Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown | Jerusalem | S02 E01 | All Documentary

It's easily the most controversial piece of real estate in the world and there's no hope of talking about it without upsetting someone, if not everyone, maybe that's why it's taken me so long to come here, a place where even the names of common things are Fiercely debated: Where does falafel come from? Who makes the best hummus? Is it a fence or a wall? At the end of this hour many will see me as a terrorist sympathizer, a Zionist tool, a self-hating Jew, an apologist for American imperialism and a fascist socialist orientalist CIA agent and worse so here goes nothing rains on my shoulders oh I was raised without religion one side of the family long time Catholic I think the other side Jewish I have never been to a synagogue I don't believe in a higher power, but that doesn't make me any less Jewish.

I don't think these guys are going to sandbag me at the wailing wall, they don't seem to think so either, but just half thank you gentlemen, I've never felt this much. I'm pretending to be something I'm not. I am instinctively hostile to any kind of devotion. Certainty is my enemy. You know, I'm all doubt, constantly questioning the nature of reality when I'm caught and totally not. -judgment essentially you know God is happy to have you you know here you go oh man you know my betrayal is complete just because I was raised outside the faith with no particular attachment or loyalty to Israel doesn't mean there are many people in this the land doesn't hate me in principle i know, but the state of israel i never really knew what to think first i looked around it's like everyone said it's nice it's amazing it's urban sophisticated modern like southern california only better than the young recruits in the streets and you start to get the idea that this is Jerusalem.

I'm taking you through the Damascus Gate, which is one of the gates to the old city and these walls are quite old. People say the deepest ones go back to King David and then as history progressed, they built the wall so that the top bed is the newest part and by newest you mean the Ottoman era, which the Turks abandoned here, you know, 150 years ago and the british came and they conquered us i was not born here now cooking in london yotam otalangi is the very well known and respected chef and co-author of the book Jerusalem, basically, this city was divided in two until 1967, when there was the famous six-day war, yes, and the entire stretch we are traveling through now is East Jerusalem, it is the Palestinian part and until 67 it belonged to Jordan, so it is now under Israeli control and is very controversial because for the Jews, for the Israelis, the city has been unified. but obviously for the Palestinians, as far as they're concerned, they're in their occupation, we just have to go through a typical falafel place, yeah, because it's a very important part of the culture here and again it's controversial because you know, the Jews or Israelis made falafel their own and everyone thinks falafel is, you know, Israeli food, but it's actually a lot of Palestinian food and even more so because you know it's been made for generations here and here you get freshly fried falafel.

I don't understand it any other way and when I go to a place like this and see that they have some bolts left in the previous customer's container, I don't understand that I want them to fry them especially for me, that makes all the difference in the world he is a completely animal different, isn't it? Is there a historically demonstrable answer as to who invented who did it first? The only thing that is very clear is that in this part of the world, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, it has been cooked. On the other hand, for many, many generations, there are Jews from Yemen who came here in the '50s and could say, "Hey, my great-uncle was in Syria at the time and he's the one I remember clearly, so actually there is no answer, but the question of food appropriation or who owns the food is huge here they can go on arguing about it forever the old city is divided into four neighborhoods there is a muslim neighborhood there is a jewish neighborhood there is a Christian neighborhood and there is an Armenian neighborhood each one works independently but the people who live in a certain area are all of that religion so here you see these Israeli flags over this house so basically the Jews bought this house although it is in the muslim quarter and that is very controversial because it breaks the separation that people would normally expect in this city now we are walking in the steps of jesus christ as i often do so this is the via dolorosa which is the last journey that did jesus do before he was crucified so people feel very excited and they come here and they feel like oh my god, i'm walking in the footsteps of muhammad david o o jesus it's like jesus is here i feel like it should be more something a little bit more pious a little bit well it's too late for me oh great you understand own crown of thorns yes, in answer to the question what would jesus wear oh no no no that's his sister israel borders egypt jordan syria and lebanon in 1967 after the war In six days, Israel took control of the Gaza Strip, the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank, the Golan Heights and a soon-to-be East Jerusalem.

