Press release of protest against Naftali Bennett

Diaspora Jews, MASA Participants Stand Up Against Occupation at MASA Israel Closing Event

May 20th, 2013

Jerusalem - On Monday afternoon, at the MASA Israel closing ceremony held in the International Convention Center, a group of 30 young Jews interrupted Israeli Minister Naftali Bennett’s keynote address by chanting, “Diaspora Jews say ‘end the occupation,’ Diaspora Jews say ‘no to annexation.’” Participants simultaneously distributed hundreds of flyers throughout the audience highlighting Bennett’s staunch opposition to a just resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The group, members of “All That’s Left: Anti-Occupation Collective” and Hashomer Hatzair World Movement, persisted with the action until they were escorted out of the auditorium.

Outside, hundreds of MASA participants flowed out of the auditorium and engaged in conversations with the demonstrators. According to All That’s Left member Joshua Leifer, “the dialogue following the action led to frank and open discussions that aren’t being held enough in Diaspora Jewish communities.” The action was a success because the young Jewish activists were able to disrupt Bennett’s speech and engage with MASA participants in critical discussion.

The action was coordinated in response to MASA’s decision to select Minister Bennett as the keynote speaker at an event for young Diaspora Jewry. MASA is a joint project of the Israeli government and the Jewish Agency that brings thousands of young Diaspora Jews to Israel for gap year and study abroad programs. Naftali Bennett, director of the Yesha Settlements Council from 2010 to 2012 and current Economy Minister, has stated numerous times that he is “vehemently against a Palestinian state”[1] and has called for the annexation of 60% of the West Bank. Bennett not only supports but has also planned settlement building in the West Bank[2], in violation of international law[3].

The ideology that motivates Bennett’s political party, the Jewish Home, is a dangerous merger of racism, militarism and colonialism. In just one instance of racist rhetoric, Bennett told Arab Knesset Member Ahmed Tibi (Ta'al), “When you were still climbing trees… we had here a Jewish state.”[4] The young Jews who interrupted Bennett’s speech demonstrated that his policy proposals and political positions fundamentally contradict Diaspora Jews’ belief in equality, democracy and a just resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  The normalization of Bennett’s extremist discourse in the context of a MASA event was so deeply problematic that the young MASA participants considered it unacceptable. “MASA’s choice to invite Naftali Bennett as a keynote speaker to the event does not reflect my Zionism and reasons for coming to Israel,” remarked demonstrator Isabel Frey. “It was necessary to make clear that there also are young Zionists that do not support the occupation, Bennett and his position.” Deeply disturbed by Israel’s turn to the right, the rise of racist violence, and the continued occupation of the West Bank, Isabel and other young Jewish activists decided to stand up in defense of the age-old Jewish commitment to social justice.

VIDEO OF THE PROTEST: https://vimeo.com/66574324

Sock politics OR How young socialists learned about the problems of common property

Today is the day I ran out of socks. But not because I am lazy and didn't do my laundry, or because I am messy and lost them all. Today is the day on which I fully experienced consequences of socialism.  12 years of being part of a socialist-zionist youth movement, with which I am now on a gap year in Israel all the long discussions about political science could not make me realize the difficulties of common property. Though all it needed was a communa of 17 people to run out of socks.

Socks in general tend to be these magical garments that, after a while, mysteriously disappear and are never found again. It is only natural that 5 months into our program, most of the people only had a few single socks left. That was when sock-anarchy started: some people had bought a few new pairs socks, which where immediately stolen by the other people, who had none. If someone had a fresh pair of socks, they tried to hide them, but eventually every hiding place is found in a small communa house.  The most vulnerable were the people, who had just washed their socks and had to hang them up to dry. After each laundry, about half of the socks had disappeared.

When the distress of trying to get a peek at other people's feet in order to know if they were sock-robbers became unbearable, we followed classical communa protocol, sat all together in a round and tried to come up with ideas to stop the sock-war. Two parties emerged from the discussion: First there were the sock-socialists, who proposed to establish communal socks. There would be two boxes standing in our corridor, one for clean and one for dirty socks. Whenever someone in the communa would need a new pair of socks, that person would just take one from the clean sock box, and throw them in the dirty sock box later. They argued that since were all out of socks anyway we might as well take an ideological step forward and have an equal amount of sock-poverty.

