Deze spotprent van Tom Janssen kwam ik nog tegen, leuk genoeg om het oude jaar glimlachend uit te luiden.

For more than 24 hours I was unable to blog, read or send e-mails etc. because of technical difficulties. At least everything started working again just in time to write a last posting for 2005. We do not really celebrate New Year's Eve here ( some people do, though ). This evening we are invited to our friends and neighbors. Together with them, their children and another couple of neigbors/friends with their children, we will light the Hanukah candles ( seven tonight, plus the shamash of course ) and have a light dinner. This morning I made a cake ( 'spiced cake with almond paste' according to my dictionary, gevulde speculaas in Dutch ) that smells wonderful. If my wife and I are awake at twelve o'clock ( we probably will be asleep already ) we will open the windows to hear the boats in the Haifa harbor honking ( is that the right word?).

I have no serious resolutions for next year, except for finally finishing my PhD. As for the most important events of the past year, I do not think my choices are very surprising, they appear in most reviews:

• For the world: the bomb attacks in London ( July ) and the riots in France ( November )
• For Holland: the rejection of the European consitution ( June )
• For Israel: the implementation of the Gaza-disengagement plan ( August )

Obviously, by choosing these events I do not say that other events ( the aftermath of the Tsunami, the earthquake in Pakistan, hurricane Katherina, Bush' second inauguration, the election of a new pope, the start of the process against Saddam Hussayn, terror in Egypt, Iraq and elsewhere, anarchy in the Palestinian territories, the process against the murderer of Theo van Gogh, terror alerts and arrests in Holland ) were unimportant or less impressive. Choosing events of the year does not make sense in any case, but to me the visual and/or possible historical impact of the abovementioned events was/seems to be the most significant. A happy, healthy and hopefully peaceful 2006 to all my readers ( and to most of the other 6 355 543 350+ people on this planet )!

My father-in-law happened to be at the city hall of the city where we live when army officials arrived there to verify the address of the family of the officer who was killed in the suicide attack in the West Bank this morning. My father-in-law, who used to be chairman of the local council a few years before it was made into a city - one of the last official acts of Yitzhak Rabin before he was murdered -, knows the family quite well and was visibly upset when he came home, where our daughter and I met him and my mother-in-law for lunch.

Talking about wasting money. Yesterday I read that the Houston Holocaust Museum brought an old railcar all the way from Germany. It is not at all sure that this particular car was used to transport Jews to concentration and/or extermination camps during the Holocaust, but nevertheless it will be officially unveiled early next year in the presence of former President Clinton as " a powerful symbol ". This is what happens when you have Holocaust and Genocide Museums shooting up like mushrooms all over the world ( and particularly in the United States ). After all, each museum has to be filled and to attract visitors, and whether or not the objects on display are absolutely genuine does not appear to be very important. That the fragmentation of remembrance and research and this use of 'almost-or-maybe-somehow-genuine' objects make the work of Holocaust doubters and deniers easier ( and that so many Holocaust survivors in Israel - and elsewhere, I suppose, as well - live in poverty ) does not interest those who have to justify the existence of 'their' musea. Of course, it is important to offer as many people as possible the opportunity to get familiar with the details of the organized murder of millions of Jews and others by the Nazis and their helpers, but I wonder if that is what is the primary goal of some of those musea's initiatiors, and if this is the right way to make those details known.

When recently it became possible for gay people in Britain to officially register as couples, I read that Israeli gays watched the celebrations with envy. Today I discovered that in Israel we have something that the British can be jealous of: one millionaire came to Eilat to marry the love of her life, a dolphin who is her junior by six years. It always amazes me how some rich people search for ( and find ) such wondrous ways to waste their money and time.

Three pictures taken from, and one of, the Tour Montparnasse in Paris, two weeks ago. On the first three pictures you can see the Eiffel tower, the Hotel des Invalides, and the Jardin du Luxembourg.

Het laatste kliekje voor vandaag. Niet vaak kom ik online een column uit een van de gratis dagbladen tegen die me bijblijft zoals deze.

Een opgewarmd blog-kliekje, dat ik volgens mij al bijna een jaar bewaar. Toch nog wel leuk om te lezen, dat artikel.

