Gatekeepers – the film, the conclusions

It’s an April morning.  There’s a buzz in the air.  And it’s not coming from the hearing aids of the mostly elderly crowd seated inside Kibbutz Ein Harod auditorium.  I’m seated with my wife in the front rows near the stage.  It’s a packed house; some are seated on folded chairs against the walls.  It’s the first of two screenings of the documentary film, “The Gatekeepers,” nominated for an Oscar in 2012.  After a short introduction by the MC, the director of the film, Dror Moreh, gets on stage.  He’s brief, matter-of-fact, throws an occasional smile.  He says,” This is not your typical film.  It’s hard to watch.  I ask that you hold judgment until after the screening, in the Q &A.”  He vacates the stage.  The lights go out.

Gatekeepers film poster

Action.

If you’ve ever been submerged underwater and felt like your lungs might explode, then you’ll come close to the feeling you’ll get when you watch “Gatekeepers.”  And there’s little chance for coming up for air during this 100-minute film, which seems like you’ve spent a decade inside a watery diving bell.

For those of you readers at the edge of your seat, who’re thinking: “YES,  BUT WHAT IS THIS MOVIE ABOUT???” then I’ll tell you.  It’s a story about six of Israel’s former chiefs of Secret Service, the Shin Bet.  They tell their story on camera.  They tell how they gathered intelligence behind enemy lines, how they recruited and paid off Arab informants to snitch on their brethren, how they intercepted and foiled scores of terrorist attacks.  They speak without embellishment, without drama.  Their ages range from 50 to 84, yet it seems their hardened faces were chiseled from the same rock.

The film mixes interviews with animated video, archival footage.  In one instance they speak of a decision to take out a terrorist in Gaza.

Targeted Airstrike

A pilotless aircraft takes silently to the sky.  Information on the terrorist’s whereabouts is gathered.  It’s checked and double checked.  It’s nighttime.  A bird’s-eye view shows a moving car in a shabby neighborhood.  The crosshairs of the target hover over the car.  An order is given.  A missile is launched.  Poof!  A white puff erupts from the car below.  It’s eerily quiet, surgically clean.  The score?  Israel: 1  Terrorists: 0

There’s also a retelling of the Hamas terrorist Yahya Ayyash, known as the ‘Engineer,” who’d long eluded the Shin Bet.  Finally, in 1996, an insider hands the unsuspecting terrorist an explosives-packed cell-phone.  Ayyash puts the phone to his ear and answers the call.

Let’s just say he didn’t live to get the phone bill.

Israel’s six former Secret Service men and the film director, Dror Moreh, top, second from left

The six men take turns in telling of their “day in the office.”  They describe their operations in an even tone, as if they’re telling you how to assemble an IKEA bookshelf.  Their term in office ranged from 2 years to 6, collectively from 1980 to 2011 — some thirty years of assassinations, of bomb-planting, of finding and paying off informants.  

The mission: protect Israel.

As if the Shin Bet wasn’t busy enough, it now had to turn its attention inward, to right-winged Jewish extremists who terrorize Arabs.  Luckily, the extremists’ plan to blow up the Moslem Mosque, Dome of the Rock, in Jerusalem, was foiled last-minute.  Yet the Secret Service men admit they failed miserably to stop Yigal Amir, a Jewish extremist, from killing Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin, in 1995.

Then, when you least expect it, while you try to suck in a lungful of air,  the six men drop another type of “bomb.”  They have second thoughts, doubts; they question the logic behind the whole thing.  The men avoid dealing in politics; they agree that they made Mission Impossible — Possible, that they granted Israel with what it wanted most: security.  They’ve done a masterful job.  But for how long?  Their cold assessment is unanimous: There’s no military solution to the conflict.  Only diplomacy, negotiations will win the day.

The screen goes dark.  

Lights on.

The audience is stunned, claps mechanically.  I watch the director Dror Moreh climb the stage.  The Q & A begins.  It’s not a hostile crowd.  On the contrary, he’s convincing the convinced, singing to the choir.  In Ein Harod, mere miles from Jordan and from the West Bank, the kibbutniks from far and wide have come to weigh in their opinions, but mostly to agree with the film’s premise.

