Copyright June 20, 2016
Hanging on a thin necklace
Around my neck
It’s always there
A silver star
David’s Star
I am never unaware of it
Neither is anyone else
Quiet and discrete
Weighing nothing
But heavy with
Thousands of years
Of a people
The size of a dime
Beautifully carved
Like two interwoven triangles
The six-pointed Star
Never shouts
It murmurs (Read on …)
An American Jew’s Bold New Plan for a Sane,Â
Peaceful and Prosperous State of Palestine
(part 9)
© by Robert M. Katzman
Man, I ain’t no dreamer—R. Katzman
Published May 18th, 2007 in honor of my father, Israel, on the seventh anniversary of his death, at age 87. I chose to not update the statistics because they aren’t the point of this article. This is about ideas. About change.
First, some background: My family came to America between 1902 and 1916 from Eastern Europe, where some of my immediate ancestors were murdered during the World War One years and the rest by Hitler later. They were non-combatants. I grew up with grim tales of unending, irrational persecution and in sync with my left-of-center politics beginning in the later Sixties, I wouldn’t wish that kind of terror and life on anyone.
Note to my readers:
© November 5, 2011,
First written almost exactly six years ago, this was a nostalgic and philosophic reflection about not just traveling, but in Israel in May 2000 with Rick Munden immediately after my father Israel died, and I planted trees for him in Jerusalem. Bet they’re big trees, and shady now. We saw a lot. I probably drove Rick crazy.
This time, I am back in Israel, alone, because of the death of Joyce, wandering aimlessly around the country, wondering what to do. I keep wanting to call her, talk to her, about what amazing place I just saw. Though I never planned it, ironically, now my title now includes both of them. I hope you connect with it.
I have been many places
Traveling alone
Traveling together
Sometimes both
Together’s better
Chicago Man Watches Death of Samurais in Israel (part 7)
by Robert M. Katzman © November 8, 2016
Some real life situations are so convolutedly charming that they defy fictionalization. Happened tonight.
Marooned as I am in The Promised Land with a painful foot problem which has stopped any explorations for now, and may now doom my hoped for two-day trip to Petra in Jordan and a night with the Bedouins, I spent the day in my nice apartment overlooking a valley thinking about ambition, ageing and gradually limited horizons.
Surrendering to pain, reluctantly and spending a day in an ancient Biblically historic land with cool November winds blowing through all the windows, and warm sunlight pouring down on a covered veranda, I had to think about how to spend my day.
Vad Yashem
Killing a Million Children
(part 6)
by Robert M. Katzman © November 7, 2017
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I didn’t want to come here
I’ve been here before
I know what’s awaiting me
So much older now
I need to feel it again
The jolt of horror
To remind myself
I am still here
We are still here
Tel Aviv, Israeli Radio and Unexpected Art
(part 5)
by Robert M. Katzman © November 4, 2017
 Driving south from Haifa, Israel, or 20 miles east of that to Tel Aviv on the mid-part of the coast on the Mediterranean Sea, later referred to all whom I asked as, “the Beach†or “the Sea†I had a choice of two ways to go, like long shoestrings hanging over a balcony, because both were parallel and I didn’t know the difference. One was more inland in the skinny country, Highway 6; the other ran along the touristy and industrial west coast, Highway 2. I chose 2.
An unmoving steel highway sizzling in the bright cloudless sun in tiny little chunks, chained together.
Discovered that rush hour in Israel was just like rush hour in Chicago or Los Angeles, except the road was narrower, the cars were tiny and aside from endlessly, robotically doing arithmetic in my head about how far one hundred kilometers really was, in American miles terms, so I had a mental picture of how much gas I had, and at the rate I was moving, would I ever get there?
Then there’s the radio. Israeli radio.