Story of Isaac[son]: Lenny and the Prince of Davka

I admit it. My behaviour can, at times, be strange. And in ways I can barely explain. Even to myself.

And my not even attempting to obtain tickets for the Morrissey (last year) and Leonard Cohen (last week) concerts in Israel was amongst the strangest. I am a hard-core fan of both singer-songwriters (add poet for Cohen), owning virtually their entire back catalogues, and both performed just a few miles from Melchett.

But I will at least try to explain (if only for myself) . . .

I guess I am a cultural snob. And, when Israelis suddenly feign interest in visiting musicians whose work I have spent much of my adult life exploring, it can just be too much. I mean it might be okay with your Depeche Modes and Madonnas (both of whom played Israel this summer), but more inscrutable artists like “Mozza” and “Lenny” should not be so easily accessible! It is not just a question of buying tickets, showing up . . . and catching up.

This distaste is similar to the one I have for football ‘supporters’ who only show an interest in their team when it starts to win (on that note, has anyone come across a Manchester City fan who goes by the name of “Seitler”?) . . . as opposed to loyal fools like me, who even go to watch them in shit holes like Scunthorpe (yes, I visited Glanford Park on my last trip to the UK).

No, the opportunist concert goer is no better than the “glory hunter”, or “part-time”, football fan. You don’t want to share your adoration of your idol(s) with either of them. Unlike you, they lack credibility (and snobbery).

And so it was, for the first performance by Leonard Cohen in Israel since 1975 – all 47,000 tickets were sold in less than 24 hours – I didn’t even pick up the phone. No, I voted with my feet . . . and cut off my nose, because a large part of me obviously wanted to be there.

In Israel, such behaviour is referred to as davka – loosely translated, in this sense, as “just to be contrary” – and I am the Prince of Davka!

But, last Thursday afternoon, staring blankly at yet another contract in my office, I started to become increasingly distracted by the thought that, a few hours later – while I would be walking Stuey and Dexxy along Tel Aviv’s Rothschild Boulevard – Leonard Cohen would be playing to a packed National Stadium just down the road, in Ramat Gan. And who were they to be there . . . and me not?!

At some point, the momentousness of the occasion then hit me even harder. It was three days after the Canadian’s seventy-fifth birthday. But, more poignantly, we were in the middle of the Ten Days of Repentance – between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur – and Cohen would undoubtedly be performing a Holy Land rendition of Who by Fire, his cover of the High Holy Days’ “hit”, Unesaneh Tokef (as well as of other songs with Biblical themes, like Story of Isaac and Hallelujah).

I got into Leonard (and, indeed, Bob) in the sixth form at school, thanks to the precocious taste – for Hasmonean, at least – of my classmate, Jonathan Levene, to whom I am forever indebted. Who knows . . . if not for Jonny – who even now I believe, as a black-hatted frummer (called “Yoynosson”), occasionally (though perhaps clandestinely) still listens to Cohen and Dylan – I may have succumbed, like so many of my peers, to the relative poverty of Billy Joel, Elton John, Genesis, ELO, Meat Loaf, and even, God forbid, Dire Straits. I have seen Cohen “live” on just one occasion, at the Royal Albert Hall in 1993. (Any Lenny “virgins” would do well to check this out for starters . . . just to understand.)

So, leaving work on time for once, I raced home, threw Stuey and Dexxy into the back of the car without their customary early evening walk (thus risking bladders being emptied on the back seat), and headed down to Ramat Gan. Bringing the beasts meant that I wasn’t even going to be looking for a ticket – I just wanted to feel part of the “occasion”, and, if possible, hear just a little of the great man’s distinctive bass from outside the stadium.

I was not alone. There were a couple of hundred of us ticketless hobos, sitting on kerbs and the grass verges of the adjacent Ha’yarkon Park. I bumped into a journalist acquaintance, Lisa, who had hoped to bum a ticket through media contacts outside the stadium. But to no avail.

I fantasized, briefly, about approaching queuing Israelis (an oxymoron, I know), and posing a simple enough question (for any genuine Cohen fan):

“Chelsea Hotel #2 refers to Lenny’s affair with which singer?”

I even planned my response for the (expected) failure to provide the correct answer (Janis Joplin):

“Right, get outta the queue! And gimme your ticket! It’s confiscated. Now go home!”

Back on planet Earth . . . following one round of the stadium perimeter, Lisa and I perched ourselves on the stretch of kerb where Cohen could be most clearly heard. To our chagrin, however, there were a couple of horribly annoying Israeli women also seated in the vicinity who insisted on vocally accompanying his every word. And not only that . . . but with the heaviest of “Hebrish” accents. Nauseating guttural noises accompanied Lover Lover Lover:

“Yes and love-airrgggh, love-airrgggh, love-airrgggh, love-airrgggh, love-airrgggh, love-airrgggh . . . love-airrgggh, come back to me.”

Lisa, eventually, could take no more and left. The opportunity I had been waiting for arrived when Stuey and Dexxy started barking at a passing canine, at which the irritating duet – far less attractive, I might add, than my hairy duo (otherwise I may have let them off) – had the temerity to deliver filthy looks in my direction. That was my cue. I assured them that I would keep the dogs quiet . . . if they would do the same with each other. I am becoming more Israeli by the day. (There was plenty other Israeli chutzpah on show – during the second half of the concert, for instance, as minibuses started rolling up, fellow freeloading kerb-sitters remonstrated with drivers about the noise of their engines!)

I had a hot date planned for later in the evening, and left early to avoid the departing hordes. To quote Suzanne, perhaps Cohen’s most well-known song, “[I] want[ed] to be there”. And, strangely, I felt as if I had been. It was well worth the effort.

In spite of having been ordained as a Buddhist monk (in 1996), Leonard Cohen still considers himself “one of us”:

“I’m not looking for a new religion. I’m quite happy with the old one, with Judaism.”

Legend has it that Cohen – who was performing for Israeli troops – shared cognac with Arik Sharon in the Sinai during the Yom Kippur War, and that he was plagued with guilt when he found himself relieved to learn that a passing convoy of bloodied bodies was ‘only’ one of Egyptians. He would later remark:

“Lover Lover Lover was born over there. The whole world has its eyes riveted on this tragic and complex conflict. Then again, I am faithful to certain ideas, inevitably. I hope that those of which I am in favour will gain.”

The recollection of Israeli singer Oshik Levi sheds further light:

“Leonard Cohen proceeded with us for three months, day after day, four to five – and sometimes eight – performances a day. And, in every place we arrived at, he wanted to be drafted. At one time he wanted to be a paratrooper, at another time in the marines, and another time he wanted to be a pilot. We would sleep in sleeping bags on the floor because there was no room, and Leonard – who didn’t want to feel like a star – refused when I tried to arrange a place for him in the Culture Room.”

Asked which side he supports in the Arab-Israeli conflict, Cohen has responded:

“I don’t want to speak of wars or sides . . . Personal process is one thing, it’s blood, it’s the identification one feels with their roots and their origins.”

Cohen hit hard times in 2005, alleging that his longtime former manager had misappropriated over five million dollars from his retirement fund (leaving just $150,000). And the Israel leg of his world tour will not have done much to help – Cohen donated all of the profits (estimated at two million dollars) to an Israeli-Palestinian charity (a political gesture, no doubt, in the face of pressure from the anti-Israel lobby).

Even international music legends are not guaranteed to make money here . . . though I am certain that Cohen will have enjoyed coming back to his “roots”.

God bless you, Lenny. And come back again soon (I promise, next time, to leave Stuey and Dexxy at home).

 

[For further photographs from, and discussion relating to, Cohen’s time in Israel during the Yom Kippur War, see the Leonard Cohen Forum. Other quotes and information from Wikipedia.]

Mission Nonsensical: Goldstone’s F*cked Findings

The talking point in Israel (and indeed the “Jewish world”), this past week, has been whether Judge Richard Goldstone – the head of the UN fact-finding mission on the Gaza War, whose report accuses Israel of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity – is an example of yet another Jew too willing to sell out to our many enemies . . . or has merely been doing his job.

From what I have read about the man (photographed right), I am not convinced that he is a Pinter, a Sayle, a Kaufman, or one of their repugnant ilk. But as a Jew who, apparently, “is a Zionist and loves Israel”, it may have been more judicious for the Judge not to have accepted the mandate (however good for his CV) in the first place, especially since he knew (or ought to have known) that Israel would not cooperate with an investigation commissioned by a totally one-sided resolution (Mary Robinson, the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, had already declined it, describing the UN Human Rights Council as “guided not by human rights, but by politics”). And, following his “shock as a Jew” to be offered it, Goldstone may have felt that he had to go out of his way to prove his objectivity. And “go out of his way” he did.

