stop me before I rant again
Jon Ford
austin-ghetto-list@pairlist.net
Mon Sep 6 15:24:11 2004
<html><div style='background-color:'><DIV class=RTE>
<P>Mike-- All this controversy has made me interested in returning to Israel again. I'd also like to see some of our "Israell bashers" on the list take a little trip that way to see what it's really like. We had a long talk on our recent flighr back from Frankfurt with a Jewish-American woman who goes to Israel with her kids a couple of times a year to see her husbands family, who migrated there from Brazil 20years ago. She didn't feel the place was "on the ropes," either.</P>
<P>Jon</P>
<P> </P></DIV>
<DIV></DIV>>From: "Michael Eisenstadt" <michaele@HotPOP.com>
<DIV></DIV>>Reply-To: austin-ghetto-list@pairlist.net
<DIV></DIV>>To: <mesmo@gilanet.com>, <austin-ghetto-list@pairlist.net>
<DIV></DIV>>Subject: Re: stop me before I rant again
<DIV></DIV>>Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 13:42:29 -0600
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Gerry,
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>I dont know how much you want to know about
<DIV></DIV>>Israel considering your heritage ;-) but I thought
<DIV></DIV>>I'd bring to your attention a book I just finished
<DIV></DIV>>reading, Real Jews by Noah Efron, an Israeli
<DIV></DIV>>professor. (you might ask for it through Interlibrary
<DIV></DIV>>Loan at your local public library).
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>It is about the Haredim, the super orthodox,
<DIV></DIV>>not to be confused with religious West Bank
<DIV></DIV>>settlers, these are the old timey jews in black
<DIV></DIV>>studying the bible being their main occupation.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>It is a more or less sympathetic look at them,
<DIV></DIV>>written primarily to inform secular Israelis who
<DIV></DIV>>resent the Haredim as corrupt free-loaders.
<DIV></DIV>>According to Efron, the Haredim are about
<DIV></DIV>>10% of the population and as far as one can
<DIV></DIV>>tell, this percentage is not changing very much
<DIV></DIV>>despite the large families they have. Apparently
<DIV></DIV>>a lot of their children abandon the faith and
<DIV></DIV>>become secular. The reason they have such
<DIV></DIV>>political clout is, in part, because they practice
<DIV></DIV>>massive fraud in elections with faked IDs,
<DIV></DIV>>multiple voting, and voting the cemeteries.
<DIV></DIV>>At recent elections, secular poll-watchers were
<DIV></DIV>>in place at Haredim precincts but it turned out
<DIV></DIV>>to be very hard to closely surveille the IDs of
<DIV></DIV>>the voters as regards their real identity.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>But it is not as you say. Israel, surprisingly, at
<DIV></DIV>>this moment is having an economic boom with
<DIV></DIV>>a strong growth rate.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>As best I can tell from reading Ha'aretz and
<DIV></DIV>>the Jerusalem Post, the Israel I defend is NOT
<DIV></DIV>>on the ropes. If anything their internal strife that
<DIV></DIV>>you speak of seems far less than that here in
<DIV></DIV>>the US. Why do I get the sense that it would
<DIV></DIV>>delight you if they WERE in internal strife?
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Could it just be that you got an attitude towards
<DIV></DIV>>these folks? I hope not.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Nice though that you remember the Israel of
<DIV></DIV>>the 50s which was a far less corrupt society
<DIV></DIV>>than it is now (the way it changed was explained
<DIV></DIV>>to me by an Israeli math teacher/rabbi on a
<DIV></DIV>>Pan Am flight from NYC to Houston in 1979).
<DIV></DIV>>It's a complicated country.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Mike
<DIV></DIV>>
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