Geert Mak schreef voor de Groene Amsterdammer een boeiend portret van een door hem geobserveerd deel van de Verenigde Staten, aan de vooravond van de verkiezingen, waarvan het resultaat ons inmiddels al lang bekend is.

In het nieuwsbulletin van de Wereldomroep dat ik zojuist in mijn mailbox ontving stond het volgende bericht ( ik had er al op andere websites over gelezen in vrijwel exact dezelfde bewoordingen, blijkbaar is dit de tekst van een persbericht van het ANP o.i.d. ):

Stille tocht Kamp Westerbork

Ongeveer tweehonderd mensen hebben op tweede kerstdag meegelopen in een stille tocht in Herinneringscentrum Kamp Westerbork. Het thema was dit jaar 'Mensenrechten kennen geen grenzen, ook niet in Darfur'. De initiatiefnemer van de stille tocht, Appelgroep Westerbork, begon ermee in 1993, toen er overigens nog maandelijks een tocht werd gehouden om aandacht te vragen voor de oorlog in voormalig Joegoslavie. Naderhand werd de stille tocht een jaarlijks evenement op tweede kerstdag, elke keer met een ander thema. Voorzitter Visscher van de Appelgroep stond in een toespraak stil bij de brand in het detentiecentrum op Schiphol, waarbij elf mensen omkwamen. Volgens Visscher leidt de omgang in Nederland met vreemdelingen tot de vraag of de mensenrechtensituatie in eigen land wel zo goed is. Albertien van der Veen, de voorzitter van de Nederlandse afdeling van Artsen zonder Grenzen, beschreef de aanhoudend slechte situatie in Darfur. Volgens haar is het de hoogste tijd dat we aandacht schenken aan de omstandigheden in de Sudanese regio.

Wat ik totaal miste was een verwijzing naar datgene waaraan het Herinneringscentrum herinnert, of in ieder geval zou moeten herinneren. Betekent dit dat wat zich in Westerbork afspeelde vanaf het einde van de jaren dertig ( van de vorige eeuw, moet ik zeggen ) tot en met de bevrijding in 1945 zo algemeen bekend is dat er vanuit wordt gegaan dat iedereen zich daarvan bewust is? Als die veronderstelling juist is, dan is het met de historische kennis van de Nederlanders toch niet zo gek gesteld als de verkiezing van Pim F. tot grootste Nederlander aller tijden zou doen vermoeden. Helaas heb ik een donkerbruin vermoeden dat een korte vermelding van de functie van het kamp Westerbork vlak voor en tijdens de Duitse bezetting ( en ook van de functie ervan na het onafhankelijk worden van Indonesie, al verwijzen de "tromellaars uit de Molukse gemeenschap" waarover ik op de site van de Telegraaf las daarnaar ) niet overbodig zou zijn. Met die kennis als achtergrond wordt de symbolische waarde van dergelijke stille tochten een stuk sterker, en zijn die tochten opeens iets minder zinloos, lijkt me.

If what Binyamin Nethanyahu said tonight is true ( "the prime minister [is] 'secretly planning' a unilateral withdrawal from 90 percent of West Bank" ) I think he is doing Ariel Sharon a favor: for me that would be a reason to seriously consider voting for Sharon's list, Kadimah. Unfortunately, there are no signs of Ariel Sharon or of any of his closest associates really contemplating substantial surprises when it comes to giving up parts of the West Bank. Au contraire, as part of the election campaign - or so it seems, otherwise the timing is quite a coincidence - tenders have been issued for more than two hundred houses in two settlements. O.k., both settlements belong to blocs that will probably remain in Israeli hands even after a ( unilateral ) withdrawal, but ( the timing of ) tenders such as this one will not help to create an atmosphere that will enhance the chances of success for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. If Sharon has already given up on such negotiations - and I would have some understanding for such an approach, given the not very hopeful signs that we receive from 'the other side', no matter what Israel's role is in this - he should tell us so before the elections, If he intends to launch a Disengagement II plan for the West Bank he ought to make that part of the election campaign, clarifying what he thinks that the dimensions of such a disengagement will/should be. By the way, Likud MK Gid'on Sa'ar, the former chairman of what used to be the governing coalition, is talking 'out of the back of his neck' when he says that "the intensifying Qassam rocket attacks attest to the disengagement plan's failure". As an IDF spokesperson said earlier this week, while about 230 Qassam rockets have fallen since Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, a larger number fell in the corresponding period before the implementation of the disengagement plan. Of course, Israeli communities and cities that border on Gaza should get more and better means of protection, and the IDF should respons as forcefully as possible and necessary to these attacks, but when Mr Sa'ar says that o"nly the Likud can place an effective dam in the face of the continued policy of withdrawal and deterioration in the security situation" he shows himself in his true colors, colors that have become a tradition in Israeli politics: those of a politician trying to turn security problems and the misery of others into a political asset. If the intensifying attacks prove anything, it is that the election campaigns and political interests of 'their' extremists and ours run parallel in more than one way.

