Jerusalem, Israel – what is really happening
I really wish there was more time this week.
Funny, I say that every year the week before Passover.
However, spending hours doing photos of President Barak Obama
did not help me get ready for the holiday.
So instead of doing a masterful and timely blog
on THE presidential speech from Jerusalem, Israel.
I will share one photo that sums up the week for most people:
US flags waving, people walking, and roses blooming.
Happy Holiday of spring from Jerusalem!
Did you hear a loud noise on Monday morning?
It was the collective sighs of relief filling the streets –
the long summer holiday was over
and over 2 million Israeli children went back to school.
Trips to museums for water play were replaced with starting Kita alef,
which in Israel is a more exciting event than many university graduations.
The school children living in the southern Israel town of Sderot
had another rocket fired at them from Gaza as they started to go to class.
More than 440 rockets have been fired into Israel from Gaza
since the year began, averaging around two a day!
Last week Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing,
was performed in English in Jerusalem, Israel’s Bloomfield Park.
The shows were free and open to the public.
Shakespeare, widely agreed to be perhaps the most clever writer ever,
could he have imagined what is happening now?
Arab families were seated on the grass to watch.
A few meters away on the plaza, Muslim women sat on a bench
and then followed to see the photos of a beautiful bride in white,
as a Jewish couple were preparing to get married.
While hundreds are killed each day in Syria,
this was the scene in the Jerusalem park.
School has started, however university does not begin until October.
Arab girls in Israel will be attending classes,
not banned from an education like in Iran.
And of course, they can drive themselves to the park or to school,
not like the women living in Saudi Arabia.
Kikar Zion, Zion Square, is still a safe place to walk during the day.
It was a long hot summer,
but the evenings are now cool for the late night summer music programs.
Last week the music and lights were at the Jerusalem Theater,
and this week Gan Sacher, Sacher Park, will showcase Reggae Music
and Safra Square will host the last August free public concert.
First there was the Wine Festival, then Beer Festival,
and now this week for the first time an Ice Cream Festival.
Always something happening on the Jerusalem streets.
In the United States “March Madness”
is the spring college basketball tournament,
in Israel “March Madness” takes on a different meaning.
With the new threat of millions of outsiders
on a Global March to Jerusalem – the “GMJ,”
Israel is again cast as the aggressor in the Middle East.
Looking through March photos, I found this picture
taken last year as Muslim worshipers were going to pray.
These men were entering through the Jaffa Gate to the Old City.
There were threats of violence on that Friday,
but Muslim worshipers still had access to their mosque.
This is not the picture GMJ paints for the world.
Please let us not forget, in March of last year
the Fogel family were brutally murdered
and a Jerusalem bus bomber killed a woman.
In March ten years ago, the Park Hotel in Netanya was blown up,
30 people were kiled.
The Global March to Jerusalem
joins BDS (Boycott, Divest and Sanctions)
and Israel Apartheid Week
as the newest anti-Israel publicity exploit.
The GMJ organizers must have not have seen what
was really happening in Jerusalem,
so I am sharing again:
Israeli Apartheid? and More Israeli Apartheid?
It is time to stop the madness.