Earlier this month, activist Rachel Marcuse spent 10 days in Israel as part of the Taglit-Birthright program -- a fully sponsored trip for young North American Jews to learn more about the country. She went to bear witness and ask questions about the Israeli state's treatment of Palestinians, and to learn about other complex issues in Israel today. After the program, she spent another 10 days elsewhere in Israel and the West Bank of Palestine talking to Israeli Jews, Palestinian citizens of Israel, international activists, and Palestinians in the occupied territories. This is the second of a seven-part series on what she found. You can read the first part here. This series first appeared in rabble.ca and this story can be found here.
Day 3
We wake up to a breakfast of amazing tomatoes, cheese, yogurt, bread and eggs on Kibbutz Efik in the Golan Heights area of Israel/Syria. Some of my fellow participants complain about the Israeli custom of having "salad" for breakfast, but the tomatoes are much tastier than Canadian ones and I'm thrilled, save for my exhaustion.
Upon arrival at the Tel Aviv airport the previous day, with very little on-board sleep, we were driven to numerous stops in Central Israel including Caesarea and its Ralli Museum (which has some unexpectedly great Latin American art, though we were too tired to really appreciate it). We didn't arrive at the kibbutz until 8:30 p.m. -- more than 48 hours after I left Vancouver. This becomes an underlying theme of the trip: exhaustion to the point of near dysfunction.
After a tour of the fully-automated Robotic Dairy Farm (for real!), our Ukraine-born tour guide, who made aliyah 15 years past, tells us the story of Eli Cohen, the Israeli spy hung in Syria, while we sit on a mountain peak overlooking Syria and Lebanon. (Several other Birthright tour groups near us are probably being told similar tales.)
"The nice green is Israel," our guide tells us, "and the dry yellow area is Syria" -- failing to mention that Israel monopolizes water supplies in the region. We are told that "archaeological history shows the presence of Jews in the Golan heights," an assertion which is loosely linked to her explanation of the occupation of the Golan after Israel's land grab in the 1967 Six-Day War.
We leave the Golan to go "rafting," which is really more like floating down a stream. Slowly. A couple of local boys grab onto our boat and splash around, flirting with us. My boatmates are less than impressed and scream to get "the Israelis" off the boat.
We arrive back at Kibbutz Efik for Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest. As this is the most secular of the Birthright trips, it is to be "our Shabbat," and there is very little pressure to do anything that could be construed as religious. Only two of the some 20 men of our group wear yarmulkes, the head covering signifying humility and religiosity.
After dinner, we all sit outside in the lovely courtyard of the kibbutz hotel (the accommodations for our trip are all shockingly comfortable...and expensive), and are asked to share comments about our connection to Judaism -- "or whatever," our leader quickly adds. Many of the participants come from inter-faith families and consider themselves "culturally" or "spiritually" Jewish as opposed to religious. I decide to "out" my politics. But gently.
I describe myself as not religious, perhaps spiritual, but note that the term seems to be a catch-all these days. I describe my parents meeting in Israel in the 70s, when working for dance companies in Tel Aviv, the history of my family in the Holocaust, and mention that the most religious person in my family was originally Catholic and converted! I say that one thing I like about Judaism is the focus on asking questions.
I tell the group that I make no secret of my problems with the politics of the State of Israel, but that I'm approaching the trip with a desire to question how oppression operates within Israel and Palestine and want to invite others to do the same. (This may be the first time anyone has said the "P" word on the trip. Most references are to "the situation" or "the conflict.") My contribution shifts the conversation slightly, but it then moves on to talk of Jewish stereotypes and the importance of dialogue.
After the discussion, relaxing at the kibbutz bar, a couple of other progressives "out" themselves to me, thanking me for saying what I said. Eventually, we become a four to eight person propaganda-debrief group, huddling together after some of the more particularly problematic "pluralist" sessions. While I don't think any of the participants would describe themselves as "activists," we do become a critical mass of folks able to provide some support to each other, and, to a lesser extent, to the group as a whole. This night becomes the first of many heavy drinking/bonding evenings with a group of 40 surprisingly interesting people. During the trip, I come to realize that nearly all of my prejudices, assumptions and snap judgements about individuals on the trip have dissolved. I don't go to bed until 4 a.m.
