Product Placement

I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve done a mediocre job of keeping track of my clips. Though I’ve kept copies of nearly all of the magazine articles I’ve written, most of the book reviews and all of the travel pieces I wrote for the San Francisco Bay Guardian between 2000 and 2004 vaporized when SFBG revamped it’s website.

In the midst of putting the finishing touches on a brand new personal site (including a Word Press replacement for this blog) I came across a PDF version of this collection of micro-reviews, Sikkum: Tikkun Recommends, that I wrote for the September/October edition in 2005.

Traditionally the domain of the magazine’s publisher, I ended up writing most of these interior back page book reviews my last year and a half as Tikkun’s managing editor. I’ll be posting a couple of more of these, including the color version we debuted with the magazine’s re-design in 2006, shortly.

Click on the image for greater detail.

Sharon as de Gaulle

“Who is that masked man?” I joked under my breath during the Disengagement, as I heard yet another comparison made of Ariel Sharon to the late French President Charles de Gaulle. The fact that then-French President Jacques Chirac had told Israel’s Prime Minister the previous month that he was not welcome in France, for having encouraged his country’s Jews to immigrate to Israel, made this stream of de Gaulle comparisons even more annoying. Whether it was out of a desire for a strong conservative leader who could reassure Israelis that they could conclude a final peace agreement with the Palestinians, or a yearning for a strong, conservative leader who would protect all Jews, was unclear.

Throughout his tenure as Israel’s Prime Minister, at home or abroad, Sharon’s persistent identification with de Gaulle was a tremendous source of strength and legitimacy for his large than life leadership. Lauded the world over for his steely resolve, his stereotypically brusque, Israeli independence, and his ability to consistently deliver Israel from it’s enemies, the founder of two of the country’s two most significant political parties of the last generation – Likud and Kadima – was treated almost as though he were the closet thing to a national superhero: a reincarnation of the founder of the Fifth Republic.

As awkward as this might sound, there are very simple reasons for asking this question, particularly in the wake of the Six Day War. Why, given the trauma associated with the subsequent rupturing of Israel’s alliance with France, would Israelis choose a French icon like de Gaulle to model their ideal leader after, especially considering how snubbed they were made to feel by the late President’s behavior in the wake of the victory? If Israelis were really as upset by de Gaulle’s action as to consider it anti-Semitic, the verdict being passed on Sharon as though he were de Gaulle generates more questions than it answers.

In the years following his assumption of the Prime Minister’s office, when comparisons between Sharon and de Gaulle reached critical mass, could this comparison have served as a sign of possible disrespect? That, Israeli politics had sunk to such a profound low, that Israelis had put their faith in a murderous thug accused of war crimes to lead them out of the Occupied Territories? Was it an expression of genuine appreciation that Israel, like France, could produce soldier-statesman who embodied a similar combination of leadership qualities? Or were such comparisons simply empty rhetoric used to reassure Diaspora Jews that Israel was indeed governed by a European style aristocracy?

In every case, the answer is affirmative. For liberals, like de Gaulle, Sharon was an ambitious army officer with anti-democratic tendencies, guided by a similar combination of nationalist and security conservatisms, and an enormous ego. Yet, despite such obviously disrespectful views of his character, Sharon was to be tolerated because he grew willing to assimilate progressive foreign policy objectives, such as withdrawing from Gaza, and determining a final international border, irrespective of how problematic both the withdrawals, and the security wall he began building on Israel’s eastern frontier would end up being.

Blue and White Blues

If you haven’t read Roi Ben-Yehuda before, you’re sorely missing out.

One of the best writers I’ve ever worked with, Roi’s articles epitomize the sensibilities of someone who has grown up in both Israel and the US, and remains rightfully suspicious of one-dimensional appeals to all forms of nationalism and xenophobia.

His latest piece, on the ideological limitations of Israel’s flag, was published yesterday in Haaretz.

Never Trust a Hippy

We often forget that one of the primary proponents of anti-Islamic ideology in the West prior to the War on Terror were Serbian nationalists like Radovan Karadzic, pictured above, in drag as a new age healer.

Nuclear Sound Affects

 
During the late 1970s, I can’t remember how many times my siblings and I would hear a song on the radio–most often English-language pop and disco–and try to sing along. We’d mimic the lyrics, switching back and forth between English and Hebrew as we unsuccessfully attempted to master particularly difficult American-sounding turns of phrase. Boney M’s 1978 mega-hit “Rasputin,” and Earth, Wind and Fire’s 1979 smash “Boogie Wonderland” were particular sources of amusement, as friends and family would struggle to properly enunciate “R” and “W,” sounding, in the case of “Vonderland,” like Israeli caricatures of Bela Lugosi.

To read the rest of my review of Soul Messages From Dimona, click here.

Israeli Punk

The best band names are frequently found in hotel bathrooms. Mitzpeh Ramon, Sukkot, 2006.

London Calling

On July 1st, I stepped down from my editorial position at Allvoices. With two months to pack up our home and move to the United Kingdom, I couldn’t have had a better reason to punch out. I’ll be spending the next eight weeks at home writing and editing a couple of terrific books while we get everything ready. To make the transition back to book editing, after being immersed in the world of blogs and online periodicals is interesting to note, (as a format exercise), given the direction that this kind of work now moves.

Leaving my office in San Francisco’s financial district (pictured above) for the very last time, I couldn’t resist capturing the signage of the cylinder shaped newsstand that sits at the building’s front entrance. Housing not only my ex-employer, but also a Reuters office, and the headquarters of the local Jewish weekly, The J, my former firm’s new abode hosts an above average number of news publishers for such a small, albeit significant, American city.

Just before I left, however, I received a call from the very first periodical I ever worked for, in between my freshman and sophomore years of high school, in 1982. Serving as a summer intern for the legendary Mother Jones (whose building, pictured above, is three blocks west of my former office) has earned me a semi-annual email or phone call from what sounds like another MoJo intern, keeping tabs on alumni. “You’re a writer, right?” asked the young man who called me. “Yes,” I told him. “And an editor, too.”