I have visited Israel 2X and spent a month at a Kibbutz AMA

Post Reply New Topic

The reasons for those 2 visits were unrelated. The first visit was in the early 70s and the second was in the last 80s. The kibbutz stay was during the first visit.

In case anybody is interested in my impressions and what I experienced there. To clarify, I made the first visit as a non-Jew traveling with other non-Jews. The second visit was with my Jewish wife I had recently married.

So, I would be very interested to hear about your experiences.

I'll write something tomorrow (probably).

Whenever you're ready, I'll be interested to hear about it.

I apologize. The South Africa thread became rather busy. I probably won't say much before the weekend.

I was originally hoping to get specific questions. Failing that, I plan to give a brief overview of impressions. Unfortunately Israel has a lot of blemishes. I would like to describe that without seeming hostile to Israel or Israelis. Like Americans, they are what they are.

I came across a long video by an Israeli. It might be of interest to some.

I can give a detailed account of what the kibbutz was like. Israel is challenging to describe. A couple of things.

The people there seemed rather stressed. Especially on my first visit not long after the Yom Kippur War. My kibbutz roommate (who was from Queensland BTW) on seeing a group of people having a spontaneous argument, gave the observation that "these people are always rowing".

The food in general was acceptable but unexciting. Largely due to dietary restrictions. It may have improved on my 2nd visit in the 80s. One way to emphasize this was on the return from the trip I took with my wife in the 80s, when the bus stopped at a rest stop on the NJ Turnpike, everyone on the bus went crazy over the Roy Rogers as they were tired of the kosher food and constant Mediterranean diet. One surprise for a first time visitor is the absence of what Americans think of as Jewish food. No bagels and lox. Instead lots of falafel.

Western tourists typically see "swarthy" Jews of Middle Eastern background and think those people are Arabs.

More later.

I will add a few more general comments but will try to avoid talking about the kibbutz with the intent of doing so later.

I must add that I have been exposed to a lot of media over the decades that presents Israel one way or the other. The same isn't really true of South Africa. So it's hard for me to separate out the impressions I had at the time from those I received later. In some cases, later input may have changed how I remember things I experienced first hand.

In general, I would say that Israel is very much a "what you see is what you get" kind of place. Israelis don't really seem to care what foreigners think of them. They don't make an effort to ingratiate themselves to foreigners. They do reach out to diaspora Jews to get their support and to inspire them to move there. I happen to think this is a mistake. Over the decades, Israel should have made more of an effort to advertise itself the the world in general and tell its story. Admittedly, that doesn't come naturally to them. They don't expect love from the outside world, but they do expect to be acknowledged as a nation alongside all other sovereign nations represented at the UN. They aren't going to entertain arguments to the contrary. You have to admit that if a typical Israeli can't cite Israel as their nationality, then what is their nationality? It's all they have and they will fight for it.

You can imagine that, for example, service in a café, store, or restaurant can be surly. If you don't like it, tough toenails. If the business isn't literally trying to cheat you, then don't complain. Israelis are rude. They are rude to foreigners and they are rude to each other. Always have been. As I see it, it's because they have no history of etiquette. Particularly East European Jews, they lived in shtetls and were subject to pogroms like what Hamas did on 7 Oct. They had absolutely no concept of nobles vs. peasants (etiquette typically derives from the nobility, countries with entrenched social hierarchies like England and Japan tend to have the most formalized etiquette). There is no polite way to address people. In theory, there are words for "Mr." and "Ms." but you don't hear them. There are no "formal" or "informal" versions of words (at least not in everyday speech). The history of the state of Israel began with a people united in fighting existential threats. There was literally no time to think about proper manners.

Furthermore, although Israel, like everywhere else, has its beauty spots, by and large it's not an attractive country. There are no quaint villages. Traveling along a major highway, structures are built where most convenient. Civilian architecture seems more suited to the military (this from 37 years ago so there may have been some improvement since).

Like I said in a previous post, the food in general was uninspiring. Also, it is typical of the "Mediterranean Diet" which is admired mostly for being healthy. But the Israeli version of this diet tends to be blander than the Palestinian equivalent.

Perhaps one of the most surprising things to me was how little of the Jewish culture with which I was familiar from the US was found in Israel. Israel is basically Middle Eastern and you will see very little there to remind you of Skokie or Shaker Heights. Also, although you don't see obvious extreme poverty among Jews there, you also see very little evidence of real affluence. No expensive neighborhoods with mansions or luxury apartment blocks (at least that I saw). Or luxury vehicles. The Mercedes were all taxis. If egalitarianism is your thing, you might very well fall in love with the place.

Another big surprise is the lack of synagogues. There is apparently a Great Synagogue in Tel Aviv (which I didn't see) but otherwise very few structures or public art relating to religion. Like nothing (compare to anywhere in Europe)! For a society supposedly founded on religion, it gives an outward appearance of extreme secularism. Where religion becomes apparent is in the rules by which they live, in particular the restrictions on food served in most eating establishments and observance of the Sabbath. Jewish areas totally shut down on Saturday. Everything apart from some essential services and hotels (and if I recall, at least some cinemas) is closed. In the hotels, they serve you food that was cooked before sundown on Friday and kept warm. Vending machines are unplugged, or I believe I can even recall seeing coin slots covered over with a metal piece that's screwed on. Although most Israelis profess to be secular, they apparently don't complain too much about these things because it's so reflective of their heritage.

At last when I was there at first, they had a 6-day work week and like I said there wasn't a whole lot to do on the Sabbath. So I could say that it really wasn't a country geared towards fun. Going pubbing on a Friday or Saturday night simply wasn't a thing (I believe this changed later with the influx of Russians). Apparently young Israelis, at least at that time, didn't get together with friends for serious drinking like in Europe. Alcohol, although available, wasn't really seen as part of their culture.

Something I saw in Jerusalem that you probably won't see now, was that on Saturday you saw quite a few Jews eating in restaurants in East Jerusalem.

The more I write, the more that comes to mind. I'll reprise a couple of things from an earlier post.

Western tourists usually mistake "swarthy" Jews of Middle Eastern and N. African origin for Arabs. This can lead to ugly situations. It does help put the lie to the claim that Israel is "European".

The population seemed stressed at the time I was there. Like my Queenslander roommate from the Kibbutz once said, "these people are always rowing".

On my first trip, there was basically nothing in the area that had been no-man's-land in Jerusalem before 1967. On the second trip, quite a bit had been filled in. Parts of the Old City had been "renovated" in ways that would probably make you uncomfortable if you're neither Israeli nor an über-Zionist Jew. Best way I can describe it. No idea what it's like now.

One thing I should point out, is that people who grew up speaking Hebrew in Israel have a distinct accent which isn't exactly like anything else. So when you hear an Israeli speak English, they sound Israeli, which to me reinforces the idea that they are a distinct nation and not just some European imperialist colony.

One more anecdote. On my first visit to Israel, I spoke French fluently (not quite native speaker but definitely fluent). At the time there were a lot of immigrants from Morocco and amongst themselves they spoke French. I went into a bar at a hotel in Eilat, and there were a group of probably 3 people working behind the bar. When I first came in, I ordered a beer, probably in Hebrew, but as I sat there drinking it, I noticed those people were conversing in French. I don't believe they said anything particularly interesting, but after some time I asked one of them a question in French. After answering me, they switched IMMEDIATELY to conversing in Hebrew. It was obvious that the thought that an outsider might be able to eavesdrop on their conversation (an Israeli stranger would of course still be able to do so) caused an immediate adverse shared response. Very much an "us against the world" mentality.