Live Webcam of Humanitarian Aid at Gaza-Israel Crossing
Last week I interviewed Peter Lerner an IDF spokesperson working at the Kerem Shalom border crossing. This is the largest checkpoint/border crossing between Israel and Gaza, and it is where humanitarian aid is being transferred.
According to Lerner, no donation has been turned away, referring to the units of blood, ambulances, medical gases, food, and staples that have been donated from around the world to Gazans.
If you’re involved in debating about the Gaza-Israel conflict, and are curious to see what is happening for yourself (this one’s for you Annie Lennox), now you can watch humanitarian aid travel through the Kerem Shalom Crossing on your desktop.
The Israel Defense Ministry started operating a live feed of the cargo crossing point. The feed will operate during the 3 hour ceasefire every day, and includes three cameras showing the points of access and exit of the terminal.
It can be viewed at: http://www.mod.gov.il/pages/general/Maavar_Kerem_Shalom.asp
I personally find the Kotel Cam (live feed at The Western Wall) to be much more inspiring in these troubled times. You can read more of my commentary on the conflict (like it or not) on the post “The Israeli Palestinian Conflict Is An Ancient Story.”
::cross-posted on The Huffington Post
Golden Globe for Waltz with Bashir
The innovative retro-animated documentary Waltz with Bashir won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Film yesterday in California, and director Ari Folman did not miss the opportunity to reflect on the poignancy of the victory from the podium.
It’s a big deal when any Israeli film wins a big international award, regardless of how many it won in the past or how much buzz there is over the possibility of an Oscar nod when the nominations are announced in about two weeks.
But with an ongoing conflict in Israel’s south making for a parallel media war battling over the opinion of the world’s citizens, an Israeli victory in Hollywood becomes even more significant – especially given the movie’s introspective soldier’s experience narrative.
The Jerusalem Post today sums up Folman’s acceptance speech thusly:
Folman thanked his team and his wife and dedicated the award to the babies born to his team members over the four years during which the film was made.
Expressing his wish to see peace arrive in the war-torn Middle East, Folman said he hoped one day these babies will regard the film and the war it describes as an old video game with which they had nothing to do.
Sadly, war’s status as hell is a timeless theme, one which speaks to the Israeli experience far more than it ought to, and The Hollywood Reporter managed to get Folman talking about it even more behind the scenes, and thankfully, with a tinge of optimism:
Folman was a man of few words backstage but did say he is sad that his film, about conflict in the Middle East, is relevant in light of the current Gaza incursions. “Unfortunately, this film is always relevant,” he said. “It has only one major statement (one of anti-war). It was relevant two years ago (when I began making it), and it’s still now.” Folman said he hopes for the best for that part of the world. “I am very optimistic (for peace), or I wouldn’t have done this,” he said. “It’s a matter of leadership: A time will come that both sides will have clever leaders who will work it out.”
Image courtesy fuxoft from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.
Nostalgia Sunday – 50 Years of Israeli Club Culture
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Nostalgia Sunday, Pop Culture, War
Anhedonia is “an inability to experience pleasure from normally pleasurable life events” and in addition to being the working title for Wood Allen’s “Annie Hall” – it also describes a feeling Israelis wrestle with on a daily basis.
Nissan Shor, is the author of the new book “Dancing With Tears in Their Eyes,” a history of fifty years of dance clubs in Israel. In it, Shor – a music writer turned cable show host – makes a case for the tension between Israel’s often grim security situation, and just wanting to have fun, as unique. 
The book (available only in Hebrew but with lots of pictures that, because of copyright issues, can’t be posted) deals with places that played recorded music only, from so-called Salon Parties held in living rooms in the late 1950s to Dance Nation clubs such as Jerusalem’s Haoman 17 in the late 1990s. It does not, notes Shor, deal with “night clubs or variety clubs where there were performances, like magicians, jugglers or live music.” Over the decades, he says, “In Israel there has always been a de-legitimization of people who want to dance and have a good time, because of our national situation.”
