Tuesday 9/20/11

What a fascinating day! We began the day in Kfar Kassem, an Arab city in Israel not far from Tel Aviv. We met with a Sheik (leader) of the Moslem community who spoke to us about his philosophy of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He described himself as a believing and practicing Muslim, a lawyer by training, the father of four, an author of many texts, and someone who has studied both the Quran and the Torah. The Sheik did not speak in his primary language of Arabic, but talked to us in Hebrew about his philosophy of שלומ לבבות or "peace of the hearts." Haim, our Seminar leader, translated his words into English. Since Hebrew was not the Sheik's first language, he spoke slower than the average Israeli, and I was able to understand phrases here and there. It was a moving, frustrating, stimulating, and hopeful morning all rolled into one. I took copious notes and will be happy to discuss this further with anyone when I return to Rochester.

Kfar Kassem was the site of a terrible occurrence in October of 1956. On the day the Sinai campaign began, a curfew was imposed on the Arab population. The workers of Kfar Kassem had already gone out to the fields to work before the curfew was imposed and did not know it had been announced. When they returned from the fields, fifty Arab people were shot by the Israeli border patrol, including a pregnant woman. The Israeli judge who presided over the investigation of the incident found not only the officer who ordered the shooting guilty, but also found all the soldiers who fired shots to be guilty. His ruling was that they should not have followed the officer's order. The sentences imposed on the officer and the soldiers were all commuted shortly thereafter by a Presidential order. These are the facts that were laid out for us prior to meeting the Sheik at the 1956 memorial.


Many, many emotions were running through our group even before the meeting took place and discussion of the morning continued throughout the day- right through dinner. I'm sure these discussions will continue through the end of the Seminar and even into our return to Rochester.

Our next stop was Tel Aviv University where we had lunch at ארומה or "Aroma" - the Israeli cross between Panara's and Starbucks. Finally got WiFi connection there and were able to download three days of email. After lunch we met with Catriella Freedman, Director of Curriculum and Program Development at Beit Hatfutsot, the Museum of the Jewish People, which is housed on the Tel Aviv University campus, a very beautiful site.








She gave us a quick tour of the section of the museum on "The Golden Age of Spanish Jewry" which reinforced and pulled together all we had done in Spain.


Catriella was funny, engaging, and very knowledgable. The Rochesterians in the group decided her breadth of knowledge and teaching style reminded us of Jan Katz - the highest praise we can bestow. After viewing the exhibits Catriella led us in a study session on the first revival of the Hebrew language in the Iberian peninsula during the 11th and 12th centuries.


My comment to Haim on the bus to Jerusalem was that the day was so filled with learning that my head was ready to explode. That definitely seemed to make him happy.

I snapped some interesting architectural shots as we left Tel Aviv for Jerusalem.





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