Anything Jew in the Classifieds?
Israel is a country like no other - I think we can agree on that - but whether this statement has a positive or a negative meaning – is debatable. Case in point: the following want ad:
In no other country in the world would someone publish a want ad that specifically recruits ‘No Jews’, but as you can see for yourself (Assuming you can read Hebrew – if not, you will have to take my word for it), a very popular job site in Israel clearly had no problem posting today this ad for a control room operator.
Usually businesses that advertise jobs just for Jewish people do it in a much more subtle way, for instance they might list ‘a full army service’ as a prerequisite, knowing full well that Arab citizens of Israel cannot enlist in the Israel Defense Forces, while Jewish citizens are required to serve.
But this ad is not for Jews – it is for non-Jews, and believe it or not, publishing it is probably legal in Israel.
You see, when the people who gave the world the idea of a weekly day of rest had established a sovereign state, they declared it unlawful for an employer to make someone work on his day of rest. So each Sabbath the state of Israel sends enforcement officers to venues that do business on the Jewish day of rest, only the business owners do not get fined for operating on a Sabbath, as that is legal – they are only fined if their employees happen to be Jews working on a Sabbath.
For that reason, employers who post recruitment ads for non-Jews for positions that require attendance on a Saturday would probably be impervious to discrimination lawsuits.
Oh, and about the enforcement officers working on the Sabbath? You have nothing to worry about, as all of them are ‘No Jews’.
I have noticed a recent trend with the ads I am being shown while surfing. Whether I am on Gmail, YouTube or MySpace, I often see ads for heep.co.il, a lame Israeli YouTube-wannabe, and those ads always leave a bitter after-taste. While each ad might be different, they have something in common: all of them insinuate that at the other end of a single mouse-click there are plenty of videos waiting to cater to your every voyeuristic need.
Now I am no prude. I can handle porn ads as much as the next guy, but I don’t like them served to me on regular mainstream websites (via Google). I think this sly way of trying to lure you into their website is pathetic. YouTube got to where it is today by hard work which created positive word of mouth – but I guess the heep guys over at heep think the Israeli weather is just too hot for actual honest work.
As the Jewish new-year draws near, Israeli coffee shop chain Aroma Espresso Bar placed this full page ad in today’s papers, wishing us all a Happy New Year. Now, Israel’s official languages are Hebrew and Arabic, but the greeting appears in four languages: Hebrew, English, Arabic and Russian, so it seems the company went out of its way to make everyone feel welcome in the coming holiday.