Ami Ayalon, the first of six Secret Service heads that agrees to speak on camera

My wife Pnina asks Dror, “You must have filmed much more than the film’s 100 minutes.  Did you bend the material to fit your message?”

“No,” he replies.  ”There was plenty of film that was left on the cutting room floor.  What you see is the essence of the story.  Six more hours will be shown on the government-run Channel 1 this coming June.”

Next question: “How did you come up with the idea for the film?”

Dror says he completed “Sharon,” a documentary about Israel’s former prime minister, Ariel Sharon, before he suffered a coma.  It was then that he learned plenty about Israel’s Secret Service .

“How did you convince these secret men to open up?” comes from the back row.

The director smiles.  He says he convinced one of the Shin Bet’s former heads, who, in turn, convinced his “buddies” to cooperate.

Time’s up.  The audience shuffles out, still shaken by the images and sounds of the film.  The crowd for the second showing filters through the doors.

We get in the car and drive off.

Will violence ever cease?  Here’s the population scorecard in the West Bank, aka occupied territory, aka Judea and Samaria: Jews – 325,000.  Arabs 2,500,000 – a ratio of 8 to 1.  For how long will Israel be able to put its finger in the wall, to plug up the hole, to keep the floodwaters from rolling in?  If a dimplomatic solution is ever reached and most of the Jewish settlers are ordered to leave, will they?

Unlikely.

Why?  Because according to Amos Harel, a military commentator and journalist for Haaretz left-wing paper, Israel’s population has shifted its ideology to the right.  In a Sept. 2012 story in the New Yorker, by David Remnick, Amos is quoted:

“And the military itself is becoming more and more heavily populated by religious Zionists—soldiers and officers who would be, at best, reluctant to follow orders to dismantle Yitzhar or Givat Ze’ev or Beitar Illit. In 1990, only two per cent of the infantry’s officer training corps was religious; now the figure is forty-two per cent. “People here fail to understand this profound change…They still think of an army of kibbutzniks, the way it used to be.”

I roll down the car window, slow down, take in the Galilee sunshine.  In 1967, a solution was easier, in 1973 it became harder, in 2002, harder still, in 2013 almost impossible.

Are we just kicking the can to future generations?

Will no one listen to the Gatekeepers?

________________________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

Boston is not in Galilee

Number of Israelis killed by suicide bombings years 1993-2009
(courtesy of Wikipedia)

The images of the recent Boston Marathon bombing were hard to watch.  Confusion, mayhem, running for cover, tending to the injured.  It reminded me of the suicide bombings in Israel of yesteryear.  The attacks, mostly carried out by Hamas, reached their peak in 2002.  Since then, a 20-foot high concrete wall was erected along the West Bank with multiple checkpoints.  It proved to be very effective in thwarting terrorist attacks, as can be seen by the graph above.

You’d think that after a decade of quite, Israel would let down its guard.  But you’d be wrong.  It’s been almost two years since my return to Israel from the United States, and security is as tough as it ever was.

Only now, I don’t notice it as much.  Security is part of life.  Much like after 9/11, we all have to remove our shoes and expose our smelly socks at airport security, here, in Israel, we all have to follow the rules.

armed guard at school entrance

Security is all around, and around the clock.  I encounter it as early as eight in the morning, the time I drop off my daughters at school.  I go through an iron gate and stop.  An armed guard approaches.  ”Good Morning,” I say.  He leans into the car window, sees my half-asleep girls in the backseat, pulls away from the car, gives me the nod to proceed.  In my rear-view mirror I see him return to his booth, a gun in his holster.  I don’t give it a moment’s thought.  It’s how it is.

