In this morning's tentative calm after 2 months of fighting, we woke up to hope for the end of the conflict, but also to the reality of its aftermath.  With the violence and political posturing, we have seen an increase in antisemitism abroad and in tensions between Israel's Arab and Jewish populations as well, often breaking out in violent acts within Israel's cities.  This morning's paper carried an article about Israel's President Rivlin work to address this latter issue, describing "the rising voices of hatred, hotheadedness and racism in Israeli society, particularly between Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel."  Israel still faces tremendous challenges to build a viable path forward with Gaza that does not simply create conditions for another war in 2 or 3 years time.  A part of this work, would seem to be finding a path to justice and understanding internally between peoples who once lived side by side amicably.  I am glad to be living in Haifa, with its tradition as a joint Jewish-Arab city during this time of both challenge and possibility.  As we talk with both Arab and Jewish city residents, I've been impressed by the uniformly positive reaction to both Adam and Zeke planning to study Arabic this year.

Speaking of Zeke, for those interested in following his photographic journeys, he has started a blog as well.  It's a bit like taking a lovely stroll with him, although without some of the hotter, dustier parts and with the ability to rest and sip something cool.







In between checking news reports and trying to maintain a sense of normalcy, I've also begun trying to understand public health conditions here, beginning with the lens of health disparities since that is the focus of my knowledge base of health in the US.  We've watched the events in Ferguson from a distance and reading about disparities here in Israel between Arab and Jewish populations reminds me acutely of similar and often more marked disparities back home between African-American and white populations.  Comparing the numbers with those in the US is really quite striking.  Continuing to try to understand these issues, hopefully with the help of some contacts in the public health community here.

Infant mortality

2.7 per 1000 births among Israeli Jews

6.8 per 1000 births among Israeli Arabs

5.5 per 1000 births among US Whites

12.8 per 1000 births among US Blacks

Children living in poverty

24% among Israeli Jews

66% among Israeli Arabs

13% among US Whites

38% among US Blacks

Beginnings

We've been in Israel for almost a week now, and having promised myself that I would do some writing while we are on sabbatical in Haifa this year, it seems time to start.  For the last few days, our time has been consumed with the business of setting up household:  figuring out where to buy groceries, how to sign our kids up for school, how to actually move the car we are renting out of the parking garage (far from obvious), and where to buy a birthday cake for our youngest son's 14th birthday. This last taught us that one of the wonderful things about Haifa is that it is Israel's bakery capital, with more per-capita bakeries (not a commonly used statistic, but one that seems to matter to our family) than anywhere else in the country.   The other thing I've noticed on the food front is that fruits and vegetables are surprisingly affordable for a desert country. Cucumbers cost about 75 cents per pound, tomatoes about the same.  From what I've been able to find out so far, much of this relates to investment in technological resources to make farming of these crops affordable, fascinating in light of their much higher relative cost in the US and the lack of investment in this sector at home.  This is an area I want to understand better.  Certainly just looking around the streets in Haifa, people are almost all thin.  Not a scientifically valid measure, but striking.

Everything seems to take longer than I think possible, largely because most businesses seem not to be listed on the internet, and in the absence of any other system, we are finding things by wandering the streets, looking for what we need and asking in various shops.  Because of this, when we sat down to figure out how to get health insurance for our family yesterday, we expected it to be very complex to figure out and require the same multiple visits to various offices that it has taken to enroll our boys in school (actually we've only managed to enroll one of them so far, with an appointment on Thursday -- visit #4 -- in hopes of enrolling the other).  We have US insurance through the end of August, so wanted to make sure there wouldn't be a gap.  Fascinatingly, one brief phone call later, we all have health insurance starting immediately and costing about 1/8th what our plan costs in the US.  Oh, and no co-pays instead of the 50% "co-insurance" we pay up to a cap of $5000 in the states.  I got an email later the same day with my insurance card as a PDF and the 24 hour toll-free number to call if I need help finding a doctor.  Really.  Israel has a private insurance system, but with very stringent governmental regulation.  I'm sure there are lots of flaws in the system that one could point out, but I'm still amazed.

Our other adventure yesterday was a visit to Dalyat el Carmel, a Druze village near Haifa.  We had a good time wandering through shops, finding a finjan for me to make my coffee in as well as a bakery with about 25 kinds of baklava.  Very, very happy boys.  Then we stopped for lunch at a restaurant near where we parked our car, where we had amazing homemade Druze food (homemade because the owner's house is next to the shaded porch where the restaurant sits).  He was unfazed by our request for vegetarian food, and brought out dish after dish of delicious lentils, stuffed grape leaves, stuffed cabbage, hummus, falafel, and mujadara.  This last is a Druze version of a dish that's made up of lentils, bulgar (rice in the Lebanese version), carmelized onions, and spices -- amazingly good!  I'm going to try making it as soon as it gets cool enough to imagine turning on the stove -- see:  http://www.everydaymaven.com/2012/mujaddara-burghul/ for what looks like a good version (apologies for not trying it before posting, but it's hot!).  After we ate, the owner sat and talked with us for an hour or so, telling us all about his family, the Druze history in Dalyat el Carmel, the history of the Druze and Muslims, and so forth.  An unforgettable trip.