Zion Square has long been the estuary in which the different streams of Jerusalem's population swirled around - and crashed into - one another, a place shared by addled Breslover missionaries and glazed-over hilltop youth djembe enthusiasts, preening acid-washed arsim and bubbly Anglo seminary girls, earnest protesters of public policy and strident prophets of doom; Jews and Arabs, residents and tourists, bankers and street kids, police and thieves, all idling in the space between Banks HaPoalim and Leumi.

A few years ago the Square centered around an elevated platform often used by musicians for performances and by idlers for, you know, idling, until without warning the city knocked it down and carted it away, apparently in an effort to keep unsavory elements from congregating there. In that regard, the city was not entirely successful (the banks, after all, are still there), but it did leave a lot of empty space aching to be filled someday with one of the damned fool ideas to which the Municipality seems to have devoted a special department.

That day has arrived.

You see, a major Jewish philanthropist from Waco, Texas has chucked enough money (2 million dollars, to be precise) over to the Jerusalem Foundation and the Municipality that they agreed to let him rename Zion Square to Rapoport Plaza (after himself) and attach that same name to a massive art installation that would grace the square - an art installation whose design has been kept a strict secret from the public. The name change was thwarted last year due to an outcry by grassroots public interest group called "Lemallah" ("Upwards"), and now the very same group has somehow obtained an image of London sculptor Ron Arad's design for the new square sculpture. It turns out it was kept a secret for good reason.

2 million simoleons can buy you the right to restructure major city landmarks as you see fit, but as for good taste, well...her value is far above rubies.

Lemallah has not been taking the proposed construction of this mighty monument to hubris lying down, dubbing it, in an apparent mix-up with the nearby Mike's Place, a "haven for beer drinking and urination." They've organized an online petition against it, but included in the anti-Arad initiative is a counter-initiative to drop an enormous curlicued Star of David over what seems to be the greater part of downtown Jerusalem.

The Jungle Gym of Og, anyone?

Lemallah's cause - to bring an end to the Municipality's closed-door policy of urban planning - is noble and admirable, and some of its ideas to improve the Square, like replacing the banks and moneychangers with the cafes and theaters that were once its main businesses, are excellent. But its proposed Peace Dome is a move sideways rather than upwards, and so Jerusalemite finds it difficult to fully support the group's petition.

But then how does a civic-minded individual express their opposition? There's always letter-writing and organized protests, but if that fails and they succeed in building the thing, Jerusalemite can only recommend one course of action: crack a Goldstar beneath its oxidized heights, yank down your YKK and let fly the golden shower of civic aesthetics. Do it for Jerusalem.

Images courtesy of Lemallah.

One is a renowned man of letters, a novelist, satirist and essayist whose emancipationist sympathies, finely honed wit and admirable mustache ensured him the title of "father of American literature." One is an Israeli war hero turned iconoclastic, if corpulent politician who during his tenure as prime minister began the process of disentangling the nation from its thorny post-1967 territorial gains before being felled by a stroke. And one is a religious Zionist seminary/urban development concern currently engaged in the controversial business of buying up and resettling the Old City's Muslim Quarter. Their common ground? One Jerusalem building, it turns out.

The aforementioned man of letters, one Samuel "Mark Twain" Clemens, embarked in 1867 on a tour of Palestine, then a region within the Ottoman Eyalet of Syria, and spent several days poking about the religious sites of Jerusalem. His travels in the Holy Land and Europe inspired the popular travel memoir The Innocents Abroad or The New Pilgrims' Progress, published in 1869, and partly informed the (for its time) remarkably philosemitic Concerning the Jews, published years later in 1898 - although as his surviving letters indicate, Twain's chief concern while he was actually in Jerusalem was one that should be familiar to any modern Jerusalem tourist: which thematically appropriate tchotchke to buy for the folks back home. From a letter to a Christian Quarter bookseller:

Basketball. Long ago in the game's early days, before everyone realized they were not on the whole a very tall people, Jews were major players, significantly overrepresented on the court. And while the era of Jewish sports mastery has since passed, the Jewish state honors the Jewish heritage of basketball by reserving the sport second place in Israeli athletic affections (after soccer, of course). Maccabi Tel Aviv may be populated by nearly as many NBA castoffs as born Israelis, but they're our NBA castoffs, and we love them even if they sometimes embarrass us by losing to the Europeans.

