1. One man, very old and very wise, told me in a cafe on Arlozorov Street in Tel Aviv that if I want to convey any message, I should do it through the negation. Since I’m not that smart and not that old, I didn’t quite understand what exactly he meant. The wise man asked me if I knew how to copy. I answered in the affirmative, he told me “Copy what I write and publish it in the newspaper.” “Why copy if you write?”, I asked. “I am like a beast of prey, blurring my tracks,” he replied. The wise man sat down and in beautiful handwriting, while using an ancient fountain pen, wrote these things, and I copied them carefully. This is how he wrote:
- There is no racial discrimination in Israel.
- In Israel there is no corruption in the state leadership.
- Israel did not conquer territories.
- Israel did not exterminate innocents in its wars.
- Israelis did not detonate explosives in innocent population concentrations.
- Israelis do not evade tax.
- There are no uneducated and well-mannered children in Israel.
- In Israel boys do not use drugs and alcohol.
- There are no organized crime organizations in Israel.
- Israelis are not involved in the international drug market.
- Israelis do not head networks for smuggling women for prostitution purposes.
- Israelis are not involved in the slave trade from third world countries.
- Israel has never sold weapons and nuclear knowledge to racist fascist states.
- Israel has never sold weapons to tyrannical regimes that oppressed their countrymen.
- Israel has never guided foreign armies in dictatorial countries.
- Israel did not bribe senior officials in foreign countries.
- Israel did not use blackmail against influential ministers in foreign countries.
- Israel does not forge passports and other documents of citizens of friendly countries.
- Israel did not take advantage of the Holocaust survivors and used for its own purposes the money intended for their rehabilitation, welfare and health.
- Israel did not dispossess Arabs of their lands for the purpose of establishing settlements.
- Israelis did not make millions in sting and fraud exercises in the world.
- Israel has never exported hired killers who gained experience in security agencies.
- Israel has never supported revolutions in African countries for its own needs.
- The heads of the State of Israel who retired always kept their hands clean in international transactions and did not evade taxes.
- Israeli government ministers in the past never used their knowledge and transferred it to foreign parties in exchange for money.
- Israeli ministers never connected with the people of the underworld for financial and sexual pleasures.
- Senior officials at the top of the government were never blackmailed by the senior officials of the underworld for documented favors they received.
- The great rabbis never dealt with financial matters.
- The chief rabbis are not involved in black deals in exchange for donations to their communities.
- Rabbis of Israel great and small abstain from dubious sexual pleasures.
- There are no gold or diamond smugglers in the ultra-orthodox community.
- There are no money launderers of the drug cartels among the members of the ultra-Orthodox community.
- There are no international drug smugglers among the ultra-orthodox community.
- Members of the Israeli government do not eat venison.
- Members of the Israeli government do not desecrate the Sabbath.
- Members of the Israeli government do not get drunk in bars and pubs in Israel and around the world.
- Senior police officers do not drive drunk.
- Senior IDF officers don’t drive off-road.
- Drugs and alcohol are not used in the IDF.
- Criminal lawyers do not embezzle income.
- Criminal lawyers do not pass vital information between their serious criminal clients and their soldiers in the field.
- Criminal lawyers do not cooperate with the underworld.
- Doctors do not take black money.
- Doctors do not build income without paying tax according to the law.
- Doctors do not protect ministers, MKs, senior officers and capitalists.
- Journalists do not accept hidden bribes.
- Journalists do not connect with those they are supposed to write about or talk about.
- Journalists do not do public relations for favors.
- Journalists do not happily receive envelopes with cash from the capitalists they write about as part of their journalistic work.
- In Israel there are no capital-government relations for illegal purposes.
- There is no illegal gambling in Israel.
- In Israeli sports, there are no sales, purchases and game biases.
- In Israel, fake study certificates are not issued for the purpose of increasing salaries (especially not in the security institutions).
2. The very old and very wise man got tired. He closed the fountain pen, and heaved a heart-wrenching sigh. After I finished copying what he wrote, he said in a depressed voice: “Maybe you shouldn’t publish these things, they’ll think you’re crazy.” They think I’m crazy anyway, so what do I care.
The old man got to his feet and sighed again. “You know, Zahavi, someone said to me this week a statement that scared me, that somewhat connects to these things I wrote. He told me that as long as the Filipinos, the Chinese and the Arabs work, and the Druze and the Russians guard, and the Americans pay – the Jews live. These things are a bit superficial and who knows how accurate they are, but there is something scary about them.
The Filipina held the old man’s hand, and they both began to walk slowly. Suddenly, when he reached the traffic light, he stopped, turned around, and motioned for me to approach him. “Listen, my young friend, all over the world there is corruption and crime and rot and stench, but we are not like everyone else.
“We wanted to establish another country here, we started well, it was great here, brotherhood, friendship, mutual help, all for one, one for all, it was a dream and we are no more. I remember your father and your mother from 60 years ago. Ask them how it was then.”
“They died,” I answer him, and see his face contort from inner pain. “Maybe it’s better that they died – I’ll die soon too. Do me a favor, Zahavi, wait a bit with this publication until I’m not here.”
This week the Filipina came for coffee, and with tearful eyes she asked me to help her hang the mourning notices for the death of the wise old man. In slurred Hebrew, she said that his children had called from America and said that they would not be able to come to Israel for the funeral.
“He also told me that it’s a shame you’re not his son,” she added. I looked at the ad and realized that I never knew his name was the same as my father’s, Yaakov Zahavi. Even though I hate funerals and cemeteries, I went to his funeral.
At the funeral, I remembered David Avidan’s song, “Old Man”.
An old man – what does he have in his life?
He got up in the morning, and that morning he didn’t get up
He shuffles into the kitchen
And there the lukewarm water will remind him
at his age… at his age…
An old man, what does he have in his cattle?
He got up on a summer morning and it was already autumn
He passed in the evening in the lights of his room
He has not yet returned from his journey down the corridor
Because there he still thought…
What to do now and what to read
old man…
An old man, what does he have at his age?
He takes a nap because he is afraid to sleep
His eyes are half open
Guessing by the movement of the stars
If the whispers are any indication
Because this is the last night
An old man, what does he have in his evening?
He is not a king
And he will not fall on his sword.