The week in Israel is coming to an end, as Pesach is   at our doorstep.  Tel Aviv tomorrow night will be a ghost city, with all of its young residents taking off for the homes of their parents usually outside of Tel Aviv.  Of course, many Israelis have left for vacations overseas, this week being the busiest of Ben Gurion Airport.  Once upon a time, the majority of travelers would be Jews coming to spend Passover here, but these days those numbers are way down.

Politically this week the career of the head of the opposition MK Bougie Herzog effectively came to an end.  At this point, he is what one would call the “walking dead”.  His final downfall was not the fact that the police are investigating him for campaign law violations, but rather, it was his statement two days ago in Ashdod that the problem with the Labor party is that it has been seen as worrying more about the Arabs and then about the Jews.  I understand what he was trying to say- but he is over as a politician leading the Labor.  His policy of trying to move to the right of Netanyahu seems pathetic, especially when Bennet cannot even do it.  Bennet actually succeeded this week in outflanking Herzog from the left.  After Herzog stupid statement Bennet stated I am the Minister of Education of all Israelis, Jews and Arabs and  I love them all.

This was a week of tunnels found,  buses being blown up by Hamas in Jerusalem; thankfully no one was killed. It was a week that Netanyahu decided to have a cabinet meeting on the Golan to declare that the Golan will always be ours, in the meantime he managed to get the world to say it was Syrian.  It was a week where the big story this morning was that Netanyahu threatened to fire Bennet at the cabinet meeting. Of course, he did not fire him and bring down his government.   Today, Netanyahu visited Putin for the third time this year and announced that he will return for another visit in two months.  Obama is in Saudi Arabia and Netanyahu is in Moscow- growing up who would have believed  it.

Tomorrow night we all sit down at our Seders, in the end, we traditionally say next year in Jerusalem.  As a nation, we no longer have to say it, as someone who lives in Tel Aviv it’s not something I wish for.  As a kid after the ’67 war we would say the rebuilt Jerusalem but after some of the architectural monstrosities that have been built in Jerusalem these past few years ( think about the Holy Land project)it’s hard to wish for that. We have been saying Jerusalem in peace and that is about as good as we can wish, and seemingly as unattainable as Zion was for the 17th centuries Jews. We did finally return and hopefully we will eventually be able to live in peace, I doubt our generation but I still hope for my grandson’s generation.

So I wish my readers a  Happy Passover, may you all have meaningful seders with friends and family!

I just came back from the rally in Rabin Square that is being held in support of the soldier accused of killing a neutralized Palestinian terrorist.  It’s a complicated story.  Originally when the demonstration was announced  I thought I would have to write a Newsweek article about the demonstration, but yesterdays hard news stories trumped todays news, so I think I can pass.  Besides its late and i put much more effort into my Newsweek stories than I do for these blog posts.

It many ways it was a good day for Israel today, the court system worked.  This morning Yosef Chaim Ben David who was the leader of the group that killed Abu Khdier the Arab teenager burned to death  last year was found guilty of murder.  The court rejected his plea of insanity.  The judge hinted that he would be sentenced to life in prison.  A short time later, Yishai Schlissel’s was convicted of murder for his attack on participants in the gay pride parade in Jerusalem last year.

Tonight a more complicated environment took place in downtown Tel Aviv as thousands came to Rabin Square to show their solidarity with the soldier who is accused of killing the Palestinian terrorist who had already been neutralized.  The accused was not at the location at the time of the attack but arrived later.  The crowd was surprisingly not the average right wing gathering.  Only a small part of the crowd were religious.  I spoke to many of the participants and one theme kept repeating itself, the kid could be any our kids.  We sent him and we should stand behind him even if he made a mistake.  It was a sentiment that I could understand and even sympathize with.  My only problem comes down to the fact that he the soldier did not just make a mistake, he seemingly in cold blood killed the wounded terrorist.

People asked me at the rally how I would feel if it was my son, and when I heard both the Father and Mother of the soldier speak, my heart broke for the pain they are going through.  The Mother was crying throughout her short speech.  On the other hand, I would hope that my son whatever the circumstances and the general anger, would not go and just shoot someone.