Fortunately for basketball lovers in Israel, soon you'll have something to do other than read about which Americans and Brazilians are becoming Israelis under the Basketball Law of Return (The Law of Rebound?) - because it's time for the annual Jerusalem Streetball tournament. The tournament, which divides Safra Square into 16 basketball courts, is probably Israel's largest sports event open to any player, with teams divided by age. Public figures are getting in on the fun too, including players from the professional Israeli basketball leagues and Knesset ministers. Can those dour boys from Shas ball? Maybe you'll find out (or maybe not).

Other activities on tap include dunking contests, 3-point shootouts and showy performances by the Israel contingent of the And1 Streetball organization. Registration closes on July 11, so do not miss this once-a-year chance to shoot hoops with Israeli basketball's finest. You can register online at the Municipality's website, or in person at Safra Square building 10 between 9:00 and 18:00 (9:00 - 12:00 on Friday).

It ain't easy being a downtown driver in Jerusalem. The traffic infrastructure, dating in large part back to the days when Jerusalemites were far more likely to travel by donkey than car, can't support the sheer number of motorists. Major thoroughfares are closed to public traffic, meaning that to get from point A to point B downtown, drivers usually have to travel by way of point Q. Roads that once bore vehicles are being chopped up and repurposed as pedestrian promenades. Construction never ends. And public parking is usually impossible to find, with the few garages and metered spaces (increasingly rare due to the pro-pedestrian initiatives) becoming scenes of stiff competition. Essentially, the city is squeezing drivers out of downtown, and in a land ruled by quick Mediterranean tempers, rage over the decreased availability of parking is an almost inevitable result. Much of that rage has been unfairly directed at the city's parking inspection officials, whose zealous enforcement of parking statutes has led to nearly one hundred attacks on their persons from angry drivers in 2007 alone - nine of which resulted in medical treatment.

After a recent meter reader assault brutal enough to attract the attention of all the Hebrew dailies, Jerusalem resident Rami Tahan was thrown into jail for ten months. Tahan, parked illegally on Radak Street, was approached by inspector Yaniv Sagiv, who began to write a ticket. Tahan asked Sagiv not to, and then, cheekily, asked him to let him keep the car parked there a few more minutes. Naturally, both requests were refused. Tahan began yelling, which led Sapir to report him to his supervisor and request support from fellow inspector Nati Halfa, also in the area. The men again tried to serve Tahan his ticket, at which point Tahan punched Sagiv, grabbed his ticket book and ripped it in half. Then, apparently feeling like a big man, Tahan began shouting "Ani shahid!" ("I am a martyr!'), threw a few more punches, and then drew an iron bar from his car and began wailing on Sagiv with it, bruising his face and breaking his teeth and little finger. Meanwhile, Halfa grabbed an extra pipe from Tahan's car and used it to defend his partner, earning himself wounds on the face and body in return.

Hey, admittedly, nobody likes a meter reader. But that still doesn't mean we should ever beat them with pipes. So please, if you see one ticketing your car, resist the urge of those dozens of other Jerusalemites to attack. Remember: often, people who park illegally contribute to snarled traffic in the city. So if you have to rain blows down on someone, make it them.

Photo courtesy of adamtrd under a creative commons license.

 

Now that he's unmasked what seems like every racist, reactionary, hick and homophobe in the English-speaking world - and plastered his face on billboards from London to LA - British uber-comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, in order to keep his incognito shtick alive, has been forced to take his brigade of comic caricatures to the (alarmingly few) countries where the words "Is niiiiiiice!" never became the irksome refrain of an era. And Israel has not been spared.

