Tel Aviv Diary - from April 7, 2003 Karen Alkalay-Gut
April 7,2003
We try not to allow space in between tragedies and terrors. As soon as the threat of Saddam's meds began to diminish we began to take up the real problems at hand - Bibi's budget.
Ezi repeatedly tells me that the government doesn't set the standards of living, but tries to create the conditions in which the standards can rise. But this doesn't comfort him or me. Because everyone knows the situation can only be set when there is peace. Unless we can begin to work things out with the Palestinians - and that means moving out of the territories, we are not going to have the conditions for peace. Sorry.
So we've got old people who can't move without their Phillipine aides being forced to fire them now because their pensions and alottments have been cut, special schools getting out early for vacation because salaries can't be paid (and problem children turned back to their parents and/or the streets), medications becoming out of reach for many many of the infirm as the prices rise, their alottments get cut, and no alternatives present themselves. We've been doing a lot of recycling of medications - but that's a drop in the bucket.
At least we're going to stop destroying surplus crops and give them to the poor. At least thousands of volunteers go around distributing food, clothing, and help, to the hundreds of thousands of indigent. But we're really in trouble. I even know a "professional" family whose home is about to be repossessed. They have no alternative place to live.
So lets go back to the peace process for a moment - a new government in the Palestine authority - So what if Abu Mazen's Phd thesis denies the existence of the Holocaust. It's today that counts. There seem to be a few reasonable people who will be in power very shortly there and with a little push and pull from Bush maybe Sharon can be persuaded to take responsibility - to back out. At this point I don't know what to do other than pray.
Why aren't I demonstrating? I don't believe this is a time in which demonstrations work at all. Prayers work just as well to assuage my conscience, and they are easier on my arthritic feet.
Thomas L. Friedman today talks about my old friend Ali Salem. He warns the Arab writers not to attack Iraqis who try to work with the U.S. "Don't stick your pens in the Iraqi wheel." Ali is always my model for the Arab writer - creative, open, exciting. I think I wrote not too long ago about how five years ago he drove his jeep from Cairo to Israel because he wanted to see what it was like, whether what people were saying about it in Egypt was true.
His book about the trip has many culturally and politically interesting observations, and wonderful scenes. (Has it been translated into English? I don't know.) Anyway here's a scene that wasn't in his book - just for the human interest.
From the long dusty ride in the desert he developed a boil on his neck, and it frightened Ali to think of being ill in a strange land. We went with him to the local health clinic that was open for minor 'emergencies' and he was given a form to fill out. I think he did it in English, but the doctor apparently didn't really believe the form and came out into the waiting room to ask him again his name. "Ali Salem." "Where do you live?" "Cairo." The doctor was getting more and more excited and impressed. "And what is your occupation?" "I WAS a writer, but now I am a PATIENT," Ali answered patiently, not at all showing his irritation at the delay.
Come to think of it, Ali always love playing up the dramatics of the Middle East crisis. Once, in Ann Arbor Michigan, he took me to the Jerusalem Cafe (I think that was its name) and after a few minutes of conversation with the owner, introduced me as his Israeli friend. The owner was very suspicious, but in the end i believe we all got drunk and had a wonderful time. I seem to remember we had a similar experience with a guide in Salzburg - provoking a stranger by acknowledging our enemy status.
I tell you about Ali because we had many antithetical points of view - but we talked - and even enjoyed the differences. And he wasn't afraid to find things out first hand, even if it meant he would suffer for it.
April 8, 2003
Maybe Saddam is dead - maybe he isn't. There are enough worries and responsibilities in any case. Here's one: The moment Mofaz announces that Israel isn't under threat of chemical attack at least a million homes are going to tear town the plastic covering from their window and throw it out. Do you know what kind of ecological disaster this will be? We've got to get an alternative program going. FAST. I can suggest that we donate this to some famous sculptor who covers everything with plastic - but there may be even more practical uses for it. Any ideas out there? Actually I got this idea from a vague letter forwarded to me by Dita - there's a phone number 053304616- Gal. It's too early to call.
My friend Rebecca complained that I don't toot my own horn, to the point where i don't even announce poetry readings, etc. Okay, I read last night at the Studio on Cremieux St. And there's a great interview of Moshe Benarroch here Didn't I tell you? Of course it is very problematic to do this, because one of the advantages of a diary is its anonymity and so 'buy my book' announcements are detrimental to my feelings about writing honestly. So I'd really rather you find out about these things elsewhere.
This came to me - unattributed - through Yitzchak Laor. Too good to pass up. It is titled "Welcoming the Liberators at Basrah"
And for those of you who say this photograph is doctored, I say it is probably no more doctored than 70% of the photographs we're getting about the news.
