Seen on the Israel Scene

Exports, tourism, Yemenite immigration, trivia and more

By Sybil Kaplan

Anyone who has ever done a little research knows of the Catholic roots of Valentine's Day and that Jews have their own holiday for love – although most people outside of Israel have never heard of it. It's called Tu B'Av and it comes in July, a week after Tisha B'Av. When I was in the very Jewish shuk (market) in Jerusalem, Machaneh Yehudah, I was surprised to see heart-shaped boxes of candy at a major candy stand. One of the downtown lingerie stores also featured women's red underwear....

For the first time in over a year, at the request of the Dutch government, Israel approved and facilitated the export of 25,000 carnations from Gaza to the European market to be shipped Feb. 12 and scheduled to arrive in Europe by Valentine's Day....

The Red Cross asked Israel to export Israeli apples grown in the Golan Heights to Syria, beginning mid-February. Representatives of the Red Cross, UN and Israel Defense Forces will coordinate the transfer, which will take place daily for several weeks. Approximately 8,000 tons of fruit were shipped. This is the fourth year the export of apples has taken place....
The Tourism Ministry has allocated 17 million shklaim for a new marketing campaign in the U.S. to strengthen incoming tourism from North America. It will also launch campaigns in Germany, Russia, Italy and France to tell people that Israel is a safe and attractive tourist destination. In 2008, 700,000 tourists visited Israel; half were Christian Evangelists....

A new national telephone center has been opened where the approximately 250,000 Holocaust survivors in Israel may call to receive information about their rights....

Masorti Women Study Together

For the past nine years, the Women's League for Masorti Judaism, in cooperation with the Schechter Institute for Jewish Studies and the Masorti Movement, have sponsored women's study days. Additional support came this year from the Jewish Federation of Orlando and the Jewish Federation of Chicago. Women came to Kibbutz Hanaton, the Masorti kibbutz; and to Masorti congregations in Beersheva, Ashkelon and Kfar Saba to bond and learn.

I was part of the Jerusalem contingent that traveled two and a half hours by van to the kibbutz. There were 115 women with programs and translations in English, Hebrew, Russian and Spanish. After refreshments, the group held mincha services led by a Hazzanit from Latvia and a female third-year rabbinical student at the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem. Then women went to their choice of study areas – four offered in English, one in Spanish, one in Russian and two in Hebrew. After two study sessions, a brief supper was offered, then a summary.

The summary was given by one of the study leaders, Professor Alice Shalvi, known for her groundbreaking work in women's rights and education for girls. She is founder of the Israel Women's Network, principal of a high school, chair of the Executive Board of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies and a 2007 recipient of the Israel Prize for her contributions to Israel society.

According to Diane Friedgut, director and Women's League Israeli liaison, the study day is a "synergy between the staff and the participants, who range in age from teens to grandmothers and come from Argentina, the former Soviet Union, the U.S. and Europe or are native-born sabras. The theme for this winter's three days was "Lechi Lach – Women taking the lead and making the journey," using the Biblical text to express our goals as Jewish women and to sing the Debbie Friedman song, "Lechi Lach" in four languages....

Remembering the 1940s: Who doesn't remember the stories of the Yemenites brought to Israel "on the wings of an eagle" on Operation Magic Carpet in 1949? On Feb. 19, in a special Jewish Agency aliyah operation, Said Ben Yisraeal, one of the heads of the Raid community and his family of nine and another individual arrived at Ben Gurion Airport. This now brings the total number of Jews left in Yemen to approximately 269. Although the president of Yemen had given special protection to Yemenite Jews, Moslem extremists had increased harassment. The family will be settled in Bet Shemesh...
People comment to me that trivia that enlightens them about how people in Israel live is one of the things they like best about my column. So here goes: 330 homeowners from throughout the country were surveyed and revealed that 88% put some information on their refrigerators. An outstanding 95% use service announcements or advertisements from taxi companies or pizza purveyors. As many as 61% post photographs; 46% have paintings; 51% have calendars; 49% have reminders; and 33% have shopping lists on their refrigerators.... 

We always knew how the UN felt about Israel, but we attended a very disturbing, anti-Israel talk recently by Robert Serry, the UN special coordinator for Middle East peace process, and sponsored by the reputable, distinguished Israel Council on Foreign Relations. His premise was whether we could expect a collision course between Israel and the UN, and his response was basically as long as Israel continued to put its neck on the line and allow it to be run over by the PLO and PA, continually giving up and giving in, there would be no problems. As far as he was rigidly concerned, a two-state solution is the only solution and "Israel won't have viable security without a two-state solution. This is the only viable future for both parties."
Needless to say, his emphasis on the "settlements," otherwise known as Jewish communities and cities of thousands and thousands of Jews, as the primary obstacle. Of course everyone knows they didn't exist between 1948 and 1970 and no move was being made for a Palestinian state or to end the violence or to secure borders for Israel....

The Jerusalem International Book Fair came and went and the noted absence of American publishers was strongly felt despite the cover-up by Israel's major book distributor, Steinmatzky's, who posted names of publishers in sections of their sales booth with their books in order to give the illusion that those publishers were actually represented at the fair. The European booths were elegant and the Israeli publishers had a good representation.

What does holding of fire mean?
Somehow the words “holding of fire” got lost in the translation between Hamas and Israel since Jan. 18 when supposedly they agreed to a cease-fire.
Today, the Israel Defense Forces announced that because that "holding of fire" on Jan. 18, more than 100 Kassam rockets, mortar shells and Grad missiles have been fired at Israeli communities. Today, two Kassam rockets were fired. The Air Force recently attacked seven smuggling tunnels.
Because Hamas claims to be the sole authority in the Gaza Strip, Israel holds them fully responsible for all terror originating within its area of control and continues to respond to attempts to destabilize the southern part of Israel.

Despite condemnations from uninformed sources close to the U.S. secretary of state and misinformed U.S. senators who recently traveled to Gaza, Israel continues to send huge amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza on a daily basis. Since the unilateral cease-fire on Jan. 18, as much as 119,409 tons of aid and 10,956,900 liters of fuel for the Gaza power station have been delivered. Goods for the public and private sectors including meat, dairy products, sugar, fruit, oil, diapers, personal hygiene items, canned meat, tuna, blankets, mattresses, agricultural inputs, frozen fish and meat, and gas for domestic use were transferred.