If so many of the thousands of evacuees from the north and the south of the country keep talking about wanting to go home, one can only imagine to what extent this hope is embedded in the hearts and minds of the hostages.
The evacuees, though appreciative of what so many hotels are doing to provide activities and superbly cooked meals for them, want to walk in more familiar streets and parks and to eat the foods to which they are accustomed from home – but at least they are living in a civilized, albeit not always comfortable environment, in which their biggest complaint is the lack of privacy, due to overcrowding of rooms allocated to large families in which there are not just two, but three generations.
But the hostages don’t have the amenities of the evacuees. What they have in common, although it’s doubtful whether the hostages are in a position to hear it, is the song that at different times in the history of Israel and the Jewish people became a hymn: “Habayta” – Home.
In an April 7 radio interview on KAN Reshet Bet, Dr. Hezi Amiur, the curator of the Israel Collection of the National Library, spoke of the background to the song written by Aharon Ashman, which became part of the regular repertoire of Shoshana Damari, one of Israel’s all-time great female singers.
The first time she sang it publicly was in November 1947, just a few days before the UN resolution on the partition of Palestine. She had gone to Cyprus to sing to the Holocaust survivors incarcerated there by the British Mandate authorities, who had turned them back when they tried to enter the Holy Land. On her return, Damari said that not all the Jews there understood Hebrew, but they did know the meaning of “Habayta,” and it resonated with them when she sang it.
US AMBASSADOR Jack Lew (left) with Ben Yanover, general manager of the Dan Carmel Hotel. (credit: Courtesy Dan Carmel)
In the 1970s, it was sung not only by Damari but by other Israeli and Jewish singers in the campaign for the freedom of Soviet Jewry. And now, coincidentally, although Damari is no longer alive, it is being sung again on behalf of the hostages in the 100th anniversary year of Damari’s birth. She was born in Yemen on the eve of Passover, 1924.
Hopefully there is some symbolism in all that. Passover is the anniversary of the Exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt. Damari’s family left Yemen soon after her birth, and as Passover is the festival of freedom, perhaps the hostages may come home in time to celebrate their own freedom, on the anniversary of Damari’s birth and the exodus that enabled the Children of Israel to become a nation.
A new arrangement of “Habayta” has been recorded by the Shabat family of singers and songwriters – Shlomi, his sister Lea, and Shlomi’s children, Manor and Avihu.
“Habayta” takes on added meaning for some of the evacuees who have been accommodated in hotels, which in the interim have received reservations for the Passover period and have told their temporary residents that they must leave immediately.
Film on the attack in Kiryat Shmona
■ THOSE WHO have been placed in this position, have been evacuated at least twice in the past six months – first from their homes and then from the hotel. But there are quite a number who for various reasons have been evacuated from one hotel after another, and others who have left of their own accord because the hotel didn’t serve meals, or didn’t provide clean towels and bed linen, or because there were cockroaches in the room, or because they had no privacy, as in some places three generations of a family were placed in one room.
In most cases, people are simply homesick. They want to get back to a familiar environment, to cook and eat familiar food, and to reclaim their regular lifestyle.
This is heard a lot from displaced residents of Kiryat Shmona, some of whom gathered at the President’s Residence on Monday to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the heinous terrorist attack on an apartment complex in Kiryat Shmona half a century ago in which 18 people were murdered. The experience was so traumatic that the grieving families of the dead moved away from Kiryat Shmona because to remain was too painful.
The horrendous incident has more or less faded from public memory, as Israel has experienced so many other tragedies, and so many more deaths from terrorist attacks over the years. The memory was revived at the most recent Jerusalem Film Festival, where the documentary film The House in Kiryat Shmona was screened.
It was screened again on Monday at the President’s Residence, where Kiryat Shmona Mayor Avichai Stern was among the viewers. President Isaac Herzog told him that all the peripheral communities in the North are deserving of the same attention as was given to those of the South, and that more resources must be made available immediately.
Stern has been making this point on electronic media outlets on an almost daily basis, and the Kiryat Shmona evacuees say that they must be allowed to return to their homes in time for the new school year in order to prevent further disruption to the studies of their children.
Evacuees from Kibbutz Menara and from Metulla are also chafing at the bit and want to go home regardless of the danger. They’ve been subjected to rocket fire for years, they say. They’re used to it.