Day 4
We wake up Saturday morning excited to have our first and almost-only downtime. After a tour of the "new-style" kibbutz, we get some pool time and hike to some natural springs overlooking the Sea of Galilee, lying below in biblical splendour.
While exploring the kibbutz, we are told that 80 per cent of kibbutzim are the "new style" where people earn different wages and pay for services like meals. Essentially, most of the kibbutzim have been "privatized." Some lament the passing of the "old style" kibbutz where everyone earns the same, eats together in the dining hall, and all decisions are made democratically by the group. (I remember from conversations with my Father that the Hebrew word "kibbutz" actually means "group.")
Back from our hike, I teach a short yoga class on the grass to a larger-than expected contingent of the group -- it turns out I'm not the only one stiff from our long time on the plane and bus.
We arrive late to our next group session and get a pretty serious scolding -- a little strange to receive at age 26. Then begins some of the actual propaganda -- it had all been so gentle up to this point. Our tour guide is clearly the expert; we are the students. There is little space for dialogue as she starts to talk about the "conflict," telling us that she is "not a politician," thereby arbitrarily separating history from politics. There are times when our expert expands on her subjectivity as an Israeli...and then switches to "the facts." I try to challenge her on the issue of "disengagement" with Gaza, but I don't want to get into an extended back and forth with her in front of the group. This session is the preamble to our forthcoming "co-existence seminar" so we're all "on the same page." We are encouraged to read extreme viewpoints from both sides. By the end of the session, I am shaking.
This session is the first of many in which I struggle to open up space and -- despite my continuing exhaustion -- to be critical and to ask questions, all while not being "that girl." It becomes even more complicated when the soldiers join us on the following day.
Rachel Marcuse is a Vancouver-based activist, facilitator and apparatchick. The executive director of the Coalition of Progressive Electors (COPE), a municipal political party, she also freelances, focussing on facilitation skills, youth-engagement and strategic planning. Her views do not necessarily represent the positions of any organization whatsoever.
The poster writes inter alia, about ‘the Israeli custom of having “salad” for breakfast’.
Please be advised that the breakfast menu cited by the poster is a 100% Palestinian custom. Not only did the Zionists usurp the land, houses, trees, and water, but also the menus. That’s the “complex” issue said poster went to study.
Sounds like a variant of ‘shakshooka’.
An Israeli I studied with gave me a taste. I told her it was basically an Arabic dish.
They even stole Arabic food..
It’s not fair to say that they ‘stole’ Arabic food, because ~50% of Israeli Jews are Mizrahi, they are themselves Arab. I have met many Israeli Jews whose parents speak Arabic at home, and they eat Arabic food at home most of the time. That’s why one-state is even more possible.
However, when they label Middle Eastern cuisine as “Israeli”, such as “Israeli couscous”, that is a gross display of nationalist co-option. However, Lebanese sometimes do it too, but not to the same extent.
Thanks Monad for the information. I forgot about the Mizrahi Jews.
Thanks Monad, I never thought about it that way either. Puts a whole new slant on things! Any possibility of co-operation between those two groups (Palastinians and Israeli Arabb Jews) upset the whole Askenazi demographic orange and cherry-tomato cart, donnit?
I’m still trying to imagine what pick up line “Dudu” the rooftop Lothario used on that girl?
How does Shakshouka happen to be such a common breakfast in Israel? It’s Tunisian in origin, is it not?
As a rule, Jews who hail from Arab countries tend to be suspicious and even hostile to their former Arab neighbors. In the 1940′s Baghdad was one-third Jewish, yet all (and I mean all) were kicked out and their property expropriated when Israel was founded. You can imagine how they feel about that.
“As a rule, Jews who hail from Arab countries tend to be suspicious and even hostile to their former Arab neighbors”
So you say. I don’t want to shock you, but I have heard that maybe Israelis or hasbaratchniks can be somewhat less then perfectly truthful about things like this. Now, I of course, being Jewish and having grown up around award-winning Zionists, reject such a notion out-of-hand, but amazingly, that’s what some people say.
