December 24, 2023

Joseph Zitt's [as if in dreams] 2023-12-23

Hi. I'm Joseph Zitt. I moved from the US to Israel in 2017. This is my newsletter about more-or-less daily life in my city in the shadow of war. You can select these links to subscribe or unsubscribe. There are more links at the bottom. Here we go...

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The rain has been coming down in torrents for much of the night and most of the day. It's been steady, with few exceptions, when I've been awake. I may have missed some dry spells while I was sleeping, but when I've been able to hear it, it has been there to hear.

Occasional thunderclaps erupt, but long gaps divide the booms. When the wind gusts, something metallic nearby bangs against something else. It has been doing so in windstorms for years. It's jarring. I've been able to figure out that it isn't in our yard. It's someplace across the opaque fences that separate our yard from others. Whoever is responsible for it hasn't bothered to get it to stop.

The rain here, from what I recall, tends to fall in short bursts. Sometimes it drizzles. Sometimes it storms. It usually finishes quickly.

But a few times a year, we get longer rainstorms, like this one. Large puddles form. They're often invisible when I walk at night. One street on my way to work tends to flood. Sometimes it overruns the sidewalks. But drainage here tends to be good.

It can be more dangerous in the desert. Hikers have died when dry riverbeds have flooded. The water builds up, coming downstream, until it suddenly hits like a tsunami. In one incident five years ago, ten students on a training trip died in a sudden flash flood.¹ I recall that there's one Hebrew word that people use to refer specifically to that disaster. I don't recall what the word is.

The local news site sends an article and video on WhatsApp.² The ceiling of the bowling alley at the mall has just collapsed. The space is flooded. I've only been there once, scoping out pinball machines for a friend, but it's adjacent to my favorite computer store, which I visited yesterday.

The rain does stop briefly in the late afternoon. Fortunately, it's right when I need to walk over to the House of a Hundred Grandmothers. I don't take any chances. I wear my good raincoat and my baseball cap. I put the papers that I'm bringing over into three nested layers of plastic bags, with the bags' openings pointing in different directions.

I don't see anyone else along the way. Even the dogs and their people are staying inside.

When I get there, I walk up to the automatic doors. They don't open. I back up and approach them again. Nothing. The worker at the front desk sees me. He presses a button to let me in.

As I pass his desk, I ask, "The door isn't working automatically?"

He looks up at me and says, "The door isn't working automatically because --" and then something I don't understand. Oh, well.

I put my still-dry raincoat on the back of a chair in my relatives' apartment, sit down, and drink some hot tea. We talk about the weather. As in every conversation, we're soon talking about the war.

As I understand it, we're at a standoff. Our government is saying that after the terrorists release the hostages, we'll consider a ceasefire. The terrorists are saying that after we start a ceasefire, they'll consider releasing hostages. Whoever blinks first loses.

As hard as the rain is falling here, it's probably falling harder across the border, where the storm comes up the coast on its way to us. In our cities, we only have to worry about the occasional collapsing ceiling and flooding street. There, most people are displaced. Living in inadequate shelters, often in open fields or out on the street, they have no protection.

Reports are claiming that hundreds of thousands of people there have infectious diseases, with little healthcare or sanitation.³ Other reports tell us that many of our own troops, returning from there, have contracted "fungal, antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections" known as superbugs.⁴

People here who have the deepest gut-level belief that we must defend ourselves and avenge the initial massacre are now saying that we have gone too far. It's hard to justify the death, destruction, displacement, and despair that we have rained down on civilians since then. Even if the terrorists are hiding among the people, the damage is too much. As I heard someone or other say in some other situation, it's like burning down a house to rid it of termites.

A link from somewhere I can't recall leads me to this video,⁵ from a live broadcast across the border about a month ago. After a journalist and his family has been killed, another gives up on thinking that his press jacket and helmet might protect him from what's raining down there. He throws them on the ground. The anchorwoman cries.

One relative has an interesting idea for what to do after the war is over. Perhaps we should get the Japanese to handle the reconstruction. They've been staying neutral in the conflict. And they have gained extensive experience in rebuilding areas after the Great East Japan Earthquake, the disaster a dozen years ago that included the tsunami at Fukushima.

Others in my family have pointed me to more information about the produce signs that I saw in the supermarket yesterday. As of Sunday, a new law will indeed require stores to label produce, meat, fish, and cheese with the country they're from. A news video (only in Hebrew), posted by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, explains it.⁶ This page on their official site⁷, which Google Translate handles pretty well, tells us more.

Several other relevant videos have popped into view.

It turns out that that letter, from the mother of the hostage that was killed to the troops that shot him, was actually an audio message. The video at the top of this page⁸ plays the message in her own voice, over a photo of the mother and son.

A popular singer has released a new song, "Black Sunrise," which he recorded with one of the released hostages. The video shows her being released (along with her dog⁹), images of the aftermath of the massacre, and footage of them recording the song in the studio.¹⁰

A new hour-long documentary on YouTube¹¹ covers the rave at which some three hundred people were killed and many were kidnapped. It's mostly in Hebrew, but this English-language article¹² goes into detail about what it shows and says.

The New York Times has just posted a large profile of the massacre at one community along the border, with video, audio, and interactive graphics.¹³

A few days ago, I was talking with a longtime resident of my town about how I feel like I'm in a sort of bubble here, and somewhat distant from the impact. Many younger people or those who have lived here longer don't get to have that feeling. She herself knew people in the community shown in the article.

The usual Saturday night rally for the hostages is happening in the next town south.¹⁴ The usual people are saying the usual things. It looks relatively small. The rain has started again. Overhead photos mostly show umbrellas.

I leave the House after the Havdalah ceremony at the end of Shabbat. It's raining again. In the lobby, I zip up my raincoat and flip up the hood.

The water on the street heading away from the House is almost up to the sidewalk. I think I'm OK, until a car zooms past me. A wave soaks my sandals and jeans up to my knees.

The park's lighting isn't the best. I can see where I'm going, but not where the puddles are. I walk right through some of them. That's OK. My ankles are soaked already. As I learned walking through sudden storms in Texas, once you're completely drenched, you don't get any wetter.

I live on a sloping brick road. Water flows down it toward a couple of grates. They messed up on creating them, though. The grates are next to each other, with a gap of several inches between them.

The water flows down a gutter in the middle of the street. Rather than going into the grates, though, it goes between them and keeps flowing. A waterfall splashes down the steps at the end of the road.

I go through the gate and walk carefully down the path in my yard. The wind chimes are going crazy. A wooden sculpture has tipped over. About a dozen of the bitter oranges have fallen from their tree.

Another set of steps leads down to my door. Water is flowing steadily down them. None of it gets into my apartment. In another sign of how well-designed this house is, there's another large grate at the bottom of the steps. The water flows in there and away.

I get into the house, kick off my sandals, and change my clothes as quickly as I can. I hear the rain continue steadily outside. My Internet connection is only being slightly flaky. I should be able to post this tonight.

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Here’s an archive of past newsletters.

You can find me via email, Bluesky, Mastodon, Facebook, and, just out of inertia, X/Twitter. There's more about me and my books, music, and films at josephzitt.com.

The newsletter’s official mailing address is 304 S. Jones Blvd #3567, Las Vegas NV 89107. (I’m in Israel, but if physical mail comes to me there, it’ll get scanned and emailed. I don’t expect that to happen much. If you want to send me physical mail, ask me for a real address.)

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L'hitraot.