Neutralizing cargo bombs – Israeli style
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Technology, Travel, War
A passengers has his luggage checked by security personnel, inside the Ben-Gurion airport terminal. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
But when international near-calamities take place – like last week’s cargo bombs that were intercepted at airports in Britain and Dubai on their way to the Chicago Jewish community, likely courtesy of Islamic al-qaeda terrorists based in Yemen – all eyes end up turning to our shores to learn what we do right.
Just so happens, coincidentally, that there’s a Homeland Security Conference taking place this week in Israel, with 50 visiting security experts from around the world exchanging information, learning procedures and talking in code.
As part of the event, they visited Ben-Gurion Airport for a rare glimpse into the security procedures that have made it the world’s safest airport. Nahum Liss of the Israeli Airports Authority, showed off everything from bomb-sniffing robots to verbal procedures to keep passengers safe – including that bogeyman word in the West, profiling.
According to the Canadian Press, the visitors watched as security officers staged a live simulation, stopping three armed “terrorists” who broke through a rear gate. Then they observed an unmanned vehicle patrolling the airport perimeter by remote control — a technology soon to be introduced at the Israeli airport.
They also learned what we all know – before even entering the airport, all cars are stopped for a security check by armed guards. Cameras scan license plates to match them with a database of suspicious vehicles. But the security officials added that there are many more security filters that we don’t know about, and nobody’s going to disclose it here.
However, it can be said that the main terminal is equipped with 700 closed-circuit cameras and is fortified against explosions. The large glass wall at the front and even the trash cans inside are also bombproof.
I always feel safe leaving Israel at Ben-Gurion Airport, and if other airports around the world adopt some of their procedures, maybe everyone else can breathe a little easier when flying the not-so-friendly skies.
The week that was
Sometimes you can be lucky enough to have a week consisting of individual events that add up to something monumental – and if you’re even luckier, you may just realize it.
When you’re in the midst of it though, it can seem like running from from one event or task to another. But when you lay it out in print and read it through, you can then be struck by the thought that, yeah, this week was a keeper.
Sde Boker IDF ceremony.
And if you’re fortunate enough to be able to sit back a few decades from now with enough faculties to recall what you did with your life, this is the kind of week that you can look back and smile at, and realize just how fortunate you were.
Let’s start on Saturday night, when my buddy Alan organized a ‘Songs of Freedom and Liberation’ night at our Conservative shul, in the spirit of the hootenanies of the ’60s. Among the highlights for me were getting to sing Dylan’s “Chimes of Freedom” backed by Harvey Brooks on electric bass guitar. Harvey’s a rock & roll hall of famer who recently made aliya from the US, and as I told the crowd, he may have played with Hendrix, Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills, but he had never played with anyone of the caliber of the folks gathered on our stage.
The other highlight was getting to play with my son Koby, who lit up the finale of the evening – Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World” with an explosive guitar solo. I was proud beyond words.
That pride carried over into Monday night, when Koby’s own band performed at a battle of the bands in Jerusalem to raise money for the Make a Wish Foundation which helps cancer-stricken children realize their dreams. With American Idol-style judges including gifted rock pianist Shlomi Shaban, Koby’s band was awarded 3rd place, and the parental pride rose even higher.
On Wednesday, it was a three hours to and from Sde Boker in the Negev for the swearing in ceremony of my daughter’s army unit upon completion of their basic training. Against a stunning desert backdrop, she and her comrades were awarded their rifles and their own Tanach in a moving ceremony that was followed by a rendition of ‘Hatikva.’
Third graders do Pessah.
There was another version of ‘Hatikva’ sung on Friday morning, at the pre-Pessah show put on by my son’s third grade class. Chronicling the Exodus from Egypt in a modern TV news approach, the show was dedicated to captive soldier Gilad Schalit, who’s about to spend his third Seder in Hamas captivity.
Singing ‘Hatikva’ the second time was just as emotional as at the army ceremony. Even though I’ve lived here for a quarter century, it’s only recently that the anthem has struck resonance with me, and during both renditions this week, I silently said thanks that I was raising my children in Israel.
In between all those activities, I actually found time to work a little – including sitting down for an hour interview with Natan Sharansky, the chairman of the Jewish Agency and the celebrated former Prisoner of Zion. And I even got some quality New York Times crossword puzzle time in with my beloved wife, and even, even to to do a little Pessah cleaning.