You don’t shock me in the least. This is just a statement of fact, and you are welcome to do your own research (and educate us on your findings). You will find that Mizrahi Jews tend to be more right wing than average, and at least one of the causes is mistrust of Arabs. The liberal or left wing in Israel is predominantly Ashkenazi.
Moreover, the Mizrahi-Ashkenazi divide is becoming a red herring, due to high intermarriage.
aban – “yet all (and I mean all) were kicked out and their property expropriated when Israel was founded”
The Propaganda-Abteilung goon “means” all but some remained to this day… They don’t count as Jews, I imagine, because they didn’t follow the Alijach-Abteilung’s call to foul their nest and leave.
Also, well duh! Seems that, on top of their invasion, massacres and theft, the colleagues of that Ebba also have the crust to expect everybody else to stay calm and friendly.
The way I read it, she picked him up. But it doesn’t seem that he tried too hard to resist.
yeah, I’ve often wondered where all those treasures from the Iraq museum ended up, and how it came to be that Haim Saban has a houseful of archeological treasures in his California mansion.
If memory serves, at the time of Iraq War 2003 there were 2 (two) Jews remaining in Baghdad.
Paul Bremer and Tommy Frank.
the Iraqi woman’s name is Khwala
link to vfpdissident.blogspot.com
Ebba – Forget memory, it’s understanding that doesn’t serve you. You missed the essential, moron. Also, the “kal” in Baghdad worked well until the late nineties or even later and the neighborhood had a number of inhabitants.
So where the fuck is your “I mean all”?
But whay am I talking to a Propaganda-Abteilung machine, anyway?
“Moreover, the Mizrahi-Ashkenazi divide is becoming a red herring, due to high intermarriage.”
This should last a good…one or two generations…hehe
“How does Shakshouka happen to be such a common breakfast in Israel? It’s Tunisian in origin, is it not?”
Yes Shakshouka is Tunisian and more broadly North Africain..Don’t forget that most of North Africain Jews emigrated to either Israel or France.
“at the time of Iraq War 2003 there were 2 (two) Jews remaining in Baghdad.”
Did they get along?
actually, a series of zionist false-flag operations in Iraq in 1950 “motivated” Jews to leave Iraq for the sheltering arms of Israel. Iraqi Jews who were thus impelled to flee their homes for Israel were treated as second-class citizens in Israel, expected to perform the dirty work that Ashkenazi Jews found beneath their European dignity, Herzl’s fantasies about Jewish agriculturalists notwithstanding.
Antidote, no! They were not talking.
aban – just in case somebody doesn’t know this story (from wiki – History of Jews in Afghanistan)
*By the end of 2004, only two Jews were left in Afghanistan, Zablon Simintov and Isaac Levy (born ca. 1920). Levy relied on charity, while Simentov ran a store selling carpets and jewelry until 2001. They lived at separate ends of the dilapidated Kabul synagogue. Both claimed to be in charge of the synagogue, and the owner of its Torah, accusing the other of theft and imposture. They kept denouncing each other to the authorities, and both spent time in Taliban jails, and the Taliban also confiscated the Torah. Recently, one of Simentov’s acquaintances stated that if you had brought (him) a bottle of whiskey, he (Simentov) would be in “heaven.”[2]
The contentious relationship between Simentov and Levy was dramatized in a play inspired by news reports of the two that appeared in international news media following the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan overthrowing the Taliban regime. The play, entitled “The Last Two Jews of Kabul,” was written by playwright Josh Greenfeld and was staged in New York City in 2002.
In January 2005, Levy died of natural cause. Simentov is now the last remaining Jew in Afghanistan, and with a total Afghan population of 30 million, this amounts to a fraction of 33 ppb, the lowest worldwide. Simentov is trying to recover the confiscated Torah. Simentov, who does not speak Hebrew[2] claims that the man who stole his Torah is now in U.S. custody in Guantanamo Bay. Simentov has a wife and two daughters who live in Israel, and he said he was considering joining them. However, when asked during a recent interview whether he would go to Israel, Simentov retorted, “Go to Israel? What business do I have there? Why should I leave?”*
Interesting, along different lines: Jews in Iran
link to eastwest-review.com
That is priceless.
