On a chilly winter night about two years ago, Muhammad, a taxi driver from East Jerusalem, waited for me in the parking lot at Qalandiya Checkpoint, reading a newspaper by the car’s interior light. I’d originally called him to pick me up from a cafe in Ramallah, but my coffee companion, also called Muhammad, interrupted our conversation and insisted on knowing how much I would be charged. “One hundred and fifty shekels?!” he repeated in a scandalized tone. “No way! Give me the phone, let me talk to him.”

And so the two Muhammads spoke rapidly in Arabic and closed matters without consulting me. Ramallah Muhammad returned my phone to me and said, “I’ll drive you to the checkpoint. He’ll pick you up and drive you from there to Jerusalem. We agreed on 70 shekels.”

I’d known Muhammad-the-driver for about three years. As an East Jerusalem resident, he had yellow Israeli license plates and was permitted to travel freely between the West Bank and Israel. Warm and refreshingly free of machismo, he spoke fluent Hebrew, and we’d enjoyed many long, interesting conversations about a variety of subjects during our drives between and around Israel and the West Bank. His low-key, self-possessed manner worked wonders on irritable, capricious soldiers at checkpoints.

Glancing at his profile as I sat down in the front passenger seat, I said jokingly, “Hey, you grew a beard! What happened, have you joined the Muslim Brotherhood?” Turning the key in the ignition, Muhammad answered curtly, without smiling, “Something like that.” He drove silently along the dark, ill-paved road that ended at Hizma, a drive-through checkpoint named for the Palestinian village on which it is built. A young soldier leaned his head in through the open window, said “Good evening, how are you?” and waited for a response, in order to check that my Hebrew did not have an Arabic accent. Satisfied, he waved us through and we were in well-lit, well-paved, red-roofed Pisgat Zeev, one of the ring neighorhoods built by the Israeli government on land that was conquered in 1967. For Israel, it is a Jerusalem suburb; for the rest of the world, it is a settlement.

Muhammad broke his long silence with a desultory comment about the weather; he also asked polite questions about my health and my work. “I haven’t seen you for a long time,” he remarked. “No,” I answered. “I don’t go to Ramallah very often. It’s difficult…” I trailed off, sensing that he was not really interested in my problems. Muhammad grunted and was silent again. Then he said, suddenly, “Things are very bad in Jerusalem.” I made a sympathetic sound, not knowing what to say. I wasn’t accustomed to discussing politics with this cold, withdrawn Muhammad. The atmosphere felt uncomfortable and I, unused to feeling anything but completely at ease with Muhammad, did not want to say the wrong thing.

Muhammad continued, “I don’t know how to protect my children. How to protect them from the violence. I don’t let them watch the news on television and I walk them to school, but it’s not enough. My wife wants another child and I think, for what? To bring him into this..?”

By then we had arrived at my friend’s house in boho chic Nahlaot, near the entrance to the Mahane Yehuda Market in Jewish West Jerusalem. Muhammad stopped the car and turned to me with a searching look. Wanting to say something sympathetic, I stammered, “I understand what you mean. It does feel very bad in Jerusalem. People in Tel Aviv seem to have given up on this city, and I don’t visit often because it’s so tense here.”

“Oh, I see,” answered Muhammad in an angry tone, “So you’re leaving Jerusalem to the Arabs and the ultra-Orthodox Jews, eh?”

Shocked at being misinterpreted so badly, “That is not what I meant, Muhammad. Not at all!”

We were silent for a moment as the motor idled. Then I asked him, just to fill the silence and indicate that I was ready to get out of the taxi, “How much do I owe you, again?”Without hesitating, Muhammad said in a neutral tone, “One hundred and fifty shekels.”

I paid him without protest, not wanting to humiliate us both by reminding him that he’d told my friend the price was 70 shekels. But I never called Muhammad again.

Last week at the Peres Center for Peace in Jaffa, I attended the opening of Frames of Reality, an exhibition of photographs by Israeli and Palestinian photojournalists. Each of the photographers exhibited a series of works based on a theme – like Tomer Appelbaum’s series on Israeli civilians who own handguns; or Gazan photojournalist Eman Mohammed‘s series on ‘home‘; or Asaf Hatav’s series on Eritrean refugees in Israel.

