Israel Revisited
– from Exile to Exodus (part 2/2)
I didn’t know what I was in for… I wouldn’t want it any other way!
(last update: 17 January 2024)
(also see: part 1)
After landing in Israel in June 2005, immediately I felt a raising of my energy. It felt perfect to arrive.
Prior to that, the only time I had been in Israel was in January 1988 for a couple of weeks.
The first place I went to was the Jerusalem botanical gardens.
[src 3]
At the garden cafe (far right above,) I spoke to the waitress and she was very friendly and attractive. I didn’t even know if she was Jewish or not and didn’t even think about it. I ended up giving her my phone number (did I get hers?) and minutes later as I was leaving, I saw a lone young man walking toward me in what looked like a state-of-fury. Then, like an edgy kangaroo, I basically fled the scene, jet-lag be damned. There was no confrontation and I never returned. I determined later from her name that she must have been Arab. I was nervous for a day or two that he might call for reasons unknown to me and I never spoke to her again and don’t remember her name.
Anyhow, I soon noticed my lips drying up – this was due to the hardness of the water. Pots and pans were even left with a white residue of minerals after each meal. The only solution was bottled water.
I headed to the Old City and to the Western Wall (Kotel.) On the way there, I asked Jeff Seidel for directions. He gladly pointed it out to me and he also became a friend.
Below, mid-2006, during an Orange vs Blue protest in Jerusalem. However, I was also there during the first protest in mid-2005.
I didn’t have much of an opinion at the time, but had a feeling withdrawal was not a good thing. The prime minister at the time, Ariel Sharon had a stroke at the end of 2005 and then within a month fell into a coma.
Tens of thousands of orange-clad activists lined major highways Monday in a nationwide protest against Israel’s planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, disrupting traffic, shouting slogans and drawing noisy honks of support from motorists.
With tensions running high as the withdrawal nears, Israel has descended into an emotional color war. Jewish settlers and their supporters have embraced orange. On the blue side are peace activists and other backers of the withdrawal. Each side’s weapon of choice: ribbons _ tied to cars, backpacks and even wedding bouquets. – 2005, source
In the back of my mind, even to this day, I have a hypothesis that the only character trait that Israelis have that extends beyond their toughness is their idiocy. This relates to class and status divisions, baseless hatred, might makes right, crippling xenophobia and acts of self-sabotage such as the funding of Hamas.
Anyhow, years later, I actually spoke to a soldier who was stationed at a checkpoint or border-crossing in Gaza, a student from Jerusalem, and he was very much for the withdrawal – he said it was very difficult and dangerous work. Another chap hated carrying his machine gun so much that he was imprisoned for initially refusing. And there was another fellow that simply hated the army, but had to do it anyway as it was compulsory.
Because many would prefer to avoid the instruments-of-war in favour for different ones.
I don’t blame them.
And speaking of war, from my understanding, in Russia hostage situations are resolved quickly because the state takes hostage the relatives of the terrorists. Why doesn’t the IDF do this? To free hostages, shouldn’t a second set of hostages (for want of a better word) be taken? Who are the other people that should be begging for their lives to the terrorists?
#WATCH: Thousands gathered in #London‘s Trafalgar Square to mark 100 days since Hamas’s Massacre in Southern Israel and to call for the release of the Israeli hostages still being held by the terror organization in Gaza. pic.twitter.com/ZhRmmapavq
— Israel National News – Arutz Sheva (@ArutzSheva_En) January 14, 2024
The IDF tracks leading terrorists. Why not the their family members as well? … so back to my hypothesis.
For this latest October 7 incursion, why not just bring a whole portion of Gaza into Israel proper permanently? All of Gaza city should become Israel and the fighting can stop, or half of Gaza. Something like that anyway. Land-grab is the deterrence to terror, not death, because death is seen differently in Jihad. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, Hamas will never be eliminated because it’s just Islam by another name. Deceived Western minds will at least understand this response, and it will memorialise the fallen – streets can be named after them. If the Magen-David is raised in Gaza, let it stay there.
