Four Monkeys, Israel 2006 style...

For those unfamiliar with the figures, from right to left:
Amir Peretz, Defence Minister
Ehud Olmert, Prime Minister
Dan Halutz, Chief of General Staff
Moshe Katsav, President of the State, currently under police investigation for forcing unwanted sexual attentions on women in his employment...

A foodies tour of Nahlaot and some history...

Jerusalem: Follow the smell

Tour guide Oded Amitai smelled the aroma of delicacies emanating from the local kitchens and decided to give tours in a variety of flavors in the multi-cultural capital
Ronit Svirsky Published on Ynet, August 21, 2006

Where to eat is a question that comes up on every hike, walking tour, or trip around the country. Sandwiches and water canteens are a thing of the past, and even when the meal is eaten in the area, gourmet or at least “authentic” is the preferred choice.
Jerusalem tour guide Oded Amitai usually takes groups around Jerusalem’s colorful neighborhoods. One day he smelled the aroma of delicacies emanating from the local kitchens, and he decided to give walking tours in a variety of flavors in the multi-cultural capital.
In Ein Karem you’ll find a combination of French, Russian, British, and Italian culture, so when you take a tour of the village you end with an Italian or French cooking workshop.

After a visit to the ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods of Makor Baruch and Meah Shea’rim you’ll be introduced to kugel, cholent, matzoh balls, and gefilte fish. The tour along Jaffa Road will introduce you to Ethiopian cooking, and a tour of the alleyways of Nahlaot will acquaint you with the cuisine of Kurdistan, Aleppo, Urfa, and the Ashkenazi lands.

Kurds vs. Urfals
The tour of Nahlaot starts at the “Ta’amim” cooking school at 88 Agrippas Street. The school was established by Guy Tuchman and is under the direction of Chef Yufal Attias. After a small cup of coffee and cake you go out to the street, next to the Mahaneh Yehuda market, and stop across from a building with a large wall painting (mural), one of several in the city.
A group of French artists from Lyons is responsible for these paintings. They select cities all over the world where there are conflicts and seek to bring beauty to the residents of these cities. They take a prominent building, restore it, and decide on the theme. In this case they took their inspiration from Mahane Yehuda and painted the shoppers, residents of Nahlaot, and scenes from daily life.

The market
Cross Agrippas Street and enter the cobblestone streets of Nahlaot. The area is over 100 years old, and has fascinating stories, human dramas, and unique architecture. When the neighborhood was built every street or two was its own separate neighborhood, but Jerusalemites preferred to call them all “Nahlaot.”
Nahlaot is spread out between two main roads that are parallel to each other, Bezalel and Agrippas. Just a few steps take you away from a noisy main road and bring you to one of the tranquil houses, redolent with the smells of cooking and baking.
Go along the alleyways, feel the cool stone, peek into the arched windows with iron shutters, stop in front of the courtyards full of greenery, and meet Jerusalemites from all of the various ethnic groups.

It's all about the food
The Kurds are cooking hamousta soup with white kubeh balls; matfunia kubeh, a reddish soup made from beets; grilled beef in okra soup; and stuffed vine leaves. The Persians serve rice with chopped meat with an egg inside. The Sephardim cook bourekas with spinach that are rolled up like a snail.
The food makes its way to every heart, and love stories are also part of Nahlaot’s lore. Marriages between different ethnic groups were not welcomed, but it’s hard to make rules when it comes to love, so Sephardim fell in love with Ashkenazim, Yemenites with Aleppans, and most problematic of all, Urfals with Kurds.
According to Amitai’s stories, the Urfals were known for their ability to have sons, while the Kurds had mostly daughters. The Urfals did not like the Kurds’ stinginess, to put it mildly, and the battles between them were intense and bitter.
The accursed house and the blessed house stand next to each other in the heart of Nahlaot. The accursed house was built in the 1970s, near the Rabbi Shalom Sharabi yeshiva, for residential and commercial purposes. While it was being built the rabbi asked the contractor not to take over part of the yeshiva’s courtyard, but he refused. Since then, no business has managed to survive in the large "marble" building.
On the other hand, the small building next door, with a red tile roof, is known to increase fertility. Every childless woman who has gone to live there has become a mother of many children.