Atta Awisat, a Palestinian East Jerusalem resident who works for Yedioth Aharonoth, put together a series about children at play.

In his written introduction to his photos of children in East Jerusalem, Atta notes:

Occasionally, they are happy and sing songs as the politicians shake hands in pursuit of peace; later, they find themsleves abandoning their school rooms – their future – throwing aside their small school bags and books, hiding behind burning tires and throwing stones at armed soldiers. When the rage subsides and the sun washes across their tanned faces, there is a respite – they begin to play again, and that is where the truth lies. Before you take issue with me, I invite you to observe these children at play. Of course, you may not be able to differentiate between their playacting and reality, especially when you place one photo next to another and try to find the distinctions between them.

Sabbar Kashur on the cover of The City Tel Aviv Magazine, 3 September 2010

A few weeks ago, a story about a Palestinian man convicted by an Israeli court of raping a Jewish woman made headlines around the world. Sabbar Kashur, a 30 year-old resident of East Jerusalem, was convicted not of rape by physical force, but rather of rape by deception: according to the verdict, he presented himself as a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious relationship, when he was in fact a married Muslim Arab looking for a quickie.

Kashur and the plaintiff met two years ago on a street in downtown Jerusalem. According to the story that was initially published quite widely, he introduced himself as Dudu (a Hebrew nickname derived from David). They flirted; he suggested that they go to a nearby building; she agreed; and a few minutes later they were having consensual sex. Only later, after the woman discovered that Dudu was an Arab, did she accuse him of rape. Israeli law stipulates that sex obtained by deception is rape.

The judges’ wording of the verdict seemed to be inspired by E.M. Forster’s A Passage to India, or an Oriental version of To Kill a Mockingbird, with Kashur as Tom Robinson, the black man unjustly accused of raping a white woman in 1930s Alabama. “If she hadn’t thought the accused was a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious romantic relationship, she would not have cooperated,” wrote the judges. Judge Tsvi Segal added, “The court is obliged to protect the public interest from sophisticated, smooth-tongued criminals who can deceive innocent victims at an unbearable price – the sanctity of their bodies and souls.”

By the time the verdict was published, Kashur had been under house arrest for nearly two years, wearing an electronic monitoring device, presumably living in the same house as his children and his wife while he was on trial for raping another woman. An interview Kashur gave to Haaretz was quoted extensively by the international media: “If I were Jewish, they wouldn’t have even questioned me,” he said. “That’s not called rape, I didn’t rape her in the forest and and throw her away naked. She agreed to everything that happened.”

There were two precedents of Israeli Jewish men convicted of rape by deception; but in both those cases, the men were convicted of lying about their socio-economic status. Never had a man been convicted of rape by deception for claiming he was a Jew when he was in fact an Arab. Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy asked rhetorically if a Jewish man would have been convicted for posing as a Muslim in order to bed a Muslim woman.

For Israel’s male-dominated, socially liberal media, the outrage could be parsed as follows: all men lie to obtain sex – this is normal and not worthy of comment; but only in Israel is such a banal incident considered rape if the liar turns out to be an Arab posing as a Jew.

This past Friday (3 September) Ha’Ir (The City), a weekly magazine distributed only in Tel Aviv, published a cover story by Lital Grossman that brought a new perspective to the story. “Don’t look at him like that,” is the title of the piece, in large white font superimposed over Kashur’s image against a red background. The lede summary continues:

‘The story of “Dudu,” or Saber Kashur, sounded bizarre from the beginning. A man from an Arab family pretended to be a Jewish bachelor and convinced a young Jewish woman to have sex with him. Based on that, he was sentenced to 18 months in jail. In response to a request from Ha’Ir, the courts released the testimony of “B,” revealing a sad life story and her version of the events that occurred on that afternoon two years ago. According to her testimony, the story is much more complicated and the identity of the victim is rather different – that of a woman who was found after the encounter with Kashur naked on the roof of a building on 13 Hillel Street in Jerusalem.”

A very brief summary of the piece is as follows: the plaintiff, identified in the article as “B*,” was an emotionally traumatized woman in her 20s who had been raped by her father from the age of six. On the day she met Kashur, she was living in a women’s shelter. Before that, she had worked briefly as a prostitute and spent some time living on the streets. Kashur lured her into the building on Hillel Street with the claim that he worked there and wanted to show her his office; he then assaulted her and raped her, leaving her naked and bleeding – which is how the police discovered her.