There’s a guard at the entrance to the supermarket.  He’s carrying a gut.  He must be getting free samples from the bakery.  In his hands he holds a metal detector wand.  He hardly uses it.  After years on the job, he’s an expert at profiling.  He knows the good guys from the bad.  And the market we frequent caters to both Jewish and Arab Israelis.  Somehow, using a sixth sense, he knows what he needs to know.

entrance to shopping center

Once I’m done with the groceries, I drop them off at home and my wife and I head to an open-air, large shopping center some 20 minutes from our house.  I slow down my car at the checkpoint.  Two young guards man the post.  I know the routine.  I roll the car forward, then stop.  I see his familiar hand gesture to pop open the trunk.  I follow his instructions.  The engine’s still running.  I hear a tap  on the trunk, my signal that all is clear.  I enter.  It’s that quick, that simple.  Do what they tell you, and you won’t even notice this tiny intrusion into your life.

After shopping for clothes and housewares, we’re hungry.  We dine at Joe’s Cafe.  The guard measures us for an instant, lets us through.  We step up to the hostess and ask for a table in the back.  We sip our coffee, dig into our salads and sandwiches.

Guard at entrance to Cafe Joe

“Check, please.”

Security Fee added to restaurant check

Once it arrives, I notice that we’ve been charged a “security fee” of 4 shekels ($1.10).  The fee is meant to cover the expense of keeping a security guard on the premises.  Not all businesses charge a fee.  Many have raised a stink about having to “subsidize” the cost of security, but many see it as a necessary evil .

Drink up, your coffee is getting cold.

We get in the car and drive home, walk through our house gate.  No guard here.

“What’s for dinner?” my 14-year-old twin girls ask.

They’re safe.

It’s a wonderful day in Galilee.

Boston, we love you.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

Kabbalah secrets for a handful of shekels

The phone rings.  I lift the receiver.  It’s a recording: “Redemption is here.  We’re heading to the Wailing (Western) Wall this week.  Tell us of your prayers and we will insert them into the stones of the Wall.  Your prayer will be answered.  Call this number today and join the hundreds who’d witnessed redemption.”

Believers at Mt. Meron

I hang up.

Last week, days before Lag BaOmer holiday, a sixteen-page pamphlet arrived in the mail.  The pamphlet speaks of the miracles of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, a 2nd century Jewish sage who revealed the secrets of the Kabbalah, or Jewish Mysticism.   Lag BaOmer commemorates and celebrates  the Rabbi’s life almost 2000 years ago.  The pilgrimage to his burial site on Mt. Meron in Galilee draws thousands of believers each year.  This year, during LagBaomer, a record is broken.  Almost 400,ooo believers came from across Israel to light the bonfire on Mt. Meron.  That’s 5% (!) of Israel’s population in one place, at one time.  That’s the equivalent of 16,000,000 (!) Americans coming to one place, at one time.

Sorry, Woodstock.

There’s no Jimi Hendrix here, but plenty of men dancing into the night, plenty of prayers.  Hundreds of orthodox boys, age 3, surrender their hair locks to a pair of scissors for the first time.  According to tradition, just as the tree bears the best fruit after the third year, so are the boys who are ripe to learn the Torah.

The travel to Mt. Meron is a logistical nightmare.  Hundreds of buses snake their way north.  Police and paramedics are stationed everywhere.  Campgrounds are packed solid.  Many suffer from heat strokes and dehydration.

Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai Brochure

I skim through the pages and headlines of the Kabbalah pamphlet.  If the Hebrew were to be switched to English, you’d think you’re looking at a Scientology brochure.  The pictures are full-color, vivid, striking.  There’s one of a giant keyhole through which a light shines through.  Several figures appear to be walking toward the light, through the keyhole.  The headline reads: “What happened to 3522 people who’d received this brochure last year?”

I want to find out.

“Last year, inside the ‘Miracles Magazine,’ in a rare event, we chose to reveal the secrets of the Kabbalah.”

On the next page there’s a personal story from Yael Bitton, a 42 year-old woman who’d gotten married.  A Miracle!

“1027 people have gotten married!”

“734 sick people found a cure!”

“The tumor disappeared!”

The article tells of a 5 year-old girl who was diagnosed with a tumor.  After the child’s grandmother  had “joined” the family of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, the doctor came out of the operating room and said: “I’ve never seen anything like it.  It’s as if someone has removed it.  It’s gone!”

