Back in Israel after 23 years (June 2018)
Impossible to do justice to this pulsating, under-your-skin and passionate country after a few days, but very impressed by how modern, cosmopolitan, at ease with itself the country and the people have become, despite the continually intractable geopolitics and politics.
Jerusalem a hort of religion, tradition, co-habitation, awe-inspiring spirituality and historic treasures. Central to Judaism, to Christianity, and to Islam. And somehow uneasily co-existing here to worship their traditions and beliefs.
Mournful visit to Yad Vashem, the didactically excellent Holocaust Museum, made that little but easier by knowing that among the Righteous Among the Nations is a grandfather on Beata's side. Inspiring visit to the new Supreme Court of Israel, hearing 10,000 cases each year; the Law of Return, which has brought amongst others nearly a million Russian Jews to the country, requires one to have one Jewish grandparent; poetic justice given that this was also the Nazi discriminatory criterion for the 1935 Nuremberg race discrimination laws.
Towards the Dead Sea all vegetation suddenly stops and desolate desert all around one. The brimy waters of the Dead Sea no relief but sitting up with no movement in the water gets you an idea of how Jesus walked on water. As temperatures soared to 41.5 Celsius, we drove south. Paying a visit to the botanic garden and dining room of the Kibbutz Ein Gedi, an institution of socialist frontier settlement by the first waves of Ashkenazi immigrants in the 1920s that always fascinated my parents.
After a night in Sodom's Plain, a stone throw from Jordan and full of impressive Israeli agricultural production based on irrigating nature back into the desert, we drove through the Negev desert north-west, bypassing Hamas-ruled and desolate Gaza towards Tel Aviv.
At the south end of Tel Aviv and its bustling city and endless beautiful beaches sits the old town of Yaffa, complete with flea market and pre-Shabbat afternoon bustle, a mixture of a Suk, Kreuzbergian cool, and Mediterranean savoir vivre - when a guy passes you in shorts on a skate board holding a surf board on his way from the nearby beach, you decidedly start to feel uncool ...
The highlight of the visit was to re-unite with UWC friend Claudia and her family, including her wonderful children and wise relaxed husband (smart women only choose that type!). A privilege to attend the Shabbat Shalom ceremony and family reunion dinner, and to engage in wonderful discussion, from the funny to the engaging to the retrospective to the political. Charlie, as we have called each other since 1983, has found a new home for her family in Israel, and the enthusiasm is infectious.
Tel Aviv is everything that Jerusalem is not, brash, loud, irreverent, modern, hedonistic, beautiful, unapologetic. To a European linguist, hearing Hebrew and searching for Yiddish is a pastime. But walking down Rothschild Boulevard and taking in blocks after blocks of Bauhaus buildings, created by 1930s immigrant architects from Nazi Germany, tops it all off; fringed by palm trees, mind you, and with bustling cafes and nightlife all around. At the end of the boulevard a significant demonstration with pictures of PM B. Netanyahu calling him Crime Minister - it is an open society, for its much-maligned imperfections.
Charlie said to take in the Itzak Rabin Museum before we go, and it was another educational and moving experience. Here was a 16 year old who wanted to be a water engineer (arguably the most effective people in transforming the country after Independence) who became a military man, head of the army, and Labour prime minister. When after 27 years of fighting or preparing to fight he pioneered the Oslo Accords of 1995 that set up a peace process with the PLO, followed by peace with Jordan, for which he and Shimon Peres and Yassir Arafat received the Nobel Peace Prize, he was maligned and attacked in orthodox and settler communities and shot in 1995 by an Orthodox Israeli after a peace ralley - depriving the Israeli side of a major agent for peace. Intifada 2, Iraq War, Arab Spring, Hamas taking over Gaza, Syrian civil war all followed, politics going from bad to worse, while Netanyahu is on his 4th term. Rabin's job did not get finished. And this is still, for all its beauty and attractions and fascinating people, a troubled country. But one that is moving forward with purpose and confidence, which one cannot but admire.
'Hevenu Shalom Aleichem' was a song we learned at school in the old West Germany - sung at weddings and bar mitzvahs: "We brought you peace.' It is an ongoing process.