Two Jews, old men, are surrounded by fanatical Jew-hating Muslims who are, of course, just longing to burn down the synagogue around them, and whom do they hate most?
Each other!
And to whom do they turn for help in their feud?
The fanatical Jew-hating Muslims who are longing to burn down the synagogue around them!
(Maybe the Taliban confiscated the Torah to try to stop the men from wasting police time.)
And now look me in the eye and say that Jewishness is not threat to mental health.
ROTFL!
Yes, lets add this to the ever-long list of Israeli “war crimes.” Bring any Israeli caught eating salad for breakfast before the Hague!
Bring any Israeli caught eating salad for breakfast before the Hague!
The Israelis seem to enjoy picnicking to the background of Gazans being slaughtered, perhaps breakfast at Hague isn’t such a big deal?
My point is that complaining about such “atrocities” as eating vegetables makes it more difficult to take seriously genuine grievances regarding Israeli behaviour. Do you really think Israel should be boycotting until they stop eating salad?
boycotted,I meant
You’re point is one you manufactured out of whole cloth. No one suggested there was anything wrong with eating salad. Do you have a legitimate point to make, or are you simply trying to waste everyone’s tome with your assinine distractions?
No, but the comments here on breakfast foods led to thoughts about the Mizrahi Jews in Israel, which leads to thoughts about how things will shake out when things get all shook up.
Dano, wouldn’t it be great for Israel if the Mizrahi decided they could be a cultural intermediary between Israeli and Palestinians.
Cause I am so sure the only thing keeping Israel from solving it’s problems is a little bit of cultural hesitancy on the part of Ashkenazi Jews. I mean, after you Nakba people, you sort of wonder if they will treat you to breakfast. The Mizrahi could be instrumental in seeing everybody starts the day right. What do you think?
Do you really think Israel should be boycott[ed] until they stop eating salad?
Since it’s Israel’s goal to keep Gaza under siege until Gazans stop eating, I think turnabout is fair play. Don’t you?
“Yes, lets add this to the ever-long list of Israeli “war crimes.”
Book ‘em, dano!
dano, it is not a big crime, but it is yet another part of the Israeli pattern of claiming everything is their invention, and denying the existence of the Arabs.
They took over Arab farms, and claimed they made the desert bloom. They took over Arab orchards, and claimed they invented the Jaffa orange.
They claim to have invented the mobile phone and the cherry tomato.
(If the latter is true, that is sufficient reason to destroy the country. Nasty things, cherry tomatoes.)
So when they claim that Arab food is Israeli, as though they invented it, it just feeds into our general cynicism about Israel.
“Yes, lets add this to the ever-long list of Israeli “war crimes.” Bring any Israeli caught eating salad for breakfast before the Hague!”
The punishment will be to eat kosher food till you die…hehe (I have been told stories about how Moishe Dayan used to sneak out from the kosher prepared dinners to eat what he called the “good food.” Who could blame him…)
Olives, cheese, yogurt, bread, jam, eggs, and tea is a typical breakfast in Turkey.
Wow. The Turks also stole from the Palestinians? I didn’t realize the Turks, too, committed such atrocities.
Wow. The Turks also stole from the Palestinians? I didn’t realize the Turks, too, committed such atrocities.
You haven’t been staying up to date with the hasbara then, especially since the “hate boat.”
aban, “stealing” a cuisinr is hardly in the same league with stealing a country, but if it makes you feel better, you go ahead and think that.
Let’s not talk about typical Greek food. Any resemblance it bears to typical Turkish food is just the result of Turks stealing Greek ideas.
Definitely not the other way round.
Definitely.
Don’t even think it.
In Iran, add dates to the menu. Oh, the dates, they are wonderful. (Just don’t tell the lady you’re a Jewish date.)
But didn’t Israel invent dates?
No, Israel invented water. The Phoenicians (Lebanese) invented oxygen. I now a have the strange desire to build the world’s largest sandwich.
<a href = "link to johnmillerglass.com; with mustard
The Ukraine-born tour guide probably had to read the story of Eli Cohen several times and memorize it, then internalize it and make it his own as though it was part of his collective memory.