A man who’d “joined” said: “A rocket from Hamas terrorists missed hitting me by just seconds.”

Lighting the Bonfire

“630 parents had tried to have a child but failed.  Once they joined the family of the Rabbi the mothers were able to conceive.”

One such person seeking help was my brother-in-law.  He’s not religious, not in the least.  Three years ago he built a house and the contractor made off with his money.  His friend said, “Go to Rabbi Bar Yochai and you’ll get your money back.”  One night my brother-in-law left the house early to beat the crowd.  He arrived well before midnight.  The place teemed with people.  Ushers and security personnel manned the gates; they let in ten people at a time.  Once inside, a rabbi placed his hand on each of their heads, told them their prayers will be answered, and were told to leave quickly.

Next!

The tradition of cutting a boy’s hair for the first time at age three

My brother-in-law waited until 2am, and seeing that the crowd continued to thicken, he turned back and went home.

The Center’s website offers success stories through video.  In it, a woman tells of pains that went away.  An older, childless man says that he finally got the son he wanted.  A man who suffered from dizzy spells became cured after he’d joined and donated to the center.

Want a newborn, a cure, money, love?  Just sign up for automatic contributions from your checking account each month.  Or send in your donations.

The phone rings.  I lift the handset.  It’s a recording.  This one’s about dental implants.

I hang up.

 ________________________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

Israel’s Memorial Day

A few days ago we observed Israel’s Memorial Day and 24 hours later, we celebrated Independence Day.  It’s no coincidence.  For years there was talk of separating the dates, yet 2/3 of Israelis believe they should be kept together: reflection, prayers, ceremonies, mourning for the fallen soldiers who’d sacrificed their lives for the nation followed immediately by fireworks, picnics, bbq’s.

Talk about a sharp transition.

As a kid growing up in Israel, the flag and Israel were one.  We wrapped our bodies in them.  We smashed noise-making, plastic hammers over the heads of adults, watched military parades march down the boulevards, threw our chests out in pride, watched fighter jets streak the sky above, sank our teeth into husks of corn, and licked the sugar from swirls of cotton candy.

Memorial Day Wreath for the Fallen

It may not have been a romantic age (we had a war every decade), but no one dared to think of Israel other than a small country against big enemies.

This notion is still true today, but you can’t help but notice that at age 65, Israel’s age is showing.  It’s no longer the ideal of yesteryear, that of the pioneers.  This week, for instance, in the days leading up to Independence Day, teenage boys and girls could be seen dashing across busy intersections in the cities, in the countryside, everywhere.  They’re not hawking bags of oranges or baskets of strawberries.   Instead, they’re selling Israeli flags to drivers at a red light.  Business is brisk.

But not everywhere.

A recent survey confirmed an uneven support for the buying of the flags.  They are snatched up in Jerusalem among the religious.  The ultra-orthodox, a fringe yet vocal group, oppose Israel altogether.  They wouldn’t be caught dead with the flag.  As for the Arab Israelis, they wouldn’t be caught dead or alive with the flag.

That leaves the secular, the people in towns, the kibbutniks, the hard-core seniors.  They wave the flags proudly, hoist them on every pole, stick them on car rooftops, hang them from every balcony.  Yet many of the flags go begging in Tel Aviv.  Why?  Don’t they love their country?  It seems their patriotism comes with questions.

Memorial Day is a solemn affair.  At 11 AM, sirens wail for 2 minutes across the nation.  Everything comes to a stand still.  Cars stop.  Buses stop.  The young and old lower their heads.  Ceremonies are held.  Gun salutes.  Tributes.  The lowering of the flag to half-mast.  Speeches by the prime minister, the president.  The radio plays patriotic songs for 24 hours.  There are no soccer games, game shows, comedies, or movies on television.  Stores close early.  My daughters attend a ceremony at their school in Galilee, hear speeches, listen to sad songs.

The nation unites.

