False Dichotomies

1. Spot the difference.

2. Promised Land.

3. Media Melange.

4. The Facebook Haggadah.

5. The Hitch, Salman Rushdie, and Mos Def = Unmissable.

6. Planet of the Dead.

7. Seth on South TA’s refugee seder.

8. A heartwarming tale.

9. The decline of UK libraries.

10. An amazing goal.

For the next eight months I will be working at the Home Front base on the edge of Ramle. Ramle is – for want of a better word – grimy. It is a mixed working-class Jewish-Arab town, where relations are generally ok, but tensions are never far from the surface. A few months ago, some soldiers had stones thrown at them while walking to the bus station, housed in a municipal building with a style that is incongruous with its surroundings. There were also warnings of attempted kidnapping of soldiers in the area. As a result, all soldiers serving at the base were told they could only walk to the bus station in pairs. Note the absurdity: an army which forbids its soldiers from walking on its own sovereign turf. Read more

Strangely enough, on a Sunday…

1. While waiting for the bus the other day, I spoke with the Binge Trader about his CIF latest. While taking his daily stroll to Bat Yam, he came across a couple of magavniks cuffing a young Israeli-Palestinian. After reading the piece, I thought Seth had made much ado about nothing.  “He was only slapped around a little bit. I thought it was going to be like Rodney King or something,” I said. “That makes it alright, does it?” was the instant response. Read more