Big story going viral on Facebook and in the Israeli press about a vulgar and racist exchange between some Israeli passengers and a flight attendant on an Israir Airlines flight to Varna, Bulgaria.
Ami Kaufman at +972 cuts to the chase:
The headlines are pretty much the same all over, and include the words: “Watch: The Ugly Israeli,” in reference to what Israelis see as the rude behavior they are notorious for worldwide.
However, few (including mainstream media) paid attention to the little gem hidden in the video, a one-liner that epitomizes the casual racism so widespread in the Jewish state.
The flight attendant refuses to sell chocolate to a passenger (apparently he was busy with another passenger, it’s difficult to discern the exact reason). Things heat up. Then, her sister sitting across the aisle says at 0:28 in the video below: “She just wants to buy chocolate, what is she – an Arab?”
……Of course, this is understandable. The only reason a flight attendant refuses to sell chocolate to someone is because they’re Arab.
#Facepalm.
Few paid attention? Maybe they tried to bury it? The Jerusalem Post, published the video with English captions (original Hebrew) but skipped mention of the racist segment of the exchange. It’s difficult to comprehend how casual racism is so embedded in Israeli society that the insertion of the woman yelling her bigoted screed is completely passed over in their coverage. We’ve documented the casualness of Israeli racism before. It’s ugly and sad, something I’ll likely never get used to or expect.
This video exposes that casualness which may be the reason, thus far, it’s gotten passed over by western media. But with all the attention it’s garnering on social media that’s probably about to change.
Haaretz mentioned
one Facebook user wrote in response to the video, “flight attendants from foreign airlines call the flight to Tel Aviv – Hell Aviv. I wonder why?”
Here’s the video and the relevant exchange, translation from Hebrew by Reem Khamis-Dakwar:
Passenger 1: You will sell me Chocolate. Do you understand? You are my worker, I paid money for you.
Flight attendant: I am not your worker. You would die before I can be your worker
Passenger 1: I want the chocolate. Why wouldn’t you sell me the chocolate. I want the chocolate. What is that. I want the chocolate
Flight attendant: If you think you’re raising your voice and being a little bit more violent so most probably you won’t achieve what you want
Passenger 2: Sister of Passenger 1 from the other side of the aisle: Sell her the chocolate, what is she an Arab? F**your god (Arabic curse), sell her the chocolate! Do you hear? She paid for her plane ticket sell her the chocolate! Yalla (Another Arabic word)
Lower your tone fast! Sell her the chocolate fast!Ya peace of trash! What is that he is not selling her chocolate? A peace of trash ! You will not sell my sister chocolate.
At this point, the flight attendant approach the sister and told her??Remember my words, To “Varna”(Bulgaria) you will not arrive
A third passenger sitting next to passenger 1 joined by a string of curses toward flight attendant.
Thanks to Ofer Neiman and Jamil Dakwar
Israelis being rude and obnoxious?!?
Surely not! That would just be so out of character.
Wow. Is it antisemitic to point out that anyone else would have been arrested for acting out like this on an airplane?
From another report: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4629380,00.html
“When the plane landed in Varna, the flight crew contacted the police to report the attack, but no measures were taken against the passengers.
“A video documenting the argument was posted on Facebook on Saturday night after first circulating in different forums of Israeli flight attendants.
“The Israeli flight attendants expressed outrage and shock at the incident, and asked to add that the violence seen in the video is not uncommon and that they encounter such attacks on quite a few flights.
“It took me a few minutes to take in what I saw in this video and I’m still in shock things like that actually happen. So to anyone who asked ‘what’s so difficult about being a flight attendant’, there you go,” one flight attendant wrote.
“After the video was posted on Facebook, several of the flight attendants who uploaded or shared the video received threats from members of the family featured in the video, saying if the video is not removed they will turn to the police to complain about the flight attendants.”
Am I gobsmacked? No.
I will re-post part of what I wrote about this earlier today:
“Earlier this week, there was an article about BG airport staff:
“Welcome to Israel, you subhuman
Re-entry into the country proved to be a humiliating affair, involving an interrogation and fingerprints.”
link to haaretz.com
which prompted this:
“Letters to the Editor / Airport staff should be grounded”
link to haaretz.com
and everyone must know by now about the frequent incidents of ultra- Orthodox men causing a ruckus on flights if they happen to have to sit next to/near a woman.
Why is this tolerated? Is the Israeli society that numb to violence? Is it because they have brutalized (with seeming glee) the Palestinians for so long that now it’s ok to abuse anyone that doesn’t cater to their every whim?”
– See more at: https://mondoweiss.mystagingwebsite.com/2015/02/european-potential-violence#sthash.oQY45Mzf.dpuf
Moreover, this kind of behavior is tolerated in Israel IF it’s done by “settlers” or right- wing, centrist, or even liberal Zionists… who are led by Bennett, Netanyahu, Lieberman, Shaked et al. and the IOF. What kind of ‘security’ and tactics are US police and military being taught by Israelis when they go there to learn the ways of the IOF, Shin Bet or Mossad?
There is something very twisted about this place and the majority of its citizens…the 95%. Empathy, grace, and humanity have been replaced by violence of all kinds, and a surreal sense of entitlement. It’s not only the evident racism, but it is also the threatening violence that made me gasp at first. Who else would be allowed to get away with this abhorrent and threatening behavior on a PLANE?
Thank you, Annie. Thanks to Ofer Neiman and Jamil Dakwar, too!
One time I was on an international flight and the boy and his Mom behind sitting me were having an issue. The mother scolded him and the boy cried repeatedly in English to stop hitting him. I turned around and told her “You don’t have to hit kids”. She fired back that she did not him, and I felt extremely embarrassed in front of the other passengers sitting right next to me. Then she scolded him really really harshly in Israeli Hebrew, and he didn’t say anything after that.
There’s been a couple of articles in haaretz arguing over the treatment tourists and even Israelis suffer when they arrive at Ben Gurion Airport in comparison to Berlin where quite a few Israelis have chosen to go and live
One of the readers left this priceless comment:
“I lived in Israel for over 20 years and I too left Israel because of it’s Barbarian culture. I have been in Berlin for three months now and I feel that I have escaped the biggest garbage can (or smallest) in the world. Israeli’s are bad mannered, ill-tempered, unfriendly, untrustworthy scoundrels, who can do nothing more than argue and litter the streets with garbage or their constant noise. Anyone now living in Germany will tell you the same, i is as if you finally realize that you have escaped a very badly kept Zoo.”