Among all this unity there are pockets of dissent.  And it comes from the most unlikely place.  It comes from some of the mothers and fathers who had lost their sons in battle.  They find no solace in being honored during Memorial Day.  They’re the minority still.  They love Israel.  They didn’t pack up and leave the country.  They want change.

Israel’s Flag at Half-Mast

The grieving parents, and sometimes the siblings of the deceased want to be left alone.  They want to grieve in private.  They don’t want the national scrutiny, the attention, the adulation.  One mother had said she was robbed of what to inscribe on her son’s tombstone.  She wanted inscribe that her son was survived by his brother and sister.  The military refused.  In that respect it’s not much different from the American G.I. (General Issue).  All tanks are manufactured the same, all army boots are sewn to a specific standard, all uniforms, mess kits, rifles, helmets are General Issue, as are the men and women.  They are but one component of the war machine.  And for that reason, the Israeli military allows one inscription on the stone: “Had fallen bravely in defense of the nation.”

To question Memorial Day is to question loyalty.  This may explain why Channel 2, in its effort to air opposing views, but also not alienate its core viewers, chose to air the controversial documentary “It’s Good to Die for Our Country” at 11 at night, well beyond prime-time.

In the film, writers and thinkers, all of whom had lost their sons or loved ones in war, no longer want the “worship of mourning” and the “glorification of death,” in their words.

Independence Day Performance in Kfar Tavor, Galilee

In the afternoon, my daughter Maya asks for help with her geography homework.  The assignment for Memorial Day: Identify villages and towns on the map that were named after the fallen.  Since Israel’s founding in 1948, some 24,000 had lost their lives in wars, acts of terror.

At 8 at night, Memorial Day is over.  Time to wipe away the tears and to celebrate Independence Day.  At hour later, we join 2500 residents in Kfar Tavor at the central park to view a comedy show, to sing, to ooh and aah over the fabulous fire works.

Happy Birthday, Israel.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

Masada Falls Yet Stands

My family and I are stationed at the base of Mt. Masada to buy cable car tickets.  After a three-minute ride inside a crowded car with some one-hundred eager tourists, we’re whisked to the very top.  We are released into the thick, still air.  The Dead Sea shimmers in the east.  The sun pounds the chalk-white terrain.  To describe the landscape is to describe the craters of the moon.  Neil Armstrong of Apollo 11 could have easily practiced his lunar walk around here.

Masada Cable Car

Map of Masada Plateau

Tourists disperse on the wide plateau, their maps unfolded, their eyes searching for 2000 year-old antiquities.  They follow their tour guides who speak of King Herod’s palatial rooms, mosaic floors, and bathhouses atop Masada.  French, Spanish and English is heard everywhere.  The guides are retelling the heroic story of the Jews against the Roman Empire.  The few against the many.  The narrative goes something like this: The Romans destroyed the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.  The remaining Jews escaped to the Judean Desert and took refuge on Masada.  The Romans lay siege to the place.  The Jews put up a good fight but in the end the Romans breached the fortress walls only to find that the 960 men, women and children had committed suicide, choosing death over slavery.

The End.

Or is it?

For years Masada stood for bravery in the Israeli consciousness.  The mountain and its story had forged a new generation of hard-core Israelis, much different from the submissive Jews of the Diaspora.  ”Masada shall never fall again!” was chanted at school rallies, in the army.

The climb to King Herod’s palace

The drum beat today is not as loud.  Attendance by Israelis at Masada is at an all-time low.  Paratroopers who once celebrated the end of their training at the top of Masada choose today to celebrate the event at the Western Wall and elsewhere.

Why the change?

The seeds were already planted in 1946, by Ben Gurion, who was to be Israel’s first prime minister in 1948.  He didn’t care for all that “suicide” story.  To win the battle against the Arabs, he advised his men to fight to the bitter end.  To him Masada was a symbol of hopeless resistance.

In the 70s the American State Department urged Golda Meir, the then prime minister, to ditch the “Masada Complex.”  In other words, to ditch the view that everyone’s after the Jews, that they’re one step away from extinction.  Golda shot back and said, “We suffer from the Masada Complex, the Pogrom Complex, the Hitler Complex.”