After my wife took our daughter to a show, I bathed our son, brushed his teeth and put him to bed. Then I made myself a sandwich and wanted to watch one of the DVDs that I bought or received as a present during my last visit to Paris and Holland, but when I turned on the television I landed in the second half of what must be one of my five favorite movies of all times, Scent of a Woman. It is broadcast about once every other week on one of the movie channels, and each time that I find myself in the middle of it I find it hard not to watch it until the end. It is funny, moving, has a good storyline and leaves me with a wonderful feeling every time that I watch ( part of ) it. Next time that I watch it I will try to pay attention to the 'goofs' in the movie. I never notice such things ( probably because I watch a movie to enjoy it, not to study it ), but you can find them on various websites, such as Internet Movie Database.

This is an old posting that I wrote in the spring of this year, and that I saved for future posting. The political reality has caught up with much of what I wanted to say, but some of it is still relevant. Two articles ( here and here ), both more than half a year old but still relevant, about Amir Peretz, who recently announced his candidacy for the leadership of Israel's Labor Party. On its way to primaries for that leadership the party claims to have enlisted 100.000 new members, recruited by supporters of each of the possible candidates in order to boost that candidate's chances. Israel's democracy at its best, but not a sign of the growing strength of the party among Israeli voters. I know personally of at least one case of a lifelong Likud voter who said that she will keep voting Likud but who was enlisted to help a friend in local Labor primaries. I really do not know which candidate is the best or most suitable one. Most of them I cannot really stand. Matan Vilnai is sympathetic and talented but does not stand a chance, Avraham Burg is not available ( and also would not be able to beat the competitors ), and I am not sure whether Yitzhak Herzog or Ofir Pines-Paz will be nominated. One of the most serious problems in Israel is the lack of a credible and viable opposition party, which offers good alternatives in the fields of socio-economics, justice, the separation of synagogue and state, security, the environment, etc. Now that the main governing party is in disarray as well, we are left to the tender mercies of..., well, of whom?

Apparently our situation - when it comes to politics, the economy, poverty, security, etc. - is very good. After all, even though Qassam rockets are still being fired from Gaza to Israel today's main headlines concern the weight ( 115 kgs according to Ha'Aretz, elsewhere I read 118 kilo ) and the cholesterol level of our Prime Minister. By the efforts to 'prove' that a clearly overweight person in his seventies is in perfect health ( as someone pointed out after one of Sharon's advisers said right after the stroke that the PM looked excellent: "He did not look excellent before the stroke, how are we expected to believe that he does now?" ) I am constantly reminded of the - succesful - attempts, years ago, to convince the American public that Vice President Cheney's health problems were nothing to worry about. Of course, Ariel Sharon's health is a news item, and totally relevant, since he is and wants to remain the leader of this country. But this whole circus has become slightly absurd, with an editorial in Ha'Aretz telling us "...one can demand from a man whose leadership abilities are so outstanding, in the army as well as on the political battlefield, to show the same leadership when it comes to the area of health, which has felled so many more than all of the terror attacks and wars combined. Many people will follow Sharon, and support him in the difficult war, if he sets a personal example the same way he did in his paratrooper days, by calling out: "After me, toward a diet and healthy habits." All this reeks of political spin, it sets a precedent, and what is more important, it is one of the main reasons why there is little talk of the real issues that the elections should be about: social issues and reaching a final deal with the Palestinians and/or determining the borders of the Jewish state.

