http://wikitravel.org/en/Israel


I remember this coming up in a thread a while back (possibly by krum)





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Exsatmar- check out the link.


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Sweet and sour. (and some just plain sour) Wrong.

The vast majority of the much disliked Israeli "elita" is very aware and not necessary overly appreciative of the rudeness of their countrymen. Direct personal questions by total strangers might not be meant to be offensive, but are offensive by definition, especially 
when they are given in a judgemental and challenging tone, as done in Israel.

The information Israelis collect from you is of little import to them. Their interest in strangers' private lives is mostly a form of entertainment. No evil intentions, but no noble intentions 
either. Just a rude, quirky habit of rude, quirky people.

 The Israeli mentality can be best understood as defining humanity as a bipolar 
collection of freierim and bnei zonah, so in order to avoid being a freier you 
should be a ben zonah.

I enjoy stuff like Harezuah and the Gashashim as much as anyone else, but you can get the DVDs and enjoy them from the comfort of your chutz laaretz home.

Oversensitive people taking offense whenever anyone says something they dont like, especially when the people with home court advantage (IOW: actually live there) say it, does NOT mean the over sensitive people are right.

Do you have noble or evil intentions when you inquire as to health of your neighbor?

Is that where you get it from?


Thats fake. Israelis like authenticity.

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Although I agree, there is NOTHING worse than being a frier....

 The Israeli mentality can be best understood as defining humanity as a bipolar 
collection of freierim and bnei zonah, so in order to avoid being a freier you 
should be a ben zonah.



This is one of the positive things that I learned from being in Israel - not to be a frierit.
I don't believe that Israelis believe one should be a ben zonah - most Israelis are fine people - but yes, better to be a ben zonah than a frier.

It is a sad commentary on human nature, but it has proven accurate in the years that I have been back in the U.S.: one thing I have found true is that most people will push you to your limit and take advantage of you if you let them. It's your job not to let them. Israelis understand that well. And I am thankful that I spent some time in Israel to have picked that up.

If you feel uncomfortable by other people's behavior you can either try to change them (good luck), suffer in silence, or go to an environment that you don't find hostile (my strategy). If as a Jewish person I don't have home court advantage in EY why would I want to go there?

Do you have noble intentions when you're a cab driver and your customer (ie my dad) "why do you speak with an accent and your daughter doesn't?" followed with "why do you talk Yiddish among yourselves?", followed by "if you're Haredi why do you only have one daughter?",  followed by "If you come from Lithuania you must know my great-grandmother" followed by "How can you claim to come from Lithuania and not know my great-grandmother?" I'm not misconstuing any evil intentions here, but noble intentions?!?

Click to view attachment

What about changing yourself? Not an option?


Because you see what goes on inside an Israeli cabbies head?

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No. You can adapt to your environment, but if your new environment makes you miserable there's very little you can do except to leave. You can change your behavior, but not your feelings.


No because I see what goes on inside my own head, and it is that I feel threatened by these people.

Are you really judging a society based on its cab drivers???

You can reeducate yourself...

So that makes you know what his intention were?

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You want stories about neighbors?
Beis Yaakov girls?
Misrad Hapnim officials?
How much time do you have?

Again, to change your behavior, not your feelings.
You can learn the language well, do as the Romans do, try to fit in, etc.

After a while I felt, if I'm home, why do I feel so out of place?

I don't care what his intentions were, not am I judging anyone. The fact is that people made me very uncomfortable, and the idea that they did so "for my good" only makes it seem patronizing and only so much more alienating.

Since your feeling are based on your (invalid) perceptions, if you realized that nobody intends evil by attempting to be friendly, you might actually be able to survive being around people that aren't from the same background and culture as you are used to.
You arent an Israeli.

Yes you are.
It bothered you that people cared about you?

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You actually felt "threatened" when a taxi driver asked you and your father questions about Yiddish and family?
Doesn't that seem like an extreme reaction?

Nobody's perceptions are invalid, I never perceived people intending to be evil, or were they being friendly. They were being nosy, impolite and patronizing because that's how they are.

Perhaps they define that kind of behavior as being friendly. If anything that's even scarier than thinking they do it without really thinking.

