Quick Kibbutz Note
Overscheduled again, I have to soon rush out. But I’m still thinking about a conversation last night here on a kibbutz where I’m visiting an old American friend and his Israeli born wife, who was born on this kibbutz. We talked about the change in kibbutz institutions from the early socialist and anarchist insistence on both collectivism and communalism to today’s more routine pursuit of individual goals amid capitalist materialism. Some see the change as merely transformation to something better, others as deterioration.
I’d like to get back to this at more length, talk to more people about how this has happened and what might lie ahead. The topic seems important to me for those of us who like to imagine that alternative community will someday be possible to sustain from one generation to the next even amidst capitalist society.
We also talked last night about The Situation. My friends, on the Israeli left as are most of my contacts here, worry about security but want the Occupation to end. They have Palestinian workers here (along with about a dozen from Thailand), but not as many as before the intifada. Two older Palestinians have worked here for a long time, one of them for 30 years, getting to this kibbutz west of Jerusalm everyday from near Hebron, a long complicated trek. He works in building maintenance, but some kibbutz members won’t let him in their apartments.
Complications, like hopes, abound.