I really do not know what kind of comments to write on local events and developments these days. Something about the health of Ariel Sharon? That subject has been squeezed dry already, I think. Something about the comments of the speaker of the Knesset regarding the qualities of this outgoing Knesset's members? Although the man is right, of course ( his advice to the Israeli public "Choose better parliamentarians" is just brilliant ), I find it hard to take seriously a politician who was one of the leaders of the political attacks against Israel's Supreme Court and who thought Vienna was the perfect place to say that Israel is "possibly too sensitive about anti-Semitism". I could write something about the escalation in the south, with Qassam rockets being fired again from Gaza into Israel, but how can I top the wise words of politicians like Yuval Steinitz, who proposed cutting off the electricity supply to the Gaza Strip in retalialion ( the hell with what the world thinks of us, no? ), or Danny Yatom, who expressed fears that Steinitz' words might drag us into a war with the Palesistinians ( what would he call the current situation? )?. Another subject could be the weather, but I can only say that I am waiting for the rain to stop ( it has been raining almost continuously since last night, and it seems that this will go on until Monday ) and for the sun to start shining again. Therefore I will simply post some more pictures from Paris. The one of Heinrich Heine's grave I took at the Montmartre cemetery in Paris on Sunday, December 11th, almost two weeks ago. The other two show the view from the apartment where I stayed.

Happy Hanukah!

Merry Christmas and a happy 2006!

Since the three holidays ( Hanukah, Christmas, New Year ) coincide this year, I can wish the vast majority of my readers happy holidays simultaneously. Therefore: Merry Christmas ( for my Christian readers and all the others who somehow celebrate the holiday ), a happy, healthy and hopefully peaceful new year for all my readers, and Hag Urim Sameah for my Jewish readers. This afternoon me and my family will visit Lila of Letters from Rungholt. Our daughter very much wanted to see a Christmas tree ( and Lila's daughter Quarta ) again, so it was about time for another meeting of our families. Interestingly enough, the Druze neigbors of my parents-in-law also have a tree on their balcony. Although they do not celebrate Christmas they adopted the tree-custom from their Christian neighbors in the village where they lived previously.

PS: Of course, also happy Festivus for those who celebrate that nondenominational holiday.

Four cartoonists' views on the trial of Saddam Hussayn. The cartoons were collected and saved months ago.

Tom Janssen ("Before... and after his trial" )

Gary Varvel

Chappatte

Billy Day

Normally I do not watch television at this time of the day but a technician of Yes, the satellite television service to which we subscribe, was here to fix some minor problem, and I left the television on to check the news on CNN and Sky, so I happened to see Mr Sharon leaving the hospital on live Israeli television. N., the friend and DBI commentator whom I met in Utrecht last week, pointed out something that I had not thought of yet. Could it be, she wrote me, that this would be a good thing for peace: a Prime Minister who - having had a glimpse of death - wants to immortalize himself even more than before by bringing about peace, or - and this is me continuing her line of thought - at least borders for the Jewish state and some sort of normalization in the relations between Israelis and Palestinians? I already kind of liked the man before his medical tsures, but now - after I saw and heard Arab and Jewish fanatics celebrate his stroke and praying for his death, not that we were unaware of the similarities between 'their' meshuganes and ours - I admire him even more, and in the current political reality in Israel I would like to see him return to lead the country, if possible in a coalition with the Labor party. Let us face it, there is no credible alternative right now. Last night my wife was one of the Israelis who participated in opinion polls that showed that political support for Sharon and for his 'party' remains high.

O.k., enough politics for today, I return to working on my laptop. Have a nice day.