By most accounts, Judge Goldstone is a man of impeccable conviction. But the South African would also appear to be one of startling naivety. In an op-ed in last Thursday’s New York Times, he wrote:

“I am unaware of any case where a Hamas fighter was punished for deliberately shooting a rocket into a civilian area in Israel — on the contrary, Hamas leaders repeatedly praise such acts.”

Well, boker tov (good morning), Judge Goldstone! (And didn’t you forget “orchestrate”?)

But I am not interested in the man. Neither am I interested in his fact-finding mission – to investigate Israel’s alleged violations of the laws of war, international human rights and humanitarian law during last winter’s Operation Cast Lead – nor, even, its ostensibly damning conclusions. And why? Because the mission’s very premise was not only entirely wrong, but utterly nonsensical . . . making an irrelevance of its findings.

Hamas, the despotic ruler of Gaza, is an Islamofascist organisation with the raison d’être of destroying Israel. Eight and a half years (and counting) of unprovoked rocket attacks against Israel’s southern communities, together with Hamas’s cowardly combat tactics – from amongst densely populated civilian areas, and inside mosques, schools and hospitals – make a mockery of “laws of war”, and even of “human rights” as they are commonly understood.

Whilst not as developed, such laws existed long before the Second World War. But did the Allies take them into account prior to, during, or even following, their carpet-bombing of Hamburg and Dresden, in which they killed tens of thousands of ‘innocent’ German civilians? Did they heck! Their top priority, and quite properly, was to bring as swift an end as possible to a war against – and started by – an uncompromising Fascist aggressor, with minimum casualties to their own soldiers. And did the British fight the “Argies” with kid gloves in the Falklands? And are they and the Americans doing so in Afghanistan or Iraq?

Whilst the IDF goes further than any army the world over not only to act, but to be seen to act, humanely – it knows, after all, that it is being judged by a unique standard (see the next paragraph) – “laws of war” and “human rights” will inevitably sometimes be contravened when defending one’s country against a murderous aggressor that respects neither (even the “rights” of its own people). And ordinary Gazans are responsible for their rulers – if they choose to continue living under, and by, the sword, they must be prepared to die by it.

The UN Human Rights Council has condemned Israel fifteen times in less than two years . . . but no other country even once. Not Russia. Not China. Not North Korea. Not Burma. Not Sri Lanka. Not Zimbabwe. Not the Congo. Not Equatorial Guinea. Not Somalia. Not Sudan. Not Libya. Not Saudi Arabia. Not Syria. Not Iran. Israel was fully justified in not cooperating with an organisation which never treats it fairly, and with an investigation which it knew was just out to get it. What’s next from the UN? A fact-finding mission to investigate whether Mossad agents respect the laws of international espionage and agent rights before delivering enemies to their 72 virgins?

Israel is not perfect. It has made misjudgements and mistakes, and, yes, maybe even violated laws. Israel would not, however, exist today if – in its permanent state of war with godless enemies who wait to pounce on its every weakness – it had given more weight to legal tomes than to military necessity. And that war – with Hamas, Hizbollah, and other Islamofascists hellbent on its destruction – is one of light against darkness, good against evil, civilisation against barbarism. It is that “comic strip” simple. And it is a war in which the entire western world will soon be embroiled, not just in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan . . . but in its very own backyard. That the schmocks at the UN can be so myopic . . .

When push comes to shove – and it always does here (as a result of its size, the first war Israel loses will be its last) – we do not have to justify, or apologise for, our right to live. Not to anyone. Never again.

So, f*ck the UN. F*ck its fact-finding missions. And f*ck its reports. (Click here for my fuller treatise on the subject.)

More deserving of contempt than Judge Goldstone, this week, was Ha’aretz ‘journalist’ Yoel Marcus, who wrote the following in last weekend’s op-ed:

“[many countries] accuse us of strengthening extremist Islam and committing war crimes. And all we need now is to stick our noses into Iranian affairs by bombing its nuclear facilities . . . We must not even dream of a move like that at a time when America is coordinating international pressure on Tehran.”

“Stick our noses into Iranian affairs”?!

Mr. Marcus, perhaps you consider Israel’s air strike on the Osirak nuclear reactor to have been an unwarranted “nose stuck” into Saddam’s “affairs”? And, by similar logic, that Israel was correct to wait for Egyptian and Syrian “affairs” to develop unhindered in 1973?

And “coordinating international pressure on Tehran”?

Yes, that should do it, Mr. Marcus – a resolution of condemnation from the United Nations. And, if that doesn’t work, the UN could perhaps issue a further one . . . but, this time, “in the strongest terms”. Ahmadinejad clearly wouldn’t mess with that.

The Persian dwarf showed his true colours again, on Wednesday, in his speech to the UN General Assembly (full text):

“The dignity, integrity and rights of the American and European people are being played with by a small but deceitful number of people called Zionists. Although they are a miniscule minority, they have been dominating an important portion of the financial and monetary centers as well as the political decision-making centers of some European countries and the US in a deceitful, complex and furtive manner. It is deeply disastrous to witness that some presidential or premiere nominees in some big countries have to visit these people, take part in their gatherings, swear their allegiance and commitment to their interests in order to attain financial or media support. This means that the great people of America and various nations of Europe need to obey the demands and wishes of a small number of acquisitive and invasive people.”

Ring any bells, Mr. Marcus? And, as Ha’aretz would appear to have cut back on its library resources, here is a compilation of other statements by Ahmadinejad denying the Holocaust and alluding to, calling for, or directly threatening, Israel’s destruction. And guess what . . . we discover today that Iran now has a second nuclear facility.

Where does Ha’aretz find these pillocks? Gideon Levy, Amira Hass, Nehemia Shtrasler, Amos Harel, Avi Issacharoff . . . they have all received dishonourable mention on melchett mike. And now there’s a new f*ckwit on the block.

And, talking of “blocks”, if you tend to suffer from the writer’s variety, Mr. Marcus, I can highly recommend starting a blog . . . then you won’t have to write bollocks when you have nothing useful to say.

melchett mike’s Rosh Hashanah Message

Dear Friends (well, that’s how “Sacksy” starts),

Dalia, one of the Rothschild kiosk quarter-to-seven crew – and the most balanced and normal of the natives who drink their morning coffee there (the competition, it has to be said, is not all that fierce) – recently surprised her husband, for his birthday, with a long weekend in Budapest.

On the morning following their return, she was simply gushing about the Pearl of the Danube, and especially the Marriott Hotel, on its banks, at which they stayed. The food. The rooms. The service. All superb. “And the best thing of all,” declared Dalia, without even a hint of jest, “we were the only Israelis.”

Now, you will never hear the Englishman – on his return to Blighty from the Costa del Sozzled (or whichever other destination he decided to grace with his civilising presence) – revel in the fact that he didn’t come across any other Englishmen during his sojourn.

Far from it. The Englishman delights in being amongst his own (and is even somewhat lost without them). Indeed, it is the “Kraut” and the “Frog”, the “Itie” and the “Spic” – in short, “Johnny Foreigner” – whom the Englishman does not wish to rub shoulders with on his hols.

I have been pondering this difference in attitude between the Englishman and the Israeli towards their own. It is not hard to fathom what it tells us about the Englishman . . . but what does it say about the Israeli?

The Israeli revels in one-upmanship. Everything he does or has must be better, less obtainable, more expensive – or, in the case of an identical product or service, cheaper – than what his friend does or has. So, for Dalia, the absence of other Israelis in the Marriott perhaps gave it an air of exclusivity.

The Israeli also believes that the Gentile – or at least the European, or white, English-speaking one – must necessarily have more class and/or culture than the native of the Middle East (said Israeli has obviously not spent a Friday evening in your average English city centre). Even I, a naturalised Israeli, receive looks of reverence when I – or, rather, my dreadful Hebrew-speaking accent – reveal my English roots. And I listen in puzzlement as awe-filled locals rave about aspects of London and England that I always took for granted. So, perhaps Dalia just didn’t want the Middle East interfering with her European weekend.

The Israeli also exhibits his own variant of what comedian Jackie Mason describes as “too Jewish” syndrome, relating to the Hebrew’s lack of comfort in his own skin. So, escaping her fellow Israeli for a few days perhaps provided Dalia with a welcome break from that uncomfortable ‘mirror’.

Jewish self-deprecation, our numerous complexes, and especially Groucho Marx’s not wanting “to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members”, all play their part here too.

Or perhaps I am just over-analysing. Anyone who has been on a flight, in a hotel, or anywhere for that matter, with a group of Israelis will know that there are politer, more decorous and rule-obeying breeds. Dalia’s continental breakfasts would not have been quite the same if dozens of her compatriots had been fighting over, and smuggling vast quantities of food out of, the Marriott buffet.

But – and I am getting to the Rosh Hashanah Message bit now (I think you will find the transition quite seamless!) – whilst neither Israelis nor life in Israel are perfect (both far from it), I strongly believe that those of you who are still living in the Diaspora are really missing out. You are just not “in the game”.

