Arabs jealous of Israeli Jews
I’ve been debating about posting this but I would love to know what the community thinks. I’m a Jewish Israeli married to a Christian. It’s Shavuot and as not particularly religious people we sought out a winery to go to today that was open. We found one in an Arab Christian town up north and again as my husband being Christian we have been to many of these towns before and have gone to celebrate Christmas so honestly we thought nothing of it. We spoke English the whole time even to ourselves and even when he left the room.
I’ll make a long story short but we had a 1:1 with the owner and I don’t think he knew I was Jewish. I had nothing identifying on me and my husband is very much not Jewish. A few comments started about the Israeli regression/occupation which I was surprised to hear but I am open to hearing people’s stories. The winemaker is making 30,000 bottles per year (as he told us) and said how his family escaped to Israel from Muslim attacks in Christians in Lebanon.
He went on about how Lebanon was “here” at this point (northern israel) but he doesn’t consider himself Palestinian just that this land is actually Lebanon. He also said how he had Jewish friends but “it’s ok because they were born Jewish”. Which made me cackle inside because people like Zohran Mamdani (sp?) think Jews are only a religion not an ethnicity and we’re not actually from Israel. To this winemaker certain. Jews (not Ashkenazi as he gets into) are from Israel but are still difficult. This wine maker said on multiple times about the struggles he has about selling wine into the kosher market (because he’s not kosher) and how he deals mostly abroad. Look I understand being a kosher seller is a PITA but even having a few cases would break into the industry in Israel. This isn’t a Jew problem, this is a Jewish problem since he lives in Israel.
From all of this he said “the Jews” a number of times but in my opinion it wasn’t from a hatred but rather jealousy. He complained about the nice areas Jews lived on the coast but yet he had a mansion in an Arab village with a visitors center and winemaking facility. He made it clear he’s not Palestinian but he’s Lebanese and there were Christians north of Israel but no longer. Yet yes a Christian speaking Arabic in Israel in an Arab village enjoying religious freedom and the kupat holim yet the Jews still were too successful or didn’t work with him. He said certain kibbutzim were “German” but as an Israel I’ve been there and they are Israeli. But if he’s Lebanese and not Israeli or Palestinian then what is he doing here either?
So my question, why live in Israel? Surely if you’re Lebanese, live in Lebanon? We are less than 15 kilometers here in Israel from there. Also he lives in an Arab village which we drove through and saw Hebrew and Arabic, surely there are loads of Muslims in Lebanon, why not live there? He said his original village was actually in Lebanese territory (in today’s terms) but his family moved here. Why live with all the rights and benefits of Israel but then trash it? I liked the man (and the wine) but he seemed jealous. Of Jews success. Of Israeli’s success. Perhaps I’m not articulating it correctly but I left not feeling like I got to know someone different from me but rather they were bitter.