Expertise on antisemitism
■ KNOWING ABOUT antisemitism and knowing what it is does not constitute an academic, in-depth study of the subject on how various kinds of antisemitism feed off traditional Christian antisemitism that dates back for centuries.
David Hirsh, CEO of the London Center for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism, is one of Britain’s leading experts on antisemitism and how different kinds of antisemitism relate to each other.
He was in Israel this week to attend a conference, and also found time to visit the Begin Heritage Center, where he answered questions put to him by an audience largely consisting of British expats in the course of a conversation with Paul Gross, a senior fellow at the Begin Heritage Center, who is himself a British expat, and is in charge of all the English-language programs at the Begin Center.
Ever-increasing antisemitism has prompted growing concern among British Jews and the introduction of many more events in which the subject is being discussed by leading Jewish community figures, though not all of them want to be professionally identified as Jews. They want to be like everyone else and identified simply on the basis of their professional calling.
Some have discovered with shock that in places where they thought they belonged, they didn’t belong, because they refused to denounce Israel, said Hirsh.
This antisemitic attitude is yet another indication that antisemitism and anti-Zionism or anti-Israelism are one and the same thing.
Israelis living in the UK – and there are quite a lot of them, said Hirsh – have not experienced this kind of antisemitism before. Now they know what it’s like for Diaspora Jews, he commented.
Hirsh, and his colleagues at the London Center are constantly challenging people who make antisemitic remarks, not realizing their impact, because they do not identify as antisemites and don’t see themselves as such. One has to be careful with words, Hirsh cautioned.
Hirsh recently edited an anthology titled The Rebirth of Antisemitism in the 21st Century which was written by Jewish and non-Jewish intellectuals who led the opposition to the campaign for an academic boycott against Israel. The book is about the rise of anti-Zionism and antisemitism in the first two decades of the 21st century, with a focus on the UK.
“We won the battle on the boycott, but we’ve lost the battle on antisemitism,” said Hirsh. The book shows how the level of hostility toward Israel exceeded that which is leveled against other states. It also illustrates how the quality of that hostility tended to resonate with antisemitic tropes, images, and emotions. Anti-Zionism characterized Israel as symbolic of everything evil that good people oppose, and highlighted Palestinians as the symbol of the oppressed.
The book also traces how antisemitism broke into mainstream politics and how it contaminated the Labor Party.
For all that, Hirsh said that he and many other Jews as well as non-Jews are likely to vote Labor in the upcoming elections because so many people in Britain are fed up with the Tory government.
Pre-Eurovision event
■ JUST AHEAD of the Eurovision Song Contest, Swedish Ambassador Erik Ullenhag will host a pre-Eurovision event with food, drink, live music, and more.
Dan Carmel Hotel in Haifa
■ FOREIGN AMBASSADORS get to see more of the country than most Israelis, and some of the places they go to are not accessible to Israelis.
It would be fairly safe to say that while all ambassadors travel the length and breadth of the country, few if any would get to all the places where the welcome mat is put out for US Ambassador Jack Lew, who has very little time in which to relax, though he does sometimes manage to combine business with pleasure, such as his recent visit to the Dan Carmel Hotel in Haifa, where he was warmly greeted by Ben Yanover, the Dan Hotel chain’s general manager for the North and of the Dan Carmel in particular.
The pleasure aspect came when Yanover took Lew out into the garden, from where there is a breathtaking panoramic view of the surroundings. On a clear day, anyone photographed against the scenic background gives the impression of being in a live picture postcard.
On the same day that Yanover happily showed Lew the view, he also greeted recently elected Mayor Yona Yahav, who, after taking a one-term hiatus, returned to his mayoral role. He arrived at the hotel along with Aliyah and Integration Minister Ofir Sofer, with whom he had a lot to discuss. The two agreed that the hotel lobby and dining room were much more conducive to their conversation than the mayor’s office.
On April 7, Lew was in an altogether different environment, meeting families of the hostages in Hostage Square in Tel Aviv and declaring that America has a special responsibility to American hostages, but that all hostages have to come home now.
On the following day, Lew accompanied Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on a tour of Southern Command and an inspection of the Humanitarian Coordination and Deconfliction Cell. The two were briefed by senior IDF and Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories officials on measures being taken to enhance the effectiveness and distribution of humanitarian aid.