And when I hear of the ‘problems’ and concerns of friends visiting from the UK, of their interests, and those of their kids – not to mention Britain’s (and Europe’s) creeping Islamisation (about which I have blogged) – it just serves to reaffirm my decision to live here. Apologies for getting all existential on you, but, in the large scheme of things, the plushest of homes, flashest of cars, most extravagant of holidays, and even the best of schools, surely mean and count for little.

Diaspora Jewry . . . the shofar calls!

To return to the “footie” analogy (they tend to be the best, I find), the intensive training, expensive boots and fancy strip mean nothing . . . if you can’t even get on the pitch. And having the privilege to live during a rare period of Jewish self-determination – with sovereignty in the Land of Israel – has given all of us the opportunity to get on that “pitch”. It is totally incomprehensible to me how Jews, and self-declared Zionists to boot (pun intended), choose instead to watch from the touchline. (Whilst this may come across as preachy, my intention is not to patronise. And if just one or two readers think about the “Israel option” while bored sh*tless in shul this weekend . . . then pissing the rest of you off will have been worth it!)

So, a happy, healthy and peaceful New Year to readers of melchett mike and to all of Am Yisroel (the Jewish people) . . . but especially to the State of Israel and its citizens, who – in spite of their many faults – are the vanguard of our people, bringing their Diaspora brothers the standing, credibility, and thus security, to continue what I believe to be their relatively meaningless (in a Jewish sense) and increasingly precarious existence.

And, whilst Dalia may not be so pleased to see you during her next European “weekend of culture” . . . she would be delighted to have you here!

melchett mike,
Rosh Hashanah 5770

Hasmo Legends XIV: Conversations with Osher

[Followed by Osher: The Postscript (featuring melchett mike‘s Osher Poll)]

A couple of hours after posting Hasmo Legends XIII: A Legend (Osher) Strikes Back, I received a phone call from a fellow ex-Hasmo Tel Avivi (single, no dogs) who couldn’t believe the coup of having Osher Baddiel on melchett mike:

“If you could have chosen anyone,” Jonny said excitedly, “Osher would have been in the top five . . . perhaps even the top one!”

And over two hundred comments in three weeks is testament to the fact that – agree with his views or disagree, and whether you liked him at Hasmo or not – Osher Baddiel is almost the definition of a legend: “a person about whom unauthenticated tales are told” (The Concise Oxford Dictionary).

Much of my initial, 45-minute telephone conversation with – or, more accurately (for the first twenty minutes or so), lecture from – Osher (see Hasmo Legends XIII: The Background below the main post) centered on the right to exist. Not of Israel. But of Hasmo Legends. According to Osher (I hope Mr. Baddiel will forgive the impertinence . . . it is how we all knew him), the series is a necessary evil which encourages only mischief and is causing only hurt: “A fat lot of kiddush Hashem it is doing.” And he repeatedly urged me to remove all posts and comments at once: “Close it. Kill it. Bye-bye.” (But Osher’s unambiguous views on the subject are there for all to read, and rehashing them here serves no useful purpose.)

When (during the initial barrage) I managed to get a word in edgeways, I informed Osher that my motives for penning Hasmo Legends were anything but malicious – I had a lot of warm and amusing memories of Hasmonean, and had been amazed to find little or nothing written about the institution on the Web. I told him that if he would actually read my posts (and turn a blind eye to the odd indiscretion), he might even find them amusing and of merit. In spite of having an Internet connection, however, Osher seemed intent not to be seen to be condoning the series, the blog, or their author (though he did eventually concede that I was “not a bad fellow”, but had just “made a very silly mistake”).

It is Osher’s disapproval of Hasmo Legends, and of melchett mike, which makes the fact of his posting all the more startling, according both a certain degree of ‘official’ approval which they did not previously have. Of course, I had no intention of telling him that. And his express precondition for posting, that I refrain from editing his words, was entirely superfluous. I had no intention! Whilst chosen to damn me – and my fellow “overgrown babies” – those words merely incriminated their author and, in many ways, Hasmo’s former religious ‘elite’. Indeed, they are a far better record of the ethos of Hasmonean Grammar School for Boys than our cumulative testimonies. And, every time I read them, I am taken back to the pottiness of those musty, dilapidated classrooms.

However surprising the fact of his posting, it confirms Osher’s status as Hasmo’s primary maverick. Excluding the posts of Tony Pearce – who only had a cameo (however unique) in the carry-on that was Hasmonean – and a brief comment from Clive Fierstone, no other Hasmo Legend has had the courage or imagination to rear his head. We hardly expected DJ or Jerry Gerber to speak out, but one of the renegade English department, for example, could quite easily have done so without jeopardising a Golders Green shtiebl membership (in spite of his son being a regular contributor to melchett mike, unearthing information on Nazi war criminals has proved a simpler task than obtaining anything whatsoever on Jeff Soester).

I tried telling Osher that comments to Hasmo Legends indicate that the Hasmonean experiences of many ex-pupils (certainly many more than I would have imagined) were far from idyllic (and again, far further than I would have believed). Osher dismissed out of hand, however, the “online therapy” justification for the series.

When I brought up the issue of corporal punishment, Osher responded that “there was very little malice” at Hasmonean, that “those things were done in those days”, and that “sometimes a kid gets what’s coming to him”. Indeed, much of the violence in today’s society, Osher believes, stems from children no longer being physically disciplined at school: “Children don’t know what physical hurt means, so they do it to others when they leave.” And “the Torah,” Osher argues, “doesn’t say it is wrong to hit a child”.

I was longing, however, to get to the two matters of most interest to me: Osher’s attitudes towards Israel/Zionism, and to his celebrity rent-a-Jew cousin David Baddiel (who, on telly, always seemed oddly willing to play the role of a Jewish Uncle Tom).

I started by quizzing Osher about the truth of a comment to melchett mike, that he had asked a pupil who attended school on Yom Ha’Atzmaut in a blue and white striped shirt why he was “wearing an Auschwitz uniform”. “Not me,” replied Osher, “I would never have said that.” What Osher did, however, volunteer was his recollection – following a talk with Sixth Formers on some aspect of (what he considered to be) “chilul shabbes in Eretz Yisroel” – of the scrawling on a classroom wall: “Osher, Hitler would have loved you!”

Osher’s views on Israel – to a Sheinkin dweller at least – do seem rather extreme: “If you don’t keep Torah mitzvos, you have no right to it.” Osher further decries the arrogance of chiloni Israelis, who “think they can defend themselves without Avinu She’bashomayim.” And he is certain that Israel only continues to exist because of God’s help, much of which has been “undeserved” and given “on credit”.

Far from being totally detached from the State, however, Osher’s mother and son live here, and he certainly has a finger on Israel’s pulse, commenting on the evils of certain “parades” (he didn’t need to specify which) and that so-called human rights groups, B’tselem and Shalom Achshav, are “terrible enemies of the Jewish people”.

When I asked Osher whether he had any sympathy for Neturei Karta and the individuals who met with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran, he replied that he was “dead against them” and that they were so out of touch that “even the Arabs don’t use them for propaganda”.

In spite of having it on my to ask list, I decided not to bring up Osher’s alleged ‘assault’ on Norman Kahler, as witnessed by various commenters to melchett mike. If I can be forgiven for the Khaled Mashaal impression, it sounded very much like Norman – with his endless “Zionist provocations” – had it coming to him!

I did, however, ask Osher whether he had really washed boys’ mouths out with soap. No denials there: “It was no more treif than what had come out of them. And they never swore again.” In front of him, at any rate.

Osher's cuz, Dave

My curiosity as to Osher’s relationship with his author/TV presenter (he is no more a comedian than Osher) relative, David Baddiel (right), stems from my recollection of the latter – in a desperate, failed attempt to draw Osher into a 2004 episode of the BBC genealogy series Who Do You Think You Are? – making some cringeworthy reference to his ultra-Orthodox cousin whilst standing outside a Golders Green bagel bakery. Osher recalled how the documentary’s producer had spent two and a half hours in his Stamford Hill home, over tea, trying to persuade him to participate. Even the very little Osher knew about David – including the “goyishe girlfriend” – was sufficient to persuade him that it could only come to no good. And David’s boasting of his partiality for seafood confirmed to Osher that he had made the correct decision. As he put it, in true Osher style: “Even goyim don’t eat oysters!” Anyhow, it seems that a wider Baddiel family Rosh Hashanah reunion may not be on the cards.

Towards the end of our first conversation, Osher enquired as to my marital status. On hearing of my singularity, he proceeded to impart similar advice to that which I receive daily from my dear mother. Following his “parades” reference, I was longing to reassure Osher – though why I don’t know – that I am not gay.  But I couldn’t quite summon up the courage or the appropriate wording (I mean, would I have gone for “gay”, “homosexual” . . . or something rather more “feigele”-like?)