B. was later hospitalized in a psychiatric institution, where the police questioned her about the rape, which led them to Kashur. During the trial, after it became apparent that B’s past, combined with her emotional state, made her a vulnerable witness, the prosecution came up with a plea bargain of rape by deception.

Excerpt from B’s testimony**:

“At first he told me his name was Daniel (and not Dudu, the nickname his friends use, as Kashur claimed in interviews; LG)… he didn’t want to tell me his last name… after a few minutes he like said ‘Cohen.’” B. also said that “he asked me if I have a boyfriend and I said no, and then he asked me if I want to be his girlfriend. I asked him if he’s married, and he said no, and then I asked him if he has children and he told me he doesn’t have children.” Later in that conversation, according to the testimony, Kashur asked B. for a kiss. “He wanted me to give him a kiss on the cheek and then he gave one back.” According to B., they also exchanged phone numbers.

At this point, according to the testimony, Kashur invited B. to see where he works, supposedly in the building at 13 Hillel Street, outside of which they were standing. “He said he wanted to invite me for coffee and show me his workplace there,”said B. The reason she gave for agreeing to leave with an almost complete stranger was “I looked for someone to put my trust in… I know that strangers, you even don’t contact them… but because I was, like, as you know, when I told you that I came from a place where there’s no, I lived on the streets for a while too… I thought that if I am with him, I’ll feel safe, and I’ll have, I’ll be financially secure. I really, like, trusted him.”

Right after they entered the building, B. claims, Kashur began forcing himself on her. “We were in the staircase, like in the first stairs of the building, where we entered and then he asked for a hug… so I hugged him because he said that he wants a hug for warmth and love because he didn’t have a relationship in a while, like, a girlfriend… and when I felt that he was too clingy, I tried pushing him away, so he used force a little, like, got a little aggressive.”

According to B., Kashur wouldn’t let go. “He lifted my shirt and the bra and kissed my chest,” she said. But then, a blond woman entered the stairwell, and Kashur stopped. He decided to move from the stairs to the elevator. “When I was with him in the elevator he also touched me and started acting like some psychopath. I was so scared of him… I started sensing that something strange was happening, because I noticed that I wasn’t going to any workplace and I don’t see any coffee cups, and I don’t, then I began to panic and started like, I also screamed when it started happening.”

When they left the elevator on the top floor of the building, according to B., Kashur took her to the stairwell that led to the attic. There, according to her, he raped her. “He took off my pants and underwear,” described B., “and all of this was done with force, I didn’t agree to anything… I was left in just my shirt. Then he took off his clothes… then he put saliva on his penis and then, it was like full penetration, like, it wasn’t with consent as he claims. He laid me on the floor… and asked to kiss my chest too and then like when I asked him to stop and tried to push him away, he started pressuring me with his arms forcefully on me… when I tried to push him with my hand in his stomach, this happened in a more advanced stage, when he was already inside of me, then he said that if I stay silent and I don’t resist, then it would like end faster and it wouldn’t be, like, he wouldn’t use force. I still resisted him and it was forced.”

B’s story sounds believable. Based on her testimony it appears that she was not a racist but rather a terribly vulnerable, emotionally damaged woman who was desperate for affection. The act she describes Kashur having committed is indeed a brutal rape. So the point made in Lital Grossman’s article is that Kashur was not unjustly punished because he was an Arab, but the opposite: that he managed to avoid the punishment he deserved because his ethnicity made it possible to plead guilty to the lesser charge of rape by deception, thus avoiding jail time. Everyone knew there was no way of convicting Kashur of violent rape based on B’s testimony, but the judges and the prosecution were sympathetic to the plaintiff and wanted Kashur to pay at least a little, so they cooked up a deal.

Over the weekend I spent a lot of time thinking about that article. Were those of us who rushed to support Kashur guilty of reverse racism and sexism? If a Jewish man had committed that brutal rape, wouldn’t he have gone to jail for a long time? Or perhaps not. Perhaps a Jewish man accused by a woman with B’s credibility problems would have been released without any conviction at all. But if B was such a vulnerable witness, then why did Kashur’s lawyer agree to a plea? Perhaps because he believed the judges were more influenced by their sympathy for B than their commitment to the law.