It’s a hard story, there have certainly been many cases of soldiers losing it in war, killing POW’s and more.  Take a look at this story of British soldier in Afghanistan.  As I discussed with one religious woman from a settlement tonight, serving in Hebron is not easy for soldiers the pressures are high on all sides and its easy enough to just lose it.  But should there be consequences?  I worried after spending time on occupation duty in Gaza 35 years ago that the occupation would have terrible consequences for our society, it has whether we like it or not.  So maybe we cannot blame the soldier who was sent to do an impossible job but it’s our society at large who cannot come up with a solution.

In some ways my saddest conversation tonight was with a man who kept on saying that we have to beat the terror once and for all.  He was close to my age and when I reminded him that this has been going on in one form or another for our whole lives he just repeated but we have to beat it.

Tomorrow night the right wing is having a demonstration in Rabin Square in support of the soldier who is accused of shooting a wounded and neutralized terrorist.  Nadav Eyal the chief foreign correspondent for Channel 10 news tweeted, what a bad idea this was, “it was going to cause the foreign press to start really covering the story.”  I tweeted back to him that yes it was indeed going to force me to write an article on the story, and he quoted my tweet.  A small twitter storm broke out on the subject, this time with me tweeting mostly in Hebrew.  It’s a problem, however, once again I will feel tomorrow night that there is not choice but to write a story about an embarrassing demonstration, with well known singers coming out to defend the soldier.  It was suggested to me that I tie into my story the story of a British soldier who in 2011 was accused of killing an already wounded Taliban fighter, and charged with his death. There were demonstrations in support of the soldiers although at first glance the incidents seem very different, I will research the story tomorrow before writing my column.

Unfortunately, tomorrow’s rally and the article I will no doubt write tie together with the survey I translated Friday from Yisrael Hayom.  That survey of Israeli high school students included answers by 60% of them that a terrorist who was wounded and neutralized should not get medical aid, with the same percentage believing that a soldier who then comes along and kills the terrorist should not be court-martialed. Those answers would not be so bad if 85% of the same respondents did not think that the IDF was the most moral army in the world and 48% did not think that Arab Israelis should have the right to vote.  I am quite sure that a very high percentage of the same respondents would also have said that they were proud that Israel was the only democracy in the Middle East.  Experts in polling tell me that I should not be surprised.  High school students are the most right wingers in the Israeli population.  Friends have told me the I should not be surprised, it represents the very real fear that people feel from attacks on the street by terrorists.  All of this is partially true.  But it’s also true as a new friend who I was having coffee with today said- Netanyahu has been very successful in turning everyone who oppose us into terrorist, every terrorist into ISIS and then turning ISIS into Hitler.  He has then thrown the Arab Israelis in with the terrorist and more recently any of the NGO who oppose his policies into  the same mix.  The success of that effort partially explains the opinion poll results.

The other part is a true lack of understanding of what democracy and democratic values mean.  To me, that is the most important problem that needs to be focused on, and it’s on that, that I intend to focus much of my efforts in the coming months and years. More on that in the near future.

In the last 24 hours I have been called, a “self -hating Jews” , “ a hater of Israel”, a “Zionist Pig” and “spokesman for the Israeli Government”.  Those were just a few of the 107 comments made on my article that was published yesterday by Newsweek.

I have had a column in Newsweek now for almost two years called, Tel Aviv Diary, trying to give a perspective of Israel from Tel Aviv.  The column started during the Gaza War of 2014, but has since grown to cover a wide range of events, mostly, however, security and politically related.  This was the first time one of my articles created the storm that it did.  I wrote the article with a certain reluctance.  While my own preferences on the Israeli political spectrum would be considered by many left of center, I consider myself mostly a pragmatist.  Throughout my active life in the Israeli/Zionist world a period that now extends over 40 years I have always taken the position criticizing Israel should be done from the confines of Israel.  That said in all the articles that I have written, I have always striven to ensure that I maintain as high a level of journalistic professionalism as I can and have never tried to consciously slant a story one way or another.  For the last year my articles have appeared mostly under the section Opinion ( but that is a function of the fact that my editor moved from being the Foreign Editor of Newsweek to the Opinion Editor) which has given me the freedom to sometimes express opinions, but I have tried to follow the statement “just the facts”

My relationship with Newsweek does however, allow me to write on whatever topics I deem interesting and relevant to the readers, with the understanding that it will provide insight into Israel and Tel Aviv today.  Thus I am certainly not bound to write about everything that happens here, many of which would be considered “inside baseball” by many foreign readers.  It was thus with a certain reluctance that I decided to write a column about the separate rooms in Israeli maternity wards for Arabs and Jews and the incendiary statement made by MK Smotrich and the ensuing criticism of his remarks.  It was a story that had dominated Israeli news for two days and unfortunately reflected a certain reality in Israel. It was a story that I felt needed to be told.  I have often published articles that are more critical or more opinionated in the Times of Israel blog section, but the reality is their platform is such, that unless you become one of the “Featured Posts”, you disappear from view almost immediately, and thus the number of readers is often very limited.