The underground widow
In 1882 Moses Montefiore founded the Ohel Moshe neighborhood, which inspired the play “Bustan Sepharadi” (Spanish Garden). Ohel Moshe has a stone entrance gate and courtyards filled with fruit trees and vegetable gardens. The Sephardic neighborhood provides love stories, stories of food brought on Fridays to the communal oven, and stories of a social life that revolved around the well (cistern).
The tour continues through Mahane Yehuda. Alongside the stalls and the singing vendors you can now find cafes serving short espresso and latte, gourmet restaurants, fashion designers’ boutiques, and jewelry stores. Ronnie, a vegetable vendor, stands behind piles of parsley and cilantro, reading rhyming poems he has written; while a pair of designers seated on retro metal chairs sip coffee.
The end of the tour is the closing of a circle for Oded Amitai. On the wall of a house in the Mazkeret Moshe neighborhood is a sign saying “Kramer-Rechtman House.” Chaya and Alexander Kramer, Amitai’s grandparents, lived in this house until 1986. His mother Rachel, their only daughter, fought with the Lehi pre-state underground movement, and was engaged to Meir Feinstein, who was a member of the Irgun, another pre-state underground group.
They met in 1946 at the height of anti-British underground activity. Rachel wanted to join the Irgun but her parents were vehemently opposed, and she ran away from home. Eventually it was agreed that she would come home and content herself with posting announcements made by the underground.
Meir Feinstein was caught blowing up a British train two weeks after the engagement. During his trial Rachel tried to convince him to ask for a pardon, which the Irgun was opposed to. He was sentenced to death, and on the day he was scheduled to be executed, Feinstein and his friend Moshe Barazani blew themselves up with a hand grenade that was smuggled into their cell.
Rachel joined the Lehi, became a fighter, and later married Efraim Rechtman, who was in the Palmach.

The tour began with a wall painting, and ends at a painting that is only several months old. The artists from Lyons returned to Mahaneh Yehuda and created a wall painting in the back parking area showing class pictures and school activities from the Alliance Israélite Universelle school. The school, which to this day is located next to the parking lot (but not in use), was once the first educational institution in the city.

It’s time to eat
Hungry and tired, we return to the Ta’amim school, where cold watermelon, kubeh, fresh laffa (flatbread), and homemade hummus await. Chef Yuval Attias explains how grandmothers chop beef to prepare fried kubeh nablusiyah, and demonstrates the use of jerish (not regular bulgur wheat) to prepare the dough.
The recipes are placed before the guests on stainless steel tables arranged in a horseshoe, and Attias now prepares the white kubeh balls for the soup. The matfunia soup is already boiling, and everyone on the tour receives a steaming bowl with a thick red liquid, like what you eat at stone houses in Nahlaot.

Ta’mim Cooking School, 88 Agrippas Street. Tour with workshop and meal: NIS 135. Call Oded Amitai at 972-50-630-0928.

Meanwhile, a client of David's and Ruth's does some research and -

Poll: Israelis believed Nasrallah over Peretz
Polls conducted by Dr. Udi Lebel, political psychology lecturer, found sad picture of Israeli PR
Anat Breshkovsky, published on Ynet (Yediot Ahronot) 09.03.06, 16:38

Since the end of the war in the north, two main issues have been keeping the public busy: The demand for an account of the failures by the Israeli leadership, and criticism of the press and nature of reports.

A new study, however, by Dr. Uri Lebel of the Ben Gurion Institute, Beer Sheva University, has found that another problem requires urgent treatment: Israeli PR.

During the poll, entitled "the management of Israeli PR during the second Lebanon war," members of six groups were asked to watch video recordings of Israeli PR in Israel and abroad, and to answer questions. Lebel says he held polls in the past on issues of strategic press, political psychology, and army-media relations. The result of his latest poll show that Israeli PR was so lacking, that in many cases the public was forced to rely on the reports of Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Lebel says a good media leader relies on three points – gripping the audience, being watchable, and giving the feeling of certainty.

