the day after rocking the casbah

Palestinians living in central Hebron were amazed to hear the sounds of music emerging from their street at 4 am. 'We ran to the window and saw soldiers dancing,' one of them says. 'We used to be afraid of them, but today they are part of the neighborhood'

"The soldiers were singing out loud a song we never heard before and dancing with their rifles in their hands", Naoul recounts.

"It looked like a dance group in uniform," adds 15-year-old Rima. "At first I laughed, but it's not entertaining at all. It shows their ridicule towards us."

"We have gotten used to them. They have lost any sense of shame and so they allow themselves to dance in the middle of the street."
Rima has already encountered Israel Defense Forces soldiers dancing or singing on the streets of Hebron in the past. "Sometimes, when the muezzin announces a prayer, they imitate him or repeat his calls. This is another symbol of their contempt, but we have gotten used to that too," she says.
But both the mother and daughter admit that the soldiers sometimes manage to make the local population happy. "For example, when the small children play football, the soldiers join them and they play together. That's actually nice. For us they are already part of the neighborhood."

Rock the Casbah: Behind the scenes - Israel News, Ynetnews
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3916366,00.html

israelis are fun

"The situation in Hebron now is pretty calm, and when you don't have any incidents, soldiers get bored and this is what they do"

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/soldiers-to-face-punishmetn-for-youtube-video-of-hebron-boogie-1.300241

And here's the original video:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIrVofeRh0g

winter in Israel

I think it's almost fair to say that this year Israel is experiencing a winter that's almost worth the name. It has actually been raining a lot, and today we have maybe the coldest day of the year.

Of course I'm saying this now because starting tomorrow the temperatures will increase and the sun will shine again.

So, here's the forecast for next week:
(the temps are in F. In degrees Celsius it ranges from about 13 to about 24)

And, to be able to understand what this means, take a look at the Israeli annual averages:

Amazing, isn't it?
Notice that from May to September (and also April and October in some places) there's pretty much 100% of sunny days. And that doesn't mean some clouds, it means really sunny.