In 2003, Israel began construction of a wall along the green line that represents the border. between Israel and Palestine. The wall now extends 450 miles when completed, it will span 700 miles, 85 of them in Palestinian territory, for one thing, there is no doubt. that the number of suicide bombings fell drastically on the other, there is this that we crossed from Jerusalem into the West Bank, also called Judea and Samaria, also called Palestine since 1967, half a million settlers have moved here, all in contravention of international law, many in contravention of Israeli law. although in reality it seems to make little difference, they are here and in increasing numbers, this is gnome, one of our drivers from tel aviv who I asked about the graffiti on this house near the settlements, so what's the price of labeling if something happens in the settlement or some attack on the Jews, the children of the settlements would come and they would have a price for each activity, so they will come to a Palestinian village like this, they will destroy cars, they will write on the walls like this, it says against the arabs, the state of israel is life or death for the arabs intimidating i mean you put two targets on my house i'm moving this is ellie a settlement with a population of over 3,000 relatively isolated from the rest of israel amiyah cohen is the executive director of the ali settlement and its former security chief here you see most of our city from above you see the palestinian villages around i want to say that it is an unusual situation many of your neighbors would very much like it if you were not here i know the Most of them and most of them Many of them are happy that we are here because we actually gave them prosperity for the last 45 years and wherever the PLO came they lost it.

I suppose many people would not agree with that statement we work with. - Technology radars and security cameras so that from high up you can see anyone, walking at night, you can see them from quite far away, you could definitely identify them after the fact, it depends, but we have our protocols that we work with and we had our successes. We drive to Ma'alevana, another settlement a few miles away, the blazing sun bleaching the suburban feel behind its ring of electronic surveillance and security sensors, all they feel they need is a school, public transportation, and a petting zoo. .

Amicai Luria has lived here for 23 years. She is a winemaker. and amateur cook oh pretty, you're not kidding, the salmon is marinated with pomegranate juice that in season I squeeze pomegranates and freeze the juice, so I'll have it all year round where were you before here I was born? Pennsylvania, so your parents brought you when you were four, yes, twenty-something parents with children living in the relative comfort of Pennsylvania familiarity, heading to what they must have had at least partly on their minds, but seemed uncertain . Yes, it was very difficult for them almost. All Jews say that next year in Yerushalayim is part of the prayers we pray all the time.

If I don't understand it correctly, you know you haven't looked at the Bible. Okay, everything happened here. That is a non-negotiable position. You see prophecies coming true, I mean things coming back to life, you know, mountains that no one wanted to live in, no one dared to for thousands of years, no one wanted this place, you know, and then we finally come here and everything is blooming again, that makes you feel good, you know you've been here since '90. you look, you look over the edge, there's our town, right, um, yeah, there's one you can see from here anywhere moment during the time you go. in anyone's house sit and eat there, but in other villages you once sat at a Muslim table, your host and everyone else had coffee, but not there, not because I, as a religious Jew, only eat uh kosher, so They respect him. they don't offer me, so I have to ask you about something that worried me when I got to the first house before you came up the road to this town, the graffiti on the front, yes, the spray painted targets, yes, who did it , villains, bad people, children.

I don't know apparently children when you raise children children are not able to understand complicated things they see the world in black and white when you get older you can see the gray and when someone hits you I understand why children do it by doing given what they you told me before to identify the perpetrators within the realm of young possibilities why not cover it good question I don't know maybe we should you are somewhere else in the West Bank, on the outskirts of Ramallah, two members of a group of women who call themselves the sisters of speed the first all-female Palestinian racing team hello hello I'm tony hello hello nice to meet you when I drive a car I'm the happiest girl that's ever raced, it's in my blood In Palestine it's very small, there are no roads, so when I drive I accelerate, I feel free.

Did you find that people underestimated you at first? Maybe they could make fun of us, but when we got good scores we won out of respect. Yes, good. Card doesn't know if you are a woman or a man. Many girls want to join us, the fast sisters, but some of their families are very reserved, they don't like their daughters to be among men running. You know that Palestine is a very secretive society so things are getting better, they stay the same or worse you never know what is going to happen in Palestine one day it is good and the other day you never know it is a crazy country the local police would prefer them outside off the streets for obvious reasons, but the track here as it is has its drawbacks.