The participants of the poll were asked who gave the a sense of certainty regarding the continuance of the war, and who was most authentic. The results were unequivocal: The Israeli public chose Nasrallah's speeches as giving it both.

'Nasrallah contradicted the Israeli spokespeople'

Asked about Nasrallah's authenticity compared to that of Israeli spokespeople, not one Hebrew spokesperson received high authenticity marks.

"We reached a really crazy situation," says Lebel. "A psychological situation which seems inconceivable: Instead of the Israeli public watching our national spokesman who tells it what is happening every day, who will minimize the chaos and who will be seen as believable, something unprecedented happened: The public perceived the enemy leader against whom we fought as having those characteristics, and waited impatiently for his speeches. Nasrallah contradicted the Israeli spokespeople more than once, many times contradicting the minister of defense – he was the first to announce the deaths of Israeli soldiers and the sad circumstances which led to them."

He added: "This isn't the first time that a bereaved mother found out the truth of the death of her son in recordings released by Hizbullah, which showed a totally different picture to what was provided by the IDF and its spokespeople."

Dr. Lebel believes that the figures indicate a serious crisis of leadership down the road. "It's not important if objectively the leadership did its best – now the public perceives it as cut off, unprofessional, and boastful. It won't follow the leadership to the next confrontation," he said.

Olmertism

Ehud Orwell's speech
If PM has confessed to being 'entirely responsible' he should resign
B. Michael Ynet (Yediot Ahronot)
Published: 09.02.06, 16:06

In the event that future historians ask for some type of document attesting to the nature and acumen of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, it's hard to think of a more appropriate document than the speech he delivered this week to the heads of local authorities.

It was obviously a speech that had been well rehearsed. It didn't comprise any grumbling outbursts so typical of Ehud Olmert, who is known for his inadequacy to control his verbal utterances.

And because of it, its preciseness and planning, Olmert's true character came through; a transparent manipulator of words and facts; a go-getter who erroneously made his way to the top. And although each and every sentence in his address personifies this argument, lack of space only permits discussion of a small portion.

It would have been most appropriate to begin with the prime minister's opening sentence: "The decision to go to war, including the responsibility of its outcome – is entirely mine," but instead we'll leave this sentence to the end.

We'll begin, therefore, with the second sentence: "The Israeli, civilian home front was the enemy's main target, and not incidentally."

Hizbullah had one intention
But incidentally, the contrary is true. Hizbullah, explicitly and with much audacity said right from the start that it had one intention: To abduct Israeli soldiers in order to engineer a prisoner exchange deal.

That's what Nasrallah said on the day of the kidnapping, and he reiterated this in his speech of "remorse" which the prime minister enjoys quoting. This time, regretfully, the civilian home front was not the enemy's primary target, and not incidentally.

Let's go to the next sentence: "Hizbullah's target was…to harm the home front, to kill, to terrorize in an attempt to spread fear, panic and to create a public outcry that would paralyze military operations."

George Orwell couldn't have put it better. Because, this was in fact Israel's declared tactic: To strike at the home front, to kill, to terrorize and so on and so forth, or as commonly put in official Israeli jargon: "To put pressure on the Lebanese government."

Additionally, contrary to common belief, the first to shift the fighting inside the other side's civilian home front was Israel. Only after the IDF bombed Beirut and Lebanese infrastructure, did the rocketing of the Israeli home front begin.

The prime minister said in that same speech that when he decided to go to war "we knew very well that rocket fire would be aimed at civilian populations." And indeed it was. The first Katyusha rockets landed inside Israeli territory only on Thursday (July 13) before dawn, just a few hours after Israel attacked the Lebanese home front.

This fact doesn't clear the Hizbullah of its responsibility for starting the war; however, even in times of frustration and rage we would do well to stick to the facts.

We surprised them
The next sentence is a spectacular sample of Olmertism: "We surprised them. The home front persevered." The prime minister knows all too well that the home front did not persevere. The home front went south, and rightfully so. Those who persevered were the ones who had nowhere to go.

In general, the home front persevered the way any home front perseveres, in whatever country and in whatever war, whether it's here, in Lebanon, Iraq, London, Hamburg, Sarajevo or Tyre. What else can it do? Those who can flee do so, and those who can't, "persevere".

