What every parent must know about youth groups in Israel (with handy vocabulary list!)

If you grew up outside of Israel, you may think you know what a youth group is--but you probably don't, at least not until you've experienced the Israeli variety.

And if you’re too old to experience it yourself, maybe it’s something you can look forward to for your kids.

(For those of us too old to be part of a youth group ourselves, I’ve put together a list of vocabulary below that you might find helpful – if anything’s missing there, let me know and I’ll add it in!)

I personally was a Brownie and then a Girl  Guide, which is the Canadian version of Girl Scouts, with all the same ideas, mainly that it’s kind of military group of kids who are corralled and brought places and taught principles of healthy living and woodsmanship by adults.  Hmm… now that I put it like that, it really doesn’t sound much fun at all.

This is literally what we had to wear to do these activities:

(except I didn’t have nearly so many badges!)

Our weekly meetings were held at a set day and time, following an agenda set by our adult leaders, who in Guides were known as Tawny Owl and Snowy Owl, for whatever reason – again, the woodsy theme, even though we were all actually sitting in my junior high school cafeteria.

During the summer, I went to Girl Guide camp, which was basically like one long Girl Guide meeting, with an emphasis on woodsmanship and a little more singing.  Oh, and we got to wear the “camp uniform,” which was slightly more casual.

So what do kids do in Israel?  And how is it different from what I grew up with?

Here, there have what are called תנועות נוער / tenuot noar, which literally means meaning youth

Who Israel has instead of rock stars and supermodels (and why I’m glad)

Sure, supermodel Bar Refaeli captures her share of headlines here.  But you know who's a real celebrity in this country?

I'll tell you.

I was sitting down this afternoon in a little cafe in the mall, revving up my voice recorder, buffing up my pen & notepad, or whatever I do before an interview… when I noticed a woman standing outside the cafe, staring intently. 

After a second, she started waving - at the guy I had come to interview.  She waved timidly at first, shyly, and then a little more crazily when she saw that he'd spotted her there.  "Todah," she mouthed at him.  "Todah."  Thanks.

"He's like a rock star here," said the translator.

I nodded, numb, amazed.

Who was this instantly-recognizable mega-star that I had come to interview?

It was this guy:

What’s that you say?

Exactly!  Yeah, this guy.  (The one in the vest.  No idea who the guy in the white kippah could be.)

Yup, him.  Desmond Tutu’s buddy.

Israel’s Children: A Christian Perspective from 1897

I’m not blogging this week, as we are away, flying to chu”l (what the heck is chu”l???).

But I was fascinated a while back to stumble across this old public-domain article from 1897, first published in a Christian periodical called The Biblical World. The article is called Children in Palestine, written by Anna H. Jessup.   (It’s available in the public domain here.)

Interestingly, this was the same year as the First Zionist Congress.  The author doesn’t seem to know yet that big changes are in the wind for Israel, then known as Palestine.

Certainly, the author doesn’t seem to like any of “Palestine’s” children – except perhaps the Christian ones.

I sort of love how this article reflects all the weird racisms and prejudices of that time period.  Of course, I’m also horrified by it as well.  (Don’t read it if you’re easily offended, maybe?)

But I think it’s helpful to think about how the situation has changed and evolved over the last 120 or so years, so far beyond what any of the players, either at that Zionist Congress, or reading that Christian magazine, could have envisioned.

I’ll be back to blogging in no time.  In the meantime… I’d love to hear what you think about this crazy, racist report on the State of Affairs in Israel (aka Palestine, back when the Jews were Palestinian) circa 1897.

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  Children in Palestine

In writing of the children in Palestine at the present day, it must first of all be clearly understood that the people who live in Palestine are not all of the same race; that the inhabitants of different sections, or sometimes even of two villages near together, are of different religions, with sharply drawn lines of separation in customs and beliefs.

Thus we find Druses on Mount Carmel ; Metawileh in northern Galilee ; Bedouin in Jericho to the south and throughout Moab ; Circassians in their colonies east of the Jordan ; both Catholic and Greek Christians in Haifa, Nazareth, Bethlehem, and nearly all the cities; Jews in Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem,