Naomi Shemer has died,
in the middle of the month of Tamuz, just like in her song. My friend A. reminded me of this song this morning, and Alisa has thought of it as well.

This country wouldn’t be the same without Naomi Shemer’s songs. Some of them have always driven me crazy, others never fail to bring tears of nostalgia or sadness to my eyes. But one thing is for sure - most of her songs are a part of our lives and national psyche in such a way that it’s hard to grasp that a person actually sat down at one time and wrote them, that they weren’t always just there, like the trees and the birds and the blue sky. Naomi Shemer is Israel.
posted by Imshin 19:00

Update: Bish is still not awake. Here goes (I'm sorry, it's the best I can do):

LandofIsrael Song
Yankele Rotblit
(An extremely humble, non-rhyming translation by Imshin)

I gave my life to you and for you, Land of Israel /
Mists of purity filled my mind, I thought it was the Will of God /
The Jewish People, the Return to Zion, Coming Home, Oh Sweet Land of the Fathers /
Leave me alone now, I can’t be bothered with Mitzvas

I built towns in Samaria and I built villages in Judaea /
I built with Rabin and Peres and Meretz and with the Labor Party /
They always winked at me with one eye, the Zionist eye /
No Supreme Court and no B’Tzelem they told me – that’s the whole plan

Every member of every bankrupt kibbutz built on the ruins of an Arab village has become a bleeding heart liberal /
And I am the enemy of the people building a colonial empire on conquered land /
They want to see me walking in mourning in the ruins of my home /
And the poet from Sheikh Munis in Ramat Aviv will write to the New York Times about poetic justice

So much –
Jews hating Jews
Don’t know if to cry or be angry
Fire up the bulldozer Arik
Let’s start demolishing

Thirty years a man builds, he has a wife daughters sons grandchildren /
They grew up under the trees he planted, and they’re bringing up their children /
And he makes a garden and a little business, and life, thank God, is not bad /
Until some little leader in a tie with manicured fingers comes and tells him that the mission is over

It seems that your life was a policy mistake, you will be reimbursed /
This is what the nation wants, and this is what their president said /
A day of joy it will be, a joint celebration, a festive day for all nations /
Give out wine in the square, dance naked for peace

Don’t call it transfer, the copywriter will find you a clean word /
And the court will prove what this has got to do with human rights and civil rights and animal rights /
Because they hate me in the new left and in the old left and in the media and all the heads of finance /
They’ve taught the poor they have exploited that it’s the Jew from Hebron who is to blame

So much –
Jews hating Jews
The cup has passed over me
Fire up the bulldozer Arik
Let’s start demolishing

My prayer shawl is not all sky blue, it is blemished /
I have been involved in quite a few brawls, shepherds quarrels, beatings and threats /
Sticks, stones, Molotov cocktails, the odd gun here and there, oh the good days /
You may like to remind me who brought him here, and who gave them guns

If here and there I bent a rule, made a straight line into a circle /
Not for myself was I doing it, it was all for the People of Israel /
Even three years of Intifada, and daily murder on the roads /
Didn’t make a partner of me, we are not cried over

There is someone to blame for war, there is someone to blame for every soldier killed /
There is someone to blame for the credit companies lowering the credit rating /
The washing of hands of an occupation of every enlightened man /
All those walking in the dark cry: why is my light on?

So much –
Jews hating Jews
Tell me now you’re the boss
Fire up the bulldozer Arik
Let’s start demolishing

There’s a sea of madmen around, all manner of dangerous elements /
Even God doesn’t know what they believe in /
And strange weeds around and enthusiastic youths hanging out on the hills /
And all sorts of Rabbis and all kinds of saviors

No, you won’t see another Massada here and there will be no street fights /
This herd will go quietly to the slaughter, that’s how it usually happens /
Only a few dazed tens of thousands whose whole world has collapsed /
A new kind of absent while present, exiled in their own land

No one will hang a key round his neck for thirty years /
They’ll take the VCR along with the tape, recording the bitter tears /
Everything is upside down – look at the Hellenized left all holier than thou /
And we of the knitted yarmulkas will be the new bearers of the cross.

So much –
Jews hating Jews
I’m throwing away my yarmulka, I’m no longer a ‘doss’
Fire up the bulldozer Arik
Let’s start demolishing

Fire up the bulldozer Arik
Let’s start demolishing

Update update: A huge confession: I hadn’t really listened very closely to the music of Rotblit’s song (Hebrew link). He’s a lyricist for goodness sake. He should have given this song to a proper musician and not attempted to tackle it alone. The music is bloody awful. I’m sure Ariel Zilber would have been only too happy to oblige. They worked together on the immortal ‘Ani shokhev li al hagav’ (‘I am lying on my back’), one of the all time favorites I mentioned yesterday, among other things.

So it seems the radio gods have a good excuse to ignore this song, although there are some really abominable songs, sung by tone deaf pompous farts (please forgive me, Dad, I’m on a roll here), droning on the radio all the time.


posted by Imshin 08:22

Okay, a serious apology is in order.
I agree with Anonymous on the Head Heeb's comments. The translation of the song is far too loose and pulls the song too far to the right. I thought about it when I posted it, I even started to write a comment, but then I thought - if you can't do anything better, Imshin, then don't write anything, so I deleted the comment. Now I've removed the links to the translation. Anonymous suggests a different translation. This is poetry though, and I don’t even like his translation much. But still Anonymous's understanding of the words is more accurate and compassionate, in my view than that of another Israeli commenter on Jonathan's blog, Danny, who misses the point of the song completely and, in doing so and in continuing chanting the usual stuff, totally proves Rotblit's point.

We have become blind to the settlers. We have dehumanized them. We care less when we hear on the radio that settlers were killed. We say to ourselves ‘They shouldn’t have been there in the first place’. But we put them there, not just the Likud, not just Arik.

And now they are there. I know a lot of people who were born there. Not babies, not children, but young adults, married with children of their own. They’ve never lived anywhere else. They are people, human beings, not sacks of potatos to be shifted around as it suits the establishment.

To paraphrase Ami Ayalon, if left wing people in this country, who claim to seek peace more than others, cannot feel the pain and anguish of people who are going to be torn from their homes, justified as this may be, they are every much as cruel and inhumane as they accuse the settlers of being.

Besides, ‘They shouldn’t have been there in the first place’ is exactly what everyone else says about us. I’ve been trying to explain us to myself for a while now, and explaining this particular paradox is getting increasingly difficult for me.

So I’m going to try to translate it myself. I’ve tried this before and always stopped in the middle because I never feel I can do the original any justice, but it’s important enough to make the effort. And as Anonymous says – it won’t rhyme but maybe it will be more honest.

In the meantime, I’ll put the original Hebrew version here as soon as I can work out how. I think I’ll have to wait till Bish wakes up (Shabbat morning, this might take a while).

posted by Imshin 07:15

There’s a new protest song in town, a new ‘Shir La Shalom’*. It was even written by the same guy.

There’s a new protest song in town, and it’s hard on the ear and a wrench on the heart. I hang my head in shame, because of what it has to say. I am guilty as charged.

There’s a new protest song in town. But you won’t be hearing it on any of the hip radio stations, or on any of the unhip radio stations either. In fact, you won’t be hearing it at all. Because this is the real thing, not the usual hypocritical garbage, not the banal commercial rehashes of the stuff that this guy wrote thirty years ago from the heart.

Yankele Rotblit, undoubtedly one of the greatest Israeli song lyricists (he's certainly written one or two or three of my all-time favorites), has written a powerful song that protests the unthinkable – the injustice being done to the settlers in the West Bank and Gaza.

And the very left wing music broadcasting establishment can’t take it. And he’s being shut out.

Because they think the only legitimate protest is their trendy well-fed-but-posing-as-working-class style of protest. They truly believe that theirs is the only opinion that should be heard. And they certainly refuse to let anyone hear any point of view that doesn't villify the settlers, no matter who it is who is doing the talking.

They’re shutting him out just like they shut out Ariel Zilber when he came out of the closet as a right-winger and recorded an excellent Hebrew version of Bob Dylan’s ‘Neighborhood Bully’ (I heard it on the radio exactly ONCE). Only in Rotblit’s case, with all that he stands for, and he really does stand for one or two things in this country, this is even more strikingly repulsive. Shame on them!

So fire up the bulldozer, Arik. Let’s start destroying.

____________________
* The “Song For Peace” was written in the late sixties by Rotblit, who lost a leg in the Six Day War. The song became the popular anthem of the Israeli Peace Camp; it is the song that Yitzhak Rabin sang in that peace rally just before descending the steps to his death; a sheet of paper with the lyrics of the song was found in Rabin’s pocket, covered in blood and with a bullet hole through the middle.

posted by Imshin 14:33

Right smack in the center of the Middle East
Tel Aviv celebrates its colorfulness and openness today with the annual Gay Pride Parade.


(Forgive the bad quality of the photo. Handy as it is, this little camera has its drawbacks)

posted by Imshin 10:41

Summer
Well, lifeguards back to work, Eldest finally got to the beach this morning. She walked there with a friend (“Take a hat, and plenty of water, and put sunscreen on before you leave, and make sure to always walk on the side with the shade… nag, nag, nag…”) and was amazed how quickly they got there.

By the time she gets fed up of the beach/pool/beach/pool routine and she’s seen all the new films, which should happen round about next week, she’s starting an art class, two mornings a week. The teacher is my art teacher from my heavenly Tuesday evening class, so it should be fun. She manages to give her classes a wonderfully accepting and encouraging atmosphere. I think Eldest is mainly going because she can see how much I love it.

So if any of you have teenage kids, seventh grade and over, who think they would enjoy being creative in such a warm environment during July, and have no problem reaching the north Dizengoff area (somewhere between Pe’er Cinema and Nordau Bvd.) for a few hours twice a week (late in the morning, they won’t have to get up early), send me an e-mail (imshin at bigfoot dot com) and I will give you more details.

posted by Imshin 19:03

Dogs
Tiggy is a lovely little bitch. She’s old now, but she has always been sweet and good-natured, wonderful with kids. Our Sis and Mr. Our Sis have always had lovely dogs. Tiggy is actually Tiggy 2. Before her there was Tiggy 1 and before her there was Dougal.

Now it’s looking like there isn’t going to be a Tiggy 3. Because Tiggy 2 is a Staffordshire Bull Terrier, as was Tiggy 1 before her. Dougal was a Rottweiller. But I don’t think any of them were aware that they were dangerous dogs*. My kitten is more aggressive than all three of them put together.

Last week, a four year old girl in Tel Aviv was killed by her father’s Amstaff. A sweet little girl called Avivit. The dog attacked her while they were playing in the living room and tore her throat apart.

It was the first time a dog had killed a person in Israel. The father had just got out of prison. The dog had been staying somewhere else while he was interned. The neighbors said they had been terrified of the dog. I read somewhere that everyone knew that the father used to beat it with a stick.

A public debate ensued, regarding the question of destroying the dog. I believe it is a sign of Israeli society’s inherent humanity that people could understand that it was not the dog that was to blame here. Attempts were made to find a home for the poor creature, in the IDF or in the Shin Bet. No, not so it could chew up Palestinian children too (some people’s minds are really twisted, but now I can’t remember where I read that), but so it could live out its days running along a leash, guarding security installations, being useful.

It was put to death yesterday afternoon by lethal injection.

And now they’ve made a list of dangerous breeds of dogs, including Staffordshire Bull Terriers and Rottweillers, and they’re planning to gradually make them illegal. I hope they let Tiggy live out what’s left of her life in peace.

It makes me very sad, because I know it’s the people who are dangerous, and it’s they who make the dogs dangerous (although I am told Amstaffs were bred in America specifically for dog fights, so maybe they can’t help being aggressive).

But how can you keep tabs on those who mistreat these dogs and rear them to be killers? How can you make sure that only Our Sis compatibles are allowed to adopt them and look after them? There are plans to sack one thousand policemen from an already sorely undermanned police force. Public veterinarian services are probably not faring the recession much better. Dogs and dog owners are certainly not high on anyone’s agenda right now.

Ultimately, under the circumstances, and knowing how things often work in this country, outlawing the dogs is probably the only practical solution that can prevent this or other such horrible events from happening again.

But I do fear it will be the Our Sis’s and their well-bred ‘good’ dogs that pay the price, while the criminals continue keeping problematic breeds of dogs, turning them into monsters, and terrorizing their neighborhoods with them, and people will be too scared to shop them to the authorities.
__________________________

* Okay, so I do know that dogs are not capable of being aware of anything.

posted by Imshin 18:12

Israel Left wing blogs written in English seem to be getting ditsier all the time.