Eli Cohen belongs in the 1960s, a good THIRTY years before this guy from the Ukraine came to Israel.
Is the Ukrainian in charge of rooftop monitoring? You don’t want a real birth spoiling a summer of Birthright.
I have always though Birthright should be renamed birthmark…
phil, can you check the format for this page. i’m seeing the post in it’s entirety in tiny print on the left and not centered on the main page. the continuation of the text isn’t included except on the sidebar. does anyone else see this?
“does anyone else see this?”
Yup
just noticed.
There’s something wrong with the formatting for this article & comments.
Yes, it needs fixed.
excellent ..i’m really looking forward to all seven parts of this series.
fascinating rachel. thanks so much. it is easy enough to read on the accompanying links but i hope phil or adam notices and fixes this format.
The theft is specifically of the Palestinian, not the Arabic menu….Mizrahis mainly hail from Yemen, Morocco, Iraq where I can assure you the breakfasts are quite different from the one described herein.
lvig,
Never mind, I was prob talking about a completely diff dish than what Rachel’s referring to.
But kudos to her for ‘gently’ expressing her views. I’d be a bit intimidated in a situation like that.
This is what I was talking about:
link to en.wikipedia.org
Shakshouka (also shakshuka, shaqshuqa, chakchouka; Arabic: شكشوكة; Hebrew: שקשוקה) is Middle Eastern dish consisting of poached or fried eggs cooked in a sauce of tomatoes, peppers, onions, and spices (often including cumin, turmeric, and chillies), and usually served with white bread. It probably originated in Tunisia.[1]
Shakshouka dish is now a staple of Tunisian, Algerian, Somali, Moroccan, and Yemeni cuisines, and is also popular in Israel, where it was introduced largely by Tunisian Jews after the Jewish exodus from Arab lands.[2]
It is similar to the Turkish dish menemen, and the Latin American breakfast dish huevos rancheros.
“Middle Eastern dish consisting of poached or fried eggs cooked in a sauce of tomatoes, peppers, onions, and spices (often including cumin, turmeric, and chillies), and usually served with white bread.”
My tummy is growling. Gosh that sounds wonderful. Put in eggplant and okra, too! Sounds evenbetter than huevos rancheros, which I love!
if you want to read the tiny print, copy it to notepad
The menu sounds like standard fare in Iran. Tomatoes, feta, cucumbers, flatbread, herbs, watermelon, grapes, tea. Don’t recall if rice was present at breakfast. Western-style breakfast pastries were also served, but if you’re in Yazd, skip breakfast entirely and purchase pastries from small shops. Yazd pastries are like nothing I have ever tasted before, incredibly light and not oversweet.
More stealing from the Palestinians, this time in Iran. Won’t Palestinian suffering ever end?
get a life.
Iran didn’t steal anything from the Palestinians; Iranians and Arabs have shared cultural traditions for millenia. Iran’s Jews participate in Now Rooz celebrations and fully participate in Iranian culture which is Middle Eastern culture which is a broadly diverse culture that nobody even thinks about claiming as “theirs” or “superior”. Only zionists have such deeply seated inferiority complexes that they feel compelled to tell the world that they are the firstest and the bestest at everything. Iranians don’t have to be so triumphalist because they know, as one Iranian friend said it, “to a metaphysical certainty,” that Iranians are superior.
;D
My comment lampooned the ridiculous comments at the beginning of this thread about Israelis “stealing” “Palestinian” food.
Where was Najd? How about Jaffa? Refesh my memory.
“My comment lampooned…”
That word, aban, “lampooned? I don’t think it means what you think it does.
“”The nice green is Israel,” our guide tells us, “and the dry yellow area is Syria” — failing to mention that Israel monopolizes water supplies in the region. ”
Rachel needs to be reminded that it’s impossible to monopolize the water of someone who is upstream from you, and Syria is definitely upstream from Israel. Israel has no control over Syria’s water.
Israel has no control over Syria’s water.
Rachel didn’t say specifically that Israel controlled Syria’s water, merely that it monopolizes water supplies in the region (that would be the general area) and that is certainly in its occupation of parts of Lebanon and WB with water resources.