A 5 year-old buried under 5 tonnes of rubble means different things to different people. But why did the parents even have children in a war-zone? How can there be a genocide when there are millions of Arabs still alive in Gaza? Who’s to say the children weren’t conceived just to be cannon fodder yet will attain paradise to their benefit, thanks to the Jews? The evil of running a false-flag attack (if it was one,) and then getting no benefit boggles the mind: it’s akin to Jewish suicide bombers attacking Israel alongside Palestinian ones. If “Free Palestine” is a strategy to reestablish a Muslim caliphate via useful idiots, how about “Free the Hostages” as a strategy to manifest the Israelites again?
Anyway, I mentioned the need for voluntary military service here – and not just for Israel.
Yet, ironically at the same time “in warfare, a theater or theatre is an area in which important military events occur or are in progress” [- source.] Thus, one is left wondering if warfare might be phoney and actually scripted for an audience, just like a music recital or rather a Broadway extravaganza. In which case, at some level, enemies are actually friends, or even one and the same in outlooks of full spectrum dominance. As such, I think people should choose different theatres to watch.
Continuing, some weeks later I ended up finding and staying at the Heritage House and also studying at Aish HaTorah which were both in the old city. The late Rabbi Meir Schuster, Elie, and Dave (from NYC) all worked at the HH.
(early 2006 )
I ended up buying Tefellin through Reb Schuster which I still own to this day.
I invariably had better days in Jerusalem on the days I donned my Tefellin. They are used to tame the evil inclination and worldly desires. Today, I carry around a Tasmanian quartz crystal and should probably “dare to wear” the Tefellin again – may God help us all.
Continuing, on one Shabbat evening in the old city, I told the host how my paternal grandfather Oskar (below) fled Warsaw with my grandmother Hela (shown Elka below) and parents Abram and Jetta Sokol (shown below) a week after the war started. They went to Lithuania, across Russia by train, to Japan and then by ship to Melbourne on a Sugihara visa after mid-1940. The host was taken aback at how I found my way from Australia to Israel at such a young age (and non-religious.)
[ scanned original | src ]
- pic 1 – www.sugiharafoundation.org/the-list/ (site down: 9 Dec ’22)
- pic 2 – src DL
- pic 3 – 1991
- pic 4 – 1993
- pic 5 – late 1980’s
- pic 6,7,8 – 1997
As referred in the second pic above, Oskar once showed me his civil engineering degree obtained at The University of Berlin, Charlottenburg, but it wasn’t recognised in Australia due to it being of German origin so instead he went into the Flinders Lane rag trade, specifically at Londex House (London Export,) next to Tasmania House
As an aside, while Oskar escaped, his two brothers Benjamin and Eliyahu were betrayed by the Poles hiding them two days before the war ended for bread and sugar. They were murdered by Nazis. Oskar’s 3rd (and eldest) brother Leon “Lolek” Weisbrem (1903 – 1999) joined the Polish army and was taken prisoner-of-war by Germany. His buddies saved his life by surrounding him at a roll call so the camp commander wouldn’t see that he was circumcised and deemed Jewish. He eventually fled Poland, across Europe to reach England in 1941. I met him once in the 80s.
source | 2 | 3 | Leon’s family tree from mid-70’s
Leon’s autobiographical book in Polish contains various other documents:
- pic 1 – book cover
- pic 2 – Wolf with son Leon (1932)
- pic 4 – Eliyahu + Oskar + Leon + Benjamin – Warsaw ~1933
- pic 6 – Leon second from left in Polish army
- pic 7 – POW documentation
- pic 8 – Nazi POW currency
- pic 9 – postcard received while at Stalag VI-C POW camp
- pic 10 – poem from London
- pic 11 – other
At one point, he had the 3rd largest Japanese stamp collection in the world, which he sold while residing in Melbourne before he returned to London.
source: Kanai Catalogue 1979/80 Japan ‘Weisbrem’ Collection
Two more people I met in Jerusalem were Sharon (below left) from the CU Agency and Warren (below right, 2018) who is also from Melbourne, Australia. Warren (aka Avraham) and I took on an extras role for Sharon at Mt Zion for a Discovery/NatGeo documentary in 2005. In 2018, right before leaving Israel, I gladly met Warren again who by that stage was using a walker.
