The gruesome details of memory

 CW: this is a post about the Holocaust, it will not be a pleasant read.

It's a cliche to say that the further the the Second World War recedes in to the haze of the past the harder it is to convey to a modern generation the extent of the perverted hellishness of the Holocaust.

Maybe that's a positive thing, that most people alive today cannot perceive the privation and depravity of those times. Or maybe it's a danger because if even then many people refused to believe that such events happened, how do we preserve the memory of the Holocaust today and in the years to come?

There is a compartment in my mind full of horrific details from a lifetime of hearing the stories of survivors and reading primary accounts. Mind and soulbreaking memoirs that once read cannot be unread. Personal testimonies told in hushed tones by little old ladies and shrunken old men who in their distant youth experienced and witnessed the unthinkable, not just with their own eyes and ears, but on their own flesh.

My grandmother-in-law describing how the Nazis discovered the Polish farmhouse where she was hiding, she and her mother fleeing in to the night, feet pounding through the forest, praying not to trip, her mother beseeching her to go on ahead because she was younger, faster. And she reluctantly obeyed, the gap between them widening, as minutes later hearing shots, a cry and a thud, in the distance the baying of search hounds and voices in German.

And she knew that thud was her mother being shot, that she would never see her again, fighting with every nerve and sinew to just keep running, not to turn round, not to stop, not to go back to her dying mother, knowing the Nazis would soon be upon her wounded mother, but that this distraction was the only thing that might give her the chance to get far enough away and survive.

My childhood rabbi, the first army chaplain to arrive with Allied forces to liberate Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, finding himself standing in a sea of walking corpses, the dead piled up like firewood or lying where they fell. Battle hardened Allied soldiers falling to their knees in shock, struck dumb by the diabolical scene all around them, passing out from the stench of death, sickness and feces that permeated the place. Even as their minds tried to comprehend what they were seeing some emaciated camp inmates collapsed and died before their eyes.

Today so often talking about the Holocaust is all so sanitised. Ask someone what the Holocaust was and if they know they will likely say 6 million Jews were killed in gas chambers, which obviously isn't entirely accurate, but on the surface of it, conveys at least some understanding of what happened.

Ask them what they mean about gassing though and they will probably imagine some kind of poison gas cloud almost gently knocking out its victims as it killed them, the image becomes almost sickly "humane" as a method of execution. What most people fail to realise is the extent to which Zyklon B killed in a far more horrific manner.

The Nazis liked using Zyklon B gas because it left little visible evidence on the corpses, allowing the perpetrators to continue the lie that this was "humane fumigation" of people they considered to be vermin. We believe that today we are so hyper aware of mental health issues, but the Nazis were too. They didn't want to traumatise their death squads. As much as the illusion of "fumigation" and "showers" was there to make the victims more docile about going to their deaths, it was also there to make the task easier for the executioners themselves. Simpler for them too to maintain a facade of rounding up the Jewish "filth" to be sanitised and cleansed, herd them in to a room and let the gas do its work, neat and tidy hands free murder with squads of slave labour to clean up the resulting "mess".

The truth is that death from Zyklon B is agonising torture, far from any kind of peaceful passing from the world, most people taking minutes to die as the gas painfully, slowly, broke down its victims.

But the Nazis preffered Zyklon B because they didn't want to traumatise their personnel with overly grotesque deaths. Even so, members of the sonderkommando, the slave labour forced to clear the bodies from the gas chamber, described the dead with blood seeping from their ears, some frothing at the mouth, others with corpses covered in red spots or bruises as they struggled to cling on to life until the last moment.

Even in the gassing murder trucks used for some executions, the Nazis trained their drivers to pack in the victims to the gassing chamber and drive just so that most of the condemned passed out from suffocation or the motion of the truck, allowing minimal use of the carbon monoxide employed in the mobile gas chambers, which left blue and messy corpses having lost control of their bodily functions.

And this is just the very tip of the tip of the iceberg of eye witness accounts, snippets that are usually locked up tight somewhere in the back of my memory because they are too awful to bring out in to the light.

I wonder if without rubbing our faces in the gruesome details though we are all in danger of being unable to keep that memory of the Holocaust real. Already Nazi and Holocaust have become pat phrases to throw around our political discourse at anyone whose politics we suspect of being problematic. Every lightly flung Hitler and fascist comment hurled at a political opponent diminishes the true memory of what the Holocaust was, the enormity of it, the extent of this mammoth centrally planned and bureaucratic killing machine.