In opposition to the socialist sock party a group of sock-capitalists formed. These were the people who had bought new pairs of socks but had had them all stolen from them, and wanted them back without switching to communal socks. It was clear to them that they would be worse off in a socialist sock system because they had more socks to loose. They also argued that if the whole communa ran out of socks, they would have none even though they would be taking care of their own socks.

After weeks of discussions at the dinner table, while remaining in a state of sock-anarchy, the socialist sock-party had managed to override the sock-capitalists, and soon the day arrived on which we threw all our socks into one box, decorated with a hammer-and-sickle symbol, with the hammer replaced by a sock. With the communal money we had even bought a few extra pairs, and everyone, even the defeated sock-capitalists seemed very satisfied at first. The fact that the system was working made us all very proud, since we were actually realizing our socialist ideals.

Today is the day we all ran out of socks. The clean sock box is empty except for a single worn-off sock with many holes in it, and the dirty sock box bursting with stinky socks in different colors, sizes and vapors and no one has volunteered to wash them so far. Now we are all truly experiencing what happens to communal property, even in a house of 17 people who define themselves as socialists. Tomorrow the house will probably reek of smelly foot odor and it will take a few more quarrels to have someone do the communal laundry, but it doesn't really matter. At least we are all in it together.

Back to school

In the past 12 years it has been a struggle to get up every morning, get ready, eat breakfast and arrive in school on time. After months of being able to sleep in most of the days, this struggle has just multiplied by 17. Why 17? For a few weeks now I been living in a house together in Haifa with my the 17 members of my kwutza. We are a communa - we share our money for food and house supplies, we cook and do the dishes in teams, we get together once a week to discuss budget, activities and issues with living together. So if 18 people have to get up every morning, get ready and eat breakfast there is no chance of all of them arriving in school on time. Today is our first day in the ulpan, the standardized hebrew course, and of course we arrive late.

I am in Level 0 with four of my friends, whom I live together with, and we definitely lower the age average in our class. All of the people in our class are "olim chadashim" ("new immigrants" in hebrew), which means they are people that are in the process of doing aliyah (immigration to Israel) and nearly all of them seem over 30 years old. In general, most of the olim chadashim are Russians, but in our class we also have South Americans, Ukranians, Mexicans and even one woman from Korea. The class starts with everyone having to say "ani" and their name, which means "I am". Even though we already know that much hebrew, it is still nice to be a good student once in a while.

After one round of names and where we are from, we have to say what our status is in Israel. All the other people in the class say "ani ole chadash", but when it's my turn, I don't quite know what to say and ask the teacher how to translate "living here for a year". She turns to the board and writes the hebrew word "tajeret", which means tourist. "No, we live here for a year, we're not tourists.", replies my friend Aliza from Italy. "Yes, yes, say ani tajeret." So much for our status.

During the break I speak to a man from my class, who said he is from Serbia. I discover that he has lived in Berlin for most of his life and speaks fluent German. Ben, my friend from France, also finds a French person to speak to. Aliza befriends a woman from Brazil, because she just learned to speak Portuguese on Kibbutz Holit. After having a whole program in English, everyone is happy to find people that speak their mothertongue. The break is not over yet, so I unpack my sandwich, that someone else made for me the night before. The sandwich is marked with my name, and there is a sweet letter in my snackback. I should return the favor soon.

Back in class, the next task is to say were we live, so everyone has to translate his home address. The teacher starts laughing when she realizes that we all live in the same house, and seems to be pleased with the thought of a communa. This moment makes me realize how uncommon it is to sit in a class, of which you live with four of the people in the class. These are no classical friendships, they are more like serious relationships. Most of the olim chadashim are only with their partner, if not completely on their own. Even though it might be easier for them to cook, clean, manage the budget and arrive in class on time, they must be lonely on some level.

Yes, living in a communa can be a bitch. Washing 18 plates and tons of pots and pans by hand is no fun at all, cooking 4 kg of pasta is a heavy operation, and the two bathrooms that we have are always occupied when you want to take a shower. But we still have a whole life ahead of us to live solitarily. The communa is the perfect transition between living with your parents and living alone, and until now it has been a great experience. So even though we will probably be late for class every single day, I am glad that I can sit in a classroom with my close friends and later do the homework together in our house.