Stan Beer

I'm both angry and ashamed. We're sitting at an outdoor cafe with a friend who came to Israel to celebrate a round birthday. About 70%of the clients are Arabs. The place is far louder than I remembered, and people are crowded around the smallish tables. Orphan tables, and tables with too many chairs. I go around the tables to ask for a chair. Finally I get one and we sit. A big guy in his 30s, all shoulders and bulging biceps, comes in with 3 friends and just goes to another table and takes a chair. The elderly woman who sits here tells him "hey, my husband sits here" (she did tell me the chair was occupied when I asked). "Well now I need the chair", says the big guy with a smile and he adds a sentence in Arabic and all his friends split up with laughter. They take the chair to their own table, sit and light up. The elderly lady begins to talk to them, and I add a sentence but my friend is visibly afraid, so I stop. We're only 3 tables with 7 Jewish women amongst perhaps 30 Arab customers, and the jeering we get is... uncomfortable. Finally an Arab girl comes in from another table and gives her chair, goes back to huddle on a bench with her friend. After some time the husband (70es) comes back. The guy who took his chair signals him to come,l ike a server. Shakes his hand and tells him, very loud "you don't mind I took your chair, do you?" And the poor grandpa swallows crookedly and nods. And wishes him good evening, too. And the tables around laugh, except one couple in Islamic garb (he in robes, she only the eyes visible) who moved uneasily on their chairs. The elderly couple left not long after, and we too. I was so mad. Humiliated for them. My friend tells me it's the same in NYC. Perhaps. But here it didn't used to be that way. Was it worth risking someone ramming my car? I think it was. I SHOULD have said something. Apartheid my.... Perhaps we should think about it seriously if this is the result of equality.