There are few unassailable facts or bottom lines here. A woman who may or may not have been raped is in a psychiatric hospital, traumatized and unable to communicate coherently. Perhaps a rapist who should have have been jailed is now a free man, wandering around Jerusalem shopping malls with his kids while the woman he raped is institutionalized, physically and emotionally traumatized. Or perhaps an innocent man was forced to plead guilty to a crime he did not commit, in order to avoid being sentenced to jail by judges who were biased against Arabs.

None of these issues were raised in the original reporting of the affair. Lital Grossman says that Ha’Ir was able to have the court testimony unsealed within two weeks of submitting a request; but in the initial reports, none of the Israeli media mentioned failed attempts to obtain the testimony.The polarized, angry atmosphere in contemporary Israel seems to make rational, detached analysis nearly impossible. This is a very troubling state of affairs. It is also quite dangerous.

*Israeli courts banned publication of the plaintiff’s name in order to protect her privacy, but the Guardian went ahead and published her first name.

**Since the 3,000 word feature was published Saturday on Haaretz’s Hebrew website (Ha’Ir and Haaretz are both owned by Schocken) I was hoping it would be translated for the English edition, but it hasn’t been and Elizabeth Tsurkov saved me hours of work: she translated the whole thing and posted it on Mideast Youth.

Sarit Hadad in concert. Credit: Nurit Manor/Flickr*

Sarit Hadad, an Israeli pop singer of Mizrachi extraction, just released a new single. The song, actually a cover of a Lebanse pop hit of the 1970s, is called “Do You Love Me” and it seems that the answer is, “Some of us do, but a lot of us really, really don’t.” For every fan who praises the song, there is someone who says it’s awful for one or all of the following reasons: it sounds Arab; it sounds Mizrachi; it’s a pathetic rip-off of an old Lebanese pop song and what’s wrong with Hebrew music, anyhow; and, Sarit Hadad is a frecha** who couldn’t sing her way out of a box.

Here she is, performing the song on A Star is Born, the Israeli version of American Idol.

Avi Shoshan, Mizrachi music critic for Ynet, loves the song. He calls it Hadad’s come-back hit.

“It’s a huge hit, and one thing is for sure: it won’t be possible to avoid ‘Do You Love Me.’ There’s a reason it was released at the height of the wedding season: if there’s one thing you can count on, it’s that the number of times this song is played at private parties over the summer will lock Hadad in as one of the highest-earning singers in this country. “

This is what some of the naysayers have to say in the talkbacks:

#54. Israel has become an Arab state

All that’s left is for Ahmed Tibi to become prime minister and Sheikh Raed Salah to be the Chief of Staff. At the parade to celebrate the revolution, Sarit Hadad will sing her Arab song to them.

#51. Now the Mizrachi population will sing this song and think it knows English.

And then there’s this one, which is interesting for what it doesn’t say about how Arabs are regarded in Israel:

#53. Let’s be honest

It’s time to come out and say it: Israeli Mizrachi music is really Arab music. And “Arab” is not an insult, heaven forbid! It’s just a nationality that is characterized by a language, a culture and an easily identifiable taste in music. Therefore, Sarit Hadad is an Arab singer who sings in Hebrew. Sababa.

These days, Mizrachi music is often called ‘Mediterranean’ (In Hebrew, Yam Tichonit). It’s mostly ripped off from old Greek songs, with the lyrics translated into Hebrew and sung in a Mizrachi accent (with a glottal ‘ayin’ and an aspirated ‘het’). Quite a few Mizrachi singers, like Eyal Golan, have had crossover pop hits in the Mediterranean style, but they really don’t sound at all like the pop music you hear on the radio in Lebanon, Syria or Jordan.