Yesterday, on my way from the Ben Gurion airport to my wife and children, I heard about the 'mild stroke' that Ariel Sharon suffered. I did not expect to be forced to face the political facts in Israel so fast after my return home. To be honest, I had not really caught up with the depelopments here in the last two weeks, but the 'mild stroke' made most of those developments irrelevant anyway. It stressed just once again that even if Kadimah was to promise to bring us the Messiah, as long as that promise depends only on the health and physical wellbeing of one human being - particulary if that human being is a septuagenarian who is very mortal and who is hated by some of the most fanatic and determined opponents of peace among both Jews and Arabs ( never before was it so clear that our worst enemies within and without have oh so much in common; see also here )- the chances of some sort of redemption really coming in our lifetime are small, I am afraid. Kadimah needs more than one pillar, and some sort of ideology, to become not yet another shortlived electoral adventure of a bunch of opportunists whose only common denominator is their political ambition.

In a few hours we are supposed to know who will lead the Likud for the next four months. There is no serious comment that I can give to that right now.

Last but not least, I promised to post pictures from Paris, so I will post a few today, and some others later. The three that I picked for today show a veterans' ceremony at the Champs Elysees, ( taken on Saturday evening, December 10th; I was told they have this ceremony every evening ), one of the main 'roads' at the Montmartre cemetery, plus the buste found at the grave of the composer Jacques Offenbach at that same cemetery.

From Monday onwards I will be blogging more regularly again. This Thursday I arrived in Holland with the Thalys train from Paris. In The Hague I had a very pleasant and interesting meeting with someone at the CIDI. It seems he and I have a lot of opinions in common as far as Israel and the Middle East are concerned. The funny thing is that in Israel many of his views would be considered leftwing, whereas in Holland he is very liberal-rightwing. I took the train to Utrecht. At what for me remains one of the best and nicest bookshops that I know ( Broese at the Oude Gracht ) I bought some children's books for our daughter and son. Later I met with who has become a very good friend ( and frequent commentator on DBI ). This was the second time that we met face to face, and it is as if we have known each other for years. She gave me three beautiful, practical and very thoughtful presents ( thanks again ). Dinner I had with my brother and his fiancee ( he also had some wonderful presents, one of them a CD of the late Bram Vermeulen ), and then I took the bus to my parents. Yesterday I packed my bags already, to see if I am going to have any overweight problems tomorrow. It seems that I do not have too much weight to take with me. I wanted to post some pictures from Paris, but I do not have a way to transfer them from my laptop to my parents' PC. You will see them in the course of ( the ) next week(s). Tomorrow in the afternoon I will depart from Schiphol airport, and in the evening I will return home. After that I will start following the news again, and this blog will stop being mainly about my personal life and more or less return to normal.

Had a very good weekend. On Friday I went through all the tribulations of someone who wants to see/photocopy something at the Archives Nationales, but it was worth the trouble. Thanks to two very friendly staff members who (wo)manned the desk in the large reading hall I was able to make digital photocopies of the file that I was interested in, even though I had been unable to reserve one of the two places de photo. The file contained some very interesing reports on public opinion in occupied France. Yesterday I went to buy some presents for our children and for my two nieces. On my way back I passed underneath the Arc de triomphe, where I saw - and took pictures of - a ceremony by war veterans, held every evening. Today i worked for two hours in the archives of the mémorial de la Shoah ( CDJC ), where thanks to a good friend and colleague some very good sources were waiting. After that I walked through the Rue Rivoli, on my way to a store in the Rue du Louvre, where I had to search for a certain model of an aeroplane for a family friend. I did not find it, and I continued to the Montmartre cemetery, close to where I live and write this posting right now. I visited and took pictures of the graves of some famous people ( Hector Berlioz, Adolphe Sax, Heinrich Heine, and a few others ) and returned home to work. Hopefully I will manage to post some of the pictures tomorrow or on Tuesday, if not you will get them next weekend, or right after my return home on Sunday next week. Wow, I just realize that in another week i will be back home again! Time fmies when you are having fun. Part of the fun was the book that I have been reading from the moment I landed in Paris one week ago until this morning ( I did not have much time most of the week ), Philip Roth`s The Plot against America. Very well written, and - although normally I cannot stand if-history - highly convincing and believable, with some brilliantly portrayed characters with whom it is easy to identify. Now I started reading a Tom Clancy novel, The teeth of the Tiger. Seems to be typically Clancy, a bit annoying but very entertaining. Off to the shower and to bed. Tomorrow morning I am working at home - entering today`s photocopies into my laptop, organizing everything - and after that I leave for my mast afternoon at on of the archives where I worked last week. On Tuesday I have some social commitments, plus a lecture - by a leading German historian - on Holocaust historiography, on Wednesday morning I work in a Jewish archive near my apartment, and on Thursday I will take an early train to Holland. If I have some time left in between i might visit the Pere Lachaise and Montparnasse cemeteries as well. It is very soothing to visit such cemeteries, and it is easy to make beautiful pictures over there; the subjects do not move very much. As promised, I will try to post some pictures in the following days ( or maybe weeks, depending on the number of pictures that I will take ). By the way, i did read that Shaul Mofaz and Tsachi Hanegbi `defected` ( I have no idea why that word is chosen ) to Sharon`s party. No comment yet; Again, this posting is unedited, maybe I will do that later this week, when I have a more convenient keyboard available ( and some more patience ).