Of course, Baron Cohen is no stranger to Israel; the son of an Israeli mother and a Welsh-Jewish father, he spent much time in the country in his youth, including a year on a kibbutz as part of left Zionist youth movement Habonim-Dror's Israel program. His last film, the inescapable Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, which centered around the travels of the titular character, a bumbling, anti-Semitic and misogynistic Kazakh reporter, received a wide release here - although with little previous exposure to Baron Cohen's semi-documentary brand of comedy, the thrust of the movie's central joke seemed to go a bit over the local audience's heads. The fact that Baron Cohen's "Kazakh" dialogue was actually Hebrew doubtless added to the confusion.

But with his face still mostly unknown, the Holy Land has become a ripe target for Baron Cohen, and he arrived in the country a few days ago in the guise of flamboyant gay Austrian fashion devotee Bruno, hoping to inject some trenchant political commentary into his new film project, Bruno: Delicious Journeys Through America for the Purpose of Making Heterosexual Males Visibly Uncomfortable in the Presence of a Gay Foreigner in a Mesh T-Shirt, which continues the trend of confusing pitches with titles. Among Bruno's targets were two Jerusalemite academics, one Jewish and one Palestinian, brought together to explain the Conflict at an unnamed meeting place just outside of Zion Gate:

Then one of us mentioned Hamas, and the exchange that ensued went something like this:

"Vait, vait. Vat’s zee connection between a political movement and food. Vy hummus?"

We exchanged astonished glances. "Hamas," we explained, "is a Palestinian Islamist political movement. Hummus is a food."

"Ya, but vy hummus? Yesterday I had to throw away my pita bread because it vas dripping hummus. Unt it’s too high in carbohydrates."

The Hamas-hummus confusion went on for several minutes. Then, the interviewer declared: "Your conflict is not so bad. Jennifer-Angelina is worse."

No word on to what extent he messed with protesters and participants at the recent gay pride parade. Just remember, if you should see that lovely fauxhawk bobbing down the city streets, say hello and tell him Jerusalemite thinks he should swing by Ta'ami - it's the best Hamas in the city.

With projects rarely finishing even remotely according to schedule, construction in Jerusalem is so pervasive and continuous that it's hard to believe that work on the Bridge of Strings has finally ended (or has it?). The past six years of bridge building (and its limitations on our city's main circuits) has certainly been infuriating at times, but the result is unquestionably fascinating. Let's look back at the evolution of the bridge from the initial sketch by Santiago Calatrava to the completed architectural marvel.

We'll start off with some interesting (and not so interesting) facts about the bridge provided by the Jerusalem municipality and Moriah, the engineering company that constructed the bridge.

Location: The bridge is located near the main entrance to the city, near the Central Bus Station.

Reason: The bridge was built to carry Jerusalem's future light rail lines across a dense urban area, resolving traffic and pedestrian issues, and to create a new landmark for the entrance to the city.

Construction began: 2002

Inaugurated: June 25, 2008

Type of structure: Steel arch bridge, cable span bridge with pylon

(The specs and photos continue here.)

The Anglican church, struggling to figure things out doctrinally ever since splitting with Rome almost 500 years ago (being founded on a king's desire for a divorce can make any religious body confused), chose Jerusalem as the setting for attempting to hash out its latest church-wide conflict - because nothing says "a calm and agreeable compromise regarding matters of faith" like "Jerusalem." What pressing theological issue brought the Anglicans to our sun-dappled stones? The gays, of course.

A group of conservative bishops meeting in Jerusalem have raised anew the possibility of a schism in the worldwide Anglican church, largely over the contentious issue of gay priests.

[...]