It's basically a parking lot in front of the Offer detention center. What do you think about next door? Sometimes they give you problems. This is an Israeli prison. It's called alpha. We were here once. Speed ​​Sisters and there was trouble because of the prisoners so I stopped my car there and I was walking I wanted to see what was going on and the Israeli soldiers came running towards me and started shooting at me and they shot me. In the back it was tear gas, the canister hit you, yeah, so my speedy sisters took me to the hospital and I passed out.

Have you thought about challenging the Israelis to form a team? I can't run because my car is Palestinian. What if they? Come here, they are not allowed to enter the West Bank and we are not allowed to go to Jerusalem, so how can we ask a silly question together? It's there for everyone to see and feels like something out of science fiction. film this is the wall from the other side from inside this place, for example, the aida refugee camp in the district of bethlehem, it feels nothing more than what a prison is. abed abu sure is the founder of the al-rawad children's center theater center, so we are at the northern entrance of Bethlehem and we are heading to the Ida refugee camp, so this has been here since 1950.

Yes, it started with tents, people were under the tents for about seven years and then the UN saw that it was not temporary. as it was supposed to be, so they started building what they call shelters. First impressions of the camp there is a notable number of children, there are now around 6,000 people and two thirds are under 18 years old, so it is a very young population, unfortunately with the continued degradation of the political and economic situation We are in a situation in which we no longer have playgrounds or green spaces, children play in the streets under walls covered with images of barter, kidnappers, simple political prisoners. 6,000 people of that number, 66 percent are under 18.

Yes. , I don't care where in the world that is, it's more or less a recipe for rebellious behavior, I think that would be for the best, especially yes, especially when you have no chance to evacuate anger and stress in a creative way. So after finishing my studies I came back here and started using theater as one of the most amazing, powerful and non-violent civilized and non-violent media.to express yourself and tell your story to be sincere and this is for me the remedy to build peace. inside and hopefully help them think that they can grow and change the world and create miracles without needing to carry a gun and shoot everyone else or blow themselves up or burn themselves, but to stay alive in bed takes me to the neighborhood of the martyrs of the countryside to feed me. by Islam Abu Ahura runs a women's collective that offers Palestinian cooking classes and helps her support six children, one of whom is disabled in the United States. children grow up with pop stars, athletes, yes, never a politician, I mean, it is unthinkable for a child to admire a politician or admire a military figure sports or entertainment yes here four or five year old children look for someone every day that you know he brought a plate yeah, um, I'm not asking why it's like that, I don't know, do you think it's useful?

Well, I guess we have a story. They are people who are under occupation, people honor their heroes and their heroes are those who resist the occupation, whether they resisted, who are destroyed or unarmed and, to tell the truth, sometimes I have been in fights with some political parties when they put images. of people who were murdered in their closest homes ahmed's sister on october 29, 2001 was murdered in her kitchen by a sniper from the intercontinental hotel but when these political parties take this woman and want to make a montage of photos with her carrying a weapon to say this is the hero who liberated Palestine I'm sorry, this is not true, this woman was murdered in her home.

Can you go today and ask the Palestinians who the great hero is? Ask these kids who they will recognize. They will recognize a young man. from gaza, who is an arab idol called muhammad aslaf, a singer who sings, becomes more famous than abu mazen and arafat and all the rest, this is another image of palestine, you could almost believe for a minute or two that some guy of peace, some kind of reconciliation meeting of the minds sanity is possible after visiting mazda is a restaurant in what looks like an idyllic village in the judean hills about 20 minutes from

jerusalem

feels like an alternative universe for several reasons muslims from a nearby town they are partners, co-owners of majda and also married, unsurprisingly they are friends of yotan together, they grow and cultivate much of what is used in their kitchen, their food reflects both their different origins and their points in common.

We're going to pamper you now, yeah, here we go. you grew up in this city yes in this city where you grew up near the beach no no in the neighborhood but we met in the neighborhood in kibbutzki kibbutz and we worked together at the hotel how was that with the families? How wonderful how wonderful now well, yes, at the beginning someone started the tvts with many questions, those answers and little by little we understand that we love each other and they can't do anything, so they continue and support us. This is their special fried egg, farm eggs with peppers from your garden tomato that looks amazing beyond words it's incredibly beautiful here I don't know why I didn't expect that uh you know, a lot of people come and say it's like provence it's like Italian it's a noise you like our crab I love roasted tomatoes okra onion and mint and that's it and what they do a lot of here is char it really bad so it's like it's really smoky just from being in the pan very high heat, so it's generally being that lives in this area, although mostly Arab ethnically Arab in this particular city, roasted zucchini and then we use fried yogurt, so that's the sauce, like that which is like that intense kind of guilty flavor very typical of Palestinian cuisine oh man it's good I just ate this incredibly delicious food, completely oblivious to the fact that it's completely vegetarian, if only any of the vegetarian residents in New York would serve food with a taste close to this, I would go there, yes, maybe I would consider it and this fresh zucchini with meals. and the apricots, the little sweet apricots that we ate, all this food is really intensely delicious, are you hopeful?

