to reach achievements worthy of such honor. This is the way to make peace.

With your permission, I would like to take this opportunity and endorse a certain ticket in the coming U.S. elections. I'm doing so as an Israeli. In all the years the Republicans have been at the white house, nothing moved in Mid-East politics. The Bush administration "loved" Israel and "supported" Israel. Bullocks. The only way to support Israel is to be tough with it and force it to negotiate and make progress. Anyone who cuddles it will simply stall all potential developments in the region and perpetuate hostilities. The way to run foreign policy is to be tough with everyone equally. The current administration was highly imbalanced in this sense.

This isn't only true to the Neocons. Whenever there is a Democrat in the white house, be it Carter or Clinton, things move here. When the Republicans are in office, all comes to a halt. Sure everything may change, but in truth, I don't expect McCain to have wisely paraphrased Nietzsche's most controversial line: When goeth thee to make peace, do not forget thy whip.

Please, Americans, give us an Ahtisaari, a president who will be unyielding enough to change things for us and for you. Vote Obama/Biden.

New Deal

People keep telling me FDR was a putz. While that's as may be, the night in 1933 on which he privatized America's banks was the night leadership was invented (oddly, it was on the same year that cowerdice was invented, by Von-Hindenburg).

Last night ignorance was invented. When Henry Paulson dramatically pleaded Nancy Pelosi not to knock down the recovery plan, he was as oblivious to his actual foes as a man kicking his pillow in the midst of a violent dream. It's the republicans, stupid! They would rather see the world's poorest starve and the dreams of all the rest of us crashed than give up their Ayn Randian aloofness.

I just hope this is the last bit of harm they will cause. This morning, as I walked down Yeffet Street, the rain came down in a torrent for the first time since May. This autumn should be the time of true renewal, in Washington, in Jerusalem, wherever renewal is needed. I attach an autumn song and a socialist song as rainy day gifts. Both are unusual versions of familiar tunes, showcasing once more how artists are gutsy where politicians should be.

08.08.08

Tamar walks into the room where I sit at the computer. "A war has erupted," I tell her, and quickly add: "Not here, in the Caucasus. between Russia and Georgia."

"What," she says, "Now? But now's the Olympics!"

Once

I'll be 32 this Sunday, and am currently looking through my more peculiar achievements: those experiences that were experienced only once.

So in 32 years I skydived once
went snowshoeing once
got married once and divorced once
got stranded on a small island once (for about 30 hours)
got my heart broken once
got my jaw broken once
tried hard drugs once
got arrested once (while protesting environmental issues)
published poetry once
earned my accomodation by reciting poetry once
visited Lichtenstein once (I crossed it on foot!)
Visited Lebanon once (long story)
biked from Holland to Prague once
spent a night at a parking lot once
spent a night inside a window display trailer once
spent a night with a married woman once
met with overt antisemitism once
got spat on once (same occasion)
frenched a tree once (a dare in a truth or dare game)
saved a man's life once
broadcast a radio show once
revealed to a man that his girlfriend was pregnant with another man's child once (don't try this at home)
saw a beaver in the wild once
saw a rattlesnake in the wild once
saw an elephant in the wild once
saw a humpback whale in the wild once
visited a rubber plantation once
touched a dead man once
spoke to a head of state once (Rabin)
saw the pope once
got massaged at a Turkish hamam once
sat in a "smoke sauna" once
sat at the waiting room of a brothel once (didn't use their services)
ate jellyfish salad once
ate blood pudding in blood sauce once
ate "thousend years old eggs" once
ate alligator once and turtle once
drank authentic moonshine once
explored the underground drainage system of a city with a flashlight once
got mugged once
painted a "trial of Paris" once
pretended to be American once
pretended to be French once
pretended to be South African once
pretended to be Macedonian once (traveling the Middle East isn't easy for Israelis)
wore a bindy once
wore fake eyelashes once
had a letter exchange with the governemnt of Saudi Arabia once
shook hands with a Serbian mafia head once
saw actors performing a play I wrote once
lectured at Harvard university once
got paid a live duck for my work once

The nice thing about this list is how difficult it was to assemble. most of the things that came to my mind I had done more than once and so they didn't get a mention. Many of the things that were mentioned, I would love to do again. It's being a great life so far, perfect for reruns.

Tangled in History

It takes gallons of guts to be Kosovo. Not that they're at risk, but no one familiar with what used to be Yugoslavia can read the headline: "Belgrad declares seccesion illegal" and not shiver a bit.

Something else catches my eye besides the headline. In the photo appearing beneath it on the Haaretz website, Albanian flags are seen flown next to the Star Spangled Banner on the streets of Pristina. in the days of Communist Tirana, who'd have ever thought this combo would someday make political sense?

Ok, fine! fine! I'm willing to shake off the past. It's irrelevant. I blame fashion designers. It's those stupid comebacks that prevent me from realizing the 80s and 90s are over. Down with the huge sunglasses! long live whatever new Republic pops up next.

What Would the Buddha Do?

