Is Raf OK? -- Installment #163
2025-01-29 -- Tel Aviv
Welcome to IsRafOK.com
First Time Here? Readers suggest starting with the expanded Gaza Explainer in #133 and #120.
Tags: 6 Min Read; Relief!
The first viral product of this blog is the "vision of peace" music video by Yoni Bloch.
Fun!
I have mumbled about cost-of-living grumbles in Israel. Property tax ("arnona") just went up. The falafel shop on my way from the gym hiked prices two shekels (about US$0.70). Where five balls used to be eight shekels, now they are ten.
The discount falafel place nearby, that held prices to six shekels until just a couple of years ago went up to eight in about 2023. For a full falafel sandwich (in a pita with hummus, tahina and salads). (Six was symbolic: 20, 30 years ago that is what a full falafel sandwich cost everywhere in the country. In Tel Aviv a full sandwich has been 20+ shekels for years already, usually 26 to 30.)
So the six shekel stand went to eight. And here this past January 1 to nine.
Cash only. Always a long line. Open just a few hours a day.
A guy a couple of blocks away holds the line at eight. (You should see his stand… smallest falafel operation in the Middle East….)
Falafel including the fixings! Across the way! 8 Shekels!
A couple blocks from my place is the old "Yemenite Vineyard." AKA the former slum where Jews from Yemen settled when they first came to Israel in the early years of the state, after a deadly pogrom in Aden (capital of Yemen). There is a street, "Kanfey Nesharim"
Which literally means: "Wings of Eagles."
The subtext is that the Yemenite Jews themselves had never seen airplanes when the Israeli planes came to collect them. The verse from Numbers "And I will carry you on the wings of eagles" came to mind at the time, it is reported.
אַתֶּ֣ם רְאִיתֶ֔ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר עָשִׂ֖יתִי לְמִצְרָ֑יִם וָאֶשָּׂ֤א אֶתְכֶם֙ עַל־כַּנְפֵ֣י נְשָׁרִ֔ים וָאָבִ֥א אֶתְכֶ֖ם אֵלָֽי
‘You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Me. (Book of Numbers)
Mail
Dept of The Invisible
Items invisible in the Western media. (Now combined with the Postmark concept, to help consolidate topics by locale.)
Doha, Qatar
90 Seconds, in English:
Sadegh Zibakalam, a senior lecturer at the University of Tehran, during an academic conference in Doha, Qatar:
"You'd be surprised today, since 7th of October of last year - you'd be surprised by the number of Iranians who HATE Palestinians.
What happened to that sympathy? It's gone it's evaporated.
If someone would've told me "Sadegh, a day would come that Iranian people would hate Palestinians and they would praise Netanyahu, of all the people, as a hero" - I would've thought that he or she is out of their mind, that they're talking nonsense, that they don't know anything about the Iranian people.
But I saw it with my own eyes during these past 15 months, the degree of hatred of the young generations of Iran against the Palestinians - and the hero is Netanyahu."
Reports are that this video is going viral and getting strong reactions on social media from pro-regime Iranians.
Is it safe for him to return to Tehran?
Perhaps not. A day later:
The Prosecutor General in Tehran filed an indictment against Sadegh Zibakalam, the senior lecturer who said in a widely circulated video that Iranians despise the Palestinians and admire Netanyahu.
What countries give asylum to political refugees from Iran?
Gaza
Hamas Information Office reported that more than 300,000 Gazans arrived yesterday from the southern part of the Gaza Strip to the northern part.
Remember this the next time someone talks to you about population movement in Gaza.
More than 300,000 in one day!
Nothing is impossible?
While the U.N. agrees with the Hamas figures, the IDF disagrees:
The Israeli military assesses that only tens of thousands of Palestinians have returned to the northern Gaza Strip since troops withdrew from most of the Netzarim Corridor yesterday morning and authorized the opening of south-north roads.
Does this mean both sides can claim victory/success?
Fatah (Palestinian Authority) Affiliated Social Media
Against the backdrop of the images of the Gazans returning north that fill the Palestinian channels, a channel affiliated with Fatah writes:
كان حلمنا تحرير فلسطين صار حلمنا الإنسحاب من نتساريم
كان حلمنا تحرير فلسطين صار حلمنا الانسحاب من شارع صلاح الدين
كان حلمنا تحرير فلسطين صار حلمنا عودة النازحين
في زمن حماس أصبح تحرير يهودية أهم من حياة مليون غزاوي
**تعريف التخلف :- **
إنك تعمل طوفان وتترجى العالم يرجعوا غزة لما قبل طوفانك .Our dream was to liberate Palestine.
