Tanya Gold has narrated this article for you to listen to.
Israel has a new train line: 25 minutes from Ben Gurion airport to Jerusalem. The Christian pilgrims would love it but they’re not here. Instead, there are soldiers and visiting American Jews. My taxi driver says American Jews come with thousands of dollars of cigarettes and drive around looking for soldiers to give them to. He says American Jews love Israel more than Israelis. Then he moves his machine gun – it’s on the front seat – and says: ‘Welcome to Israel.’ The American Jews go south to the massacre sites of 7 October to stare at the bullet holes. I don’t. You can’t forget the war here. At the airport you are greeted by photographs of hostages. They are up in windows and on street corners. Some say, ‘Bring them home NOW’, an anti-Netanyahu message. My cousin says that when the war began Israeli women coped by baking. Soon the message came back from IDF commanders: no more cakes. Just cigarettes.
I date my trips to Jerusalem in the falafel sandwiches you can buy near the Damascus Gate, where the road splits like history: left for the Dome of the Rock and the Wailing Wall, right for the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The souk is sullen, angry. A 12-year-old Palestinian boy was killed by an Israeli police officer in East Jerusalem the day before for holding a firework. Itamar Ben-Gvir, Netanyahu’s coalition psychopath, praised the police officer. It’s Ramadan and Hamas have asked the Palestinians to rise up.
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