We should never have come here.

We are cruel and unjust.

Our army's actions are far worse than the Hamas'.

I thought she was kidding. I thought it was leading up to something profound. Apparently not.

Well, I’ve thought about it, and she hasn’t convinced me.

No, seriously. I’ve been thinking about it since before she was born. Thinking and thinking and thinking. And the funny thing is that round about when she was born I was just coming around to her way of seeing things.

Maybe it was me who lost the plot somewhere around the summer of 2000, and not her (How old was she way back then? Fifteen?). Maybe it’s because I wasn’t born in the year of the Rat. I’m obviously way too old to get it. I don’t even know what Chinese year I was born in. Forgive me, I didn’t even know it was of consequence.

Hang on. She’s nineteen and she listens to Joan Baez?? Is that sad or what?

Now I’m definitely going to be kicked out of the Ministry of Compassion. Fancy being nasty to some infant blogger, still wet around the ears, young enough to be my daughter!

I am downright ashamed of myself. (And of Israel’s education system. Don’t they teach them why the Six Day War broke out? Or do they reckon it’s too complex for the kids today to understand?

Or maybe when she says “We should never have come here” she’s not talking just about the territories. Maybe she missed the lesson about the Holocaust. I know they teach that.

Hey kiddo, you’re free to leave, you know. You’re still young enough to build a life somewhere else, and, unlike most Israelis, you seem to know English well enough to get along in a nice civilized country.)

In my perplexion, I return to the infant blog for clues.

We have the right to defend ourselves, when we're living within our borders.

We are living on stolen lands.

We should never have come here.

I detect a logical dillema here. If we should never have come here, and we are living on stolen lands, which exactly are the borders we have a right to defend? Define 'borders'; define 'here'; define 'us'; define 'defend'.

Fuzzy brain attack ... I really shouldn’t start thinking about these things at this time of night.

I wish infant peacey bloggers would be more precise and not leave me with all these bothering questions.

On the other hand it’s nice to see that someone can manage to be even fuzzier than me.

Imshin, you are horrible and mean.

Okay, I’m going to bed now, before I get completely out of control.

posted by Imshin 23:03

UN confronts anti-Semitism
Thank you, Mark in Mexico, for pointing me towards Anne Bayefsky’s powerful speech in the UN at a conference on Confronting Anti-Semitism yesterday (That’s a good one. Maybe they mean confronting anti-Semitism with cheers and standing ovations). I can only hope someone was listening (Dream on, Imshin).

On Norm’s profile I suggested that the best thing to do with the UN was to continue ignoring it. But reading Bayefsky I wonder of it shouldn’t be subjected to a bit of the treatment our old friend in the green cap would have for us.

Oh Imshin, don’t be so mean. People coming from Israellycool are going to think he got it all wrong. And then they’ll complain and then I’ll lose my lofty cabinet position and then… Hmmm, I wonder if there’s pension in it for those that get the chop.

posted by Imshin 09:24

Summer
I’ve been a bit sleepy for the last few days. The humidity is just getting revved up for summer. Eldest has finished school. She’s been gleefully celebrating summer for a few weeks now, and she deserves to, because she worked hard this year and did very well. So now she’s on an orgy of movies, swimming pool, beach, potentially - I had to veto the beach this morning.

Her little group of friends plans to go during the very hot hours and I fear she will burn to a frizzle. Furthermore it’s still not clear where there will be lifeguards. They’re on strike, of course. It’s summer. Summer means lifeguards go on strike.

This time though it’s not for higher pay (they’re apparently paid very high salaries, but then they don’t get paid in the winter). This time it’s because they’re cutting down the lifeguards to two at a station, instead of three. The lifeguards say this will undermine their ability to do their job safely, but we know the truth, don’t we? Two lifeguards instead of three will seriously hamper their ability to cruise the beaches and hit on babes during their workday. Definitely not to be tolerated!

I see they’ve been forced to go back to work by court order, seeing school’s out and a few people have drowned, but they’re not manning all of the stations, probably only the ones on deserted beaches!

posted by Imshin 09:18

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