And yes, it is true that 84% of statistics quoted are made up on the spot.
March 9, 2003
Israel's own troubles are worsening. Bibi with his egomaniacal inability to conceive of the needs of others is beginning to 'negotiate' with the workers' representative Amir Perez because of the terrible dangers of economic collapse. So the big strike scheduled for today was postponed for a day. Yet the individual tragedies continue. One example: When the electricity was turned off in the home of a single mother and her teenage son, he killed himself so as not to be a burden on her.
I don't even know where to begin with the missiles fired in Gaza. Of course missiles can't be totally accurate. But that's why you don't fire them. Six people killed - three were Hamas leaders intent on killing Israelis. Three were not.
All right, it is also pretty clear that every single day terrorist attacks on israel are foiled through the very hard work of the israeli army. that means possibly 10 israelis killed a day. still it doesn't justify the 3 innocents.
Iraq. John Williams sent me this:
The eight Saddam body doubles are gathered in one of the bunkers in downtown Baghdad. Tariq Aziz, the deputy prime minister, comes in and says, 'I have some good news and some bad news.' They ask for the good news first.
Aziz says, 'The good news is that Saddam is still alive, so you all still have jobs.'
'And the bad news?' they ask.
Aziz replies, 'He's lost an arm.'
We in Israel don't seem to be aware of the fact that we're next. As soon as Iraq is put in order, I am sure the US is going to pull up our socks. I for one am looking forward to it.
(later that day)
You would think we would be thrilled - I mean the Arabs think we must be thrilled because they have been shamed. At least the Palestinians I spoke to thought they had been shamed. I don't. And we're not thrilled either.
We're sooo embroiled in our financial disasters and the fact that everybody is being screwed by the government we're not excited yet by the apparent victory of the allied forces. We're not even thrilled about putting our gas masks away. I mean we're relieved, but we're jewish and don't allow ourselves to be thrilled. who knows what's waiting for us later...
And WHERE the hell are those chemicals?
(still later)
I was wrong about putting the gas masks away. We're still supposed to be carrying them around. I was wrong about the big crisis too - the national strike is probably called off. So much for accurate analysis.
April 10, 2003
Whaddayawant, i'm an english teacher. So i look at the footage of the people of Baghdad bringing down Saddam's statue and of course i think of "Ozymandias." Like it actually means something about the eternal fate of tyrants.
April 11, 2003
Exhaustion. i diagnose it as the sudden drop in tension. But a friend I hadn't seen in ages (turned out she was recovering from a hopeless cancer) claims she took no notice of all the apparent threats on Israel. The fact that the level of alert has not been lowered, she says, is just another government ploy to keep us scared and therefore more compliant with government 'security' decisions. She makes some sense, but she's also hopped up with enough medication to screw up the clearest of minds.
And we certainly have enough 'real' security problems that we don't have to make up anything else. I mean, for example, Passover will never be the same since the massacre last year at the Park Hotel. The concept that no place is safe and nothing is holy is with us always.Two young soldiers were buried last night and this morning after their training camp was the site of a terrorist shooting.
So the threat from Iraq seems less real. And yet somehow i will be very surprised if they don't find at least a nuclear reactor somewhere near tikrit...
ADVANCE WARNING
PRISONER OF PARADISE will have its broadcast premiere on PBS on April 22, 2003 at 9:00 p.m. ET. Directed by Malcolm Clarke and Stuart Sender, PRISONER OF PARADISE is the stunning true story of Kurt Gerron, a well-known and beloved German-Jewish actor, director and cabaret star, who was sent to a concentration camp and ordered by his captors to direct a pro-Nazi propaganda film. This film, which came to be known as The Fuhrer Gives a City to the Jews, was intended by the Nazis to persuade an increasingly suspicious world that Jews who had been “relocated” from across Europe were being well-treated in their new homes … the concentration camps.
If you have an opportunity to see it, i'd love to hear what you think. if you have the opportunity to tape it... i can't seem to find it in israel.
Actually that's wrong. Estee - who had been kind enough to evaluate the Kurt Gerron painting I've been talking endlessly about, called me last week to tell me that she had been contacted by a woman from a Home in Jerusalem who wanted some help selling something. "Im not just anyone, you know," she told Estee, "I was a friend of Kurt Gerron." I'm hoping we'll go to see this woman next week - she's in the film and has a copy.
Today's "Haaretz" carries an article from the Forward about how Jewish continue to be generous but they don't give much to Jewish causes. Sometimes these things are obvious but we don't notice them until someone points them out. I have noticed that contributions and contributors have dwindled in Israel from abroad. Does this make you feel guilty? Here's an ecologically sound Jewish cause. Keren Kayemet
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