Letters from Israel – Sida 7

Teenage girl about the army

Letter from Israel: ABOUT THE ARMY.

So, I’m a 17 year old Israeli. I’m a regular teenager. I was born in Caracas, Venezuela and I came to Israel when I was 8.

In a year and a half I’ll go to the army. After finishing high school, EVERYONE, every young man and woman in Israel that turn 18 must go to the army. Only if you have a medical problem you don’t have to go… While young people all over the world goes to college and start a career, we need to defende our country, for 2 years (girls) and 3 years (boys). So for those who think that we are having fun in this Arabs-going-to-kill-us situation, it’s not like that. I will go to the army, of course. I want to go, but nobody asked me if I really like to.

I just wanted to say that. After all most of the soldiers in Israel are teenagers. KIDS, who just graduated from high school.

Want to write a ’letter’ about your army experiences?
Send it to lettersfromisraeltosweden@gmail.com.

”You wouldn’t accept an entire Jewish nation into your country, would you?”

Hi,
My name is Hadar. I am a musician from Israel.
I’m not sure why I felt the need to write this letter but here it is.
I know what the Swedish people think of our country. I have a feeling if you knew what we hear about you, your ears would be burning. But this is how the world works… People with interests blindfold us into thinking we know what goes on on the other side of the ocean. Their interest is to divide the world and turn us against each other.

When a pro-palestinian organization decides to boycott Israel’s culture, he doesn’t realize this makes no difference for the governments at all. The only people that get hurt are exactly that: the people (the same people who posted a mass campaign titled: ”We love you Iran, we would never bomb you”) and let me assure you, if it does happen (god help us all) it won’t be because we are bloodthirsty people.

Let me give you a different perspective on things: in WW2 the Jewish people were almost wiped out by humans. Not by hurricanes, or earthquakes. Humans…
When the war was over, it was obvious we wouldn’t go back to Germany, Poland, Ukraine etc. So we came to Israel. You wouldn’t accept an entire Jewish nation into your country, would you? And yes, people lived here while we were away (for 2000 years)… but the world was built by immigrants. And so did we. We built this country and made it to the developed country that it is.
If you came here to see both sides, you would see how complex this conflict is. It’s not black or white, do or die, leave or be kicked out. For the most part, we do what we need to protect ourselves, it’s the most basic right for a nation. Isn’t it?

In every country in the world, there will be radicals who will bring disasters on its nation. You don’t seem to think the war in Darfur is as terrible as the conflict in Israel, however there has been a genocide going on in Darfur for years!! We even give shelter for their refugees…
And you’re right, sometimes we are just wrong. Like your government, like any country who has any conflict. But to judge an entire nation because of YOUR media’s propaganda is as unfair as convincing bands to cancel their shows in Israel or not accept Israeli acts to world events. What does music or art in general have to do with political views??

I can only urge you to open your eyes, don’t believe everything you hear, open your mind to other possibilities and maybe you’ll realize what you think you know is so far from the truth.. We are gay friendly (Tel Aviv is the most liberal city in the world), we offer our assistance for any country who needs it (fires, earthquakes, tsunamis), we send our doctors to return eye sight for thousands of blind men, women and children in far away villages around the world, we develop technologies that would help our next generation. So it can’t all be bad right?

I wish us all peaceful times and great music 🙂

Hadar
Just a musician

”A neighbour threw stones at me, shouting: ’Jew, go home!’ My parents took his advice and we came Home – to Israel”

Hello Kim!

My name is Adriana and I was born in Argentina.
When I was about four, the Six-Day War took place and a neighbour of mine (not very nice indeed) threw stones at me, shouting: ”Jew, go home!”
My parents took his advice and we came Home – to Israel.
I grew up here, went to the army, got married, raised a family…

Today Israel is my home, my daughter’s home, my family’s and my friends’ home – my whole life.
Like many Israelis it came with a price: family members killed in wars, lost friends, and a life that for some people around the world may seem crazy. And yet – this is home.
Imagine for yourself, the feeling of someone who finally comes home and his neighbours want him to leave – or in their words: ”throw you to the sea”…
And yet – because this is home (and always has been, as my neighbour said), we don’t intend to go anywhere.
Sorry folks, we are here to stay!
And now, that we made this clear, we can start talking…

Sincerely yours,
Adriana

”Before you say one more thing about Israel – come here!”