Osher then enquired as to my level of religious observance. I gulped (even though I knew it was coming). “Are you sure you want me to tell you?” He did. And I told him. “Of course you believe in the Ribono Shel Olom,” Osher assured me, “you are just estranged from him. It is just that you have seen things in your life that you didn’t like.” (At the risk of reinforcing your views on modern Israel, Osher, what I forgot to tell you is that I was the first person in my company – of over nine hundred employees – to challenge the big boss and put a mezuzah on my office door. My deference to the Big Boss, even if born of superstition, perhaps means that I am not such an apikores after all.)

My “joker” for Osher was the thorny issue of charedi service – or, rather, the lack of it – in the IDF. But I might as well not have played it. “The Shulchan Oruch and the Rambam,” he assured me, allow for “Torah learners to be left alone.”

“Anyway,” said Osher, “frum Jews have never got a good press, because we’re outlandish and strange.”

I couldn’t argue with that. I had, however, enjoyed talking – or, rather, for the most part, listening– to Osher. And I must have asked him about five times whether I could have “just one more question”. In spite of Osher repeatedly saying that he “would like to keep up the contact” (I would too), I had the strong feeling that I had to make the most of this audience because he might not speak to me so freely again.

Defending his position on corporal punishment, Osher had commented: “Fashions change. Values don’t. Because they come from Hashem . . . and He doesn’t change.”

Pithy and brilliant.

What a shame, I thought, that this man – who most definitely has something to say (even if I might not always agree with it) – didn’t teach me at Hasmo, instead of the various muppets . . . who had nothing to.

[I took contemporaneous handwritten notes of my telephone conversations with Osher Baddiel with his express knowledge and consent, and on the clear understanding that I would be using them to accurately document them. I did not amend the above post in the light of the following.]

…..

Osher: The Postscript (featuring melchett mike‘s Osher Poll)

During my drive home from work, on Monday, I had two “missed calls” from a UK telephone number. I called back. It was Osher Baddiel. He asked me to remove his post from melchett mike. I listened to the reasons for his request – essentially, the nature of the comments it had engendered – whilst remaining purposely non-committal.

The following day, after receiving a message from Osher on my answer machine – seeking confirmation that I had removed the post as requested – I sent him the following by e-mail:

Dear Mr. Baddiel,

I just heard your voice message.

After spending the evening thinking it over, I have decided not to remove your post from the blog. You expressly agreed that I post it, and – with the greatest respect – I will not remove it because you don’t like the resulting discussion. I will, however, consider removing or editing specific comments.

I had already (i.e., before your telephone call of yesterday) written a further post about our conversations, which I told you I would and which I intend to post. If you would like me to send it to you first, I will be happy to and to take into consideration your response. Anyway, I think you will find it to be – in the main – flattering and positive.

As I have mentioned to you, many, many ex-Hasmos have found the Hasmo Legends series to be extremely beneficial, and not just mere entertainment.

I am not e-mailing because I wish to avoid talking to you, but because I fear it would end in an argument. And I don’t wish to get into that situation with you. Our world views are very different. I will talk about the law and rights. And you will talk about Torah.

Even though I didn’t really get to know you during my Hasmo days, I respect you and your forthrightness. And I would still like to meet you some day soon, even though I understand that I might now be jeopardizing that . . . or that I am likely, at the very least, to get a “putch” for my disobedience!

Yours respectfully,

Mike

I addressed Osher’s reply of that same afternoon, written between paragraphs of the above, on a similarly piecemeal basis (my explanations of the context, where necessary, in square brackets):

• I listened carefully [to your request] and very intentionally did not make any “promises” of the kind [that I would remove the post].
• You are of course “entitled to ask for it back”, but – in terms of the general law – I don’t believe that I am obliged to remove it. This is made even clearer by the terms and conditions of my blog (see https://melchettmike.wordpress.com/about-this-blog/).
• Your post has had 3,145 ‘hits’ to date. Since November of last year, my blog has had 128,378. These statistics hardly support your contention [that the post has “breathed life into” melchett mike and that I “wish to exploit” it “to engender more interest”] (though you are of course free to think as you please).
• I have no desire to get into a personal war of words, but your post makes it abundantly clear that you are not afraid of hurting people’s “feelings”. [re Osher, once again, accusing contributors to melchett mike of this]
• The e-mail at the bottom of this page [seeking, and obtaining, your confirmation I could post the draft] makes it quite clear that there were no such “false pretences” involved. [re Osher’s claim that his post was obtained under such]

Just as you have no wish do get into a public “scrum”, I have no wish to get into a private one. You sent me a post. I posted it. I do not believe that I am under any obligation, moral, legal, or otherwise (we are not at school anymore), to unpost it.

If you wish to appeal via the blog, feel free to do so. They are not all “foulmouthed cretins”.

Still respectfully,

Mike

It may sound a little harsh, but the bottom line is this . . . melchett mike is a blog (see the link above). It is not the Hasmonean School Magazine Online. If it were, none of you would be reading it. I am an ex-journalist, and (believe it or not) take my blog reasonably seriously. And, whilst it didn’t “make” melchett mike as Osher seems to think, receiving a post from him was (as I wrote in the first paragraph above) a “coup” for Hasmo Legends. Why would I remove it?

Early on that Tuesday evening, Osher sent me his pièce de résistance (of seven hundred words no less), to which, yesterday morning, I replied as follows:

Dear Mr. Baddiel,

In spite of the deeply insensitive things that you wrote about me in your post to the blog, I went out of my way to refrain from attacking you personally. But you fail to accord me the same courtesy. How ironic that you write about “hurting people, deliberately, gratuitously” . . . and call me a “bully boy”!

You have now crossed the line, and I certainly no longer feel the need to accord you special treatment. I won’t, however, get drawn into an unseemly e-mail ‘war’.  But neither will I “tell [my] bloggers” anything. If you are as “not afraid of the truth” and “not scared of [my] bloggers” as you claim, you will have no objection to their seeing the e-mails you have sent me. I have nothing to hide . . . do you?

In some sense, as a result of all their comments, my Hasmo Legends series has become theirs too. And perhaps they are the ones to decide whether your post to the blog should rightfully be removed.

Mike

By prompt reply, Osher refused me permission to publish his e-mails, which I will respect (even though, from a strictly legal standpoint, I don’t believe that I require any such permission). Perhaps he considers them copyrightable works of art. In subtlety, however, they owe rather less to the school of Michelangelo than to that of Rabbi Angel (and the plank for our backsides that he christened “wacko”).

"Osher who?"

Indeed, after what he wrote in those e-mails, I have little respect left for Osher Baddiel. They were hateful, viciously abusing both me – though I am mischievously proud of my new “Rotter-in-Chief” title – and contributors to melchett mike. Osher was particularly scathing and unpleasant about my relationship with his seeming bêtes noires, Stuey (above right) and Dexxy. The great defender of former Hasmo teachers’ and Rebbes’ (suddenly) delicate sensibilities appears to have no problem assaulting those of their former pupils, too many of whom are singing from the same hymnsheet for his liking. (If Osher wishes to challenge any of this, I will gladly publish his e-mails . . . and let you be the judges.)

So, what do I take out of this whole Osher episode (apart, that is, from marvel at the man’s astonishing ability to psychically reproduce dogs)?

(Trite and banal, perhaps, but . . .) That religious extremism is bad, whatever the religion. No less than the fundamentalist imams around the corner from him, in Finsbury Park, Osher dexterously manipulates the Scriptures to suit his own arguments and ends. His post to melchett mike, e-mails, and even telephone utterances, clearly illustrate that Osher does not apply the laws of loshon hora (for example) as rigorously to himself as to others. And I have no doubt that Osher would have a most eloquent and persuasive justification for that. (It is just fortunate that Jewish texts are rather less open to pernicious interpretation than those of our Islamic cousins [though 72 virgins could always be nice].)

And there was I, wondering how many buses I would have to catch for the honour of tea with a Legend in N16 during my next visit to the “green and pleasant land” (though Stamford Hill is probably not quite what William Blake had in mind).

 

Next on Hasmo Legends, Part XV: “Polly” Sue Schneider

HOT . . . in the bedroom and under the collar

Over a drink in Tel Aviv yesterday evening, a friend divulged details to me of the HOT Action that he and his girlfriend have been enjoying in the bedroom.

Alas, he was not referring to “action” of the rumpy-pumpy, bit of the other, “ooh err missus” sort . . . but that of the Channel 14 variety (14 is the action movie channel on Israel’s HOT cable TV network).

A mere matter of weeks into a new relationship – and with a particularly attractive woman – said friend, who doesn’t have a television in his own apartment, has started to appreciate the benefits of his girlfriend’s.