I think I did a reasonable job in laying out the facts of the story without being overly critical of too many of the players and even presented a relatively flattering view of Minister of Education Naftali Bennet.  Thus, I was surprised by the comments that the article unleashed.  On one hand the minute I saw the headline, I should not have been surprised.  I should note- I have no control over the headline, something that critics of various correspondents do not seem to recognize.  We write a story and our editors or the headline writers choose the headlines.  Their choice is based on some connection to the story and a headline that they feel will get read,r to click on the article and read it.  In the days when media was mostly conveyed on paper medium, the headline was considered important, a way to get the attention of the reader. Today it’s much more important, readers do not read almost any publication linearly like they once did, but instead pick and choose the stories that strike their fancy, usually based on a quick look at the header.  While I disagreed with the choice of headline “Apartheid Arrives at the Maternity Ward”. It was an effective headline and at least reflected aspects of the story.  Of course, effectiveness is a function of the results and this article certainly generated the readership and level of interaction that a mostly web based news organizations desire.  So much so that the Editor and Chief of Newsweek wrote me an E-mail thanking me for the article.    Is it a fully accurate headline,? No its was not- Israel within the 1967 borders is not an apartheid state- Arabs are free to take any jobs go anywhere, live anywhere they desire.  Is there racism and discrimination in the Israeli society?Yes as there is in almost any society.  Is it codified in the laws? Something that is required to be apartheid, the answer is no.  Of course, the situation is completely different on the West  Bank but that is a different article.  What is true however, is that in our state of perpetual war, it is too easy to fall into the trap of becoming an apartheid state.

One final thought on what was planning to make a short posting- The level of discourse in the comments was clearly frightening on both sides. Those that were pro Israel immediately attacked me for writing the story, “what gave me the right to criticize Israel- and Israel that seemingly can do no wrong”  Of course, they obviously know little about me, but they immediate draw the conclusion that if someone is even mildly critical of Israel they must be an anti semite of self-hating Jew.  Second there seems to be no understanding that there is a clear difference between the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza and the Arab- Israelis who are full citizens of Israel. Something I will try to address with an article in coming weeks.

Finally, when it comes Israel’s critics, for them there are no half measures, our very existence remains the original sin, at least, based on the comments, reaching a peace agreement with the Palestinians that would result in the partition of the land would be a half measure at best for them.

I truly do not know who seem scarier- our supporters who think we can do no wrong and our opponents who think we can do no right.

If you did not read the article or want to read the comments here it is

When I woke up this morning I was planning to write about Trump’s speech at AIPAC last night, it was the last thing I heard as I was going to sleep.  By the time I got back home this morning the news alert came across my phone of a bombing in Brussels.  Israeli news went live to Brussels and that became my morning.  The news was bad and only got worse as the time went on .  The world seems to be  faced with a problem that there is no real solution.  What do you do when a part (even if it’s a small part) of a major religion has declared war on the civilized world?  It is a war that has been going on for twenty years, has gotten worse over time and no one has a real solution to it.  I certainly do not claim to have a clue at this point.

Which brings me to the AIPAC conference.  This afternoon Israel time Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke to the convention.  Since it was in the midst of the non-stop news from Belgium it was carried live on Israeli TV.  In fact, it was shown on split screen with Netanyahu filling a third of the screen and the pictures of the destruction at the airport taking up the rest.  Netanyahu’s speech was not all that different from speeches that he has given in the past.  This speech  began with condolences to the victims of today’s attacks.  He, of course presented the standard line that the terror attacks in Europe are merely a continuation of the terror attacks against Israel.  Terror with no real goals.  Usually, I just dismiss that view, and part of it is clearly ridiculous.  Regardless of one’s political views, it must be admitted that the Palestinians have a grievance.  Does it justify terrorism of course not, but one should not say they have no grievance.  On the other hand, I have recently begun to believe there is a greater link between the act of the ISIS and our dispute with the Palestinian then we have understood to date.  That tentative link I believe is the difficulty that Islam has in making compromises. After all, we would never have had 70 years of war if the Arab/Muslims of Palestine had been willing to compromise in 1947.  Or if they had been willing to accept their defeat in 1949 and just resettle in new places.  I believe we have underplayed the religious element of the conflict.   Its been easy in the last few years to say that the window of compromise was closing as the conflict has become more religious and less a secular nationalist conflict.  However what if it was always a religious conflict and we just did not recognize it.