“Throughout, we see people whose desire to have fun becomes an antiestablishment act. And a young person who dances isn’t necessarily protesting the establishment but the ideological hegemony is so strong, that people who deviate for the purposes of pleasure become, whether consciously or unconsciously, anti-nationalistic. You can’t just dance and be normal.”
Shor touches on the non-conformist bohemia of the early Yishuv pre-State settlement – whose Foxtrotting tea-dances were condemned by the poet Chaim Nachman Bialik, who wrote, “What emptiness! What tastelessness!… Degeneration and hollow soullessness!”
But the book really gets started with the introduction of Rock ‘n Roll and the noar salon (literally, “living room youngsters) Israeli-style Greasers later immortalized in the movie Eskimo Limon (Lemon Popsicle). Says Shor: “They didn’t go to Zionist youth movements because the framework – uniforms, hierarchy – wasn’t their style. They wanted to be like the other young people all over the world, wear jeans and leather jackets, listen to Elvis Presley and Cliff Richard. And by the way, there were noar salon who went to both youth movement and dance parties.”
Photo by Fritz Cohen
The summer of 1965 marked a milestone in the history of Israeli clubbing, when the first discotheque opened on the veranda of the Hammam nightclub in old Jaffa. The venue, owned by author Dan Ben Amotz and poet Haim Hefer, was leased out to entrepreneur Rafi Shauli – a key figure in the creation of a new paradigm in Israeli nightlife. Shauli really deserves a full column devoted to his accomplishments, but it should be noted that in addition to the many clubs he opened in the 1960s and 70s, (Mandy’s, Mandy’s Cherry and Mandy’s Singing Bamboo – all in honor of then-wife, the glamorous and scandalous Mandy Rice-Davies), he also opened HaMoadon in 1977, a members-only discotheque that raised the bar for all clubs in the Jewish State.
The phenomenon “gave rise to serious debates in the Knesset from all ends of the spectrum about the deterioration of Zionism and all sorts of dangers to the nation’s future. And this discussion comes up every few years. When the Coliseum club opened in 1982, around when the [first] Lebanon war broke out, the national debate was ‘how can people dance when others are dying?’, and [state-run] Channel One called it ‘the last days of Pompeii.’ The 80s New wave clubs – Penguin, Sirocco, Liquid, Kolnoa Dan – said rock had to be sung in English,” leading to another outcry. “And when the second intifiada broke out, the national debate was about the ‘Tel Aviv bubble’. It’s constant.”
Photo by Moshe Milner
In the early Nineties, euphoria over the Oslo Accords and the promise of a New Middle East, dovetailed perfectly with the introduction of muti-channel television and increased Western cultural influence in Israel. “The Israeli electronic dance music revolution came in with the consumer revolution, chains stores, cable TV – and Ecstasy. By 1997-98, it dominated youth culture.” That euphoric balloon, he adds, “burst with the second Intifada.”
Given that clubs have become a target for terrorists, Shor says that going clubbing during times of high alert has evolved into a form of national pride for some young people. “For example, right before the first Gulf War, there were ‘End of the World’ parties. After the suicide bomber attack at the Dolfi-Disco, the club re-opened and the kids kept on coming. It wasn’t heartlessness. It was saying, ‘No, you won’t stop me living my life.’”
Shor worked on the book for four years, inspired by his own love of nightlife, and the lack of an authoritative source on the subject. “I saw there was this genre of literature in other countries. I think that the conflict, that the subject deviates from the conventional, is one reason why no such book had been written. And this book tries to analyze that convention and introduce it into the Israeli discourse. It seemed right from an Israeli point of view.”
The generations of accidental rebels, he adds, “Weren’t trying to be political protesters. It was a rebellion only because of their actions, trying to live a western life in Israel. I think this is true Zionism – to live as every other nation. I think Herzl would have preferred endless partying to endless war.”