Things in Myanmar are getting rougher. The police is currently shooting over the heads of the protesters. In 1988 they shot into the crowds and killed "thousands", you can always tell a murderous totalitarian state when "thousands" is the only figure available.

I'm going crazy in this room without any way to help the courageous Burmese people, and especially the Buddhist monks who are leading the protests. I'm a citizen of a nation that takes part in training the Myanmar army, the army that is killing them and enslaving them. I pay taxes that are used to fortify the junta in Myanmar, then again, so do the Burmese.

So many of us are exploited by violent factors without being aware of it and without doing much about it. Buddha is said to have taught: "Let us live in joy, in peace among people who wage war, among people who wage war, let us live in peace." (Dhamapadda, Chapter 15). This sounds like peacenik religion at its most passive, but in fact it is impossible to live in peace without being active, otherwise you end up becoming a tool of war.

The monks of Myanmar recognize this. This is why they are out on the streets, fighting tear gas. This is why they are in dungeons, experiencing torture. They know that sometimes Buddhism is exactly about breaking out of the lotus position and fighting for human rights and justice. I'll keep that in mind the next time I hear a call to action by my window.

Ok, I Want to Talk About Ireland

Ok, I want to talk about Ireland, specifically I want to talk about Armenia, and in particular I'd like to talk about Watertown, Massachusetts.

The best way to learn about the current drama going on around the issue of the Armenian genocide is to log on to Mimi Asnes's excellent blog "A Stranger in a Strange Land". Mimi is a native of Watertown as well as a professional peace activist, so she's been following the issue closely and intelligently.

While living in Boston I used to visit Watertown for Middle Eastern goods. That little suburb is home to large Lebanese and Greek populations, which translates into excellent delis with olives and knafe and what not. It is also Boston's Armenian quarter, which is a lovley thing, but inevitably a "memento mori". While walking down its streets I would often catch myself thinking about the historical wrong than nation has known, and I don't even mean the genocide, I mean the denial.

This week something happened. So far the Jewish Anti Defamation League's refused to call the murder of close to 1,500,000 Armenian's during WWI a "genocide". This caused its new educational initiative to be banned in Watertown. The bad publicity over the event forced The ADL to announce this week that there indeed was a genocide. Bravo, I'm proud of them, proud of Abe Foxman, proud even of Alan Dershowitz, who usually just makes me cringe, and this week came to the support of pro-acknowledgmentists in a Boston Globe op-ed .

But that's hardly the end of the story. Now Israel is being pressured by Turkey to reprimand the ADL. So far Israel, a nation itself traumatized by a genocide, has helped Turkey deny the Armenian Genocide, under threat that if it failed to do so, it would lose its only ally in the middle east. I love Turkey, Turkey is my beloved friend, but sometimes a friend needs an arm around the shoulder and a fearless advice. I advise the Turks to grow up, face history and start apologizing.

As long as they fail to do so, both Turks and Armenians will remain in flux, as well as certain Israelis, Bostonians and others who posses a sense of justice. Sinead O'connor has a song about the Irish potato famine of the 1840's, a disaster caused largely by British occupation policies and one that is still unacknowledged by Britian. She sings:

"I see the Irish As a race
Like a child That got itself bashed in the face,
And if there ever is gonna be healing
There has to be remembering
And then grieving
So that there then can be forgiving
There has to be knowledge and understanding."

Turkey, I want to be proud of you too. If the Germans can do it, you can do it. Israel, don't yield to the pressure. I will gladly give up the right to visit Istanbul's fair minarets, the beautiful nights by the Bosphorus with Efes Pilsen and music by Ibrahim, the support of a Muslim nation in the face of the Arab world, the good olives and knafe of Anatolia (better than Watertown's!), everything, only to see a small first step forward made towards processing and reconciling.

Meet Me in St. Louis

Refugees from Darfur who arrive in Israel have a couple of problems:

1. They are refugees

2. They are black

3. They are Muslim

For these three reasons they will not be received here, in a land populated by many former refugees and victims of racism, with open arms. In fact, this week we gleefully kicked a couple of them out to Egypt, "back where they came from". I hear that Egyptian soldiers beat several of them to a state of unconsciousness before the eyes of the deporting Israeli soldiers.

My view of the world while growing up was marked by the story of the ship "St. Louis". In 1939 that ship took close to a thousend Jewish refugees from Germany to Cuba. By the time it arrived, Cuba's government changed its mind and allowed only 22 of the passengers on shore. The ship continued to sail around the world. Its passengers were denied entry to every country they approached, including the United States. This country was at the time under British rule which forbade Jewish immigration on the onset. The refugees were eventually taken back to Europe and put on the trains to the slaughterhouses.

I understand the governments of Cuba, the U.S. et al. Is it their fault that the Jews are hated in Europe? What, is Cuba a dump site for unwanted people? When the African refugees were to be settled in the Israeli town of Hadera, its mayor notified the press that "Hadera is not Israel's trashcan." Amen to that, I certainly hope none of these politically dangerous, money sucking members of an inferior race gets dumped on my lawn. I hear that they carry a revolting and highly infectious disease called P.T.S.D.