As I evidently found out, so if you're in your country why are you a foreigner, and in chu"l if you're not in your country why do you fit in and feel at home?

At some point, the brainwashing is so challenged by reality that your mental schema changes. This has happened for me in many areas of life, and EY is one of them.

If you are a Jew and you are living in Israel, you are an Israeli. Any Jew is eligible for the Law of Return. That is the definition of an Israeli. Someone who was born in Israel - a "sabra" - is no more an Israeli, than someone who immigrated there.

Having lived there for 4 years, having immigrated there from the U.S., I consider myself now both Israeli and American.

Israelis do consider asking questions of others being friendly. It is not considered nosy or impolite. There are different standards of politeness there. It may seem impolite to those coming from the U.S. or Europe but it simply is not considered impolite in that society.

One thing I found, since Israelis are so direct, is that indirect methods of deflecting questions are not effective. Israelis tend not to be subtle people.
If I didn't want to talk about something, I had to say directly, "I don't want to talk about it."

That's what I was taught, and I adapted enough to be thought of as an Israeli by them. But if you still don't feel at home, then Israel is not for you. If you're *born* somewhere and you feel as ill-at-ease as I did in EY you probably should go live someplace else, and there are plenty of sabras who do.

I didn't have any outside identity to help me create a hyphenated identity in Israel. I wasn't anything-Israeli. I could either be Israeli or nothing. I tried to be Israeli, but in the end I was nothing.

 Wrong. There are plenty of Israelis who consider this to be very impolite. 

Truth be told, if I wouldn't be frum I'd fit in into the super-hiloni Gush Dan "elita" pretty well, but if you so much as light shabbos candles you're seen as ridiculous. The Israeli Haredim are too backwards, ignorant, and fanatical for me to even distantly fit in. The lower-class presumably Mizrahi Israelis gave me the creeps and the Americans were too over-nationalistic, too groupthink-oriented, too fake and too sect-like for me.

If I went off the derech tomorrow, I could move to Tel Aviv and live happily ever after. But that's not an option.

Wow. Talk about stereotypes. I don't even know where to begin.

For starters, among the chilonim, there is now a trend of "spirituality' where people are starting to get into religion, certainly lighting Shabbat candles is not seen as ridiculous any longer.

Not all Israeli Haredim are backwards, ignorant, fanatical, etc. Some are actually becoming more progressive and modern - you might try to get to know some of them. Some are starting to go to college, go to the army, etc.

Not all Mizrachim are lower-class, not all lower-class are Mizrachi, etc. I don't know why they "give you the creeps", as you put it. I met some very lovely Mizrachi Israelis of all socio-economic classes.

And there are Americans in Israel all over the Israeli political and religious spectrum - from far-left to far-right, from Reform to Haredi.

Maybe you didn't look too hard or try too hard to meet new people who you might fit in with?

Your perceptions are not the truth. Do you know what polite means? "Rudeness is the (apparent) disrespect and failure to behave within the context of a society or a group of people's social laws or etiquette. These laws have already unspokenly been established as the essential boundaries of normally accepted behaviour" If that is the way Israeli society behaves, that IS being polite. In fact by acting otherwise YOU are the one being impolite. (yes, I am aware you had no evil intentions when acting as such)

You scare easily.

That should be quite obvious. Thats what you are used to, being an oversensitive American.
I feel for you. Really.

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Amongst Ashkenazim?

Going to an army doesn't count as progressive in my book. And last time I checked Israeli Haredim were male-chauvinsts, xenophobes, homophobes and otherwise ultra-conservative even if they go to a college.
(Yes there are some who are becoming progressive. They're called yotzim lisheilah. And yes there are a select few who are progressive and remain frum. May I suggest they also feel like outsiders and they also end up leaving EY?)

There are some secular Americans to be sure, but they all seem to be oh-so-right-wing fanatics.

Maybe if you need to look that hard it's a red flag that you're looking in the wrong place?

If you are immigrating to a country, then it stands to reason it might take some effort to find people and a community to fit in with.
Yes, some hard work.

I have a hard enough time coping with the cards I've been dealt in life to emmigrate and look for more trouble, thank you.