Video: Haoman 17 Jerusalem closes
Peace now, or later?
Whether it's the right move or not, Israeli society is open to debate on whether the Gaza campaign should continue.
In fact, Haim Oron, the leader of Meretz, the flag bearer of the Zionist Left, spoke out in favor of a military operation in Gaza to stop the Hamas rocket attacks on the South. But now, two weeks into the campaign, the general support for the operation is being frayed. And last night marked the first demonstation by Peace Now and Meretz against the continuation of the campaign.
The Jerusalem Post reported:
“Even though we supported initiating the operation after Hamas broke the cease-fire, now we are saying enough,” Meretz head Haim Oron said at the rally. “A cease-fire must be reached now. We must do everything possible to reach a peace agreement under the umbrella of the Arab League. Only an agreement between us and the Palestinians can end terror.”
Peace Now expressed understanding for the operation when it began, but started calling for a cease-fire six days into the fighting. “Calls for a cease-fire are not anti-IDF,” Peace Now secretary-general Yariv Oppenheimer said at the rally. “We just don’t want the soldiers to lose their lives in an operation that should not be continuing. The Left was divided at the start of the fighting. But when the choice is between staying in Gaza for years or leaving now, it is clear what we support.”
As caualties mount, the IDF prepares a ‘phase three’ of its offensive which will likely take troops farther into Gaza toward Gaza City, and efforts intensify to find a formula that will enable both Israel and Hamas to accept a cease-fire, the calls for a withdrawal will likely increase.
And the debate is intensifying too. A weather vane of public opinion, Facebook is full of back and forth whether the status report that many supporters of the IDF efforts have adopted, which tracks each Kassam that falls on Israel, is ‘jingoistic’. And there have also been reports of a similar status report on the other side labeled ‘body count’ which marks each Palestinian fatality at the hands of the IDF.
Friends by any definition, are turning on each other with increased exasperation and lack of understanding for the other side. Self-criticism has long been a tenet of the Israeli way of life, and now is certainly no time to stop. It keeps us in check, reminds us that we, as a people, abhor war and killing, and sets us apart from our enemy, which doesn’t seem to have any internal debate or qualms about the suffering and death it causes.
A letter to Joe the Plumber
Dear Joe the Plumber Opportunist,
I’m a bit confused as to why Pajamas Media have chosen you of all people to cover the current conflict in southern Israel and Gaza. Maybe it’s just the circles in which I travel, but I have never heard your name uttered in any serious way whatsoever – just in jest. Being in the right place and at the right time propelled you into the bizarre world of pseudo-celebrity and somehow you’ve managed to turn your 15 minutes into a 20. I want to officially welcome you to Israel. I know you aren’t the most knowledgeable about the conflict. That was evident in your comment back in October where you agreed with a supporter of John McCain that a vote for Barack Obama “is a vote for the death of Israel.” Shepard Smith of FOX news even called your views “frightening.” I hope you read up a bit on our country on the flight over. At the very least you should watch the movie “Ha’Instalator.” Here’s the plot. Perhaps you can relate.
In this madcap Israeli satire, a clueless plumber somehow finds himself elevated to the position of Minister of Finance for the whole country. Because he is inexperienced in politics, he takes his brief seriously and fails to perpetuate the kinds of graft and greed that his predecessors were party to, puzzling everyone — most of all the poor plumber himself, who cannot comprehend the kinds of political depravity he is being invited to participate in.
He succeeds in his post and ends up providing, among other things, a solution to the electricity crisis generating electricity via flushing toilets. Perhaps this bodes well for you. Maybe through your over simplified views of foreign policy you’ll offer some fresh ideas that will solve the current crisis (or perhaps the entire Arab-Israeli conflict) that no Israeli leader, politician, intellectual or professor has thought of yet. Best of luck.
Cheers,
Harry
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