Menachem Begin, the hard-line prime-minster who’d eventually signed a peace treaty with Egypt, he too didn’t care much for the suicide narrative.

The attitude towards Masada and its significance is changing.  Maybe it has to do with Israel now being all grown up.  It doesn’t need a hard-luck story to justify its existence.  And there’s also archeology and historical data.  They are now being questioned.

Take, for example, the number of Jews killed or committed suicide.  Yigael Yadin, Israel’s renowned archeologist of the 1960s, led a highly public excavation of Masada, partly funded by the English newspaper, The Observer.  Three human remains were found.  The hair braids of one woman were also found.  Yadin claimed they were Jewish.  After much Rabbinical debate, the remains were given a proper Jewish burial ceremony.  Years later, after further forensic investigation, it is believed they were Romans.  Twenty-eight other human fragments were also found.  With them, pig bones were buried, a typical Roman burial ritual.

View from Masada plateau

So where are the Jews?  We live in an age when we want quick answers and want all the puzzle pieces to fit nicely.  Their absence doesn’t mean they weren’t there.  It just means, for now, they weren’t found.  Or they were carried away, disposed of, burned.  Or…put in your own theory.

And what about the drawn-out siege that lasted almost three years, until 74 A.D.?  It is now believed the siege lasted several weeks or months at best.  The slopes of the mountain are steep and impassable on all sides, except the western.  The Romans with their 10,000 warriors, auxiliary fighters, Jewish POW, and slaves dumped thousands of tons of rocks and stones to create a ramp to the top.  It was all over sooner rather than later.

Cooling off at Ein Gedi Falls

And what about the heroic Jews who chose death over slavery?  The fighters were called the Sicarii, or the dagger-men.  For good reason.  The conventional story was that they fled burning Jerusalem and took refuge on King Herod’s abandoned place – MASADA.  Many now believe they were driven out, kicked out of Jerusalem, because they were blood-thirsty trouble-makers.  Before being holed-up in Masada, these Sicarii men had raided Ein Gedi, a Jewish desert oasis, killed its 700 inhabitants, then looted their food and provisions.

Then there’s the suicide?  Did it happen?  Eleazar Ben Yair, the Sicarii leader, proposed drawing a lot, a “Roman Roulette” of sorts.  The men would first kill off their wives so they will not be defiled by the Romans.  Then the men killed each other off.  Only the last man standing committed suicide.  The story tells of “one old lady” who survived to tell of the horror.  In fact, Josephus Flavius, the Jewish-Roman historian stationed in Rome and the only known person to write about Masada, in Greek, spoke of 7 survivors…

Lastly, what business did the Romans have in this desolate, remote, barren place?  Weren’t they better off splashing water on each other’s back in some bathhouse in Rome?  Weren’t they better off nibbling on a bunch of grapes and watching gladiators fight in the arena?  Why trek across a harsh desert to chase after a few hoodlums?  It can only be that it was all part of the Roman war machine.  No one takes over a fortress and calls it its own.  It all belongs to Rome.  The cost in human lives, in material was inconsequential.  Punish and all will learn.  All will fear.

For 1900 years Masada stood as a rock in a desert until it was “discovered”.

Rome fell and is long gone.

Yet Masada stands.

Israel stands.

Two hours later we take the cable car down, see the minerals fog lift off from the face of the Dead Sea.

“How about lunch?” I ask.

“Yeah, Dad, we’re hungry!”

“Roman pizza, anyone?”

Maybe something Roman did survive.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

The Men Behind the Olives in Galilee

The “Shaking” Machine at work

“It’s a blustery day,” would be something Winnie the Pooh would have said about one chilly day in Galilee last December.  I step outside my house in a hat and a windbreaker and await my ride to the fields.

Allon, a fifty-something farmer, and a longtime resident of Kfar Tavor, shows up in his truck.  ”Get in,” he says.  ”We’re running late.”  Ten minutes later, we arrive at a large olive grove.  The ground is heavy and soggy.  I climb onto a large tractor that makes its way to the first row of  olive trees.  It’s a race against time.  The rain will soon return, making the picking of the olives much more difficult.