Now finally to Trump, I had no doubt that AIPAC had to invite him.  He is after all the most likely Republican candidate for President.  I also opposed the walkout for the same reason.  On the other hand the enthusiasm that he was received with was stunning and depressing.  How a Jewish group could receive a demagogue with such enthusiasm is beyond my understanding.  Even more importantly how can anyone believe that Trump is the best candidate for Israel. I say that on two levels.  First, his contradictory statements. Who knows what he actually believes.  But more importantly, his stated policies for US foreign relations will, without doubt, weaken the United States in the world.  The strength of Israel is indirectly tied to the strength of the United States.  A Trump presidency would clearly weaken America in the world.

One final comment on the speech that Bernie Sanders did not give but published, It showed a sophisticated understanding of Israel and the Middle East, but he loses me when he attacks the disproportional Israeli response to the missile fire from Gaza.  It shows a fundamental lack of understanding of  the average Israeli.  I am sorry so many people died in Gaza, but all that had to happen to stop the killing was for Hamas to stop firing rockets at us. I am not sorry that  the missiles that were meant to kill me were intercepted by our anti-missile systems and thus, our response was “disproportional”  .  I want all our encounters with our enemies to result in disproportional results.  That will end when they fully accept our existence here, there unwillingness to compromise may in fact be indicative of their religious inhibitions to compromise

A twitter friend asked me why I was not a fan of Bernie Sanders and I promised her an answer.  First let me say that I am sympathetic to Sanders basic message that one of the main problems that the US faces is the rising inequality of income.  He is right about that, however,  I have always believed that the problem does not have any easy solutions, and Sanders explanation for the cause of the problem is simply wrong.  While American bankers especially the nontraditional one like Hedge Fund Managers and their ilk have been piggish in their approach to their compensation, they are not the prime causes of the misbalance- rather technology and to a lesser extent globalization that technology enables.  I have written elsewhere about this problem but suffice it to say Sanders does not seem to have a grasp of the technology factors and his solution to globalization is a new version of protectionism.  When questioned on how he would get his domestic agenda approved he states that the US needs a revolution.  The only problem with that approach, is the US has never since the original revolution been a revolutionary society.  It has historically been evolutionary, and its very system of government was established in such a way to limit revolutionary impulses. The greatest revolutions to occur in modern American history was the Roosevelt’s New Deal and it took the Great Depression to get it implemented.  Today while there is underlying economic malaise, by all indicators the US economy is doing well

However, it’s not all these areas that would bother me about a Sanders Presidency, for ultimately as “President Sanders” would quickly find out his ability to impact economic matters is limited, it’s really the role of commander and chief and chief diplomat that counts.  I have alway been what was once called a “Henry Jackson” democrat.  While I think that the invasion of Iraq the second time was one of the greatest mistakes in US history, and Sanders gets points for his opposition, his opposition to the first Iraq war was mistaken. Iraq could not be allowed to have capture and sovereign neighboring state that was an ally of the US.  Furthermore, his view that America can achieve its goal almost solely through diplomacy is mistaken.  I believe he underestimates the vital role the US plays in the world system, and whether Americans like it or not, the US is the worlds’ policeman, with the only navy and air force to capable of  carrying out that role.

When it comes to the Arab-Israeli conflict, I am somewhat troubled by some of his wording.  As someone who believes that the occupation is a terrible thing that has gone on for two long, but see no easy solutions, on the other hand, I find some of his equivalency troubling.  His website states the following position “However, while recognizing that Israel has the right to defend itself, he also strongly condemned Israeli attacks on Gaza as disproportionate and the widespread killing of civilians as completely unacceptable.”  As someone who lived under two months of missile fire my answer was simple all they had to do was stop firing missiles.  If Israel cannot respond with force to attacks, it can never pull out of more territory.  His call for ending the blockade of Gaza without mentioning Hamas rejection of Oslo and any peace with a Jewish state is also problematic

In short I think Bernie Sander as Commander in Chief would make all but his most ardent supporters miss the days of the Obama Presidency.