Our dream has become [for the IDF] to withdraw from Netzarim.
Our dream was to liberate Palestine.
Our dream has become [for the IDF] to withdraw from Salah al-Din Street.
Our dream was to liberate Palestine.
Our dream has become the return of the displaced [to the north of the Strip].
In the time of Hamas, freeing a Jewish woman has become more important than the lives of a million Gazans. [Who were stuck, unable to move to the Northern Gaza Strip because Hamas failed to release a female hostage who had been on the list they signed off on in the agreement.]Definition of backwardness: You [Hamas] create a "flood" [Hamas’ name for the October 7 attack] and beg the world to return Gaza to what it was before your flood.
In contrast, on Hamas social media:
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim on the return of the Gazans to the north:
لأول مرة في تاريخ الصراع مع إسرائيل يعود الفلسطينيون إلى منازلهم
"For the first time in the history of the struggle with Israel, the Palestinians are returning to their homes."
How should I interpret this?
That Hamas has no further conflict with Israel because these Palestinians are residents of Gaza and have access to their homes in Gaza?
Or have you forgotten that before October 7th, these "returnees" were living just fine... and actually had houses?
Given that Hamas has claimed victory in this war, the fight (on campuses, etc.) is over, right? Hamas says they won. Is there a need to demonstrate on their behalf in the West?
UNRWA: You Don't Need More
The below photo is from 2017. Two top UNRWA officials at a meeting attended by a range of terrorist leaders.
There is more, but I suspect we have all seen enough. UNRWA is a material part of the problem.
Geneva, Red Cross HQ
The observations of Rachel and Jon Goldberg Polin, parents of murdered hostage Hersh Goldberg Polin. 1 Min, in English
Seattle: Tesla Car Dealership
USA Map: Which US States More Populous than Israel?
(The ones in green below. File under: Factoid of the day.)
Relief Area
Alef
Bet: Eretz Nehederet, 8 Years Ago
(About the 1973 war, in Hebrew)
Gimmel: Eretz Nehederet, 6 Years Ago
(About the 1973 war, in Hebrew)
Dalet
This is actual, not humor. Sections of the web are now banning links to x.com because of who owns it. Why is that relevant to IsRafOK.com? Because the split in the American Left is what led to the rise of the Far Right in the U.S. What was the American Left split over? A major piece of it was antisemitism. This did not start with the Gaza war or October 7. Recall the antisemitism that surfaced in the Black Lives Matter movement a few years ago. This was visible but not new.
Hey: Musical Relief
This is Noga Erez, an Israeli rapper who raps in English. I was at a desert music festival on October 5 that featured her (among other acts). Different desert. Different day. She performed with one leg in a cast. On crutches from a stage fall a few days earlier. And had more energy than the other acts.
Vav: How terrorists imagine their heaven
A comment:
מוסיפים שם גם גבר במקרה והוא אל תוך זה
There is even a man there in case that is what he's into.
Zayin: בן גביר קאליפה -- Ben Gvir Khalifa
Mia Khalifa: On December 28, 2018, Pornhub revealed that she was the No. 1 ranked performer on their website.
Looks Yemenite
Also like from India
Likes to dress as an Arab
Likes to dress as a nurse/doctor
Reactions:
And both of them make me sick 🤮\
תומכת טרור, תומך טרור - She supports terror. He supports terror. [Ben Gvir supports Jewish terrorists in the West Bank, Khalifa is on record supporting Hamas as "freedom fighters."]
Chet: Not Possible!
After a natural disaster that killed 15 people: The Prime Minister of Serbia took responsibility and resigned.
(This actually happened just now.)
Non-Relief
Above: Imagery shows throwing Israel in the trash and a guy with a swastika. E.g. if eliminationist/exclusionary posturing is OK (e.g. eliminating Israel), why is a Nazi posture wrong?
Spring is in the air. The airport is busier than its been since the war started. The war gave birth to a new airline route between Tel Aviv and New York.
To Peace,
Raf
(Thank you A.K., M.T.)