The Global Anglican Future conference (GAFcon), the group of conservative Anglican bishops and believers that ended its weeklong meeting in Jerusalem on Sunday, released a statement that stops short of outright schism with the Anglican Communion. However, it seems to set up an alternative fellowship of conservative Anglicans within the Communion, made up of its own group of key archbishops, or primates.

And so on. Jerusalemite is not in the business of expounding on the intricacies of Anglican doctrine, although one must admit, the timing of all this is suspect. Conservative Anglicans were here last week considering a schism over gay ordination. And who else was here? A whole lot of happy, marching gay people. Coincidence? Or...something more sinister? Are those crafty (if fabulous) Jerusalemites at the Jerusalem Open House conspiring to interfere with the inner workings of the vaunted Church of England? Or are the bishops just getting a last look at the rollicking rainbow-hued merry-making they plan to lock out of their faith? You decide!

Photo courtesy of andydr under a creative commons license.

It used to be tough to be nocturnal in Jerusalem.

While the city's nightspots and clubs don't start really heating up on go-out nights (Thursday, Friday and Saturday) until well after midnight, the Jerusalem bus system ground to a halt at midnight, and didn't resume service until 6 AM, meaning car-less revelers had to either walk home or shell out the shekels for a cab ride.

But those days of long nighttime walks back from the club zone in Talpiot are over. Egged, responding to consumer demand, has for the second summer running established seven nighttime bus lines that wind their way from the outlying neighborhoods and suburbs of the city all the way down to the nightlife districts (Shlomtzion HaMalka, Emek Refaim, Talpiot, City Center) and back again. 

The seven lines are:

101: Ma'ale Adumim to Talpiot via French Hill, City Center, Liberty Bell Park (Gan Hapa'amon) and Emek Refaim.

102: Gilo to the Central Bus Station via Talpiot, Emek Refaim, Gan Hapa'amon and City Center.

103: Neve Yaakov to Talpiot via Pisgat Ze'ev, French Hill, City Center, Gan Hapa'amon and Emek Refaim.

104: Mevaseret Tzion to Mamilla via Givat Shaul, Beit HaKerem, Kiryat Moshe, Central Bus Station and City Center.

105: Givat Ze'ev to Talpiot via Ramot, Binyanei Ha'oma, City Center, Emek Refaim.

106: Givat Masua to Central Bus Station via Kiryat Menachem, Kiryat Yovel, Talpiot, Emek Refaim and City Center.

107: Chomat Shmuel (Har Homa) to Central Bus Station via East Talpiot, Gan Hapa'amon and City Center.

The buses run to the centers of nightlife from 12:00 AM to 3:00 AM, every half-hour. The lines will operate nightly starting tonight (save for Friday nights) until August 31, at which point they will switch to only Thursday and Saturday evenings.

Jerusalem is marked by so many overlapping neighborhoods that apartment listings come with checklists and categories rather than single choices. By the time your cabbie or tour guide finishes telling you you're in the German Colony, you're actually in the Greek Colony, and then, a block later, Pierre Koenig St, which is what, Talpiot?

And don't even try to create a database of these neighborhoods that's even somewhat practical, as we've attempted here at Jerusalemite. Want to see a lits of landmarks on Mt. Scopus? Restaurants in Malcha? Jazz concerts downtown? Hey, we're trying.

Each neighborhood of Jerusalem has its own historical narrative, colorful ethnic population segments and issues. Some more than others. Many have their own neighborhood association organizations that help work with City Hall and other governmental bodies to foster neighborhood identity through community-specific events. And the Municipality's website even has a section dedicated to the various neighborhoods and their relevant institutions.

Now Jerusalem's neighborhood pride is getting a bit of an upgrade, with the goal of making the locales more distinct and welcoming. Over the past week or so, the city government has been installing a series of signs at the entrances to various neighborhoods.