Living in Israel during an American election year has always been an experience. I have had a site on Presidential elections on the web  for 20 years and it needs to be continuously updated. This forces me to be more attuned to events and follow them closely in real time. Thanks to twitter I can get up in the morning in Israel and  hear blow to blow accounts of the various debates.

Of course the rather unusual nature of this years primary process has generated greater interest then usual in the elections, and as a result I find myself often answering questions about the elections to Israelis that I know. Reporting for Newsweek has put me in the position of giving American a little of how does it look from over here perspective. This year however, my connections to the election process have been a little more formal. We have been working with the US Embassy on a number of projects this past year, and about two months ago we jointly came up with the idea of an App that explains to Israelis the US elections process. I think there is woeful lack of knowledge about the US and its democratic processes in Israel, and as I mentioned above the election section was the first part of our web site to go up 20 years ago so it was a natural fit. In early January it was decided to go ahead and develop an App based on our current material plus additional material that we developed, all of which we translated into Hebrew. The goal was to have it ready for March 1st Super Tuesday, a day that the Embassy was planning an event. So we began work, and happily we were able to create the App in time and it was approved by Apple the day before. The App which includes an introduction by Ambassador Shapiro is free and available in the Israeli and US App stores for the iPhone, and runs in whatever language you have your iPhone set to. An Android version should be ready in the coming days. This was also the first content App that I did the programming in, in Swift. Of course whenever I ran into trouble Eytan was always there to help.You can download the app here

On the evening of Super Tuesday I found myself presenting the App to a house full of guest in the home of the Deputy Head of the US Mission in Herziliah. It was a fun and interesting evening.

As to the results themselves- one of the ideas for the evening was a contest to have people pick who was the likely winners in each of the contests. I must say there were a enough surprises Tuesday night that there were no winners, the closest winner had only two contests wrong. It was a night of small surprises, with Rubio pulling off a surprise victory in Minnesota, or Cruz winning in Alaska. But the overall narrative seems crystal clear on the Democratic side- Hilary will win, and while still a little hazy on the Republican side the means of stopping Trump are what is most hazy. If it was anyone else, he of she clearly would be the presumptive nominee. While Carson has bowed out, it seems clear that neither Cruz Rubio or even Kaisich will . By the time they do, it will most likely be too late for the anyone to stop Trump. Of course Trump could self-destruct- and certainly something terrible could be found in “his closet”. but if I had to bet at this moment I would say it will be Clinton vs Trump. What I find most interesting as someone who reads the news constantly, and of course sometimes write it, is how little has been discussed about what factors are driving the Trump and the Sander phenomena. What is causing so many Americans to choose candidates far from the mainstream? Candidates who in any other elections year could hope at best for a third party nomination. I have written a little about this before and will write about it in more depth in the future.

The results are in from New Hampshire, the two outsiders have won.  Most pundits talk about the anger at Washington the anger at the establishment, what missing is the true explanation why Trump and Sanders are doing so well.  Their support reflects the growing sense of unease among most Americans.  There is the growing sense that their  children will not be as well off as they are.  Both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump have answers for that, and both are wrong.  Sanders blames the banks and other large corporations and Trump blames the illegal immigrants.  Both make excellent bogeymen but neither is the cause.  The banks and the big corporations are the symptoms and the immigrants are simply the wrong target.

The real economic culprit is technology, and no one is willing to say so.  How may jobs have been taken by computers in the last few years.   How many people answer the phones, act as secretaries, How many jobs has Amazon replaced?  How many printers are out of business thanks to E-=books? How many newspaper jobs have been lost thanks to Google taking all the advertising revenue?, How many jobs will be lost when the driverless car becomes a reality? How many more jobs will be replaced by robots?  The list is long and growing, and it gets event longer the better computers become and  the closer to true Artificial Intelligence becomes

For centuries there has been a balance between capital and labor, technology has upended that balance and now capital is ascendant.  The growing wealth gap is a direct result of this change.  The wealth created by Google, Facebook, Apple and others have helped fuel that growing gap.  Many of the financial instruments that have made many in the financial sector so wealthy are possible only because of ever more powerful computers.  When almost any worker can be replaced by technology the ability of workers to negotiate for better wages is very limited.  Politicians talk about preparing our children for 21st-century jobs, but I would love to know what they are. How many programmers do we really need?  How many Apps?  The answer is many less than we need taxi drivers, truck drivers and all sorts of other drivers that will soon be replaced.