Jews and chess
■ DESPITE THEIR exceedingly minor ratio in global populations over the centuries, Jews have played an extraordinarily prominent role in the development of chess and as chess champions. As far as is known Jews – especially rabbis – were involved in formulating rules for chess and in playing the game as early as the 11th and 12th centuries.
THEN-WORLD CHESS champion Garry Kasparov (right) playing against Natan Sharansky during a simultaneous match against 25 competitors in Jerusalem, in 1996. (credit: Avi Ohayon/GPO)
There is a legend about a German Rabbi Shimon Ben Yitzhak who lived in the 12th or 13th century, who trained his young son Elkanan to also be a rabbi. Elkanan was a very bright boy, who loved his studies. He also had an engaging personality, and all the servants in the rabbi’s household loved him. So did the devout Catholic woman who came only on Sabbaths to light the fire because all the other servants were Jewish.
The Sabbath servant spoke of Elkanan to her priest, who thought it a pity that such a talented boy should be Jewish and not Christian, and pondered aloud to what heights the boy could rise in the Church.
The two plotted how to bring Elkanan into the Church. Accordingly, on the following Friday night, when Shimon Ben Yitzhak’s whole household was asleep, the Sabbath servant crept into the boy’s room, wrapped him in blankets, and, carrying him in her arms, left the house. The priest was waiting outside, took the boy from her, and placed him in a carriage.
When Elkanan awoke and saw the priest sitting opposite him, he was afraid. “Where am I?” he asked.
“Lie still Andreas,” replied the priest.
“But I’m not Andreas, I’m Elkanan the son of Shimon,” the boy protested.
The priest spun him a tall tale about having had a fall in which he injured his head to the extent that his memory had become affected.
Elkanan kept plying the priest with questions which went unanswered, and eventually he went back to sleep.
When he awoke again, he was in a bed in a small room. He could hear a bell and a chorus of singing voices. The priest was in the room and told him to follow him.
The boy was taken into a chapel, made to kneel, and was baptized.
He did not understand what was going on, and another priest, a cruel one, told him that he would be made to obey.
Just as he had devoted himself to his lessons in his father’s house, Elkanan, who had been brainwashed and was not always sure of his identity, applied himself to his studies and proved to be a brilliant pupil. He was also an outstanding chess player.
When asked where he learned to play, he said that his father, Shimon Ben Yitzhak, had taught him.
Occasionally, he thought of escaping but was never left alone, so there was no way that he could return to his home.
Eventually, he became a priest and a tutor and was even summoned to Rome, where he became a cardinal.
He made great progress in the Church and, following the death of the pope, Elkanan, or Andreas as he was known, was elected pope. He sought to do only good for the vast number of people who came to him for a blessing, but some of his counselors said that the Church was short of money and must find a way to take it from the Jews.
The pope refused to sign any edicts that would constitute a threat to Jews. Such threats came with demands for huge sums of money to guarantee their safety.
One day, the pope received a letter from the archbishop of his home town, who wanted to drive out all the Jews. He ordered the archbishop to come to Rome and to bring with him leading Jews to state their case.
The archbishop brought with him three Jews, one of whom was Shimon Ben Yitzhak, whom the pope asked what his prayer was. After that the pope asked the elderly man to tell him something of himself and the other two Jews.
Then the pope asked him about his family, and Shimon, in a broken voice, told him that his only son had long ago been kidnapped.
After a while the pope said that he had heard that Shimon was a skilled chess player, and told him that he also was considered to be good at the game. He invited Shimon to play, and told him that if he won, his prayer for his people would receive a favorable answer.
Shimon agreed, not knowing that he would be playing against his son.
The game aroused considerable interest, as the two players seemed to be evenly matched. And then the pope made a brilliant move which appeared to spell defeat for his opponent.
No one was more surprised than Shimon, who rose from his chair and stared at the pope. “Where did you learn that move?” he asked, his voice trembling. “I taught it to only one person.”
“Why?” asked the pope.
Shimon said he would tell him only in private.
After the pope asked everyone to leave, Shimon said: “Unless you’re the devil himself, you can only be my son.”
The two embraced each other, and the pope, after calling the others back into the room, said that they had decided to call the game a draw, and that it was his will that the Jews for whom Shimon had prayed could live in peace.