Back in the 1980s, when I moved to Israel for the first time, Mizrachi music was very Arab. For years the Israel Broadcast Authority refused to play Mizrachi pop on the radio; instead, fans bought low-quality cassette recordings that were sold cheaply at makeshift stands around the central bus station. This started to change in the 1980s, when the IBA introduced Mizrachi music programs to the radio (and sometimes to television), thus bringing singers like Haim Moshe and Zohar Argov to a wider audience. Ami Kaufman wrote a post about his memory of belting out Haim Moshe’s 1983 hit song, the Arabic-language hit ‘Linda, Linda,’ while hanging out with friends in the Carmel Forest. Reading that post reminded me vividly of the first time I sang that song aloud.

‘Twas the summer of ’84. I was studying Hebrew at the university during the day; by night I waited tables with supreme ineptitude at a restaurant that was owned by a couple of newly immigrated American Jews who lived in a West Bank settlement. They were bearded, covered their heads with enormous crocheted skullcaps and had pistols stuck in their belts at all times. The Palestinian guys who worked in the kitchen often corrected their Hebrew.

At night, after we’d cleaned up and closed the place, the owners would drive us all home in their van. First they’d drop off the Palestinians in various East Jerusalem neighbourhoods, and then they’d take the student workers (like me) back to our dormitories on Mt. Scopus. As we sat squashed shoulder-to-shoulder in the back seat of the van, the Palestinian workers called out to their employer, “Yaakov, put on some Haim Moshe!” Surprisingly eager to oblige, Yaakov would shove a grubby cassette into the player and turn up the volume. Thus we drove through the badly-lit streets of East Jerusalem, bumping over the potholes and swerving to avoid stray cats as we belted out the Arabic lyrics to the Israeli smash-hit single, “Linda, Linda.” According to Haim Moshe’s Wikipedia entry, there were rumours of Linda, Linda being a hit in Syria that same summer.

The original version of “Do You Love Me” was composed and performed in 1978 by the Bendaly Family, who seem to be a Lebanese version of the Partridge Family. Whereas Hadad sings her cover in Hebrew and English, the Bendalys sing theirs in Arabic and English.

I discovered the whole controversy over Hadad’s cover of “Do You Love Me” via this essay on HaOkets (The Sting), an Israeli group blog. The author of the piece, Maya Wallenstein, summarizes the controversy and puts it into the context of an Israeli society that is still dominated by Ashkenazi culture and characterized by dislike, suspicion and ignorance of both Mizrachi and Arab culture.

Here’s a translation of the last two paragraphs of Wallenstein’s piece:

Around the same time that Hadad’s single was released, a charming clip for a song by a Lebanese group called Mashrou’ Leila was circulating around the social media world of the Israeli left. The popularization of the clip amongst Israeli leftists was of course an act of opposition to Israel’s aggressive attitude toward its northern neighbour, and a subversive message of support for peace and reconciliation between the two states. The song is pleasant listening; perhaps too pleasant in this context. The melody is completely western, the substance is western (young people, disappointment in love, highways) and lighthearted. It’s “Mizrachi-ness” is expressed only in the octave-scaling violins.

There is something very easy to digest about this Lebanese song, which is actually very “Paris.” In that sense Hadad’s song is more subversive, because playing it makes people a bit uncomfortable; it is irritating to the ear, it causes a headache – all the things that Sabras (native-born Israelis) feel when they hear the sound of music that is “too Arab” on their radio.

I’m a bit puzzled by the use of ‘sabra’ and ‘Ashkenazi’ as interchangeable terms, given that the bulk of Mizrachim immigrated to Israel in the 1950s and now have native-born grandchildren. And I’m a bit surprised at Ms. Wallenstein’s surprise at discovering that Lebanese pop music is influenced by Europe in our globalized world. And, actually, the first person in Israel to post the Mashrou’ Leila clip on Facebook was a foreign correspondent based in Jerusalem who has family connections in the Middle East and friends in Beirut. She has a lot of Israeli Facebook friends – mostly journalists – and they (we) liked the clip and shared it simply because it’s good music and the clip is quirky and hip. It seems kind of sad that sharing a song about love is described as a subversive act – even if subversive is meant in a positive sense. But then again, this is a region where states nearly go to war over the pruning of a tree.

*Link to photo source.

*Derogatory term used by Ashkenazim to describe women, usually Mizrachi women, who dress gaudily and speak vulgarly.

Cross-posted to +972 Magazine.

The following is my translation of a piece that was published yesterday on Walla!, a popular Israeli news and information site.

