A very good friend of mine was invited last Wednesday on a trip to Israel, for free, on the following Sunday. He applied to work for a political action committee (PAC), a lobby on Capitol Hill, and they hired him over the phone. Truth be told, he had no idea what he was hired to do, what exactly his role was, or what they expected from him. They just said, "Come to Israel for 8 days, for free, and get the real inside scoop on the government." This organization, which I will not directly name, is the second most powerful lobby in America. Let's just say this: If you hate the corruption on Capitol Hill, you'll name this group. If you hate Israel, you'll name them. Those that say 'Jews control everything,' cite this PAC first.

So, my buddy goes on the trip, only to find out that he absolutely hates it all. All the kids are pompous, egotistical, selfish brats; their only goal is to be wielders of supreme power. One kid started every new statement with the declaration, "When I'm a Congressman..." Who does that? Naturally, I asked if the other kids all rolled their eyes. He responded, "Nope. They all thought, 'Well, that's fine, but...When I'm a Senator.'" Half of them want to be Congressmen. The other half want to be Congresswomen.

The point of this post is about the last governmental trip they made. This organization, considering its influence, is able to get insider access to things that normally are off-limits to Israeli government workers themselves. For example, they toured one of the Israeli rocket companies factory. They sat in the 'head of state' section during a live parliament session. The prime minister's spokesman had a private meeting with them. And so on.

The last trip that they made was to the police's headquarters here in Jerusalem. First, they had to be individually screened just to be let inside the premises. This is fairly normal for Israel, to have your bag checked or to go through a metal detector, but they were screened, if you catch my drift. Next, to go into a more sensitive area, their faces were biometrically scanned. They had to step up to a computer monitor on the wall, stand close to it, and stand still as the sensors made a digital map of their face. Finally, they found themselves in the anti-terrorism nerve-center operated by highly trained computer techs and the number one anti-terrorism force in the world.

They were led into a large room, like something you'd see in a movie about impending nuclear war, with monitors all over the walls, men and women in uniform, and strange codewords floating through the air. The guide showed them a wall of security feeds, each showing different areas of Jerusalem. A technician is able to move the position of the camera, in real time, with a pure high definition feed not skipping a beat. From the downtown district to the Western Wall in the Old City, these cameras have a tighter lock on Jerusalem than Webster does on the dictionary. The camera quality is so good that the technician directed the to a live feed, moved the camera on its pivot, and proceeded to zoom in all the way onto a rabbis prayer book, displaying the letters on the page as vividly as if you were reading it yourself. 100% true story.

After sufficiently blowing their minds, the guide led them to a conference room, where the group had an interview with a New York City anti-terrorism bigwig. This guy is in Jerusalem for a few months, in order to learn from the police how to fight terrorism. The NYC officer informed the group that he's been in law enforcement for thirty years, and he thought he knew everything, but in the couple months he's been around Israel, he feels like he is a new-born rookie. Jerusalem stops dozens of planned terrorist attacks each month, week, and sometimes each day. They are constantly on the move. I personally have witnessed a dozen packages and abandoned suitcases being torn apart by remote controlled robots, being charged with electricity, and even shot by the robot himself. Once, it was a real bomb, but they caught it just in the nick of time. If anyone has experience with terrorism, it is Jerusalem.

NYC is getting its anti-terror tactics from real pros: The Jerusalem Municipal Underpaid Overworked Police Force. So don't worry about me over here, we're protecting you, New York.

Click on the picture for a larger view.

Honestly, how can you look at that picture and not understand why a young Jewish person wouldn't want to be here?

www.popular-pics.com

I don't know how many of you follow the news, but if you even glanced at it, you'll see that the former Pakistani Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, has been assassinated. Over the past few months there has been a restriction on freedoms and civil rights by Musharraf, the current Prime Minister, and Bhutto was fairly outspoken on the regression of the Pakistani government and society. Pakistan is a Muslim country, torn between extremist groups (they are heavy supporters of Al Qaida) and moderates (such as Bhutto).

Everyone saw Bhutto as a great "bridge" between the Western world and entrenched Muslim societies. She could have served in some type of special position, a position to rectify the differences that often find our two spheres in conflict. She was also a potential peace-broker for Israel and the Middle East, considering her ability to relate to the Muslims, and her slightly more moderate stance (relative to, I dunno, Hamas negotiators).

