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BOAZ DVIR
SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

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hen Mitch Chupak wants
to escape Tel Aviv's mad
rush, he sinks his muscular
body into a soft but sturdy sofa in his second-story
apartment, remote control in hand, and watches "late
Night With David Letterman," "Oprah" or "Married
With Children."
"I don't feel like I'm in Israel," says Chupak, a 41-
year-old fund-raiser for charity groups who moved to
Israel last year from New York.
Lately, the bachelor has been looking for other ways
to relax besides gluing his eyes to the 25-inch box,
which allows him to watch 50 cable channels, in-
cluding CNN and ESPN. He wants to feel like he
moved from the Empire State to the Jewish state —
not the Sunshine State. He wants to be immersed
in a different, more meaningful atmosphere than the
hectic ambience he willfully left behind, he says.
But Chupak, who lived in the Jewish state for sev-
en years in the 1970s, hasn't found this magical aura.
It has evaporated in the warm, dry air, drifting out
to the Mediterranean. "Israel is not what it used to
be," Chupak says, sighing like a retiree watching peo-
ple pushing and shoving in a su-
permarket. "Israel has become an
Busting at
imitation of America."
the seams:
U.S.-based
The Americanization of Israel
chains, such as
is hard to ignore. No Israeli can
Blockbuster
avoid the visual and auditory on- are taking overr some
slaught of this cultural, econom- Israeli intersections.
is and political force. Even
Haredim, ultra-Orthodox Jews,
living in Jerusalem's Meah Shearim neighborhood,
where you will not find TV sets or secular publica-
tions, encounter the American influence on their way
to work or to visit friends and family.
Many ultra-Orthodox Jews even shop at Ameri-
can-style malls and use cellular phones.
"Everything has changed here. Even east Jerusalem
is not what it used to be," says Chupak, who fought
in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. "Back in the 1970s, they
did not build modern complexes and fancy yeshivot
like they do today. The Old City has become very com-
mercialized. One of the things that really bothers me
is seeing McDonald's in this holy place. The golden
arches don't belong here.
"McDonald's also doesn't belong in Tzomet Golani
[a famous junction in Northern Israel named after an
army unit]. I feel we have lost something."

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It doesn't take a U.S.-born Zionist like Chupak to =
notice that this country, which was founded on spir-
itual, socialistic ideals, has been going through dra-
matic — and,
d, to many, disturbing — changes.

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