Interestingly, the “raising of vibration” that hit me when first entering Israel and kept bringing me back had left by 2018. It is for this reason that I tend to think the term “aliyah” (going up to Israel) is wrongly applied to Israeli immigration. It can be correct, but not all the time for everyone, for example I met two immigrants who were murdered there: Tony Rose in April 2014 and Dave Gordon (or was it rather a suicide… which is a murder of self anyhow?) in August 2014.
In a similar vein, I think the country name “Israel” is incorrect. That name should only be used once all the lost 10 tribes can (and do) return to the holy land and not while the Israelites are lost and in exile – imagine if that became the new security narrative rather than Iran!
"Nearly all Jews today consider themselves as descendants of the tribe of Judah. Some do claim membership in the Levites, the priestly clan that - like other Jews - was exiled to Babylon and returned to rebuild the Temple. However, Jews with family names such as Levy (Levi), Rubin (Reuben), Simon (Simeon), Benjamin, Asher, etc. are unable to document their genealogies as going back to these historical tribes." source
- Holyland
- Israel-2B / Israel To Be (ישראל להיות)
- Israel 1 (as opposed to Israel 2 for the messianic age)
- Israel 4 (see image below)
- Future Israel
- Israeland (ארץ ישראל)
- Judahland
- Judah / Yehuda (יְהוּדָה)
- Jacob / יַעֲקֹב *
- Green / Grün / Grünia **
- Boronia (ie Adrian Boron, plant and suburb)
- The Jewish State
- Capital
- Tribe / Blessed Tribe / Blessed
- Heart
- Semitica
- Outpost Płońsk (DBG’s hometown)
- Plonskia / Plonskonia
- Israel Rebooted
could be a more apt name for Israel – at least as a thought exercise and for debate.
* Israel was Jacob after being renamed by an angel. Similarly Abram was renamed by God to Abraham.
** (Green) was David Ben-Gurion’s (Israel’s Founding Father) original surname from his father Avigdor that was changed to Ben-Gurion. It was “taken from one of the Jewish generals who fought against the Roman legions in the time of Bar Kochba.” ~ source
Also, I wonder in ancient times if it was ever called Israel.
The name “Israel” first appears in the Merneptah Stele c. 1208 BCE: “Israel is laid waste and his seed is no more.”[29] This “Israel” was a cultural and probably political entity, well enough established for the Egyptians to perceive it as a possible challenge, but an ethnic group rather than an organised state. – source
My personal favourite name is The Kingdom of Israel and that is mentioned in a few places already on this blog and the subject of a film ennealogy that I started in Jerusalem in 2017.
This is the name that really should’ve been used in the “Free Your Mind” campaign video that influenced me to “make aliyah” in 2006.
However, it couldn’t have been used because there is no kingdom in Israel… yet. No messiah, no temple, no lost tribes and lots of division – and this isn’t about to change anytime soon. As such, the video is a con-job to me at this point and is more apt for gentiles. Really, there’s still an exile, even in Israel, but one should have faith.
Anyhow, the Temple Mount has not changed since 1948 (State-of-Israel’s inception) and wars never end because there is a fear of justice or the adoption of a “war-is-peace” attitude. Isn’t that farcical?
After Jerusalem, I made it to the holy mountain city of Tsfat.
Here I spoke to Jeremy Hart (Hartley?) at length who was immigrating to Adelaide from England. He wasn’t sold on Israel and was very concerned with the poverty.
I also met the late Tony Rose (from Manchester) and his children (photo Jerusalem, 2006.) Jeremy actually met Tony after my introduction. As previously mentioned, Tony was tragically murdered in Tsfat in 2014.
In Jerusalem, at around the same location as above, I overheard a couple of American guys discussing Israel and making “aliyah.” They said it was a highly security conscious, hyper-rational and highly competitive society. Their main gripe was that Jews fighting other Jews just doesn’t work – I suppose they meant especially in Israel – and I agree. It’s ironic, because I went to Israel to be in a place where there’d be less walls between people as a result of being from the same spiritual and genetic background – but it turns out the walls are just different.
On this note of “Israelis fighting Israelis,” at Hayarkon Hostel (pics below) in Tel Aviv during 2005 there was a non-Jewish British carpenter with an Israeli girlfriend. He told me how Israelis emulated much of their abusive behaviour toward each other from Arabs. I translate this in daily life to mean as countless Tom and Jerry-like battles for narcissistic supply, with this character trait in turn being the result of trauma associated from being born into a warzone and the subsequent creation of an invincible false-self.
