Tel Aviv Rooftop

A visit to Zuccotti Park, the epicentre of the Occupy Wall Street movement, triggered a sharp sense of deja vu. We'd flown in from Israel where the last vestiges of the protest tent encampments were being removed, only to find that they had been reincarnated a spit away from Wall Street. And what was fuelling the protestors here among the sleeping bags and placards  was the same middle class anger with big business, with bad government, with the disproportionate distribution of wealth, in short: with the system. There was also the same infuriating/intriguing refusal to be tied down to fixed set of demands. References to the fundamentals of American democracy were a major motif. One man stood reading the Constitution out loud. I copied the following passage from the New York Times Review (but forgot to jot down the name of the author): Sounds familiar? It would be hard to beat this as a description of the Daphni Leef  school  of the Israeli social prot...

This weekend the annual Tel Aviv art festival took to the streets. We took a walk along Yehuda Hayamit in Yaffo, a normally nondescript commercial street in a mixed Jewish-Arab area  that turned up some suprises. Outside the Galei Tzahal (Army Radio) building two dancers performed in front of a small crowd . This trio of Arab girls had a strategic view next to spotlights and seemed entranced. a From the outside, the studio/salon at number 20 looked pretty dilapidated but the interior revealed this cosy area. Further up the road, an explosion of primitivist colour. Not often that you see a cellist playing at the entrance of a carpentry shop, so  we were drawn in. To find that the cellist had friends making electronic sounds at the back. On the way we met Ahmad who was taking advantage ofthe crowds to display his bicycle technique. He agreed to have his picture taken on condition that it would appear on the internet. So this is for you Ahmad. ...

We were out on the streets last night, together with another 400-450,000 people, in what was optimistically dubbed The 'March of the Million'. The million didn't materialize but it was still the biggest protest ever held in Israel. All these photos were taken on the upmarket Kikar Hamedina (State Square), an ironic venue for a social protest Encompassed by boutiques selling Tshirts for hundreds of shekels, hundreds of thousands of Israel's long suffering middle class came to chant, perhaps for the last time this summer "ha am dor esh tzedek chevra ti! " (the people demand social justice!). An English speaking protestor turned the familiar graphic slogan "I (heart) Tel Aviv " into, "I can't afford to (heart) Tel Aviv " The (religious) Reform movement touts a banner quoting a Biblical commandment to pursue righteousness Like all the previous demonstrations, this one too, though noisy, was completely peaceful. On the outski...

There are now 2,000 (!) tents and various other structures pegged into the former grass along Rothschild Boulevard and (according to a police survey) a total of 3,383 around the country. At this stage of the "revolution", as a stroll  down Rothschild clearly revealed, the original "the rent is too damned high" protestors have been augmented , if not outnumbered, by the rest of am yisrael.  A partial list includes doctors, psychologists ('Bibi, ask Sarah, what a psychologist earns is chara [shit]' ), social workers, animal rights groups, environmental activists; Ethiopians, immigration seekers, divorced fathers  settler "hillop youth", old age pensioners,Communists, Kahanists and Reform Jews who want to separate religion and state. Each has its own compound  and conducts earnest seminars on the synthetic rush mats that cover the entire area. Some have fully-staffed information desks and cable TV while others are simple tent-and-megaphone jobs. I ...

Taken on Saturday night at the ever growing tent city on Sderot Rothschild and later at the march to the square outside Tel Aviv Museum. The organisers hoped for 5,000 people. 20,000 turned up. Mahapecha  (Revolution) says the sign above the shack and behind it, 'Rothschild corner Tahrir' It's hot ... Gathering by the square. At least in Tel Aviv, this is a revolution of nice middle class young people who have been squeezed too hard and aren't going to take it any more. Nor are the hard pressed doctors. The head of Israel's doctors' association has just embarked on a march from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, while fasting and vowing not to break his fast until the doctors' demands are met by the government. Today, small groups of protestors blocked traffic at busy intersections throughout the country. more revolutionary images here

After the "cottage cheese revolution" on Facebook which forced the big dairy cartels to reduce prices or face the wrath of the consumer, a new protest movement has emerged and is camping out on swanky Rothschild Boulevard. Young people, some families with children, are protesting against prohibitively high rents which, combined with their low wages, make it impossible to make ends meet. Economists say that 70% of Israeli wage earners would have to pay more than one third of their income to repay their monthly mortgage repayments. In other words, they can't afford to purchase an average apartment. The "new homeless" have jobs, iphones and laptops but not enough disposable income to pay their constantly rising rents . "It drives me crazy" said one activist."Half of my wages goes on rent." "Add electricity, rates, water, internet and food and there's nothing left," said the mother of a son who was camping out. The Rothschil...

Early morning, Cafe de Renaissance, 18th Arondissement, Paris.  A young woman sits hunched over a book and cafe creme.  This regular was happy to be photographed with his first expresso of the day.  Most of the clientele look fashionably crumpled, the music is from the sixties but the decor remains meticulously untouched. In the Montparnasse Cemetery we came across the grave of Serge Gainsbourg  and after a meal and wine at a local bistro we tippsily catch up with his wild legacy on Youtube.