The prime minister also knows all too well that no one made any effort to assess the home front's preparedness for the "perseverance" it was forced into. But now, instead of asking for the home front's forgiveness, he is trying to use excessive doses of flattery.

Let's continue. In order to reinforce his victory argument, the prime minister quoted his enemy: "Nasrallah says simply – had I known this would be the outcome; I would not have given the order to start the war."

Isn't this wonderful? At the same time the prime minister was taking pride in these words, tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians hoped that Olmert would be the one to say simply: "Had I known this would be the outcome of the war, I would not have ordered it to begin." But it seems that Olmert leaves these simple sayings to Nasrallah. He prefers more convoluted pronouncements.

The most amusing part is undoubtedly the part where Mr. Olmert tries to explain why a state commission of inquiry is inappropriate: It will be prolonged, it will paralyze, it will keep attorneys occupied, it's a luxury, it is indeed an "enticing solution" but it's "not what the country needs…"

Not since Louis XIV
Since Louis XIV, who said "L'État, c'est moi" (I am the State), no head of state has demonstrated such absolute monarchy. Namely, what he doesn't need, the state doesn't need either.

And then came the ultimate 'attorney' schmaltz, the pit of pathetic manipulation: "Each one of you, with his hand on his heart, knows deep inside that this will not put the shortcomings right."

Everyone - with or without his hand on his heart - knows all too well that when an attorney resorts to such meager tricks, it is an indication that he is in great distress.

One final sentence for the finale – and it cannot be more revealing: "The military should be examined in a way that a democratic civil society examines its military. And the same applies to us, the political echelon."

According to the prime minister, a state commission of inquiry is neither civil nor is it democratic. According to him only blunt-toothed investigative committees, devoid of any authority and financed by those being investigated, are appropriate for examining "a democratic civil society."

To sum up, as promised we'll go back to the first sentence: "The responsibility for the war is entirely mine."

If so, there's no need for an investigation. The person responsible has been found. And in keeping with the Jewish tradition of "He who confesses and forsakes (sins) will find mercy," he should be told: You confessed? Very well. Now resign. Only then will you find mercy.

A Persian Paradise in Israel's desert - a while ago...

Ancient biblical waterworks found in Israel
Network of reservoirs, drain pipes and underground tunnels served a palace in biblical kingdom of Judea
Reuters, published in Ynet, (Yediot Ahronot), 09.01.06, 19:42

Archaeologists in Israel have unearthed an ancient water system which was modified by the conquering Persians to turn the desert into a paradise. The network of reservoirs, drain pipes and underground tunnels served one of the grandest palaces in the biblical kingdom of Judea.

Archaeologists first discovered the palace in 1954, a structure built on a six-acre (2.4 hectare) site where the communal Ramat Rachel farm now stands. Recent excavations unearthed nearly 70 square meters (750 square feet) of a unique water system.

"They had found a huge palace ... even nicer than the palaces in Jerusalem, (dating) from the late Iron Age to the end of the biblical period in the 7th century," Oded Lipschits, a Tel Aviv University archaeologist, said.

The infrastructure of the palace was remodeled throughout the centuries to fit the needs of the Babylonians, Persians, Romans and Hasmoneans who ruled the Holy Land, said Lipschits, who heads the dig with an academic from Germany's University of Heidelberg.

To turn a desert into a paradise

But it was the Persians, who took control of the region around 539 BC from the Babylonians, who renovated the water system and turned it into a thing of beauty. Lipschits said they added small waterfalls to try to turn a desert into a paradise.

"Imagine on this land plants and water rushing and streaming here," Lipschits said. "This was important to someone who finds aesthetics important, for someone who wanted to feel as though they are not just in some remote corner in the desert."

Yuval Gadot, a biblical archaeology expert from Tel Aviv University who is taking part in the excavation, said it was unclear exactly how the water system worked.

"Probably rainwater came down on the roof of the houses (in the palace complex)," he said. "From there, it was collected by drains into pools or to the underground reservoir and taken to nearby fields for crops or nice gardens."

For centuries water supplies have been one of the most sensitive issues in the Middle East, where most of the region is desert.