Allon at the Controls

Allon is a seasoned farmer in Galilee.  He’d also gone to California’s Central Valley to learn the latest farming methods.  He owns thousands of almond trees.  And a small vineyard.  But today he’s working as an olive-picking contractor.  He’s renting out his Italian-made equipment.

For me, who’d long thought apples, oranges, chicken breast (and olive oil) came from the supermarket, today’s a vivid reminder of how a farmer’s life  and fortune are unpredictable.  Olive oil is big business.  The olives must be picked within days or the entire year’s crop will be ruined.  The olive press facility is booked solid, operates 24/7.  There’s a time slot assigned to this one harvest.  You don’t show up, they’ll press someone else’s olives.

The farmer wheels his tractor inside the grove, unloads a stack of empty crates.  Allon goes to work.  In his hands he holds a joy-stick with levers, controls the “shaker” machine remotely.  Move one lever up and the mechanical arm of the machine snakes its way towards the tree trunk.  Toggle another lever and the clamp, the “mouth” of the machine, wraps itself around the trunk like a noose.

Loosening the olives off the branches with sticks

This is when the men show up.   Six farmhands, all foreign — Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese — spread a wide tarp on the ground, at the foot of the tree.  It’s cool, the sun has lost its punch, yet the Oriental men cover their faces in scarves, bandannas, sunglasses.  I question Allon.  ”They don’t want to burn their skin,” he says.  ”To them, black is not good.”  He then signals them with a head nod.  The men produce long, stiff wood sticks.  They swing the sticks and whack the olive branches overhead.  Again.  Again.  And again.  That’s the first step in “loosening” the tree.  If the trees could talk, they would cry.  Whack!  The branches quiver in the wind.

Allon smiles, exposes a wide gap in his teeth.  It’s time to bring in the big guns.  ”Stay to my right,” he tells me, urging me to keep away from the long metal arm that slithers towards the tree.  He illustrates how the clamp grabs the trunk.  ”It’s like sex,” he explains, motioning to how the arm glides under the tree canopy, under its “skirt.”  The sexual references don’t end there.  As the expert in the field, pun intended, he says the ideal tree trunk must have an “erection” – in other words, straight and without a bend.  ”This way the clamp can get a good grip.”

He laughs.  I can’t help but laugh too.

One final toggle of the joy-stick and the show begins.  The tree begins to shake violently, as if possessed by demons.  It’s no wonder the Italian machine is called “The Tornado.”  The branches shake; they’re out-of-focus.  The noise is similar to that of a blender at full grind.  Hundreds, if not thousands of olives are released from the tree, glide in the air, and fall as casualties on the tarp below.

One tree done.  Five hundred to go.

“Why do you push the schedule to its limit?” I ask, thinking one false move, someone calls in sick, the machine breaks downs, and it’s all lost.

“It’s a calculated risk,” he says.  ”We wait until the last minute because that’s when the fruit (the olives) are at their heaviest.  They’re at maximum ripeness.  And they carry maximum oil.  They WANT to fall off the trees.  We just help mother-nature.”

The men lift the edges of the tarp and push the olives — green, black, purple — to the center, and from there, to the conveyor belt.  A large air blower blows off the leaves before the olives are dumped into the crates.

These Oriental men replaced the Arab men of yesteryear.  The men are “imported” to Israel.  Allon is their caretaker.  The men are under a work contract for a few years.  When done, they’ll return home with the money they’d saved.  In the meantime, Allon provides them with shelter (bungalows in a nearby village), medical care, and wages.  A Thai man calls out to the Chinese man in Hebrew: “Bring the crates over here!”

Hebrew is the one thing that unites them!

Each crate contains 900 pounds of olives (400 KG)

Within two days Allon and his crew will have picked the olives off the five hundred trees.  They will turn bare.  The fruit will be hauled to the olive press in an Arab village.  After four nights of pressing and squeezing, the fruit will surrender its juices and produce the finest olive oil.

