Mother's Day

It's very hot today. 20 degrees. Still locals wear light sweaters as we know well under the shade or a cold breeze will easily make us sick. Tourists are easily recognisable .... they're in T-shirts and worse ... the female tourists are all dressed for the beach with extremely short shorts and barely anything above. It's disgusting ... because we're in the holiest City in the world, the sanctuary of the 3 monotheistic religions ... and the closest beach is 70 km away. This lack of respect for the local culture and religious sentiments are a constant source of tension.

Today the arabs celebrate Mother's Day. It coincides with the first day of Summer since last night was the Equinox. The palestinians are mostly too poor and only the western educated ones celebrate it as they have the economic means. For the other women, it's work as usual. Nothing special ... another day, another struggle.

The Condemnation chapel behind
the arch and plants

Today we have the 5th pilgrimage Mass. It's in our Chapel of the Condemnation. It's a 7th century byzantine chapel that was destroyed and rebuilt only 100 years ago. It's really small and has no windows so the Mass with incense and a huge crowd will be quite a trial. I cannot participate because I only finish work at 5pm and then there is more work at the other library till maybe 9pm.

Everyone here is having a great laugh at the news that some americas mistook the Malaysian flag for an american flag "desecrated with ISIS symbols". Utterly laughable. The "most powerful nation int he world" doesn't seem to have the brightest minds ... not even normal minds. Must be their education system ... but then again who is the Secretary of Education? Someone said it's easier for Malaysia to change it's flag than to educate americans ... at least in Kansas.   http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/malaysian-flag-mistaken-for-american-flag-with-isis-symbols-leads-to-kansas-lawsuit?utm_campaign=Echobox&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&xtor=CS1-10

Haredim protest last night

Yesterday evening the ultra-orthodox jews (haredim) again demonstrated rather violently in the streets against compulsory drafting to the army. Trash was strewn across a major road and set on fire. Traffic lights were knocked over. All transport in that area stopped, and even pedestrians could not get across. Local residents are extremely angry but the govt. will do nothing about these disruptions because they fear the political power of these ultra-orthodox groups.   https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5183785,00.html 

This Friday the Jewish Passover begins, and the palestinians have called for a massive civil disobedience movement. No violence, no attacks ... just total disobedience with people divided according to their clans and tribes. As the newspaper says ... Israel is not prepared for this. They are well prepared for violence. But if it's non-violent civil disobedience the military doesn't know how to deal with it. And this perhaps is the greatest weapon of the Palestinians yet unleashed.   https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-palestinians-new-doomsday-weapon-has-israel-scared-to-death-1.5930920