Ben Gurion. First thing you see is some kind of promotional poster about soldiers. Then you see more soldiers, and guns. At other airports you see excitement about the city, its history and activities, its new projects. You see none of that at Ben Gurion, just flags and flags and flags and pictures of soldiers. Israel really does come across as a military dictatorship.
On the approach in we get instructions that Israeli authorities require everyone to be seated 1/2 hour before landing, no exceptions. Already they start with the military dictates. No other country does this. It is obvious that this is a security measure, fear I would suppose of terrorists commandeering a plane and crashing it into something, as if that ever happens here. Is this the geula that Professor Hershel Schachter speaks of?
It amazes me that Professor Schachter, who flies to Israel several times a year, goes through the New York airports, which are quite impressive in scale, accommodations, and technology (at least JFK and Newark are, haven't been to LGA in a while) and comes to the dump called Ben Gurion which is dirty and barren and small and unfriendly and continues to assert that Israel has all the modern inventions and is a wonderful place to live.
Filthy carpet at Ben Gurion
Professor Schachter is a madman. He's not a gadol. The only reason he's popular in the Modern Orthodox world is because he imitates what they imagine a gadol to be which is a computer. At YU, the best thing you can be is a genius, a gaon, brilliant. That's all they ever talk about. Tzidkus they never talk about. As for the Yeshiva people that accept him, again, it's because of lomdus. Yet, I cannot think of a single devar Torah that I have heard from Professor Schachter that is moving or impressive. I'm just told over and over again that he's a major talmid chocham but honestly when you hear him speak, he sounds like AI audio. He can cite lots of sources very quickly from memory. Like a computer. So it's not surprising that he has no idea what's going on in Israel or that pushing people to move there ruins their lives in many cases. He is missing the human element. Is he autistic?
Leaving the airport I am surrounded by grumpy faces. Nobody is helpful or considerate. We arrive after a slow train ride to Navon station in Jerusalem, then take escalator after escalator to emerge like rats from the ground. There's Jerusalem, modern Jerusalem, which is a poor imitation of a modern city. It's ugly, and grumpy soldiers are everywhere.
In Cleveland, East Cleveland is supposed to be the dangerous part of town, the run down part. I went through it several times. It wasn't so bad. Not crowded. No bums on the streets. It's sort of run down but looks actually better than 95% of Israel.
I'm driving through the town where I live right now, every building old and beige because that's the dictate that all buildings around Jerusalem must be beige. Some free country. Beige is a color that causes depression. And I feel so depressed being back here. It's green soldiers and beige buildings. It's not a normal society. Even the nature has been ruined. I can't even comment on the land of Israel because it's dotted with trees that are not native to this part of the Mediterranean. They are too big for the hills that they occupy. You can't just impose a country on a place. It has to grow naturally. Israel is imposed.
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