Auspicious appointments

By Emily Grunzweig
22 July 2010

The Office of the Civil Service issued an external tender for the position of director of the Government Press Office (GPO). Danny Seaman, who has been director of the office for the last 10 years, declared his candidacy for an internal tender that was issued in March, but the committee decided against extending his tenure.

The responsibilities of the GPO, which is part of the Prime Minister’s Office, include coordination between the government’s communication offices and the international media based in Israel. Over the years that Seaman headed the GPO, several complaints were made regarding his dealings with the foreign media. In 2007 the Office of the Civil Service opened an investigation into these complaints, which included accusations that Seaman behaved in an inappropriate manner, and that he issued press credentials inequitably, circumventing GPO regulations.

Information Minister Yuli Edelstein gave the following response: “Mr. Danny Seaman served for a number of years as the acting head of the GPO. As per the orders of the Office of the Civil Service, an internal tender for the position was issued. Mr. Seaman put himself forward as a candidate, but the committee declined to select him. Given the importance of the position and the fact that it was unfilled, we issued an external tender in coordination with the Office of the Civil Service.

Danny Seaman’s long history of ‘inappropriate behaviour’ includes the following incidents:

Violently shoving and pushing a female photojournalist while she was covering the Pope’s visit (video clip here).

Attempting to predicate the issuing of press credential on the political views of the applicant. Seaman was complicit in denying renewed press credentials to 60 foreign journalists in a single year – thereby turning veteran, respected journalists who had lived in Israel for years into illegal aliens.

When the work visa of German bureau chief Joerg Bremer of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,  who had been in Jerusalem for 15 years, was suddenly not renewed, he took the matter to the highest levels, involving the German foreign ministry.  Seaman’s response was to tell a Haaretz reporter that the bureau chief is a “piece of shit” that he’d like to “screw over” (actually, Seaman said he wanted to “fuck over” the reporter, but that bit of colourful language didn’t get past the editor).

Refusing to renew the press credentials of Palestinian cameramen, producers and photographers who had worked for the foreign media for decades, thus destroying their careers and livelihoods.

Refusing to renew the press credentials of veteran reporters of Middle Eastern extraction. According to Reporters Without Borders, this led to a Reuters cameraman and a reporter for Abu Dhabi TV being deported under humiliating circumstances.

Telling New York Times bureau chief Ethan Bronner that he (Seaman) did not want foreign reporters covering Gaza because “Any journalist who enters Gaza becomes a fig leaf and front for the Hamas terror organization…”

Attempting to predicate press credentials on having the applicant journalist investigated by the Shin Bet.

Comparing the BBC to “the worst of Nazi propaganda.”

Sending out an email to the entire foreign press corps, shortly before the May 31 Gaza flotilla incident, in which he sarcastically recommended the cream of spinach soup at Roots, a restaurant in Gaza (this was apparently meant to imply that Gaza, where 80 percent of the population lives on UNRWA aid, is not really in such bad shape; and that the media is exaggerating the gravity of the situation there).

Below is the (slightly edited) text of a letter I sent in 2006 to the head of the civil service, following my own experience with Danny Seaman.

October 29, 2006

To:
Shmuel Hollander
Office of the Civil Service
39 Kaplan Street
Hakirya
Jerusalem 91919

Dear Mr. Hollander,

Re: Danny Seaman, director of the Government Press Office

I am writing to lodge a complaint against Mr. Danny Seaman, director of the Government Press Office, and his assistant Sharon Gorbagi. On the afternoon of 28 September 2006 I went to the GPO office for what was supposed to be a routine renewal of my press card. Instead I was dragged into a shocking confrontation that included abusive language and threats directed against me by Mr. Seaman. Ms. Gorbagi witnessed most of this incident; she was extremely rude to me, and she also supported Mr. Seaman’s threats against me. After giving the matter a great deal of thought, I have decided to make this incident a matter of public record because I think it is very grave.

Since we are both native English speakers, the conversation between Mr. Seaman and me took place in English. He used foul language that is considered offensive in polite discourse – and completely unacceptable coming from a civil servant. I have never in my life, in all my travels around the world, been addressed by a civil servant in such an abusive manner.