But don’t let any facts get in your way, just like any good Hasbara Zionist.
“But don’t let any facts get in your way, just like any good Hasbara Zionist”
And they don’t ever, ever, ever, just keep their mouths shut, no matter how badly it’s going to blow up in their face. Is that some kind of rule?
Maybe they have determined that this kind of chutzpah-cum-misinformation attracts the kind of person they want?
Do explain how “monopolizing the general area” is relevant to Syria’s being “dry and yellow”. Was Syria green before 1967? Or maybe Israel was yellow?
Are you going to seriously play the “Jews made the desert bloom!” card?
See my post on the subject and quit wasting everyone’s time. Do bother to use an online search engine next time.
“Was Syria green before 1967? Or maybe Israel was yellow?”
Let me guess..Maybe Syria lacks the American-Jewish funds that are making the Golan “desert” bloom..Or maybe they’re just lazy, too indolent, do not know any better, too primitive to understand the value of things, and rather smoke arguileh, drink Mate than cultivate and feed themselves and their families…. Or maybe they do not “love” the land as much as Israelis do, after all Israelis are experts of legendary reputation at loving, coveting, grabbing, expropriating, annexing land, the more and more and more the better…. Or maybe it could be many other things, they could be of a different type of humans..They did not have the unique, exclusive privilege of being selected and chosen by some very picky, discerning, difficult to satisfy, fussy entity..
BTW, if you have no intention of giving back what you’ve stolen from the Syrians, don’t even think you’ll have peace in the region..EVER!
But my guess again is that you already know this and calculated that you’d rather have the land than peace..Peace?!!Are you kidding? That’s for the wussies!!
He’s already posting pure lies claiming that “in fact” this and “in fact” that.
This one’s got the chutzpah down pat.
Do you know, aban, how many times I have read a comment like yours, and said to myself, “It’s wrong, I don’t know why, but he’s wrong, and in just a short time, someone better informed than me will come along and say why”?
Gosh, I wonder why hasbaranauts provoke that reaction? Do you know?
Sometimes they come along and clarify things during the time I’m questioning the comment! Amazing!
False. The Golan Heights itself is, I understand it, an upstream source of water. Which is a large part of the reason Israel conquered it and ethnically cleansed most of the original inhabitants.
The Golan is upstream from Israel, but not from Syria. Furthermore it is separated from the rest of Syria by the deep ravines of the Yarmuk and the Rokad.
The Syrians (and Jordanians) are in fact heavily exploiting the Yarmuk, a major tributary of the Jordan, and so at expense to downstream Israel and PA (not suggesting they don’t have a right to).
There’s nothing Israel can do from the Golan, or anywhere else, to influence Syria’s water supply, which is the main point.
aban July 29, 2010 at 2:10 am
The Golan is upstream from Israel, but not from Syria. Furthermore it is separated from the rest of Syria by the deep ravines of the Yarmuk and the Rokad.
The Syrians (and Jordanians) are in fact heavily exploiting the Yarmuk, a major tributary of the Jordan, and so at expense to downstream Israel and PA (not suggesting they don’t have a right to).
There’s nothing Israel can do from the Golan, or anywhere else, to influence Syria’s water supply, which is the main point.
Lies, lies and more lies cloaked with a veneer of rationality.
Nice try.
It’s rather instructive that you continue to ignore my posts, much in the same you your ilk ignore Israel’s crimes. Keep that head in the sand, bub.
Is your recital of a few names supposed to convince the gullible and gain you credibility?
It’s a known fact that Israel built several dams along the various water sources that cascade from Mt. Hermon (up north) down south toward the Banyas (Hot Water Springs Israel occupied from Syria) where the borders of the three states (Syria, Jordan, Israel) meet.
Again, the fact that you can recite a few names, doesn’t mean that you know what you’re talking about.
Next time, provide a source to your “Up is actually Down” kind of claims.
Incidentally, Israel has done the same with water sources along the Lebanese border as it built dams to divert water.
Lies, lies and more lies cloaked with a veneer of rationality.
Nice try.