Our world has known many murderous dictators, but even Stalin's homicidal rule and Pol Pot's killing fields were in a different league to the state regulated mass murder infrastructure of Nazi Germany, with its meticulous records, complicit industrial complex, precision technology and punctual railways. There have been many crimes against humanity, but sheer organisation and planning of this specific crime against humanity stands out in its heinousness because this was no incidental war crime or spontaneous massacre but to an extent the raison d'etre for much of the Nazi war machine.

It feels sick to talk of these things, the extent of the degradation and pain suffered by the 6 Million as they went to their deaths, the technical details of how Zyklon B gas killed. But how can we not?

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Tis the season for garlic and matza

Fresh garlic season is upon us and every year I try to do the whole plaited garlic drying thing, but it never seems to last, at some point I find it gets mold or starts to rot, summers are too humid.

My plan this year is to try plaiting and drying some in the kitchen where we just double glazed our door, so hopefully better insulated against the humid summer weather, and freeze the remaining garlic.

Hedging my bets, but maybe this will be the year I succeed in drying out the fresh garlic and making it last?

Meanwhile I'm taking some of the fresh garlic greens along with the garlic itself to use in my chicken soup (well, it's really turkey soup, but same idea). I find they add great flavour and this time of year I use them instead of leeks. Putting up a big pot with kneidlakh (matza balls) for this Passover holiday weekend.

Usually this week we'd do a communal matza bake the traditional way, so much fun and a great way to get everyone involved from kids to grandparents.

The trick with matzah is that to be considered kosher for Passover the entire matza making process, including baking must happen in under 18 minutes. It's a mad race to mix the dough, knead, roll it out and get it in and out of the oven within the time limit or else it is considered leaven. Not only that, but everything must be thoroughly scrubbed down within that 18 minutes so that not even a dot of dough or flour might remain stuck to anything, hands, surfaces, utensils, not a thing. Would make a great tv game show.

It's a rubric that lends itself to team work and a fun community project, with everyone assigned a job, including someone to man the stopwatch, do a count down and call time.

Last spring we were under strict lockdown, only allowed 1000 metres from our homes, no mixing with anyone outside our households. Definitely no community baking, even some families who traditionally bake their own had trouble getting out to bring the fresh spring water used to make matza.

This year with Israel's high vaccination rates the covd situation is much better but in most places still no communal matza baking or else just for those who have been vaccinated, so children under 16 who are not yet eligible for vaccination can't participate, though some schools managed to have matza baking. Lets hope for next year for everyone.

I will miss using matza we've made with our community, but we'll be fine with only bought matza this year, both machine made (square) and handmade (round, think pita/matza hybrid). I see so much matza lasagne, farfel and matza brei in our immediate future.

Northern exposure

Things are gradually re-opening in Israel with covid rates declining for weeks, so headed up to Mount Hermon for a last chance to see snow before it's gone, and really, we got there just in time.

The melt was already underway with just patches of snow left in shaded areas on the lower slopes and even riding the cable car to the top yielded fields of snow interspersed with bare rock. There was enough though for some sledding, snow ball fights and of course snowman building. Always a thrill to be above the clouds.



Driving back down we stopped a few times to enjoy the first post-melt spring wildflowers - oriental hyacinth, from which the popular cultivated plant was domesticated, round-leafed cyclamen, more delicate than the common cyclamen found elsehwere in Israel and vividly coloured tiny delicate grape hyacinth in cheery clusters along the mountainside. 

At one point a jackal, majestic in its luxurious winter pelt, darted across the road in front of us, clambering over a rocky outcrop before pausing to stand and stare at us, eye to eye, in the fading late afternoon light, the last rays of the sun illustrating why this is known as the golden jackal. 



The approach road passes through the Druze town of Majdal Shams and is lined with food stalls selling regional farm produce, especially the famous Druze pita bread, a popular local treat. A visit to the area is not complete without enjoying some of the excellent local fare.

We stopped at the "Pita Queen" run by a delightful older lady who is a font of culinary and health advice.

We enjoyed watching her whip up some fresh Druze pitas, which are nothing like pita bread that you might find in a bakery, rather they are thin and papery, almost like a crepe and must be eaten hot and fresh from the saj (metal domed griddle) on which they are made.

Traditionally served with a smear of labeneh, olive oil and zaatar, or just olive oil and zaatar, sometimes a little chili pepper.