Sometimes the results are confusing (within three blocks of each other, signs welcome us to Givat Ram at the bottom of Rabin Blvd., to the Federal District at the Foreign Ministry and to National Parking at the Supreme Court, for example), but in a land where signage lags sorely behind the development of infrastructure described by signage, it's good to know someone's working on it.

Photos by Ben Jacobson for Jerusalemite.

As anybody in opposition to the raw on-screen sexuality of a young and virile Kevin Bacon can tell you, dancing is a threat to the fabric of society. Some jurisdictions respond to the sinister undulations of those nymphs held in the thrall of wicked Terpsichore by simply banning all iniquitous wiggling outright. Others "compromise": profligate poussettes will be tolerated as long as all female participants cover every inch of skin, from neck to wrists to ankles, in featureless smocks and hide their hair beneath all-black Jacques Cousteau tuques. It's a fair compromise, truly: nothing expresses the glory of the human form in movement like a Sears poncho.

It's also the preferred compromise of Jerusalem, which inaugurated its sparkly new Bridge of Strings by lighting off fireworks, dangling acrobats from impressive heights, and dressing up the young girls of the Mechola Dance Center, slated to perform at the ceremony, as gold lamé Hefty bags. The abayas weren't an artistic choice; the girls were forced to modest up after Mayor Lupolianski initially cut the entire performance due to an outcry from ultra-Orthodox residents of Jerusalem.

On Wednesday Lupolianski surrendered to the ultra-Orthodox community's demands to cancel the show by Mehola dance ensemble planned for the inauguration ceremony.  
 
Following counter-objections made by the opposition of the city council a creative compromise was reached, according to which the dancers would wear long clothes covering their bodies and black hats on their heads in an effort to blur their sexual identity.

Artistic director of the Mehola ensemble Yaniv Hoffman expressed his revulsion at the decision and told Ynet, "The parents are shocked, the children are shocked, and we are even more shocked.

 "These are only young girls, aged 13 to 16. We have performed with them at all of the national events and this is the first time in 20 years that we have come across such an extreme reaction. These are not strippers or gogo girls – the ensemble engages in culture and art."

City councilman Saar Netanel voiced his displeasure by trodding all over a speech by Lupolianski at a council meeting yesterday.

"You always open with achievements and positive things that happened this month," Netanel called out, "so how is it that you didn't open with the 'marvelous thing' that happened to us yesterday when the girls of a dance ensemble were dressed in clothes like in Tehran. How is it that you don't open with the fact that women in Jerusalem are being dressed as in Iran?"

Some of the young people present encouraged Netanel by singing, "Jerusalem is not Iran, Jerusalem is Tehran." Despite many requests, the singers refused to quiet down and were therefore forcefully removed from the hall by security.

Netanel and his backup singers (the Saarettes?) are total drama queens. Jerusalem is completely unlike Tehran. In Tehran, you can't see ladies' necks, but in Jerusalem, all that decadent chin-to-clavicle flesh is on view for the entire public. That's progress.

Oddly, given this reverberating kowtow to the miffed sensibilities of a vocal few, nobody in the city government seemed to pay much attention to Jerusalemites whose aesthetic senses were offended by the soaring, heart-stoppingly expensive middle finger of Iberian modernism jutting out the heart of one of Jerusalem's drabbest neighborhoods. But then, wounded aesthetes don't typically express their displeasure with municipal policy by setting their garbage bins alight, a lack of gumption that's allowed, for example, Moshe Safdie to strew his least appealing designs across the Israeli landscape like a petulant child knocking over his blocks.

But at least, even with all this dancin' controversy, the bridge is finally finished good enough for government work. Jerusalem finally has a distinctive landmark to call its own. Jerusalem has a Calatrava bridge - which is something, all ideological similarities aside, the tiny town from Footloose (unlike, say, Salford, Valencia, Barcelona, Seville, Mérida, Bilbao, Buenos Aires, Milwaukee, Dublin, Redding, Haarlemmermeer, Petach Tikva and Reggio Emilia) never had.