It’s rather instructive that you continue to ignore my posts, much in the same you your ilk ignore Israel’s crimes. Keep that head in the sand, bub.
Is your recital of a few names supposed to convince the gullible and gain you credibility?
It’s a known fact that Israel built several dams along the various water sources that cascade from Mt. Hermon (up north) down south toward the Banyas (Hot Water Springs Israel occupied from Syria) where the borders of the three states (Syria, Jordan, Israel) meet.
Again, the fact that you can recite a few names, doesn’t mean that you know what you’re talking about.
Next time, provide a source to your “Up is actually Down” kind of claims.
Incidentally, Israel has done the same with water sources along the Lebanese border as it built dams to divert water.
That facade of rationality is wearing thin, isn’t it?
The Peace Treaty between Israel and Jordan stipulated that both countries would cooperate on building a dam to share the waters of the Yarmouk.
However, Israel moved in to make a “generous” offer to pay the cost of the dam and the infrastructure needed. Jordan agreed.
Fast forward a few years, and Israel is allotting Jordan far less per capita water than was originally agreed.
Either way, the main point is that the Golan Heights remain illegally occupied by Israel. So whether Israel didn’t build dams or did build dams, is irrelevant.
The land is not Israel’s and neither is the water.
slagbom, aban, whatever your name is, this map will explain why your claim is patently false.
Kudos, Avi. Your dealing with aban has been positively brilliant. Thanks for the time and effort you put into refuting his crappy propaganda!
Avi: I saw your map, but it is makes no point: Water going south and east flows into the Rokad and ends up in the Jordan. The entire Golan Heights is part of the draining basin of the Jordan, so there’s no motive to divert it.
There’s no stream or river that flows eastwards from the Golan (south of the Hermon mountain) towards Syria. There’s nothing to dam or divert.
Elsewhere you got Banias confused with Hama. They are on opposite edges of the Golan. The Hermon water indeed flows thru Banias, but it is not a hot-water spring, and is many kilometres away from the tri-state border. As already said, putting a dam there would be pointless.
Regarding Lebanon, the entire Israel-Lebanon border is on a ridge. Impossible to build any dams there, and indeed there are none.
This is also well established: Ad hominems are not very effective at convincing anyone.
Aha. What you’re telling us is, “Who are you going to believe, your lying eyes or me?”
Nice try. Better luck next time.
Avi: Sorry. My “lying eyes” tell me nothing. Which source of water in the Golan (or in Israel) ends up in Syria?
“Sorry. My “lying eyes” tell me nothing.”
Not when you’ve get ‘em shut tight, chump.
No Mooser, it’s because Avi has no case. Switching to name-calling confirms that you have nothing real to say.
So the generic zionist troll of the day today is called aban?
Yes. It’s nice to see “better use” arguments employed to justify ethnic cleansing, isn’t it?
Thought of the day:
I just had a glimpse right now, of a program on SBS on the “situation” in the OT… and I had this thought:
There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that is half as pornographic as an Israeli/IKF spokesman “explaining” why such and such was killed or another arrested in the middle of the night or a house demolished and its inhabitants thrown out to the curb…. And if you think Mark Regev illustrates the nec plus ultra in sleaze and obscenity, think again..Why do they all look so much alike?..They must breed them using one set of genomes, they must be manufacturing them using the same mold (or is it mould?)..I’d rather believe that this ability to lie with a straight face must have come with some intensive training than to think they were selected for being natural..
I hope I’m not becoming too misanthropic for my own good..
“curb”
Oh, dear!! I meant kerb…
Much in the same way there’s nothing Memphis can do from Tennessee to control New Orleans’ Mississippi River water. Right? The river flows south to north, right?
You must be holding upside down whatever map the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs gave you.
Please don’t feed the trolls.
That the different people of the region eat similar foods is unremarkable.
I think Israel knows it occupies the Golan Heights as it has refused many offers by Syria to normalise relations for their return. Israel requires perpetual conflict to continue its colonial enterprises.
From the fascinating article:
This is a technique used by cults. When you are exhausted, you are less able to analyse and criticise what is said to you and therefore more likely to accept what you are told as true.