Hej kära vänner!

So… Originally I wanted to write this letter in Swedish, but I gave up on the idea since my Swedish is far from being perfect and since I want to convey my message as coherent as I can.

I read some of the letters here, and they’re very touching letters about the conflicts here in Israel and about the terror attacks and all of the threats we are dealing with from all of our neighbors. Unfortunately, our neighbors are not Norway, Finland and Denmark, to say the least :-).
I do have a lot to say about the political aspects, about the European hypocrisy and the ”human rights” activists, who are falling into the trap of Hamas and terror organizations. I have a family in the South of Israel, and my brother spent his birthday in a shelter, and in general I have much to say about the conflict.

But!

I don’t want to focus on the negative and problematic sides, but on the positive ones. Because that’s how I am. I guess that most Israelis and Jews are like that – ”everything will be alright” (”Allt ordnar sig”). Maybe because my people have been through so much…

In order to truly understand the mentality, the way of thinking, the culture, the conflict and all what you might thought or heard in the news about Israel – you just have to come here. There were so many people who completely changed their mind about Israel after visiting. There is so much ignorance in the Western world in the Israeli subject, it’s just unbelievable. In my four visits in Sweden, there were Swedes who thought the language we speak is Jerusalem, some thought that Israel is in Africa and were surprised to see that I’m white; others thought women have to work with their faces covered, and so on. The only way to fight that ignorance is to come, see by yourselves and tell your friends the truth. Så kom!

Before I tell you what Israel is for me, I’ll tell you a bit about myself. My name is Dan, I’m 21 years old and I live in Tel Aviv. I was born in Moscow and my parents immigrated to Israel when I was one year old. I grew up in Be’er Sheva, a city in the South of Israel. I moved to Tel Aviv just after high school because I got accepted to Law studies at Tel Aviv University. This year I’m finishing the fourth and last year of my degree, and afterwards I go to the army to work in the law unit there. I speak Hebrew, English, Russian, Spanish (from TV shows I watched when I was a kid) and some Swedish. My romance with Sweden started a long time ago, in the beginning with the Eurovision and the Melodifestivalen. Since March 2009, I visited Sweden 4 times and also started studying the language. I really like your country, the culture, the people, the music and even the weather (probably it’s the Russian genes…).

But anyway, we are here to talk about Israel. Do you remember Mika’s song, ”Grace Kelly”? It has a sentence – ”I could be brown, I could be blue…”- If someone would ask me what the magic of Israel is, and why people fall in love with it, I would answer, without any doubt, that it is its diversity.

Israel can be the Holy Land, with all of the sacred places for Jews, Christians and Muslim people and you can feel the Holy Spirit in the different holidays, as well as during the weekends in Jerusalem, Nazareth, Safed, and more. Jewish Rabbis are praying in the Western Wall, Priests and nuns are walking down Via Dolorosa road in the old city of Jerusalem, and Muslims are looking at the beauty of the Dome of the Rock. If there is a G-d watching us from above, he is definitely overlooking at Jerusalem and the holy places.

But at the same time, alongside with the religion and the tradition, we can see at the same Jerusalem city bars and pubs and night clubs, celebrating the miracle of life until dawn. If you go a bit west you will find Tel Aviv, the most liberal city in the Middle East. With endless night life, it earned the name ”the city that never sleeps”. Pride parades, amazing beaches and a beautiful port, big club scene, Parties – all of those contributed to the image that Tel Aviv got – young, funky and maybe a bit of a crazy city!

Israel is known for also other unique places: The Dead Sea, where you can lie down and relax. Go in the footsteps of the heroes in Masada, explore the Negev desert (and the craters there – a night walk in the desert with all the stars above is an amazing experience!), look at what is left in Caesarea, use Israel’s ski resort (yes, we also have snowy mountains) in the Hermon Mountain, swim in the sea of Galilee, enjoy the water in the Mediterranean sea all across it’s shore – including Haifa and the outstanding Baha’i gardens, dive and swim with dolphins in the Red Sea, in the beach of Eilat, Israel’s southern city, and much more.

It has everything for everyone: different religions trips, families, young travelers, adventurous people, straight, gay, and practically – each and every one of you will fall in love with Israel and will find what he likes. We truly made the desert blossom. Once you also meet the people and communicate and listen – you can understand the truth and the beauty of it. You can find a lot of information and pictures once you search the stuff I put in bold online, but I also made a collage that shows the different extraordinary places in Israel.