She offered us tea, made the local way with cinnamon and cardamom, gratefully received on a blustery spring evening. We sat in the car enjoying the view, warming our hands on paper tea cups and chatting to the Queen herself as she pottered around telling us about her wares. 



In the back of her small kitchen she had a pot bubbling away with a warming dessert of hot sahlab/sahlev, somewhere between a thick starchy-milky drink and a pudding seasoned with rosewater, maybe cinnamon, sometimes vanilla too, and topped with more cinnamon, shredded coconut and/or crushed pistachios and/or crushed peanuts.

It was introduced to the Levant during the period of Turkish Ottoman rule and today is a popular winter treat in countries like Israel, Lebanon and Syria. Authentic Turkish, Greek and Iranian salep is made from orchid roots but in Levant countries it is usually milk based with corn or other starch rather than orchid roots. Perfect to warm you up on a chilly day.

Piled up in front of her stall was assorted farm produce made by her family: wildflower honey, balls of labeneh in olive oil and lemon cured olives.

In season there are delicious apples from the orchards now in blossom, but this time of year she was selling Coke bottles full of cider vinegar from last season's crop (drink every morning for good health, fertility and weight loss), as well as homemade olive oil (drink every morning for longevity and good health). This is her daily regimen for getting in shape for the summer, when God Willing, her son is getting married.

Is this why case rates remain high despite high vaccination rates and some (but quite limited and poorly enforced) lockdown measures?

Reminder that when this lockdown was declared due to skyrocketing infection rates the government and the Ministry of Health wanted to close schools. The Ministry of Education opposed closing schools and the Knesset Education Committee vetoed the government decision, forcing schools and kindergartens to remain open.

So despite the supposed lockdown schools were (except in red zones) operating as usual, with the following results:

"Health Ministry data shows that one in three confirmed cases in recent weeks are below the age of 20 and one in eight are below the age of ten.

According to Education Ministry, there were 23,549 students who tested positive — 4,000 of whom are in preschool, 11,680 in elementary school and nearly 8,000 in high school."

When life gives you lemons...

The saying about life giving you lemons is truth be told rather misleading. 

Lemons are in my opinion wonderous fruits, far more useful then just as ingredients for lemonade.

If life has given you lemons, or even better, a whole lemon tree, than truly you are blessed, because these are some of the most delightful multi-purpose products of the fruit world.

The song is just as mistaken: lemons are many things, but impossible to eat is not one of them. From using the grated rind and juice in my daily salad, to brightening flavours in soups, stews and curries, enhancing a fruit salad, prevent apples and other fruits from browning, making soothing teas, cheerful lemon curds and lemon cream for tarts, the famous merengue pie, playfully sweet-tangy biscuits and scones, a zingy partner for fish and chicken to simply adding a few slices or a little fresh juice to a humble glass of water, lemon, or occasionally its green cousin, lime, is a staple in our home year round.

We are very thankful to have a lemon tree. When it is in blossom it fragrances our garden with a heady sweet perfume. When its fruit is ripe it is a delight to just stand near the tree and inhale the delicate scent. I love the way the kitchen smells when grating the rind, especially on freshly picked lemons. After Sukkot I use another lemon relative, our etrog, to make a pomader, preserving the delicious lemonyness with clove spikes to use as our besamim for havdalah each week.

In these rollercoaster covid times we are profoundly grateful for our fruit trees more than ever. This is our third lockdown and truly I have come to appreciate these trees in a much more visceral way. They have become like friends, I feel I know them so much better for spending so much time looking out the window at my little patch of green among the concrete and stone.

They mark the passage of time when days and weeks feel as though they have lost meaning. The evergreen lemon doesn't lose its leaves like the mulberry or the pomegranate, but it still changes through the months, alternately budding, blossoming, raising its young or groaning under the weight of fruit ripe for harvesting. Sometimes it does a few of these at once.

We do not possess the greenest of thumbs and for the most part our garden is in shade, not ideal I fear for most of our trees, but of all of them the lemon and kumquat have been the most forgiving and the kindest. Of these two, there is no contest that the lemon provides us with the greatest benefit, though we are very fond of them all.

Today felt a bit festive despite the lockdown because we harvested about 4 kg of ripe lemons. How I adore the aroma of the fresh lemons as we pick them. Our tree flowered twice last year so these were just the first batch of lemons. Plenty of green ones still growing on the tree that look like they will need a while longer to ripen.

Lucky then that we love lemons so very much.