So, every evening, they rip off each other’s clothes, jump into bed . . .  and watch telly.

This, it has to be said, does not bode particularly well for their relationship. HOT’s standard fare of tasteless wannabe/quasi-celebrity “Isratrash” and shit films (repeated ad infinitum) has transformed the international news networks – BBC, CNN, Fox, and Sky – into the staple television diet of most English-speaking households in Israel.

I pay a monthly 210 shekels (about 35 British pounds) to, in effect, have Sky News “rolling” on in the background – it has taken on an elevator music-like quality in my apartment – but, essentially, for the luxury (for a further 50 shekels) of being able to watch the English Premier League from Dexxy’s and Stuey’s (previously my) Rechov Melchett couch.

HOT’s abysmal programming (with the notable exception of Channel 8 documentaries) is matched only by its miserably inefficient, unreliable and thoroughly discourteous customer service . . . easily the worst I have experienced in a country in which it faces formidable competition in that regard (see my earlier post, The Buyer’s a Freier).

There is even a Hebrew website, Ani soneh et HOT! – translated as “I hate HOT!” (logo above) – dedicated to the seemingly widespread contempt for the network. (If any readers of melchett mike wish to suggest a more worthy contender for the title of Worst Customer Service in Israel, please do so below.)

I spent yesterday morning – like so many others during my decade in Israel – pulling my hair out in the futile wait for a HOT technician. “Seven-thirty to nine,” I had been confidently assured by HOT’s telephone customer service representative.

The technician didn’t turn up. Neither did he call. And, to add insult to injury, after I demanded compensation for the wasted two hours off work, HOT’s customer service manager offered me a temporary extra channel (to add to the over one hundred others that I never watch).

“The Food Channel? What . . . for a WHOLE MONTH?! Wow! Yeh! That’ll be fine then.”

When the technician finally did turn up, yesterday evening, Dexxy treated herself to a taste of his calf. That showed him! Bastard.

So, I will be voting with my feet and switching to HOT’s satellite competitor, YES. Either that, or I will splash out a one-off 400 shekels for a receiver that will allow me to view Israel’s handful of terrestrial channels.

And, should I desire some HOT Action, I could always pop round to my friend’s girlfriend . . . sounds like he could definitely do with some ‘assistance’ in that regard.

The Return of the Lockerbie Bomber: Lessons for the Golan

The shameful release of the Libyan convicted of murdering 270 innocent people over, and in, Lockerbie in 1988 disgraces Scotland, its criminal justice system, and its people.

The freeing, on “compassionate grounds”, of Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi (right) by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill – seemingly more intent on making a name for himself than living up to his title – shows no “compassion” whatsoever for the families and friends of the victims of Pan Am Flight 103, never mind consideration for the rule of law.

Watching “breaking news” of the Lockerbie mass murder, the biggest in British history, was one of those never-forget-where-you-were experiences – I was sitting on a friend’s couch in Finchley – and, as it transpired, a boy I knew, Marc Tager, was on the flight.

MacAskill’s expressed motivation for releasing Megrahi – Scottish values to show mercy – smacks of the empty cliché:

“In Scotland, we are a people who pride ourselves on our humanity. It is viewed as a defining characteristic of Scotland and the Scottish people.”

To the Scots’ other, less attractive, mythical traits – misery, meanness, and drunkenness – can now be added gross stupidity and insensitivity.

The argument that Megrahi, who is said to have terminal prostate cancer, should never have been convicted in the first place is a “red herring” and does not excuse MacAskill’s horrible lack of judgment. If this is the logic of the Scottish Justice Secretary no less, and a member of the Scottish National Party, the Scots are clearly no more ready to govern themselves than their Celtic cousins down in the Valleys.

Some see more than coincidence in Megrahi’s dropping, less than a week before his release, of his second appeal against conviction – at which embarrassing evidence may have come to light exposing a miscarriage of justice and/or a cover-up (see David Horovitz’s article in last weekend’s Jerusalem Post) – whilst the even more cynical link the decision to the increasing interest of Western (including British) energy companies in Libya’s vast oil and gas resources.

More shameless than the decision to free Megrahi, however, was the hero’s welcome put on for his return. Even if Libya disputes his conviction, the sickening scenes of jubilation on the runway in Tripoli were a further slap in the face for the the Lockerbie victims’ families. And, viewing those scenes on TV, I perceived a real warning for Israel . . .

I spent the weekend before last in the Golan Heights, where I talked to Syrian Druze displaced by Israel’s occupation – and, in 1981, formal annexation – of the Heights following the 1967 Six Day War.

My discussions did not confirm the oft-heard view – from those whose veins flow even bluer-and-whiter than mine – that these Druze (right) do not really want the Golan to be returned to Syria, because life is better for them in Israel. True, they currently live in a genuine democracy and enjoy greater economic prosperity, but – unlike too many of us Israelis and Jews, who (sadly) attach so much import to the merely material – the Druze lead simple lives, wanting nothing more than to be reunited with their families on the other side of the fence. (For more information on the Golan Druze, and the Golan Heights in general, see Wikipedia.)

I have little doubt that, within the next decade or so, the Golan Heights will  be returned to Syria. But to what end?

"Look into my eyes, my eyes . . ."

Will Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad (right) do his part to guarantee peace along the countries’ (adjusted) common border?

Will he cease providing refuge, in Damascus, for Jew-killers?

And will he withdraw Syria from its dastardly axis with Iran and Hizbollah?

Will he f*ck!

His continual anti-Israel pronouncements aside, just one look at Assad’s eyes are enough to know that (if I may be forgiven for quoting a previous post) “for  Israel to deliver the strategic Golan Heights to the Ass’ Man would be akin to putting a serial paedophile in charge of a kiddies’ paddling pool.”

Assad and the Syrians are no more trustworthy than Colonel Gaddafi and their Libyan “brothers”, who – by granting a convicted mass murderer a hero’s welcome, instead of receiving him in an appropriately low-key manner – exposed themselves to the world as the heartless, amoral lowlifes that they are (indeed, if Megrahi – a former intelligence officer – wasn’t dying, I have no doubt that Gaddafi would be putting him straight back on active duty).

If, or more realistically when, the Golan Heights is returned to Syria, the state-sponsored jubilation will make Megrahi’s welcome, in comparison, seem more like a birthday bash for Bernie Madoff attended by satisfied former clients.

Dictators’ PR stunts, however,  are nothing new, being all they have to offer their long-suffering subjects.

The real question is whether Assad will “be putting” the Golan Heights “back on active duty”, and utilising them for the same purposes as pre-1967 . . . to attack Israeli villages below. With the greatest respect to the memory of the victims of Lockerbie and to the feelings of their families, Israel has far more to lose than ‘merely’ insult and hurt.

Hasmo Legends XIII: A Legend (Osher) Strikes Back

[Followed by Hasmo Legends XIII: The Background]

Someone has told me about the Hasmo blog.  I haven’t seen it for myself and, considering what it is supposed to be like, I don’t think I want to, either.

After all, as far as I can ascertain, the fellows who are obsessed with this hatred of Hasmo have more or less wasted the last 20 or 30 years doing nothing much for themselves and even less for the world.  The owner of the blog, who calls himself Mike Something-or-other, as far as is known, lives alone, unmarried, in a flat in Tel Aviv, together with his four dogs.  Most of these people who say that Hasmo did nothing for them spiritually, etc., etc., moan, groan, moan, groan, are now grown men but are unfortunately the drinking companions of ingrates and malcontents and suchlike others who are pretty much the dregs of society.

This site is a shame on all of us normal people who have a great deal to be thankful for to Hasmo.  If Mike and Co. won’t close it down themselves, or at least remove the offensive comments about teachers and Rebbes and start to be more positive and grateful, then the rest of us should not give it any support by contributing any comments to this site.  It is a disgrace to all of us ex-Hasmos!  Let’s silent this scab!  After all, most of us ex-Hasmos know full well that wherever we go in the world, Hasmo is known and its ex-pupils are looked up to – and with good reason!  But these malcontents want to spoil all that.  For why?  Of course we all know that there were/are areas that could have been better.  OK, so what?  Does that cancel all the good that is Hasmo?

Let’s have a bit more pride in our school and gratefulness to those teachers and Rebbes that have given us so much opportunity and advantage.  Malcontents and failures should not be allowed to define what is a true Hasmo product nor besmirch our name and reputation!  Hasmos of the world – unite!

As a Limmudei Kodesh Rebbe at Hasmonean for well over thirty years and also a teacher (I also taught bookbinding and for a time I taught also woodwork and even calligraphy) I am saddened to hear about this website about the Hasmonean.  It is so unfair.