Later while taking a bus from the hostel, a tourist mentioned to me how bogged down the small country was in security spending, with guards required at so many public places, not to mention defence spending as a whole. Moreover, the Walk Through Metal Detectors outside malls and bus/train stations were a real health turn-off for me. The risks are played down, but I can feel their effects so I avoided them.
Another standout reader comment I read on an Israeli news site was “Jews from the diaspora have difficulty fathoming the depth of moronicy present in this country.” I would have to agree – people can act in counterproductive ways to each other. And back in Australia in 2007, an Israeli ex-pat mentioned to me how Israelis when they leave the country often end up seeking other Israelis to associate with. After living in Israel for ~12 years, I would imagine that to mean that it is difficult to be comfortably sociopathic unless around other sociopaths. By this, I mean that sociopathy arises when narcissism is combined with baseless hatred.
Baseless hatred exists as a remnant causative factor of the destruction of the second temple. In a narcissistic society due to constant war, I suppose one could hate another simply for taking attention away from oneself to fracture self-worth. A religious fellow at the Mahane Yehuda market confirmed with me once that baseless hatred is everywhere in the country and keeps people divided. This is why Yaakov said to me something akin to “English speakers need to stick to English speakers.”
For Jews everywhere, there are also issues associated with being in the age of the “Shalom Rav” (Peace Rabbi), which I deem something akin to an atheistic security guard taking control of the Jewish synagogue they’re supposed to protect: some new type of coup between a rabbi and his security guard.
[ far right, June 2005, a potential bomb is detonated at a bus stop ]
Can’t we all just get along?
Anyhow, months later, in October 2005 and still with the travel bug, I reached Vancouver.
While browsing a second-hand bookstore I discovered a book (Idel, 1988) Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah and it really had a strong resonance with me. The book is a study of Rabbi Abraham Abulafia. Abulafia uncovered new knowledge through an itinerant life and believed he was the messiah – although perhaps that belief was justifiable to the extent of his preeminence.
Abulafia even attempted to convert the pope to Judaism:
He went to Rome in 1280 in order to convert Pope Nicholas III to Judaism on the day before Rosh Hashanah. The Pope was in Suriano when he heard of it, and he issued orders to “burn the fanatic” as soon as he reached that place. The stake was erected in preparation close to the inner gate; but Abulafia set out for Suriano all the same and reached there August 22. While passing through the outer gate, he heard that the Pope had died from an apoplectic stroke during the preceding night. He returned to Rome, where he was thrown into prison by the Order of Friars Minor but was liberated after four weeks’ detention. He was next heard of in Sicily. ~ Wikipedia
I also visited the British Columbia Parliament Buildings in Victoria, BC.
Back in Israel months later, I borrowed the Tanya from Ascent (in Tsfat) and started reading it back in my room.
One thing that struck me was how it described the world being continuously created through the constant emanation of the names of God (in Hebrew.) I’d already heard something similar on a radio interview while driving to South Australia in early 2005 – that the Big Bang didn’t occur once – the world is big-banging into existence at every moment.
The apex of my learning came whilst studying at Ohr Somayach yeshiva in Jerusalem.
During one of my first classes there, I had the distressed thought:
“So this is it, I have come all the way from Australia, dropped out of university, travelled a great mental distance, spent lots of money and relocated to this premises and all for this classroom? A whole new journey of infinite learning was about to start. Please God if you’re listening, make my day.”
And the class proceeded as usual.
Then that night, in a dream-like state some angelic teacher stood near me and imbued me with an avalanche of wisdom. The transfer went for about a minute or so. I’d never experienced anything like it before or since. It was like the feeling of a million burning questions being answered.
Now who doesn’t want to stand in God’s stream of consciousness?
And so that was it, the exodus was over… at least for me at that point.
So the Ari (Isaac Luria) told the student something remarkable: "if I had 80 years to write down the material that I heard from Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai, I still couldn’t finish it." That’s how much stuff Rabbi Shimon said in whatever brief time that he (Luria) was sleeping or in a trance." ~ Rabbi Mendel Kessin 8:51
✓ 3 months ago