Eh, they're the unpleasant people this side of South Africa.

Oh if you want to start a South Africa-bashing thread, count me in. Definitely everything is relative, and just as North Americans seem 
incredibly rude when you get off a plane from Japan, I suppose the Israelis seem
like adorable sweet goody-two-shoes when you get off a plane from South Africa...

Of course, immigrating isn't easy and isn't for everyone, I agree.

True, at least Israelis don't rant about the blix stealing their tellys at every opportunity.

What's that?

The native Africans stealing the white Afrikaaners' TV sets.

Oh. Thanks.

So you're saying that white South Africans are ruder than Israelis?

I'm not sure they're necessarily ruder, but they are so morally bankrupt, arrogant and obnoxious that they make the Israeli rudeness seem nothing but a little quirk.

I've always gotten along quite well with S. Africans and feel much more at home with them than I do Americans...
Israelis are b'ain aroch ruder and more obnoxious....

You mean Jewish South Africans living in Israel? They're OK, but I wasn't talking about them...

No, even momish Afrikaners....
I actually seriously considered moving to SA when I was younger, before the country went to pot

The only thing keeping the country from becoming a living hell was institutionalized racism of the worst kind. So they ended apartheid and the country went south. They couldn't have kept it up indefinitely.

Yes, the analogy to Israel doesn't escape me

From my experience, South African Jews are the largest group of English speaking Jews in Israel. I'm surprised they feel they fit in there. Unlike Israelis, they are very much into formality and politeness. I had a South African ex-girlfriend and I recall how strict she and her family were with table manners.

Unfortunately, that is often the price that must be paid for living in a civilized society....
Or you could just do what the Americans did and massacre the natives....

I guess that's what Hitler felt he had to do in order to live in a civilized society - massacre the Jews.

K-Reb never justified or suggested massacring any native populations...
I strongly disagree with his views on apartheid, but at least he doesn't have a double standard...

Israel is different though because it is rightfully OUR land. The S. Africans just showed up and set up shop......

We like to think so. (Me included)
I don't know if this is objectively true since I can't have an objective POV in this.

The fact that G-d said so is objective enough for me...

For you, yes.
Unfortunately, not for the rest of the world that wants to destroy the state of Israel.

right

Chill. That's just part of the official national mythology, but you don't have to buy it.

We feel Hashem gave us EY.
The rest of the world believes that EY belongs to the Palestinians but since we needed a place to go after the holocaust that we have a right to a part of EY.

That's fine with me.

Avraham Avinu was on one side, and the whole world was on the other side. I'm fine with being in the minority position, especially with millions of fine Jews on the same side.

"The whole world wants to destroy us" =paranoid delusion
"But we can beat the whole world" =delusion of grandeur

Not true for many reasons.

1. Balfour Declaration
2. UN creation of Israel
3. Every country (except the Arab ones and even some of those) recognize Israel
4. There NEVER in history was an independent Palestine or a "Palestinian People" (until the 1960s)
5. There was a HUGE population increase of Arabs to Israel AFTER the Jews settled the land.
6. Most "Palestinians" aren't, any more than Jews are "Israelis". Count how many "Palestinians" have ties to the land for more than 2 or 3 generations and those were nomadic Bedouins who had no concept of "land ownership" Ha gonev mi haganav patur.....
7. None of the Political entities in the middle east are based on demographic or national issues. The region was carved up and given out.
8. Israel took the West Bank from JORDAN, not the "Palestinians", they most certainly don't want it back, and only ONE country recognized the Jordanian occupation of the land.
9. The world doesn't care about the "Palestinians", more people are killed in a year in Africa than there ARE "Palestinians", no one says or does anything. Even the Arab world exploits and oppresses them for political purposes.
10. If Israel were "occupied" by anyone but Jews, no one would even know where it is or that it even exists.....

The whole "Palestinian Issue" is based on a bunch of lies, that the Israelis allow to be spread and refuse to counter. It is no wonder that the world won't go to bat for Israel when they are unsure and less than confident about their OWN claim to the Land.... Perhaps the Jews have no claim to the Land except for the Torah, but the Palestinians have no claim at ALL unless you want to play the "squatters rights" game....

Thank You.