Soon after, rumors spread that the pope had committed suicide, and a new pope was elected. But in Shimon’s hometown a mysterious stranger appeared and was warmly welcomed by Shimon into his household.
In modern times, the story has been told over and over again about Natan Sharansky playing chess against himself in his head in order to remain sane.
After he could play chess for real, Sharansky in 1996 beat world chess champion Garry Kasparov in a simultaneous exhibition game in Israel. Kasparov is one of several Jewish chess champions. Among others are Bobby Fischer, Mikhail Tal, Mikhail Botvinnik, Emanuel Lasker, and Boris Gelfand.
Born in Belarus, Gelfand has been living in Israel since 1998 and is Israel’s top-ranking chess player. He is among the 30 top chess players in the world, and in 2009 won the Chess World Cup.
South African Jewish 13-year-old chess player
■ THE LONG preamble about chess was by way of introducing Caleb Levitan, a 13-year-old eighth grader at King David High School in Johannesburg. Levitan is the youngest-ever member of the top-ranking chess team representing South Africa at the Chess Olympiad global tournament, to be held in Budapest in September, this year.
At the South African Closed Chess Championships held from March 25 to April 2, Levitan came in second, thereby ensuring a place on the team. He was the youngest player ever invited to the competition.
His father, Shaun Levitan, said that “for Caleb, this was really his first experience of playing in such a senior competition and to finish second says a huge amount not only about his talent but his ability to play under pressure.”
The proud father also noted that “King David has been exceptionally supportive,” and allowed Caleb to be absent when competing. He added that Caleb leads a dual lifestyle of being good enough to compete with the South African men’s team in chess, but still has to go back and catch up with science and is-i-Zulu.” (one of the three official languages of South Africa which is the Bantu language of the Zulus).
Conference hosted by Ynet and Yediot Aharonot
■ MOST OF Israel’s major newspapers are hosting conferences. They’ve been doing it for some years now, but the frequency increased during the COVID pandemic and again in the immediate aftermath of the murderous Hamas assault on southern communities.
Yediot Aharonot and Ynet’s annual conference this year will be devoted to “the People and the State,” and is sub-headed “Between Pain and Hope.” The focus will be on the heroes and heroines both on the front lines and in the vanguard.
The date is May 8, which is a significant date in world history, as it is the day on which Germany unconditionally surrendered to the Allied forces in 1945. The date is known as Victory in Europe Day, though in Russia it is commemorated on May 9 because the signing of the surrender took place late in the evening in Berlin, by which time it was after midnight in Moscow.
This year, Victory in Europe Day comes three days after Holocaust Remembrance Day, which will be commemorated on the evening of May 5 and during the day on May 6.
In 2018, when relations between Israel and Russia were much friendlier than they are now, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended the Victory Day parade in Moscow at the invitation of President Vladimir Putin.
Eylon Levy
■ INCIDENTALLY, IN a five-page feature article last Friday, Yediot Aharonot referred to dismissed government spokesman Eylon Levy as a public diplomacy rock star. Though impetuous from time to time, Levy was very circumspect when asked about Netanyahu, but extremely forthcoming in his enthusiastic remarks about his hard-working former boss President Herzog.
Though pressed again and again throughout the interview as to why he had been dismissed, he kept repeating that he honestly did not know. He doubted whether it was really over the politically incorrect and undiplomatic tweet that he sent to British Foreign Secretary David Cameron, and he had no knowledge beyond rumor whether Sara Netanyahu was behind his ousting because he had participated in demonstrations against judicial reform. According to Levy, he has never met the lady or her husband.
Although he wasn’t looking for fame when taken on as government spokesman, he confessed that one of the highlights in his short-lived career was being spoofed on Eretz Nehederet, Israel’s leading satirical television show.
On the downside is his loss of privacy. He has been inundated with marriage proposals, and not just by young women who find him attractive, but by mothers who want to marry off their daughters. Whether it’s his plummy British accent, his gift for repartee, or his expressive eyebrows is anyone’s guess. It may be a combination of all three. But so far the 33-year-old has eluded the wedding canopy, and intends to continue with his efforts to bolster Israel’s image in the world, with or without government backing.
Dismissing him was yet another of the government’s irresponsible mistakes.