Some more information about the seminar in which I participated. There were a little more than thirty young and not so young researchers of ten or more nationalities. Most of them were historians, but other academic disciplines were represented as well. About half of them presented their current or past research project, but the most important part of the two day event was the social aspect. I got to know some very nice colleagues, and I am sure that I will stay somehow in contact with at least four or five of them. After my presentation I got some very good feedback, especially from the people whose opinion I value highly. There was a strong Israeli ( or at least Hebrew speaking ) 'delegation', about 20 percent I guess. On the first day we visited the Memorial de la Shoah ( which I already know pretty well, I used the opporunity to go and say hi to two friends of mine in the library/archives, yesterday I went back to have lunch with them ) and met with Simone Veil, who presides over the foundation that organized the seminar. She is a very impressive personality. One of the questions that she asked was about the whole restution process in Holland and Belgium in comparison with France, and I was asked to tell something about the Dutch case. On Tuesday, after the seminar, we ( only about half of the participants remained: it was going to end late, and most people had to travel further than Paris ) had a private screening of Belzec, a movie by Guillaume Moscovitz about the extermination camp. For two hours ( and for two minutes after the lights went back on ) there was almost absolute silence, except for the movie`s soundtrack. Most of us were reminded of Claude Lanzmann's Shoah, but the movie has a very distinct character of its own. The most impressive part - except for the interviews with Polish witnesses of what could be seen, heard and smelled from outside the camp, who still live in the village - was the story ( in Hebrew ) of Brakha, the only one of the three known survivors who is still alive. As a seven year old she was smuggled out of the camp in a bread basket, and hidden by a Righteous Gentile - for more than a year, ttwenty months if I am not mistaken - under a pile of wood where she could not move or talk. When she was taken out of the pile she could not stand on her feet, she could only whisper and she had forgotten what the sky was or looked like. You do not have to be a father or mother to imagine how that poor little girl must have suffered, but I could not help thinking about my own daughter when I heard this 70-year old woman tell about her ordeal. The other participants stayed for the night at the center where the seminar had been held, I returned to Paris around 11 PM with Mr Moscovitz and the person who had organized the seminar and the film screening. We talked all the way to Paris, about the movie and its making, Israeli politics and several other subjects. All in all two very well spent days. Yesterday I spent digitally photocopying two microfilmed periodicals ( one of former resisters and deportees, the other of Auschwitz survivors ), I will finish that on Monday. Tomorrow I will be at the Archives Nationales ( they close on Saturday for several weeks ). On Saturday I will sleep late, work on my laptop and see a bit of Paris. On Sunday I will work at the CDJC, on Tuesday I hope to work in the Resistance Museum, on Wednesday I will work at the Alliance, and on Thursday I will leave Paris. Seems like a productive week and a half to me. The weather is very pleasant, coldish but nice, with a little rain now and then but also a lot of sun. The news and Israel and elsewhere I know only from headlines that I see when checking my mail or my weblog. The news can wait another week, although I know that pretty bad things are happening at home. This posting is not edited, so simply ignore mistakes etc.