When I asked Mr. Seaman why he was speaking to me in this manner, he responded by threatening to initiate a Shin Bet investigation of me. When I asked why he would do such a thing, he gave two reasons: 1) he was enjoying himself (he repeated several times, while smiling, that he was enjoying himself); and 2) I was asking too many questions and he did not allow questions. He then added that he would make sure the Shin Bet investigation took the maximum length of time possible, and that even when he received their approval of my application for a press card he would deny it and force me to re-submit the paperwork. When I asked him why he was doing this, he told me that he did not have to explain himself, and that every time I asked a question, he would reject my application again. Then he added, “You will be without a press card for at least six months.”

In response to my request to speak to his boss, Mr. Seaman said, “I do not have a boss. I am not accountable to anyone. I make all the rules. And just the fact that you have asked me this question means you will never receive a GPO card again.” Shortly after that, I left his office and returned to Tel Aviv.

During subsequent conversations with colleagues who work for various Israeli media, I was warned several times that if I were to lodge an official complaint against Danny Seaman I would risk ruining my career as a journalist in Israel. I was completely shocked to discover that friends who are experienced and well-respected Israeli journalists were so afraid of Mr. Seaman that they were unwilling to make an official complaint against him. Several of my colleagues reported having experienced or witnessed similar confrontations with Mr. Seaman. They all said that my only option was to write a letter of apology (one friend told me I should “crawl”). The consensus opinion is that Mr. Seaman is a civil servant who has become corrupted and sadistic by his power and by the fact that he does indeed seem to be unaccountable.

I have decided to submit an official complaint not only because I need a press card for professional reasons, but also because I am deeply concerned about the long-term damage Danny Seaman is doing. Every foreign journalist in Israel must deal with Mr. Seaman; and I have heard many terrible stories from various foreign correspondents about their dealings with him – confrontations that included threats, foul language and abusive treatment. I am also deeply concerned that a civil servant, whose salary is paid with tax funds, feels that he can abuse Israeli citizens with impunity.

Sincerely yours,

Lisa Goldman

One month after I sent that letter, I was invited to give  a detailed deposition to an attorney at the Office of the Civil Service. Another year passed before I was informed, in November 2007, that the legal department had decided to issue Seaman with an official censure.

After asking – in despair and anger – what it takes to get fired in this country, I asked the attorney at the Office of the Civil Service how the censure would affect Seaman. He answered that when (or if) a tender were issued for the position of GPO manager, a position to which Seaman was appointed ‘temporarily’ in 2000, the censure in his file would make him an unsuitable candidate.

Four years later, the tender was finally issued. And, as the attorney at the Office of the Civil Service said, Seaman was indeed rejected as a suitable candidate. The wheels of justice turn exceedingly slow…

My only wish for Danny Seaman is that he should be treated for the rest of his life exactly as he treated others during his tenure at the GPO.

They were born in Israel. They are native Hebrew speakers who were educated in the Israeli public school system. But because they are the offspring of non-Jewish migrant workers, around 1,200 children stand to be deported to their parents’ native countries – even though they’ve never been there and often do not speak the language.

You can see these children all over south Tel Aviv, playing basketball and football in the parks and walking hand-in-hand with their mothers through the Carmel Market. Many of them attend a school that is called, perhaps a little ironically, Bialik. They speak unaccented Hebrew and they celebrate the Jewish holidays just like all secular Israeli Jewish kids – with school seders, mad Yom Kippur bike rides through car-free streets, wearing fancy dress to school on Purim and singing songs about light and the Maccabees at Chanukah.

Interior Minister Eli Yishai (Shas) wants to deport these children because they are not Jewish.

The organizers of Israeli Children, an NGO that is working to save these Israel-born children of migrant workers, believe that Yishai will sign the final order to deport these children in the coming weeks, when the school year ends, in order to minimize bad publicity from scenes like this:

In a last push to stop Minister Yishai from signing the order to deport the children, a protest demonstration will take place in Tel Aviv tomorrow evening (Tuesday, May 25), at 7.30 pm at the Tel Aviv Museum.

The event will be hosted by: Orly Vilnai and Guy Meroz (investigative reporters who focus on social justice issues).

Performing artists: Dudu Tassa, Shlomo Grunich, Maya Rotman and Keren Pelles

Various MKs from across the political spectrum are also scheduled to speak.