Just another week in Israel? Or my ‘best’ week? Either way, I’m lucky I can step back for a second and appreciate it.
Austrians forget how Hatikva goes
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Politics, Sports
People wonder why Israel is always on the defensive, when things like this explain it perfectly.
At an international fencing competition over the weekend in Austria, two Israeli teens – Dana Stralinkov, 14, and Alona Komarov, 13 – won the gold and bronze medals respectively.
However, at the ceremonies awarding them the medals, instead of playing the national anthem – Hatikva – as is the custom with every other winning athlete, there was only silence.
After standing in shocked silence for a few seconds, the two teens along with the entire Israeli delegation of 22 people, burst in to song and sung Hatikva, the teenagers’ coach Yaakov Friedman told Yediot Aharonot.
“It was a very moving moment,” Freidman said, adding that a similar incident occurred five months ago at a competition in Sweden. According to the report, the Austrian official in charge of playing the national anthems of countries of the winning participants, explained he was unable to find a recording of the Israeli anthem.
Yeah, sure. And we believe that Nidal Malik Hasan wasn’t an Islamic jihadist, but suffering from PTSD. These occurences, which someone with paranoid tendencies might attribute to European snobbish digs at Israel’s legitimacy, is becoming a bit tiresome.
Yossi Harari, chairman of the Israel Fencing Association told Yediot that he intended to submit a complaint to the European Union. Harari also advised supplying every Israeli delegation participating in competitions abroad, with a recorded disc of Israel’s national anthem.
If the Hatikva snub had happened to Yuri Foreman, he might have come out swinging. Foreman, an aspiring rabbi who mixes religious studies with work in the gym, made history in Las Vegas on Saturday night when he became the first Israeli boxer to win a major world title, outpointed Daniel Santos over 12 rounds to claim the WBA super welterweight crown.
The 29-year-old, who was born in Belarus but lived in Haifa from the ages of 10 to 19. Foreman, who remained unbeaten in 28 fights, emigrated from Israel to Brooklyn and began studying to become a rabbi three years ago.
Maybe we should send Foreman to Austria next to teach them Hatikva.
Art Show at the Museum of the Underground Prisoners
Just when we thought we’d seen all that Jerusalem has to offer, along comes a surprise in the most unusual of spaces. For weeks, the Jerusalem municipality has been running full-page ads promoting Art Jerusalem 08, an exhibition with hundreds of mostly new and unknown artists. The setting was the Underground Prisoner’s Museum just off Kikar Safra (City Hall Plaza) in the Russian Compound neighborhood.
The fair was fabulous, ranging from under appreciated impressionists like Reuven Rubin to up and coming artists such as Ra’anana-based Estee Kreisman whose paint-on-photo panoramic canvases were one of our favorites. There was also a fair sprinkling of multimedia new age video and music-centric installations.
Art was for sale too. In one gallery, you could pick up a pint-sized version of David Gerstein’s striking multi-layered metal-on-metal sculptures or gaze longingly at an authentic Agam. There was an exhibition of just Bob Dylan photographs and even a Sotheby’s gallery featuring paintings for sale (at prices jumping to the hundreds of thousands of dollars for some works).
The highlight, though, was not the art itself but the interplay between the exhibition and the museum. The Underground Prisoner’s Museum was new to us (though both of our older kids have taken school field trips there). The museum is set in and around a former British jail used to house inmates ranging from petty criminals to political prisoners from 1918 to 1948 when the British quit Palestine. The building itself dates back to 1858 when it was served as a Russian pilgrims’ hospice for women.
The exhibits depict life in the prison and tell the stories of the underground groups and their members in order to perpetuate their memories. Incarceration resulted from offenses that included putting up posters, training and possession of weapons, and physical assault. At its height, the prison population totaled 250.
There are several long corridors lined with prison cells where inmates slept 8 to a room on thin woven mattresses on the floor. We toured the solitary confinement cells, the infirmary, synagogue and death row. Prisoners from the Jewish underground were put to work making coffins and gravestones for British policemen and soldiers they had killed in combat.
In retaliation, the British executed tens of Jews from the Irgun, Hagana and Lechi brigades during the time the jail was in operation (most of the underground members were transferred to the prison in Acre for execution). Large photographs of each of the underground fighters executed are displayed in an emotionally wrenching gallery.
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