But you know, it’s rather sad to see grown men (some of them must be about fifty years old by now, if not older) who are so absorbed with themselves and so vindictive that they have to try to besmirch, denigrate and ridicule people, sometimes using language and expressions which are shamefully foul and dirty and not at all fitting for Jewish people to use, just because – more than thirty years ago! — these people were their teachers and, according to their childish perspective, they treated them unfairly.  These overgrown babies think that they can now take their revenge against their teachers (but like the cowards that they are, of course hiding behind the cloak of anonymity) for what they perceive to be “unfair treatment” – referring to things which happened twenty or even over thirty years ago!

A number of points to remember:

1.   After all is said and done, people become teachers because they are idealistic.  They are generally more intelligent than your average person and could probably do quite well out there in the world of money and material gain.  But no.  They have chosen to dedicate their lives to helping youngsters make their way in the world, to give them the equipment they will need to do well.  Nobody, but nobody, has ever decided to become a teacher so as to make life for children a misery.  All teachers start out with the best intentions.  Sadly, the treatment that they receive from their pupils can sometimes make them regret deeply their chosen vocation, but if they have become embittered it is because the children, who can be clever, manipulative, nasty, cruel and quite vicious, have made them so.

2.   The self-pitying, vindictive, spiteful, foul-mouthed, overgrown babies who contribute their spiteful remarks about their teachers were in all probability pretty rotten kids who quite deliberately intended to play-up and ruin, both, the best efforts of their teachers and also the learning opportunities of their classmates.  If their teachers were nasty to them, they probably brought it upon themselves by trying to make their teachers’ lives a misery.

3.   And even if they were completely innocent, so alright!  The teacher made a mistake!  Because the real culprit was clever, the teacher mistakenly picked on you and punished you!  And you, of course, protested your innocence but would not snitch on the real offender.  So the teacher made a mistake!  Is that a valid reason for insulting him so foully thirty years later, publicly and mercilessly?

4.   These 50-year-old overgrown babies, some of whom have managed to make their way in the world and, by the sound of it, have managed to feather their nests quite nicely, thank-you-very-much, should consider that these teachers whom they vilify so pitilessly are in fact the ones who gave them the wherewithal to make their fortunes, and they should show a modicum of gratefulness.

5.   They might also consider that their memories of things that happened so long ago might be more than a little distorted by time and bias and imagination (and possibly drink).  Nevertheless, they are willing to vilify people and spread their own malevolence to others, just so that they can glorify themselves in the hurt and insult of another.  Maybe this is what it takes to be popular in the crowd of mean and nasty people that make up this social circle.  As I recall, there used to be a place with people like that not far from where the Dead Sea is today.

Osher Baddiel in familiar mode, Ohalei Yaakov Yeshiva, Moscow (March 2009)

6.   As I used to say to my young pupils many years ago, “Your being disrespectful to your teachers says more about you than it says about your teachers!” (I also used to point out that when children behave nicely they fulfil the Mitzvah of honouring their parents because people say how well they have brought up their children but that they do their parents a dishonour by being disrespectful because their parents are ultimately responsible for how their children behave and interact with others.)  And that is said to pupils who are, after all, children.  So, I ask you, what does this ungratefulness to a school that provided a pretty good education, and vindictiveness towards teachers, say about a supposedly mature 50-year-old?

7.   If this is their attitude towards their teachers even now, as grown men, twenty or even thirty years later, one shudders to think how they have allowed their nastiness to fester and grow in their minds and how they have infected their own children to feel and relate to their teachers.  And the viciousness doesn’t stop there, either, because now their children have probably got the same jaundiced view of teachers.  (And of Rebbes, of course, and of authority generally, no?)  It is very much the same as the cruel damage done to children and grandchildren and even beyond, when parents divorce (or split up) amidst rancour and bitterness.  If you have to, divorce.  But do it respectfully and if at all possible, amicably, for the sake of the children.  Just because you two misled each other or made a bad choice of partner, is that a reason for ruining your children’s and grandchildren’s view of marriage and family life and spoiling their own married lives?  Or that they will not marry at all?  How selfish!  So, just because this person has had a bad experience with one or two teachers (probably brought on by himself, as said) is that a reason to blight the school experience of his children?

8.   Let these people realize that it’s high time they grew up.  They should stop wallowing in self-pity, looking for scapegoats to blame for having such a rotten character.  They should remember that they are big boys now and how they choose to develop their character is up to them.  They can’t go on forever blaming others for their own failures (but of course patting themselves on the back if some things pan out alright).  Whether to be gracious or nasty, thankful or ungrateful, forgiving or vengeful, respectful or insolent, kind or cruel, scoffing or admiring, all these are their own making.  As I have said: What they choose to be says much more about them than it does about the ones that they denigrate.

9.   Any decent person understands that it is unfair that a thug should beat someone from behind a bush, without giving him any chance of self-defence.  Yet these people hide behind the cloak of anonymity to attack their victims, who can never defend themselves, who can only hope and pray fervently that their close families and friends do not get to read these vicious lies and childish rantings of warped memories and biased imaginations.  The person who runs this website should close it down immediately.  There is no excuse for it.  He should remember that there is no such thing as innocent fun at someone else’s expense.  It’s a shame and disgrace to him, not something to laugh about.  I insist that there are enough good people who went to the Hasmonean who know that such a website offends against all the noble and good teachings of the Torah and Chazal who could exert pressure to have this maverick close down this site as it is at present.  It’s a great pity that this website could be such a Kiddush HaShem, showing that Jewish people are truly grateful, Makkir Tovah, and repay good with good.  Instead, it’s made a laughing stock of a venerable institution and a fair number of good, hard-working, dedicated, well-intentioned people, Jewish and non-Jewish, and shown a nasty side to Jewish people.  In short, is this website something to be proud about or does it make you wince with embarrassment?  (After the initial guffaw of laughter, of course.)  To what purpose, please?  To what benefit?

10.   And I haven’t even mentioned yet the Torah, the Halochoh and the Mussar aspect of this shameful website.  But I don’t suppose the person responsible for this enterprise is interested in what the Torah’s attitude is towards his obsession to defame his teachers and his school.  He can’t be particularly religious, anyhow.  Oh, I don’t mean that he doesn’t keep Shabbos or wear Tefillin.  He probably does.  Which just makes him a pious hypocrite.  And not only is he a hypocrite but he’s a cowardly hypocrite, too, who hides behind the anonymity of a website.  I say that he’s not a genuinely religious person.  He knows that in the Torah it says, “You shall love your friend like yourself,” and he wouldn’t want these things said about him, even as “a bit of a laugh.”

Well, I’ve gone on for long enough.  Perhaps I shouldn’t have come down so heavily but I know that some of the comments about some of the people are most unkind and really have hurt the feelings of the people concerned, Jew and non-Jew alike.  Every human being has feelings, and if he hasn’t, then he’s not human.  Which makes one wonder about the person who runs this site, does it not?

Please feel free to make known what I have said in this email.  But please, all of it, not selections from it.  I say that the site as it is now should be closed down, with sincere apologies to all those who have been hurt or harmed by it.  Start again.

And, in future, be thankful and grateful for what the Hasmonean gave you all.  It’s a mighty good school and all its pupils should all be grateful for all that it has given them, the rough with the smooth.

Osher Y. Baddiel, Stamford Hill, 17 August 2009.

[Photographs by “Benjamin”, picasaweb.google.com]

…..

Hasmo Legends XIII: The Background

To satisfy the steady flow of enquiries . . .

In the early hours of Monday morning, on checking for rogue comments to melchett mike from sly ex-Hasmos trying to catch me off my guard (i.e., asleep!), I was mildly amused to discover a comment – to Hasmo Legends I: An Introduction to an Institution – consisting of the first few paragraphs of the above post (though shorn of their more incendiary elements) from an “Osher Baddiel”. It was prefaced:

This was received from Osher Baddiel and he seems to have a point.

The Israeli e-mail address began “RAVI59” and an IP search located the e-mail’s source as Hod HaSharon, a fairly mixed – but predominantly non-religious – city south of Raanana and Kfar Saba, and most definitely not a place that one would associate in any way with a certain Hasmo Legend of said name.

So, I deleted the comment and the one response thereto, from the ever on-the-ball Dan Gins:

There’s simply no way that the last comment emanated from Reb Osher Yitzchok, someone for whom I, for one, have substantial respect and affection. He is a man of sufficient culture and substance, to use the word “gratitude”, not some kindergarten pidgin dialect substitute such as “gratefulness”.

Before nodding off, I sent “RAVI59” a curt e-mail, reminding him that Hasmo Legend ‘rules’ prohibit anonymous comments. On waking up some hours later, and fearing that I had perhaps been a little too brusque, I sent him a further, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, e-mail:

Pursuant to my earlier message, I would also be happy for you to post your own views – which I take it these are – even if they are not those of Mr. Baddiel . . . but, again, with an authentic name. If Mr. Baddiel wishes to post in his own name, I would love to have him on melchett mike . . . as would, no doubt, hundreds of other readers.