For all that I am a lemon fan I confess that I have not identified the variety we grow. The tree was planted by the previous residents. They have amazing flavour, a pleasant almost sweet-tartness when fresh picked, which certainly does put me in the mind of Meyer lemons, though I don't think that is what they are.

On the day I pick fresh lemons, when they are at their most fragrant and juicy, I love to make lemon pasta. The recipe is very simple, learnt from cookery writer Debbie Koenig, but it's just perfection: olive oil, grated lemon zest and juice, salt, black pepper, some grated parmesan, kashkeval, grana padano or kishk.

I experiment with whatever pasta I have in the cupboard, delicious with rice or kasha as well. This time I found amazing whole wheat papparadelle which married beautifully with the aromatic lemon sauce. Everyone licked their bowls clean.

It's become something of a family tradition, a personal Lemon Festival. The children help to pick the fruit. Then we weigh it to calculate the trumot and maasrot, the biblical tithes religious Jews living in Israel must take from fruits and vegetables they harvest. Until the trumot and maasrot have been deducted the produce is tevel, not kosher for consumption.

The tradition reminds us to share our good fortune by donating to the poor and links us to our ancient past by remembering the contributions the farming population gave to the priestly tribe of Levi, which was not allocated agricultural land because their job was pastoral, as teachers of Torah and to serve in the ancient Tabernacle and later Temple. To the best of my knowledge there were no lemons in ancient Israel, but simply growing some of our own produce here and preserving these customs connects us to generations of our ancestors and their fruit trees.

And then we feast together over a lemon pasta dinner, with salad dressed with lemon juice, and tea with slices of our lemons. Basic and filling and our own mini family celebration to thank God for this wonderful treat we have been granted, these bright, sunny lemons that ripen in the middle of winter.

You gotta have faith

So much is still closed in Israel and with numbers rising we may be heading to another lockdown, but at least we can go out and enjoy this wonderful time of year and the beginning of the most impressive wildflower season.

It's not just the enjoyment of beautiful flowers but experiencing each year anew the magical transformation of the landscape during the rainy season. Living in this region where rain is seasonal and we have no great rivers you have to maintain a certain kind of faith all through the dry season that this barren earth can be fertile again, long after you can't even remember what rain feels or smells or tastes like.

This is the annual miracle of the rebirth, of brown hillsides turned green and covered with flowers, of seasonal waterfalls or seeing bone dry desert canyons suddenly flowing with rushing floodwaters. The imagery is familiar to many from the bible, in the lands of the bible this is a very real, living reality, not simple metaphor.



If you know that the desert really can bloom, that the dry ravine really can turn in to swirling torrent, that the forest burnt by a dry season wildfire will turn green once more, then you know hope. Every year the turn of the seasons here reminds us that the seemingly impossible is possible, that the bleakest hour will pass.

Seeing the autumn rains bring out the winter wildflowers is a reminder that this difficult crisis we find ourselves in is not forever. 

Here comes the rain again

 
The rains have finally come to Israel and our neighbours, and what rains, pouring down with such intensity that many areas received half the month's average rainfall in just a few days, accompanied by stunning lightning shows.

After several months of the dry season folks have almost forgotten what rain is. People, and especially kids, go out to delight in the first downpour and drink in that delicious scent of the first autumn rainstorm, the forgotten novelty of droplets falling from the sky, fresh rain water on hair and skin. It feels so exotic to pull out the rainboots and raincoats packed away at the top of the wardrobe in May. Who truly imagined then that we would all still be mired in this covid crisis when the rains returned. Still, the cycle of the rains is also comforting, other routines may have been thrown into disarray, but here we are in the Hebrew month of Heshvan and here is the rain and with it the first new green shoots and the delicate autumn crocuses in pastel hues, the promise of renewal and hope for the arid earth. The first rainstorm of the season is so special it even has its own name in Hebrew, going all the way back to biblical times, the Yoreh, some say from the word moreh, teaching or showing, because the Yoreh is the sign to get ready in earnest for winter, to fix the roof, strengthen the barn and prepare the fields. In a region where we don't have major rivers rain is very important to our culture, ancient Hebrew has many terms for the different types of rain: geshem, matar, revivim and more. If the rains are late the custom is to institute emergency prayers and communal fasts until it finally rains. How intense can a good rainy season be? For comparison, Tel Aviv and London receive about the same annual rainfall, just in Tel Aviv all that rain is compressed in to just a few short months.