Toughing It Out
Varied Views
Israeli shopkeepers lament drop-off in business amid fear of terror.
RACHEL KOHN
the businesses of the Mercaz Ha-ir
(City Center), particularly those in the
Ben Yehuda area, need money more
And give dew and rain as a blessing on
than they need the rain.
the face of the earth, and satis_6 , us out of
The Ben Yehuda pedestrian mall
your goodness."
and the surrounding area has been a
shopping and dining attraction for
Jerusalem
decades, appealing to both Israelis and
1 ews all over the world recite
tourists. Since the current Palestinian
these words in their morning,
uprising and perpetration of numerous
afternoon and evening
terrorist attacks, however, the status of
Shemonah Esrei prayers. This
the establishments in the area has gone
excerpt comes from the request for
from somewhat unstable to dangerous-
sustenance, particularly the life-giving
ly precarious.
rain that Israel anxiously awaits during
Storeowner Alberto Dwek estimates
the winter months.
that 95 percent of his customers are
Downtown Jerusalem seems particu-
tourists and that business has dropped
larly blessed today as rain beats down
80 percent over the past two years.
against the pavement and drenches
Dwek, originally from Argentina, has
those who left home without an
worked in the City Center since the
umbrella. While the blessing of rain
early 1980s; he opened his T-shirt shop,
may have sustained the nation in the
Sweet, on Ben Yehuda Street in 1991.
agricultural society of biblical times,
"The problem is that our main cus-
tomers, age 16-30, come here [to
Rachel Kohn of West Bloomfield, a 2002
Israel] on programs and are not
graduate ofYeshivat Akiva in Southfield,
allowed to come here." Despite the
is studying in Israel this school year
grisly terrorist attack that took place in
Special to the Jewish News
43
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immigrants' pensions and other overseas funds. Many
had warned that the new taxes would discourage immi-
gration to Israel from prosperous Western countries.
Furthermore, Sharansky appears to be a good succes-
sor to Rabbi Michael Melchior, Israel's first minister for
diaspora affairs, whose party was affiliated with Labor.
"Melchior made it a real ministry, and I see Sharansky
taking it a step further to give Jewish communities
abroad a voice in Israel, and vice-versa," Brown said.
Evolution
Sharansky says his party's apparent failure in the last elec-
tions actually is a sign of success. "I've been saying ever
since the birth of the party that it is a tool for reaching
a specific social aim: integration," Sharansky said.
Its success in that field carried a price tag — the
party's obsolescence. 'Already in 1996, I said that
our aim is to get into the process of integration to
empower" immigrants "to open doors, so they can
enter the rooms where the decisions are made," he
said. "It was a unique experiment."
Sharansky says his party helped propel local politi-
cians to the deputy mayor positions in 20 municipali-
ties. That has created a base for Russian representation
in the crucial lower rungs of Israeli politics, he said.
Almost 800,000 recent immigrants from the former
Soviet Union were registered for the Jan. 28 elections.
2/14
2003
22
the square just outside his store last
December, Dwek claims he is not
afraid to work in this area. "It's all
fate," he says and shrugs.
Vered Shemtov, on the other hand,
admits that she is sometimes appre-
hensive about working on Ben Yehuda
Street, "but there is nothing else to do
but continue. With all the fear, you
have to believe in God, and that's it."
The 27-year old Jerusalem native has
worked at Hapening, a large store some-
thing like an artsy Amazing Savings, for
the past five years. In general,
Hapening's customers are mostly Israelis,
with the holidays bringing in droves of
tourists. During the 2002 holiday sea-
son, however, there were fewer tourists,.
Shemtov says, and most of them were
from South America and France.
The absence of foreign customers at
Hapening is not necessarily because
there are fewer tourists in the country,
adds Shemtov, "It's because it's Ben
Yehuda. There were many, many,
many attacks here, and there are con-
stant warnings."
That only 8 percent of them voted for a party that
aims to represent their interests shows how quick their
integration into Israeli society has been, Sharansky said.
Indeed, almost 15 years after the massive wave of
immigration began as the Soviet Union crumbled,
Russians rank among Israel's
.top businessmen, scientists and
even young army officers.
Inertia prevented Yisrael
Ba'Aliyah from changing to
reflect that reality, so the party
essentially disintegrated,
Sharansky said. Public opinion
experts faulted Yisrael- Ba'Aliyah's
campaign managers, arguing that
the party had focused on the
Natan Sharansky
concerns of elderly immigrants,
while hardly reaching out to
Russian youth.
Even the four pillars of Sharansky's political philos-
ophy — that peace is impossible before Israel's neigh-
bors practice democracy; the need for compromise to
bridge the religious-secular divide; the need for elec-
toral reform; and the need for a smaller, decentralized
government — failed to move young voters.
"Young Russian Israelis consider themselves young
Israelis and are not looking for an immigrant party,
but an Israeli party that might also cater to their inter-
ests," public opinion analyst Dahlia Schendlin said.
At Cafe Rimon, one employee claims
that past terrorist attacks are not the
only reason for the lack of business in
the area. Yahav Rimon, who has
worked at the restaurant for almost 15
years, says that there are simply places
more attractive than the City Center.
"First of all, people don't come to
Israel as much," explains Rimon. 'And
when they're allowed [to come to
Israel], they don't go to the City Center.
They go to the mall or the German
Colony," a popular but more secluded
and expensive shopping scene. "There
are just lots of other places to go."
Rimon seems to be alone in his
opinions, however; the majority of
business owners and employees asked
insist that the Ben Yehuda pedestrian
mall has not yet lost its allure to the
other, newer places open to the public.
The only real problem is fear of ter-
rorists. Itsik Sason, artisan and business
owner, opened his jewelry store
Turquoise 925 on Yoel Solomon Street
12 years ago. Even though the small
side street intersects with Ben Yehuda
and is considered part of the pedestrian
mall, Sason does not feel that he is in
any great danger and is not thinking
about moving his store — "not yet."
With his clientele "75 percent
tourists, mostly Americans, UJA peo-
ple," Sason says that the church and
Sharansky says most of the parry's voters moved to
Likud, Yisrael Ba'Aliyah's ally for the past several
years. Likud officials say they gained about nine
Knesset seats from immigrant votes.
While he doesn't have the charisma of some politi-
cians in the television age, Sharansky continues to
exude the determination that kept him sane for nine
years as a Prisoner of Zion in solitary confinement
in the Soviet gulag.
Both Sharon and Netanyahu have changed positions
over the years on the idea of a Palestinian state. Yet
Sharansky rarely has wavered in his belief that only a
democratic Palestinian state is a viable peace partner
for Israel — and can serve its citizens well. Likewise,
he consistently has called for electoral reform in Israel
and for smaller, more decentralized government.
As for his political future, Sharansky is not pes-
simistic. He has a strong ally in Sharon, who was
among those Sharansky embraced at Ben-Gurion
upon his arrival in 1986 and was the first person to
call him after he announced his resignation last week.
Sharansky is content to play a smaller role, relinquish-
ing the symbolic title of deputy prime minister and get-
ting down to work in "the things I know, understand
and can do without having the backing of members in
Knesset: the diaspora and Jerusalem portfolios."
"I no longer have the power to defend heavy
budgets from cuts, so we'll have to start again with
the little things," he admits.
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