Only in Israel

Religious Mustard and Other Hebrew Acronyms

January 26, 2011

Hodaya, the most famous “datlashit” from the TV show “Srugim” In the U.S. and most western countries, Jews tend to identify their religious affiliation through one of the major Jewish movements, be it Conservative, Reform, Orthodox, Reconstructionist, Jewish Renewal, and even Secular Humanistic Judaism. Not so in Israel, where one’s religious standing is far more […]

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Hairdresser Offers Unkind Cut

January 6, 2011

My daughter’s no dummy I’ve written before about how our family has become addicted to GroopBuy, the Jerusalem-based knock-off of the uber-popular Groupon in the U.S. (which just raised a ton of money this week). The GroopBuy service offers a single “deal a day” with a big discount – say, a coupon for a NIS […]

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A Walk on the Wild Side

December 22, 2010

Change has come to downtown Jerusalem It has been years since I’ve been to downtown Jerusalem at night, but it’s the “in” spot for the teenagers in our house. After our sushi dinner last week, my wife and I decided to take a walk around. Frankly, we were blown away. I expected to find a […]

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Overeating in the Land of the Buffet

September 22, 2010

Alon Tavor Field School What is it about Jews and buffets? We see one and we go hog-wild, pardon the expression. And buffets are big business in Israel. Our most recent encounter with the ubiquitous Israeli buffet was during a Shabbaton earlier this year with our synagogue at the Alon Tavor Field School. Some explanations […]

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Culture Clash at Cinema City

September 16, 2010

Image from The Jerusalem Post version of this article I am not particularly fond of going out to the movies here. The audience jabbers away incessantly, cellphones never cease to ring and the infamous movie theater hafsaka breaks the film into two parts, often cutting for intermission while the main character is delivering a critical […]

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A Subversive Marriage Proposal

August 10, 2010

Rabbi Haviva Ner-David Rabbi Haviva Ner-David has a subversive proposal for young couples in Israel: don’t get married. At all. And with the recent directives to rabbis at the local marriage registrars that I wrote about previously, her approach is more timely than ever. Ner-David, one of the first (and only) women to receive Orthodox […]

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Patriotic Pride

August 4, 2010

The Jerusalem Pride Parade, 2010 Some 3,000 people marched from Jerusalem’s Independence Park to the Knesset in last week’s annual Gay Pride parade. My daughter Merav and I were there to support the community. It’s been a long time since I was at a gay parade – I used to regularly join the massive San […]

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Tisha B’av with Helicopters

July 20, 2010

The book of Eicha is traditionally read on Tisha B’av Every year on Tisha B’av, there are pundits who write in the local newspapers that we should stop fasting and start celebrating. Tisha B’av – the ninth day of the Jewish month of Av (which always falls somewhere in super-heated July or August) – commemorates […]

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Meet Me at the Mugrabi

July 8, 2010

Mugrabi Cinema in its Heyday When I was hired to record a series of conversations to accompany a course on teaching Hebrew to English speakers, I didn’t know I’d be getting a lesson in Tel Aviv nostalgia. The project was to edit a 500-page curriculum originally developed to prepare U.S. diplomats posted to Israel. Along […]

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Search for the Perfect Knafeh

June 25, 2010

Must-have knafe I’ve never eaten it, but I’ve just got to have it. Kanafeh, that is. It’s an Arab pastry somewhat like baklava, but with the addition of soft goats cheese, an orange coating and sprinkled pistachio nuts. I first learned about kanafeh from a friend who was guiding us through East Jerusalem. He pointed […]

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