Other than the different cities and religions in Israel, another aspect of this diversity is the diversity in languages, people and ethnicities from all around the world. In every corner you will find a mix of a truly Moroccan spirit, the Polish or ”Yiddishe Mame”, French accent, flags of Russia, Hungarian Kiortosh, Egyptian pride, American youngsters, Argentinian meat and ”Assado”, and much more. The reason is of course the gathering of all of the Jews around the world in this small country. I think that makes life much more interesting. People from different backgrounds, with different mentalities meet, know each other and even get together. It can also be very funny and amusing, when for example a Russian lady tries to find her way in the line to a Falafel store. No wonder it’s called the ”Melting Pot” of the Israeli society!

The diversity is also shown in political views; from very right political parties, to the most left. There is a joke about Jews – ”Two Jews, three opinions”. It seems that you can’t describe the Israeli inner political conflicts in a better way. As a democracy, Israel allows all inoffensive opinions to be expressed (with Arab Muslims in the parliament). That’s why also a lot of political parties rise and fall; because they had the illusion they could unite most of the people into one opinion. Due to the different background and mentality of every person, it’s almost impossible.

In any case, please, before you say one more thing about Israel, or before you judge Israel because of something you heard in the media, come here. We’ll show you around. 🙂

I will be happy to get in contact with you, if someone also plans to come or just to ask any question – you can find me on Facebook (Dan Erukhimovich).

Shalom och hej,

Dan.

”Not Lego sets or dolls – the children want peace!”

Hi,

I saw your request on Facebook and think it’s a great idea. Unfortunately, I do not know much about Sweden. I have never visited your country and my ideas about Sweden are purely based on the media stereotypes of blond haired blue eyed people who enjoy a high standard of living. I presume that most Swedes opinions on Israel and Israelis are based on similar misconceptions.

My name is Dalia and I have lived in Israel for over twenty years after having been born and grown up in England. Life is very different here from the one I knew in London, but although I still miss certain aspects of the UK I love it here. It has been my experience that Israelis are a very warm and caring people. I remember when my children were babies, absolute strangers would stop me and offer me advice. They did not mean to be rude. It is just their way to treat each other as family, which sometimes can be annoying , but is always assuring. Israel is a family orientated nation and cares about its children and parents. Last summer we had the social justice demonstrations. I think that we were the only country in which these demonstrations were not violent. In view that most of the year it is hot and the sun shines, we enjoy an outdoor life, whether it is in our many parks or on the beach or in outdoor coffee shops. There is less crime than in a lot of the world and therefore the kids have a freer life. I feel safe walking alone at all hours of the day and night, something I cannot do in London anymore. Most people here are worried about the same things that people worry about all over the world, work, health, family, finance, global warming etc. Most people here are busy on a day to day basis with the same things people do all over the world, school, work, bringing up their kids, computer etc.

Israel is the home to people of different faiths and in my expereience there is mutual respect for each other. When I first came to Israel I studied at the Hebrew University and nearly all the students in my department were Arabs, Christians and Moslems. There were cultural differences, but it didn’t stop us from being friends. When I have had the misfortune to be in hospital with one of my kids, he has shared a room, Israelis and Palestinians together and the children and families have got along with no problem.

Unfortunately, the outside world does not experience everyday life in Israel, but is only exposed to news items about the Israeli Arab conflict, which often are incorrect, or at least misleading. I have never met an Israeli who did not want peace. Peace with the Arabs is taught in our schools and on our television. All children learn about peace. I remember when my children were in kindergarten and they were asked what they wanted for the New Year, nearly all the children answered peace, not Lego sets or dolls as would be the case in a different country.

It would be a pity if you take isolated incidents you see on TV as being the norm in Israel. That is far from the truth. Most people here would be happy for the Palestinians to have a good and prosperous life side by side with us. However, we cannot afford to be naive and in view of the terrorist threat in which we live, security cannot be ignored. I think that tolerance is a key and this is something that must be learnt.
I hope that as here in Israel, the Palestinians succeed in educating their children to want peace with us, in order that we can live without harm or obstruction to either side in a peace based on mutual understanding and respect.

I also hope that you visit our country to see for yourself and experience the warmth and many positive aspects it has to offer. I would be surprised if you do not leave with a positive view of this much loved piece of land.

Dalia