Of course, I have my children, I need to see them, I respect her religion, she respects my religion, my family and together we can build something for our children. our future country, that is what we think and that is what we give the message to our clients. Part of the appeal of this restaurant is the fact that it actually manages to do what not many chefs try to do here and that is sort of a mix of Jewish ethnicity. or background with arabic food getting in and out of gaza from israel is truly one of the most surreal travel experiences you can have on earth.

More than 1.5 million people live in Gaza, most of them considered refugees, meaning they are not from the place they are forced to go. to live now in most cases they are prohibited or cannot leave israel decides who enters and leaves what enters and what remains outside apart from journalists humanitarian workers first aid workers very few people are allowed to cross into gaza in 2005 the defense forces israelis left the gaza strip and all israeli settlers were expelled now inside gaza hamas is in charge, considered a terrorist organization by both the united states and israel, they were elected in 2006 this is leila haddad, a journalist native of gaza and author of gaza kitchen the catches are not as big as they used to be and that is mainly because the fishermen cannot go beyond three to six nautical miles, you could continue fishing, with what happens, oh, them They will shoot the fishermen, they will spray them with cold water.

They will destroy your boats, they will cut your fishing nets, they will detain you, so obviously it is a very risky business. Nine nautical miles, that's where that deep water channel is where you're going to get the really good catches, so Gaza is the last one. Palestinian area with access to the coast, it is very important to remember that you know you have the West Bank just an hour away, but many of the Palestinians there have never seen the sea, they have never been to the sea. The sultan's family owned a small farm in Barisala. eastern gaza strip area omsultan and her husband are unusual in that they cook together, this is not typical in this part of the world or in this culture, they use their own freshly slaughtered chickens to make gazan classic, a traditional palestinian dish made up of layers of fried eggplant, tomato, potatoes, caramelized onions and chicken sautéed then simmered in a broth with nutmeg, cinnamon, cardamom and rice.

It's a big family, kids, grandkids, everyone lives under the same roof and it can get chaotic, so let's talk about food and eat food because it's just sitting here, but yeah, right, what do we have here? Okay, so this is called luba or traditional name with lamb, in this case chicken, we don't allow others to eat, he says how can you eat and you are letting everyone eat. Me being from Gaza being a child of the diaspora I always thought that food was a really interesting way to be able to tell the Palestinian story, to be able to discover this lost history, this Palestinian past, plus the food is really good, right?

And I think it was too. It is important to be able to offer Palestinians an image of themselves if they recognize a very human image because everything they see in the media, whether here or there, whether on Arab channels or abroad, are these types of images. very caricatured of, you know. armed men and you know, whaling women and this kind of bleak landscape, you know, cinder blocks, uh, you're not going into private houses and what's a kitchen or what's a family that you see here, yeah, do you like that? What question? It's absolutely delicious really very good She wants you to open a restaurant for her Keep cooking like this It's really delicious Gaza has three distinctive culinary heritages: those who come from villages that were depopulated or destroyed in 1948 and make up about 75 percent of the population. of gaza and bring with them their own distinctive cuisine that is very different from the cuisine of gaza city, which tends to use much spicier and more chillies than the cuisine of the coast, which is rich in seafood, of course, and a very sophisticated cuisine, very urban, I'm curious to know what everyone here thinks.

Will there be something in your life? I guess the first question would be: Will you ever be able to? She says you know she hopes she can do it. She also hopes that you can go to Jerusalem. Also, she is optimistic, he said you don't allow us and then he said, then he corrected himself and said that the Israelis allow us to go, this is the normal tone of voice, he is not bothered by the way this is how we are. Speak, what do you say? What does she say? Give me permission, if you allow it, of course, I will go.