Voters understand that there is problem, but it’s hard to blame technology.  In the past new technologies always brought new opportunities.  The end of the wagon, heralded the era of auto manufacturing, this time, that is unlikely.  In the past technology replaced our muscles, now it replaces our brains, which means it essentially replaces us.  Its a hard concept to fully understand, and even a harder concept to find solutions for. Since there are no clear solutions we have politicians who have created false bogeymen.  I fear that the fear in the land is very real, and without some honest discussion of the issues by someone fear will win out, and we could end up with one of these candidates as President of the United States.    A truly scary thought!

Three random thoughts of the last few days.  The first and the first and most disturbing was the information that Hadar Cohen, the young Border Policewoman killed yesterday, was still in basic training when she was killed.  It surprised me and saddened me to learn how little the army has learned in the 40 years since I was in basic training.  In 1975 they sent me and my fellow soldiers, who at the time had been in basic training for all of one week, to the Casbah of Nabulus to patrol.  I even spent a day guarding Joseph’s tomb and having stones thrown at me, after having fired my rifle all of once.  Now forty years later they send a soldier early in her training to one of the most attacked locations in Israel.

The second totally unrelated news was from a Knesset committee on public relations.  The Foreign Ministry reported that the total budget worldwide was approximately 10 million dollars and that their budget for Sweden was $17,000.  For over a year I have been amazed at Israeli chutzpah on the matter.  They wonder why they fail at Hasbara- and while Israeli policies are sometimes to blame the failure to fund any serious effort is certainly a major factor.  I have never understood how Israel can receive over $2 billion a year from the US and not think it needs to do any serious marketing.

Final thought relates to recent stories on the F-35, the US new front line fighter jet that Israel has contracted to buy at over $200 million a plane.  The F-35 does not seem to living up to expectations and by some measurements is inferior to Israel’s current aircraft.  I have always been very skeptical to the idea of buying a plane that cost $200 million.  But then what do I know.!

I had a marvelous discussion last night that I have to share.  I review books and movies from time to time on my website, historycentral.com, and thus I am often approached to review books, movies or given the opportunity to interview people.  I was approached recently by the PR firm working for Disney who is promoting the film Bridge of Spies.  The movie chronicles the  freeing of Gary Powers and the defense that James Donovan, who is portrayed in the movie by Tom Hanks, gave to Rudolf Abel who was convicted of spying for the Soviets and whom Donovan arranged to be exchanged for Powers. I was giving the opportunity to discuss the film and their father with Donovan’s three children, John, Jan and Mary. I had a delightful chat with them.  They gave me a unique perspective on a man who was clearly devoted to the law, while at the same time, devoted to his family.

I asked them if they saw much of their father during the height of the trial and they proudly told me that their father was always home for dinner, and how he worked at home in the evenings.  Their father had a great den where he worked, but that door was always open for his kids.  I asked the children whether they had any problems in school from other children who were upset that their father defended a “Commie”,  and they said only once in a while.  It did not bother them when strangers attacked them, but it did hurt when people they knew criticized their father. Donovan was committed to explaining to his kids what he was doing and why.  He took one of the kids with him on a visit to the Soviet Union and even took one of them with him to Cuba when he was negotiating for the release of the rebels captured in the Bay of Pigs Invasion.  Their father had put together with some short films on the Holocaust to be used at the Nuremberg trial, and were thrilled that Steven Spielberg, the director of Bridge of Spies, spoke highly of the short films their father made.

The sibling, who must all be in their late 60s and 70s, seemed close and although they claimed that each were very different were certainly tied together by their love of their father and appreciation of his work.  When the sibling got on the phone they had no idea that I was talking to them from Israel, but when they heard I was in Tel Aviv it seemed to become even more animated and one of them told me about his visit to Israel 40 plus years ago.  It was a fascinating and inspiring 30 minutes and I wish I had time to do more similar interviews.