But, alas, she was gunned down. Assasinated. This situation is just about the same to Pakistan as the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin was to Israel. Or JFK to America. Kinda. Also, she was killed in the same location, after giving a speech, as the first prime minister of the country.

The greatest chance of true democracy and personal freedoms in Pakistan has just died. Another country bound to support terror and Islamic facism? Maybe. Probably. Quite likely.

And the rioting begins...

Merry Christmas to all of you celebrators out there. Peace, Love, and Harmony to every human, Christian or Shinto.

Anyway, you all should check out this article about today's immigration of Iranian Jews to Israel.

The history of Jews in Iran is really quite old, but the majority of this minority left Iran by the 1980s. The Shah's regime fell and was replaced with the anti-progressive, regressive, Iranian theocracy that has seen the rise of a modern day Hitler. So, us Jews in Israel are thanking our stars that the 200 new Israelis this year are from the most tumultuous place in the world; at least for Jews.

It's funny for me to read the news and hear the world support Iran, in her nuclear ambitions, and then to hear about these immigrants. I came to Israel for positive reasons, to elevate myself in Judaism and to join in the struggle for the future of this free, democratic state. Those Jews had the devil behind their backs, chasing them, tearing away their freedoms and threatening their survival. I came on my own terms. They came because of the nature of other people. I came because it's hard to learn Hebrew in America. They came because Hebrew is illegal in Iran! I came voluntarily; they were nearly forced to.

If ever Jews and Christians were both celebrating on Christmas, today is that day!

According to most all societies in the world, I rank among the taller crowd. I like to think that I tower above you mere ants, looking down upon your bald spots and dandruff, atop my position of prestige;-- just kidding? No, honestly, I realize that I am taller, but I don't think about it or find it to make me different from anyone else. This is just who I am.

Nationalities, or ethnicities, have general height parameters. The German and Scandinavian blood-lines tend to be quite tall. Various Asian ethnicities find their people to be extraordinarily short, at least by what we're used to in America. Along those lines, Israelis (Jews, remember), tend to be of medium height. Just like America, Israel is chock full of people from all over the world. The Russians here are generally tall, while the Sephardic (Middle-Eastern) Jews are generally shorter, at least in relation to the Ashkenazim (European Jews). So, like America, the average height is in the mid to upper five foot range, with quite a few six footers, and quite a few baseline five footers. So, I'm not like a Jewish Yao Ming out here, or something.

That being said, children find me to be monstrously tall no matter where I go in the world. This past school year I was babysitting a family of mentally challenged kids once a week, and found myself playing with about 15 kids from the cul-de-sac all day long, each week. The 6 year olds couldn't get enough of climbing all over me, wanting to see what it is like up in the clouds. I'm big compared to the typical 4 foot child.

So, I was walking down the street with a friend a few days ago, minding my own business, when we chanced upon a group of 11 year olds lazily kicking a soccer ball around. We were on course to walk by them, and from a block away I saw them all start staring. I was with an attractive female, so I wasn't thinking anything of it, until we were close-by and noticed that all eyes were on me.

"He looks like a basketball player!"
"No, he looks like a... He looks like a murderer!"
"Murderer, Murderer, MURDERER!!!"

I was wearing a grey and black outfit... So I grabbed my friend, looked behind me at the crowd, and pretended to go James Bond on her. The kids loved it. Hey, what can I say, I was born to be in the Mossad.

The conventional way to get a raise in this country is by striking. One of the teacher unions has been on strike for about two months or so, asking for a raise and more class-time per week. They finally ended the drawn-out affair, with a whopping 55 day vacation. This was a big deal, a huge deal, which struck at the heart of Israel's true concern: A piss-poor education system, due to budgetary constraints. The frustration on both sides, governmental and educational, was so palpable that a month ago there was a rally of a hundred thousand people in Tel Aviv; certainly the biggest in Israeli history, and according to a friend, the biggest education rally in a Western country.

The protesters could be seen everywhere for those two months. Children and parents, teachers and administrators, walking down the street with signs and whistles, chants and donation pleas -- they were everywhere. It was really a sight to see. For two months they could be found on Emek Refaim, a street commonly packed with Americans, here in Jerusalem, walking up and down with billboards. Then, one could walk down my own street, an out of the way area of Jerusalem, and see 50 kids protesting the government's lack of funding. The ability of these people to strike is really remarkable...but I suppose they have plenty of experience.