Leila has something to show me a watermelon salad. Something she discovered on a recent trip here that really piqued her interest, so come on, I imagine this. It'll take a minute, we'll get to what looks like a pretty serious meeting, this is a dewan and soon we'll be joined by um sultan's husband, it's an area where elders gather to, you know, solve community problems, you know. , to advise everyone. These boys are originally from Beer Il-Sabi, now part of Israel, so they are united by traditions and a very different way of life from here, where they have been relocated and lived since 1948.

Do you think they will be able to return to their ancestral land during his life, the life of his children, what is your assumption, yes, we will resume if this enemy supports me, please kill him and we understand that he expects and from me, my son, my daughter, so what you are doing now is called fatigue and The blue is basically a small watermelon under a ripe watermelon and this is kind of a specialty of southern Gaza in general, but also Sinai. It's usually something done exclusively by men, as I was told here, so they start, you can see there, they are roasting over the fire.

They cover baby watermelons with aluminum foil and pass them through a wire like a kind of rustic skewer and then they add them, they simply throw them there and then the idea is that they take out the pulp and that is what is happening Yes, and then they do it What they do while it's roasting on the fire is that they need an unleavened dough in there with whole grain barley, a lot of very rich extra virgin olive oil and then they throw that in the hole too or they dig a hole in the sand there. and that's fire baked right into the embers, yeah, and then they mix it all together, so it's interesting because right now we're about 35 minutes from Gaza City.

Ask anyone in Gaza City if they've heard of this station, not even In an area as small as Gaza you see this really wide variation, they're going to clean it up. Many, if not most, of these guys aren't too sympathetic to my country or ethnicity, I guess, but there's that issue of hospitality anywhere you go. In the Muslim world it seems that no matter what you feed your guests, you do everything you can to make them feel at home. You're supposed to eat. You shouldn't eat again for three days. Where does it come from? This is a native dish. south of gaza, uh, the Sinai, a kind of Bedouin desert area, all the food I've tried so far in Gaza has been very different from anything else I've tried in the Arab world, a different spectrum of flavors, Yes, totally, it's something like that. own little gastronomic bubble you know I find food more flavorful I have a better sensory experience even children like to eat with their own they say god gave us hands to eat with spoons of nuts one can be forgiven for thinking when you see what similar are the two peoples who cook with pride eat with passion love their children love the land in which they live or the land to which they dream of returning those who live so close those who are locked in an embrace so intimate although deadly could somehow Someday we'll figure out how to live with each other, but it would be very soft to think that, in fact, those things probably don't count for much in the end.

While Galkowitz runs a restaurant just seven miles from the Gaza Strip, you and your family have paid what worst imaginable. price, yes, my daughter was killed by a mortar sent by Hamas in some Israeli cities and towns very close to the Gaza Strip. Bus stops serve as bomb shelters and air raid sirens warn of incoming missiles fired from less than a mile away, rockets and mortar shells. They have been known to fall from the sky in these

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and no one understands the consequences better than this man. You were not a fervent ideological Zionist, no, you are not an Orthodox Jew, no, and yet here you are, at the tip of the spear, right in the dip. there is your restaurant this is a shelter there is a shelter here you are after the death of my daughter I just started talking to who, to the people who want to listen I know that my daughter was murdered for no reason and I know that the people on the other side They have been killed for no reason, elderly children, they have a soldier in Gaza, I saw very poor people, I know that there is an interest in supporting these poor people, you can go very far, but the bottom line is, let's stop suffering, you know, I went to the settler community and I was nice people and I told you you know they were nice and you said you said what did you say you said everyone is nice everyone is nice I know they are Palestinians very nice and nice everyone is nice but if you scratch if you push you have to talk but everyonethey want to put the everyone says put them in the seat most of the people don't talk they are very upset they are fed up and the same From the other side towards us, you have to find the right people in both towns, also in those below and in those from up, and get them talking, and I'm sure it's possible.

The opportunities to do so here are very, very, very limited. It seems I agree. and I mean, when do you have to speak metaphorically because there's an actual wall that's either a wall or a fence depending on who you're talking to? fence or wall oh oh oh no, it's a big wall, it's ugly, it's really ugly, you can Look, it's not too far from here.