Grapevine: Attractions lure Israelis to the capital

IN ITS desperation to outdistance Tel Aviv as the city that never stops, Jerusalem – with the assistance of the Jerusalem Foundation – keeps adding new attractions and events to lure people from elsewhere in the country to spend a weekend in the capital.

Starting today, Friday September 13, Mishkenot Sha’ananim is launching a monthly actuality program in which news reporters and anchors of documentary programs will have one-on-one conversations with Omri Assenheim, a broadcast journalist, investigative filmmaker, and nonfiction author.

To start the ball rolling, Assenheim will be talking with Itay Engel, the intrepid documentary television journalist who has entered conflict zones – including those of countries hostile to Israel – to bring Israeli viewers exciting, factual stories.

October will be a miss due to the numerous Jewish holy days and events commemorating Oct. 7, but in November television journalist Michal Peylan, whose focus is on social issues, will be the person in the hot seat.

In December, to make up for the October omission, there will be two such sessions – the first on December 6 with Suleiman Maswada, the political affairs television and radio journalist, who has his finger firmly on the pulse of everything and anything to do with the hostage situation but also deals with other political issues. Although the hostage issue is in itself a humanitarian one, it has evolved into a political football. Hopefully, by then, all the hostages will have returned home.

The final journalist in the series for this year will be Liel Kyzer, who broadcasts about economics on radio and television. She is very knowledgeable and has a breezy manner of reporting, which helps to lighten an otherwise heavy subject. She will appear on December 20.

The songs of the mountain Jews

■ JOHARA IS a region in the northern Caucasus where Jews have a language of their own, which is neither Yiddish nor Ladino nor the Jewish languages spoken by Jews from Arab lands. Audiences will have an opportunity to hear traditional and contemporary songs sung by the mountain Jews of Johara, a relatively obscure Diaspora community, at an evening of Joharan song and nostalgia at Confederation House on September 23.

Move the Besheva Jerusalem Conference to Sderot

■ IF THE annual Metulla Poetry Festival that took place in August could be moved to Jerusalem because most of the residents of Metulla have been evacuated, there is no reason why the Besheva Jerusalem Conference taking place on Tuesday, September 24, should not be moved to Sderot, which is now undergoing a rehabilitation and revival process. Many of the evacuated residents have now returned home and are interested in revitalizing the economy and cultural activities in an environment of enhanced security.

Education will be another key subject under discussion as will the role of journalists covering a war. In most of the topics, tribute will also be paid to victims of the Hamas massacre and to fallen soldiers. This includes a women’s panel discussion “The Day After” with Yael Shevach, the widow of Rabbi Raziel Shevach, who was killed in a Palestinian terrorist attack in January 2018, leaving his wife to care for their six children; Devora Idan, whose granddaughter Maayan was murdered at Nahal Oz on Oct. 7; Einat Avitan, the mother of fallen soldier Yair Avitan; and Hannah Vaknin-Cohen, widow of Uriel Cohen, who fell in battle in Khan Yunis. Interestingly, no politicians are listed among the speakers.

Kfir Neiman: An external genius 

■ THE “JOBS for the boys” system of making appointments in Israel is less related to the qualifications of people chosen for topnotch positions than to whom they know and who owes them a favor. The system has been extended to “jobs for the girls,” but not regarding Kfir Neiman, who was appointed CEO of the Jerusalem Business Development Authority. According to his CV, he has business development, marketing, and sales skills. He succeeds Amir Hakimian, who left at the beginning of July.

Certain senior members of the BDA saw themselves as worthy of being promoted to the top spot, but the message filtered down that the powers that be were looking for an external genius, given that so many business enterprises in Jerusalem, especially in the city center, have closed down over the past year, with stores bearing “For Rent” signs for months on end.

There were shock waves running through Safra Square when Neiman was appointed because his previous jobs had been as bodyguard to Nir Barkat when the latter was mayor of Jerusalem, then bodyguard to Mayor Moshe Lion, graduating to Lion’s personal driver. But no one should be too quick to judge. Many of the bodyguards of the president of the state, the prime minister, and other dignitaries are university students who are using such jobs as a means of paying for their studies or people fresh out of the army who have not yet decided what they want to do with their lives.

It’s possible that Neiman has more going for him than meets the eye. His appointment is part of a general shake-up at Safra Square, where there are several new faces among senior appointees who have taken the places of people who have left City Hall for greener fields.

Defaced portraits of hostages

■ WHETHER OR not one agrees with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the importance of the Philadelphi Corridor, it takes a really sick mind to deface the portraits of hostages that have been placed on fences, bus stops, and billboards all over the country. On some of the bus stops running from Keren Hayesod through downtown (and presumably elsewhere in the city), the hostage posters have been either torn or defaced.

Because they have been there for so long, most people have probably stopped looking at them closely. But on the day it was announced that the bodies of six hostages had been found and brought to Israel, many people looked to see the portraits of the six murdered hostages. With one or two exceptions, they were defaced or torn off, including the portrait of Hersh Goldberg-Polin.

greerfc@gmail.com