Shortly thereafter, I received the following response from Ravi Shahar (whose name, which now appeared in full, I vaguely recalled from his previous comments to melchett mike):

Rabbi Baddiel sent me the message and told me to post on the blog, they were HIS words not mine. He said I could do so in his name. They were not my views, but his. He does not wish to associate with melchett mike because he claims that the views posted are evil gossip, slander etc. He does have a point. Many but not all, are slander and badmouthing.

I asked Ravi for Mr. (that’s how I remember him) Baddiel’s telephone number, so that I could “call him to verify”. By early Monday evening, I had received that number and the ‘green light’:

He is willing to talk to you by phone.

I was rather apprehensive, however, about making the call. Mr. Baddiel didn’t teach me for all that long, but I clearly recall him as a rather daunting figure and – even though 24 years have passed since I left Hasmonean – found it strangely difficult to get that picture out of my mind. But, after failing to persuade (in true Hasmo style) Dan Gins to make the call instead – the soft lad “bottled” it! – I gingerly dialled the number provided at 9:20 that same evening. A woman I presumed to be Mrs. Baddiel picked up the telephone.

“Is Rabbi Baddiel there, please?”  [I thought I’d go with “Rabbi” this time . . . just to be on the safe side!]

“He’s at mincha.”

I had a 20 minute stay of execution.

The 45 minute telephone conversation that followed, however, was extremely interesting, oddly uplifting spiritually (not a word that you will hear me use often in reference to my personal experience), and somehow took me back a quarter of a century to the classroom in which I always picture Osher Baddiel . . . the one on the other side of the narrow staircase (leading up to the Staff Room) next to the Computer Room (that of the brilliantly original name).

Mr. Baddiel confirmed his authorship of the comment posted to melchett mike by Ravi Shahar (who lives in Jerusalem, and not Hod HaSharon, after all). As for the details of the remainder of the conversation, I leave those for another time. I took detailed notes, and Mr. Baddiel agreed that I could use them to provide an accurate account of the conversation, though not to ridicule (and, of course, I will respect that).

The above post – received from Mr. Baddiel, by e-mail, yesterday (Tuesday) morning – took me, however, by complete surprise. It was almost six times the length of the comment which I had deleted, and far more outspoken. In a further telephone conversation, Mr. Baddiel – who couldn’t explain the discrepancy (perhaps his former sheliach, Ravi, can) – informed me that he had written it the previous morning and then sent it to Ravi for posting to melchett mike.

As is fairly obvious from a reading of the post, Mr. Baddiel, somewhat surprisingly, didn’t amend it to reflect the very cordial nature of our Monday evening conversation, one in which we each expressed our very contrasting opinions about melchett mike . . . but during, and after, which he understood (I hope) that I am not – as I suspect he might have imagined – The Dybbuk of Melchett.

melchett mike, Tel Aviv, 19 August 2009.

Next on Hasmo Legends, Part XIV: Conversations with Osher [followed by Osher: The Postscript (featuring melchett mike’s Osher Poll)]

Why I Am Not (Really) an Englishman

The most frequent question I get asked, by Israelis and non-Israelis alike, is why I moved to Israel.

The non-Israelis – English primarily – can’t understand why I would have wanted to leave the country of my birth (and first 28 years). Whenever there is any kind of sporting contest between their (our?) country and my adopted one, the English cannot fathom why I support Israel. And, when we get inebriated on the Friday evening of my annual visit to Harrogate, my mate John, a good, solid Yorkshireman, always sets me his own version of the Tebbit Test: “If there was a war between England and Israel, who would you fight for?” Suffice it to say, my answer – like John’s question, the same every year – always leaves him shaking his head, lips clenched.

Many – perhaps even most – Israelis I meet, too, can’t understand why I chose what they consider a far harder life. Following a brief discourse on Israel’s (in my opinion) vastly superior quality of life (cf. standard of living), the positive half of my (now somewhat rote) explanation is that I am a Jew and a Zionist, and believe in the State of Israel (though, of course, that is not enough . . . one has to like it here too).

Somewhat surprisingly, the “Jew and a Zionist” account elicits fewer looks of incredulity from the English than from chiloni (secular) Sabras (born and bred Israelis), many – or perhaps, once again, most – of whom consider Zionism of only marginally more relevance to their lives than Judaism. It is as if these people view their nationality in a total religious and historical vacuum. Whilst I am far from religious, my Jewishness has always come first, being a sine qua non of both my Zionism and my Israeliness (soon after making Aliyah, I had furious arguments on the subject with my then work room-mate . . . though I put them down to Michal being a particularly aggressive Israeli bitch). So, in relation to John’s question (above), if I had emigrated instead to Australia – i.e., if there were no Jewish factor – my reply would be quite the opposite.

The other half of my explanation to Israelis is that I never really felt that I truly belonged in England. Most people find that odd. And I can understand why. I was born in England. I went to school there. I was a BBC journalist. I then qualified as an English solicitor (no, those are not “the ones with the wigs”). I am a keen football fan (some have said even a typical English hooligan). And I like cricket even more, travelling with England’s Barmy Army to the West Indies earlier this year.

But it was that trip to the Caribbean and time spent with said Barmy Army (right) – the only semblance to an “army” being that, after a few days, you can’t wait to get out – which reminded me (not that I had ever truly forgotten) why I am not (really) an Englishman: I simply do not enjoy consuming copious amounts of alcohol for hours on end while standing at some nondescript bar stinking of urine (the bar that is . . . not me), making less sense by the pint (me this time). (In fact, thoughts and feelings fresh, I wrote the first draft of this post during the first leg – from Barbados to New York – of my return journey to Tel Aviv, on the 3rd of March.)

Of perhaps more significance, three of my four grandparents were born in Eastern Europe, while the parents of the fourth only arrived in England a year or so before she was born. And my father was born in Ireland. So, in what way can I meaningfully be said to be English (which many would argue constitutes a distinct ethnic group)?

I grew up in an area of North-West London that could justifiably be classified as a “ghetto”. With the exception of an Indian family and a Greek one, everyone in our crescent of approximately fifty houses was Jewish. I went to a Jewish kindergarten, primary and secondary schools, and – other than merely dutiful or perfunctory exchanges with non-Jewish teachers, my father’s hospital colleagues, our cleaner Mrs. Hart, and my babysitter Mrs. Smith – did not experience any form of meaningful interaction with Gentiles until I attended university, aged 19.

And, after discovering Amy Henderson – tall, willowy, blonde, dreamy bluey-green eyes, and bra-less under fine lambswool jumpers in the biting cold Manchester winters (if you get my drift) – on the first day of my philosophy degree, it took until my graduation, some three years later, to regain my composure (and if any of those stories about going blind are more than bobe-mayses [old wives’ tales], then, God, I am truly sorry).

But my Jewishness and ghetto upbringing aside, even the ‘true’ English – though they believe, and will argue, that they do – have little sense of identity. Ask an Englishman why he is proud to be English and he will puff out his chest and boldly tell you about the Second World War – unless you enjoy pain, reminding him that it was actually the British who fought the War is ill-advised – and, err . . . football. He might also mutter something about the flag of St. George (see the photograph above). But you won’t understand what. And neither will he.

This lack of meaningful identity can be readily observed whenever you mention an Englishman’s compatriots to him. Geordies (from Newcastle) are knobs, Mackems (Sunderland) are dicks, Tykes (Yorkshiremen) are foul, Mancs (Manchester) are horrible, Scousers (Liverpool) are scum, Brummies (Birmingham) are prats, Cockneys (London) are twats, etc. They all bloody hate each other.

So, if a ‘true’ Englishman struggles with his identity, what hope is there for the English (ostensibly) grandson of Lithuanian and Galician Jews?

Of course, in terms of nationality, I am part British (part Israeli). Being so, however, is not synonymous with being English (whatever Israeli sports commentators might believe). And, certainly as far as the Englishman is concerned, if he has to share his Britishness with the Scots and – worse still (from his perspective) – with the Welsh, he has no problem admitting a mere 280,000 Jews too.

Notwithstanding all of the above (spot the contract lawyer), I identify myself as – probably because I instinctively feel – Jewish first (and very foremost), English second, then Israeli, and British last.

British last because it is only really meaningful in terms of wars and passports (i.e., formal nationality). The Olympic Games’ Team GB does not inspire a fraction of the passion of, for example, the English football or cricket teams. Indeed, the common traits of the English, Scots and Welsh hardly distinguish them from Uzbeks or Western Samoans.

From time to time, I visit the British military cemeteries in Jerusalem (left) and Beersheba, where thousands upon thousands of World War One dead rest. It is a deeply moving experience, knowing that these young men – from towns and villages I have only heard of through my former (sad) interest in local league cricket – fell in a far-off land, fighting a war which probably meant even less to them than the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan do to today’s British servicemen. And I always wonder whether anyone still mentions – never mind visits – them . . .