Don`t worry, everything is o.k., I just returned from the second and last day of the seminar that was the main reason for my visit to Paris. I find it hard to use the macintosh mouse and keyboard in the apartment, so i think i will spend a Euro or so before the end of this week to sit in an internet cafe and use a - French, but still better than a French macintosh - keyboard in order to give you some more details. My lecture went well, I got good feedback and some very useful comments. About the terror attack in Nethanyah yesterday I heard from a friend who works in the Memorial de la Shoah, which I was visiting together with the other participants of the seminar.

Wow, I managed to get the computer started. The apartment is small but very comfortable and cosy. Right now I am listening to a compilation with quiet classical music that I burned for our son when he was born, there is a pretty good stereo. The apartment has cable television ( which I probably will not use, but nevertheless ), and there is a Macintosh computer with an internet connection. It is quite different from what I am used to ( keyboard, mouse ) but it does the job. I bought some basic groceries, and now i am going to have a shower, after which I will sleep, setting th alarm clock for tomorrow morning. Tsohorayim, errev and layla tovim ( good afternoon, evening and night ).

I forgot to mention that my mother could be right, I bring good weather with me. For the last week or so the weather forecast predicted heavy rain in Paris for today, and except for a few drops and a grey skyI have not seen any sign of rain. Hopefully it will stay this way until next week. I bought an umbrella, but I would not mind not having to use it at all.

Everything went smoothly, I arrived in Paris around 5.30 this morning, easily found the RER platform, bought the public transportation ticket that I need for this week, and then went straight to the Marais quarter, where I had two coffee and a pain au chocolat at a Jewish daily that was already open ( it was about 7.30 AM ). At 10 AM I went to the Memorial, returned the microfilms, and then went to buy a telephonecard. Now I am waiting in an internet cafe close to the apartment where I will live for the next ten days. In another hour I will receive the keys to the apartment, then I will call my wife and parents, do buy some groceries for the next few days and go to sleep until tomorrow morning. Tomorrow and Tuesday I will be at the seminar, and from Wednesday I will be a little more relaxed. I am not sure whether I will be able to post anything for the next two days, but be patient, there will be more postings before I go to Holland next week. By the way, I forgot again how annoying the French keyboard is.

All over the country we can already see election posters. Most of them are aimed at the party members who will vote in the Labor and Likud primaries. Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom has a very lame slogan ( "Only Silvan can" ) that has been used by more than one politician in the past. The guy married into one of the richest and most influential families in Israel ( the Mozes family, owners of Yedioth Aharonoth ), and that is all that he and his advisers could come up with? If he had asked me I would have suggested something like "Rotsim Shalom? Matsbi'im Silvan!" ( "Want peace/Shalom? Vote Silvan" ), I can hardly imagine that someone did not at least propose doing a similar thing with his name. Shaul Mofaz, one of the most loyal Sharon supporters in the last two years, tries to find favor in the eyes of the right wing of the Likud by making all kinds of pro-settlement and anti-Oslo statements. He cried on one of the most popular tv shows ( hosted by Yair Lapid, son of the Shinuy leader Tommy Lapid ) and also tries to score points by profiling himself - rightly, in more than one way - as the only non-extremist who worked his way up all by himself. Sharon's posters are impressive and persuasive ( "Israel wants Kadimah ( forward )", but the slogan that keeps playing in my head is the one used by the online-casino businessman Avi Shaked, who runs in the Labor party primaries. His posters say "Avi Shaked, socialist-millionnaire, and not ashamed of it". I knew he dealt with online gambling, but I did not know him as a veteran Beilin-Peres supporter and activist. The chances that I will vote for him got smaller, though, when I received a telephone call with a recorded message from him. Shimon Peres' campaign sent me tens of such calls in the weeks leading up to the elections for the Labor party chairmanship, and those calls are one of the main reasons why in the end I voted for Binyamin 'Fuad' Eliezer.