See you at the market.

____________________________________________________________________________

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.

Is that Big Brother in your Pocket?

Your neighbor’s raking in millions and you’re struggling to come up with mortgage or rent money.  You drive to work in a beat-up Volkswagen and your boss pulls into his reserved parking space with a shiny BMW.

I ask you: Is that fair?

The handyman who fixed your toilet last month just got back from a week’s vacation in Italy.  Sorry, you can’t step into the elevator with him because it’s taken up with his three Gucci suitcases.

You’re fuming.  You kick the elevator door.  You’re mad.  But then what?

If you’re in Israel, don’t get mad.  Get even.

How?

If you suspect the neighbor, the boss, the handyman is not paying his fair share of taxes — just snitch on him to the authorities and watch him boil in hot (olive) oil.

This is all thanks to Israel’s Tax Authority and its  latest initiative to raise 20 billion shekels (5 billion dollars) in uncollected taxes over the next four years.  Israel, a Middle Eastern and Mediterranean country, wants to model its moral code, according to its fiance minister, after the “honest” countries of Northern Europe (Sweden, Norway).

Good luck.

This tax-collection drive is the latest wrinkle in today’s “share the burden” phenomenon.  The scenario goes something like this:  The Middle Class is being wrongfully squeezed.  It shares the majority of the burden; it pays more in income tax, serves in the military while the well-connected, the Orthodox Jews, and the Arabs get a free ride.

It’s time to level the playing field.

“Justice Hotline”

The informants are encouraged to call the “Justice Hotline” anonymously and report the cheaters.  Since the “Justice Hotline” was first launched a few weeks ago, thousands of calls came pouring in.  The informants rat on plumbers, repairmen who give a small discount in exchange for getting cash.  No receipts, no invoices, thank-you-very-much.  They snitch on cab drivers who don’t care to turn on the meter.  They inform of dentists who drill a hole in your tooth and in your pocket, of piano teachers who sing all the way to the bank, of  landlords who act like lords, of math tutors who add their own numbers.

Cheaters unable to sleep at night are counting sheep.  And Shekels.

Big Brother is watching.

Greed and jealousy are what drives most calls.  It’s neighbor against neighbor.  Family members who have a score to settle.  On a recent news program the 5 staff members sitting at the Tax Authority switchboard were overwhelmed with calls.

Opponents are quick to criticize the campaign.  ”It will collect pennies on the dollar,” they say, while the Fat Cats, Israel’s multi-national corporations (Teva, Osem, etc) use the loopholes to pay little or no taxes.  They say it’s all a smoke screen to divert attention from other pressing problems: housing, education, the political stalemate.

In a sense, the government has turned the average Yossi into its tax-collector.

How?

The original 1.0 Version has been upgraded.

Informants that come forward and identify themselves can share in the loot.  If the tax-evader is found guilty and is told to pay up, the snitcher collects 15% of the total.

Ka-Ching!  Ka-Ching!  Cash registers are ringing from Galilee to Tel-Aviv to Eilat.

It’s doubtful the taxman will be able to collect the monies they’re projecting.  If anything, it’s a powerful deterrent.  People might think twice before they settle for cash only.

Recently hundreds of private tutors received a text message on their cell-phones.  It warned them to report ALL transactions, or else.  It later turned out to be a clever hoax.

Or was it?

As for me, I plan to wire my few Shekels to Switzerland.  After all, it’s pretty close to Northern Europe.

Below is a campaign from the Tax Authority to all citizens to do their “civic duty” for the benefit of all.

Maurice Labi is an Israeli-American who lived in Los Angeles for many years. In 2011 He returned to Northern Israel (Galilee) with his wife and twin teen-age daughters. He is of two lands, of two cultures and he blogs about his experiences in Israel, particularly from Galilee where Jews and Arabs dwelled for centuries.

He has also written three novels: “Jupiter’s Stone,” “Into the Night,” and “American Moth” — available at Amazon.com or BN.com.