After everything I have written, however, how can I identify myself as English before Israeli?

Whilst you are entitled to be confused, unlike my Israeliness – which, as I explain above, is inextricably linked to my Jewishness – my Jewishness and Englishness stand alone. I am also far more English in character (cf. sense of belonging) than Israeli, which I will never truly be (other than, again, by nationality). And, in my adopted home, I am widely regarded as English – whenever I visit the café next to my office, its owner unfailingly “outs” me with a loud “Ahhhh . . . English-man!”

There are never lumps in my throat, however, when I watch A Bridge Too Far, The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Dam Busters, or Battle of Britain . . . and they are proper movies, unlike those “B” Entebbe ones. The excrutiating experience, however, of watching Yoni (Netanyahu, Bibi’s brother) slowly expire, and the exhilarating one of the freed hostages running down the ramps of those Hercules transport aircraft, touches me in a way that nothing English or British ever could.

At a time when it was not common, or widely acceptable, for people to question the existence of the Deity, British philosopher Bertrand Russell (right) felt the urge to write his essay Why I Am Not a Christian (a good read, incidentally, for anyone prepared to open their eyes and mind).

And today, when it is not widely acceptable to be a Jew, never mind an Israeli, I guess that I am feeling a similar need to examine and to understand my sense of identity.

And, if that sounds a bit f*cked up, well . . . that’s because it probably is.

England’s Ashes Turning to Dust

I have no idea how many readers of melchett mike have the slightest interest in cricket, that most noble and fascinating of all sports, but the events of the past few days have given me little choice but to indulge my frustrations.

This time last week, England were one good Test match away from winning back the Ashes from Australia, and holding the little urn (left) for only the second time in twenty years. A victory in the 4th Test at Headingley, the venue most suited to “English-style” bowlers, would have put England two-nil up in the series with only one Test to play.

But, in spite of having lost their best batsman Kevin Pietersen to injury, and with talismanic all-rounder Andrew Flintoff a serious doubt, England’s spineless selectors infuriatingly stuck with the same underperforming batsmen. In fact, England were only one-nil up in the series because the Aussies had fallen way below their usual high standards. But, with the Ashes there for the taking, the English selectors bottled it.

And, surprise surprise, England were bowled out for a pitiful 102 in their first innings and, this afternoon, for 263 in their second. Australia, who scored 445 in the only innings they required, won by an innings and 80 runs. So, the series is tied at one-all, and it is now all down to the 5th and final Test at the Oval on Thursday week. As the holders, the Aussies only require a draw to retain the Ashes.

Bopara: couldn't play with himself

Current openers Andrew Strauss and Alistair Cook are probably the best England have. Following them, however, comes Ravi Bopara (right), who has now scored a measly 105 runs in the first four Tests. Quite frankly, he looks like he couldn’t play with himself. Ian Bell, at number four, appears terrified every time he walks down the pavilion steps, while Paul Collingwood, although a tough competitor, is not quite a Test number five. In their combined six visits to the crease during this 4th Test, the gormless trio amassed the grand total of 16 (yes, that’s sixteen) runs. With wicketkeeper Matt Prior – who has batted commendably above himself – having to come in as high as six, it completes a most depressing picture for England cricket fans.

Even if this isn’t England’s worst-ever top order, I certainly can’t recall a poorer one. Perhaps I have unreasonable expectations, having grown up spoilt with the riches of English batting talent: Geoffrey Boycott, Graham Gooch, David Gower, Mike Gatting, Allan Lamb and Ian Botham (even though they rarely all “fired” together). And, in reserve, you had my all-time hero, the mercurial Derek Randall (above left), Graeme Fowler, Chris Broad, Tim Robinson, . . .

The Key to regaining the Ashes?

Geoff Miller, England’s insipid head of selectors, is as totally uninspiring in the role as he was in that of spinning all-rounder (in 34 Tests between 1976 and 1984). The central contracts system, too, has a lot to answer for, encouraging perseverance with continual failures, such as Bopara and (to a lesser extent) Bell, rather than giving a chance to in-form county players. Okay, everyone knows I am a Kent fan, but the gutsy Rob Key (above right) – who had scored 123, 270 not out, 25 and 110 not out in his four previous visits to the crease (and with a respectable average of 31 in 15 Tests) – should have been given the nod for this 4th Test.

Anyhow, it is no use looking back. But, if England are to have any chance of regaining the Ashes, Key or 39-year old Mark Ramprakash – averaging over 90 in this year’s County Championship, and who would be playing on his home ground – must be selected for the Oval (I would play them both).

I am praying for a miracle, because, with the Aussies’ tails now up, a minor one at least is what it is gonna take.

Tel Aviv Gay Murders: A Rude Awakening

Just as there can be no substitute for a first hand witnessing of Ground Zero, where New York City’s World Trade Center once stood, walking past the gay and lesbian youth center on Tel Aviv’s Nachmani Street on Sunday evening brought home to me the true horror of what had happened there just the night before.

Amongst the grieving Tel Avivis and burning candles – in memory of Nir Katz, 26, a volunteer at the center, and Liz Trubeshi, just 16 (fifteen others were injured, four seriously) – were signs reading “Die le’homophobia” (Enough homophobia) and “Ahava loh sina” (Love not hate). They said it all.

Israelis comfort each other at the scene of Saturday night's killings

Outside the (mainly residential) building, I ran into Tzachi, a kiosk acquaintance. The front door of his apartment, he told me, is directly opposite the center, and on hearing the shots – of the lone, masked gunman – he loaded his gun in readiness. But he was too late. On exiting his apartment, Tzachi stumbled across two bodies, lying in pools of blood, in the building’s hallway.

I have been meaning to address the following question on melchett mike for some time now: what is it about homosexuality that so disturbs so many, otherwise reasonable, people? Actually, I will rephrase that: what is it about homosexual males that so disturbs so many, otherwise reasonable, heterosexual (ostensibly) males?

I have a few straight (ostensibly) male friends who recoil in disgust every time that they see other men holding hands or kissing (not uncommon sights in Tel Aviv). Another goes into a frenzy whenever he passes men’s clothes stores which he considers too camp. One doesn’t, I suppose, have to be a brilliant psychotherapist to come up with plausible explanations for such behavior.

But repressed, conflicted and/or closet homosexuals apart, why the hell should it bother anyone where some men like to stick their todgers (or take another’s)?

My religious cousin yesterday trotted out the “it’s unnatural” argument. I informed him that I had recently seen research indicating that over fifty percent of heterosexual couples either regularly indulge in or have experimented with – I don’t recall which (I didn’t take notes, but you get the point) – anal sex.

He retorted that, if everyone in the world was gay, it would signal the end of the human race. But not everyone in the world is gay. And what about single people, those with fertility problems, etc? Should we discriminate against them too?

It is interesting to note that male homophobes are, in general, not remotely disturbed by the sexual proclivities and activities of gay females. Especially not those of attractive ones. Very far from it, in fact.

Religious bigotry in Israel has certainly not helped the homosexual community. And unthinking chiloni (secular) Israelis have already pointed fingers of blame for Saturday’s attack at haredim (the ultra-Orthodox). Needless to say, that is totally wrong. It is far from inconceivable that a chiloni homophobe or just a plain nutter perpetrated the atrocity, or that it was the result of some internal dispute.

Conversely, kneejerk reactions that a haredi was unlikely to have carried it out are similarly unhelpful. Among the curious reasons provided in one particular comment to melchett mike were: “1. A haredi is recognizable with or without a mask. Beard, peyot, clothes, etc.  2. Most haredim neither have automatic rifles nor know how to use them.  3. Motzei shabbat [post-sabbath] seems an “unlikely” time for a haredi to act.  4. Where did he get the intelligence?”

It is as if, English football fan-like, many Israelis have chosen their side and will support it whatever. Such are the chasms in our society.

Anyway, another commenter to melchett mike, who opined that homosexuals are “just ill” and “halachically [according to Jewish law] should be put to death”, is merely modern, not ultra, Orthodox.

What this tragedy has brought home to me are the genuine dangers faced by Israel’s gay community (and others). Perhaps we should all be more careful in our discourse, even in our jesting, which otherwise may unwittingly create an atmosphere in which homophobic behaviour is tolerated. Whilst never having considered myself even remotely homophobic, perhaps I have not been overly sensitive to the gay community’s interests and concerns, recently penning a satirical post – Vot do you mean “gay” . . . like “happy”? (which is followed by the full gamut of commenters’ opinions) – on Tel Aviv’s Gay Pride Parade.

On Saturday night, the purpose of, and need for, such public displays of solidarity and pride suddenly and shockingly became much, much clearer.

I am sure we all wish they hadn’t.