SPRING EVENING IN JERUSALEM

Having lunch in front of my hotel, facing the placid sea.
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Waiter says, "enjoy"
How can I not?
"I realize the view is a bit 'arsh but we are working on it"

Here, instead of looking west and imagining China or Japan, I look over the horizon and see Rhodes, Malta and Venice, and crusader ships arriving more than a thousand years ago for some ungodly godly reason.

It borders on the inconceivable that Israelis aren't trying harder to solve the mess that they are in; the country is so impressive, as an example of the resiliency of the human spirit. But for a people this dedicated to survival not to figure out an answer to this conundrum is ridiculous. While I sit here in a streetside cafe and read the Jerusalem post, with story after story of rockets smuggled and nuclear weapons debated and settlements built, though ordered dimantled, it's hard to believe that it's not some sort of trumpet call. Gideon, where are you? There are certainly walls that need bringing down.

Arak and grapefruit. Good stuff.

A distinct feeling of being in Brooklyn , with palm trees.

The Palestinians are like the people in Orlando who sold their land to Disney and then resented how well Walt did with it. If only the Israelis had already paid for it.
Now, what will be the price?

A beautiful spring evening
In tel aviv,
Why abandon the strawberries ?
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Cats. Cats everywhere. In fact, one of them just pooped in the potted plant near me in the restaurant. Downwind. Fortunately

A big, hulking guy walks by on the promenade, with an armfull of roses, maybe for his girlfriend. And the next persons to pass by, a couple, looked very disappointed in each other. We all live side by side, but so far away from each other.

Debbie , I am indulging my penchant for interrogating waiters.

I guess that it comes down to: who wants this land more?
Are Palestinians more of this land than they are Arab ? Who is most of this land?

Walking away from the beach, it's hard to leave this sybaritic outpost for the ascetic interior.

Who are the Israelis who deny the Israeli-Arabs the vote, refuse to give any tax money that the state collects from the Palestinians back to their community and will not allow some of the most common goods, like cilantro into the occupied areas on the excuse that it might compromise national security and then are perplexed when some people condemn them as oppressors. I haven't met those Israelis.

To paraphrase an old rabbi, l'haim 's a beach.

Had the best cappuccino since Italy.

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