Ik maak zelden reclame, zeker niet als ik het produkt niet ken of ( nog ) niet gezien heb. Deze keer maak ik een uitzondering, omdat ik de maker van het produkt ken en vertrouwen heb in zijn initiatief. Gisteren kreeg ik een e-mail van Arnoud de Jong, de schrijver achter ( voor, op, naast, etc. ) Verbal Jam. Een paar ( reacties van ) DBI kijkers zouden geen kwaad kunnen, lijkt me. Zelf zal ik de programma's pas later zien ( als ze online bewaard blijven ), want vanmiddag vertrek ik per Sherut-taxi naar het vliegveld ( Ben Gurion ), om midden in de nacht richting Parijs op te stijgen. Aanvankelijk zouden we vandaag gevijven ( mijn gezin plus mijn schoonmoeder ) richting Qiryat Ono vertrekken. De tante van mijn vrouw woont daar met haar gezin, we zouden er 's middags eten en in de loop van de middag zouden Y., de kinderen en mijn schoonmoeder terugrijden, 's avonds zou de tante of iemand anders me dan naar het vliegveld brengen ( Q. Ono ligt ongeveer een kwartier rijden van BG ). E., onze driejarige zoon, heeft echter een ongelukkig moment uitgekozen om te doen wat hij en zijn zus hoogst zelden doen: ziek worden, en dan nog wel met hoge koorts, veel diarrhee en - eergisteren, inmiddels niet meer - overgeven. Ik heb dus donderdagmorgen alsnog een sherut-taxi besteld, dat is echt een uitkomst. Voor nog geen zestig shekel ( ongeveer 11 Euro ) word je voor de deur opgehaald en naast de vertrekhal afgezet. Op de terugweg kom ik vrijwel altijd met zo'n taxi. Het enige nadeel is dat je soms heel Haifa te zien krijgt ( als je de eerste op de route bent ), want je reist met max. acht of negen andere reizigers, maar het blijft makkelijk en goedkoop. Alles is ingepakt, ik wil alleen nog een keer mijn lezing doorlezen voordat ik haar definitief uitprint. Ik geloof wel dat ze aardig gelukt is. Vanmorgen ben ik om half acht opgestaan, en we eten al om twaalf uur bij mijn schoonouders, zodat ik nog een uur of drie kan slapen voordat de taxi komt. Ik land morgenochten in Parijs rond zes uur. Vandaar ga ik meteen richting het Memorial de la Shoah, waarvan het Centre de Documentation Juive deel uitmaakt. Ik moet acht microfilms terugbrengen naar het CDJC, die had ik in bruikleen gekregen als interbibliotecaire lening tussen het CDJC en de universiteit van Haifa. Het CDJC gaat om 10 uur open, ik neem aan dat ik rond een uur of half negen daar zal zijn, dan heb ik nog lekker de tijd om rustig ergens te ontbijten. Daarna ga ik naar het apartement dat ik voor elf dagen gehuurd heb. Als ik me daar geinstalleerd heb ga ik naar de Auchan in La Defense, boodschappen doen voor anderhalve week. Ik zal vroeg naar bed gaan, want ik heb toch een nacht gemist. Maandag en dinsdag ben ik op het seminar dat de aanleiding voor de reis is. Dinsdagmiddag geef ik mijn lezing ( mijn eerste ooit ). Vanaf dinsdag begint wat ik als een werkvakantie zie. Die zal ik voornamelijk in het archief van de Federation Nationale des Deportes et Internes Resistants et Patriotes ( 'kort'om FNDIRP ) doorbrengen, al zal ik ook een paar ochtenden op het CHAN doorbrengen en ga ik waarschijnlijk ook nog even langs bij het AIU om gedag te zeggen, ik woon daar tenslotte in de buurt. Het laatste weekend van mijn reis breng ik in Nederland door. O.K., nu dan toch nog de mail van Arnoud, waar deze posting om begonnen was. Inmiddels staat er op VJ ook een posting met de tekst van de e-mail, dus verwijs ik daar maar naar. Ik raad aan om te kijken en te reageren, in de moeilijke mediadagen van Van der Laan is alle steun voor een (concept)programma en voor de publieke omroep in het algemeen hard nodig, neem ik aan. By the way, hopelijk heeft mijn eerste en tot vanmorgen laatste 'reclame' geholpen, dat weten we dinsdag.

A picture of the Eshkol building at Haifa University, taken a few months ago.

Tom Janssen's vision on Ariel Sharon's "change of heart". The Dutch words used in the cartoon speak mostly for themselves, I think, except maybe "routekaart", which means "road map".