Anyway, today on Jpost.com, an English news source in Israel, there is an article about the government considering a 'privatization of the ulpanim.' An ulpan is an intensive Hebrew language course, which is essential for a country like Israel. Israel was built on the backs of immigrants, and after WW2 the country was flooded with people speaking literally dozens of languages. Spanish to Arabic to French to German to Russian to Farsi to Hungarian to English to Dutch to Greek to Italian to Martian -- the list does not stop. So, the country had to come up with a way to teach all these people the common Jewish language, Hebrew. The ulpan was born, and its need is still pressing, with immigrants coming from every continent on earth (and if there were Jews on Antarctica, they'd come from there as well).

I myself participated in a shortened ulpan almost two years ago, and it did more for my Hebrew in a month than any college course could do in two years! Starting January 15th, I'm starting a 5 month program; 5 months, 5 days a week, 5 hours a day. That's immersion, but it does the trick, and it's the #1 thing on my plate. I'm going to give it my all, and even if I'm the worst in my class (which I won't be), I will still learn volumes worth. And, the beautiful part is, this course is free for me because I'm a new citizen. The way the government has it set up is that when a new citizen arrives, they have a few years to take an ulpan for free. No strings attached. This is a Hebrew speaking country, and if you don't speak it, there is no way to really break into society. If you're a Mexican in America, you've gotta learn to speak English in order to get nearly any non-labor jobs. If you want to be a merchant in Japan, you better learn Japanese. If you want to work in Israel, it's best to speak Hebrew -- and the government knows, and actively encourages this integration.

So, in order to make room for the new budget for these teachers, the ones that were on strike, the government is strongly considering letting go of this necessary system. A system that has worked charms for 60 years. Amihai, the director-general of the Education Ministry, says that they want to transfer the ulpan structure from Education to the Immigration Ministry, and effectively wipe their hands clean of the mess. The Jerusalem Post reports, "Amihai told the committee on Tuesday that the plan was indeed to reduce the number of ulpan teachers, which currently stands at 600, to a mere 300 by January 1 and to cut up to NIS 40 million from the ulpan budget, in order to cover the pay increase promised to the country's teachers after the recent teacher's strike." So, they would transfer the system to a weaker ministry, cut the budget by half, and also cut the work force by half...all before January 1st. That's about two weeks away.

I start my ulpan, the oldest ulpan in Israel, a government backed institution, in less than a month. I wonder if I will actually have an ulpan to go to?

The private ulpanim, like those at Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University, are well known to be the best in the country, but they aren't supported by the government, and therefore cost a pretty penny. Or should I say, a pretty shekel?

This whole situation reminds me of a guy that was running for governor of Virginia, a decade ago. Jim Gilmore ran his entire campaign on the slogan, "NO CAR TAX," and the scary part is that he won. I was 13 years old, but I still vividly remember those signs being everywhere. His scheme was pretty dumb, however, and they just siphoned off other taxes in order to support the Transportation Board...a scheme that did not work, and put the state into even worse debt. The correlation between the No Car Tax trick and the raise in the education budget here in Israel is that both systems are trying to keep an overall system balanced, while effectively unbalancing the entire structure. We cannot simply just will-it-to-be that these teachers can have a bigger budget, while nothing else changes. The raise for one thing must be a decrease for another. That does sound like balance, but in truth, everything here is under-budget, so by making one sector satisfied, another is forced into chains; Crippled.

Unfortunately, Israel has to spend an inordinate amount of her money on defense, money that should be spent on better causes. That's what baffles me when it comes to the American budget. Why exactly does America need to spend trillions on a military, while there is essentially zero need to defend the land? Israel is constantly in a struggle to hold on to its very capital, and so the military budget is necessary, even over the education of our children. The need to breathe is more important than the need to spell.

Still, somehow, Israel found the resources to protect a wave of Sudanese refugees knocking on our border, knocking because they knew that Israel had the heart to take them in, even for a little while.

So, maybe if the United Nations stepped in and did more than just talk, Israel could actually educate her children and her immigrants?