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Daniel Gordis: Israel from the Inside

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What’s the mood here? What are Israelis feeling? Everything. Unbridled joy at the sight of returning hostages, worry about what we’re going to see when the returned hostages are not health, or alive, horror as hints of what these hostages went through begin to spread, disgust as we see mass murderers released from Israeli jail and celebrated by Palestinian civilians. Hope that the ceasefires in the north and south will hold, and deep worry when Hezbollah and Hamas both insist on violating the agreements (as they did yesterday). Delight that Trump is releasing heavy bombs that the Biden administration had held up, but concern about what Trump is going to demand in return.

Israel has become an emotional rollercoaster, again.

Yoni Bloch, not as well known outside Israel as he deserves to be, is a hugely popular Israeli musician, songwriter, composer, rock singer—and of course, what else—a hi-tech entrepreneur.

Interestingly, tech also had major influence on Bloch’s music career. He first started posting his song on the website known as Bama Hadasha (“New Stage”), which allows aspiring artists to publish their work—be it prose, poetry, art, or music—online. The daughter of the chairman of the record company NMC heard Bloch’s songs on the site and introduced his music to her father. In a short while, Bloch’s music career took off, and his work is regularly featured on Israeli radio.

Today, we’re sharing a new instance of the intersection of Bloch’s music and his tech interests. Bloch recently released a new single, called “Sof Tov,” or “A Good Ending.” It’s an unbridled, hopeful description of a future Israel, and it has taken the country by storm.

The song is fun and is played everywhere. But what really got the song its traction is an AI-generated video of the future that Bloch also released.

At the very top of this post is the original video, and below, we’ve inserted a YouTube someone else made with an explanation of what all the images mean. They’re clear to Israelis, but less so to those who don’t live here. So the video explains much, and to fill in the picture further, we’ve also added some stills from the video with explanations, too.

First, though, the song. The following is an AI-generated translation of the Hebrew lyrics.

 

 

 

Maybe we'll just start with a good ending
And go back in time
We'll post pictures on the street
Of everyone we brought back from there

We'll start after there's already peace
And we just need to finalize some details
We'll invite all the residents of the north
To a sanity party in Re'im

Other than that, there's nothing to talk about
Other than that, it won't help
One thing will work out
And another will pass

Other than that, we're already here
And we have nowhere to leave to
So even if we don't achieve anything
At least we'll start with a good ending

Maybe we'll go back to arguing about nonsense
Get stuck in traffic every morning
Watch half an hour of news
And a Bruno performance in the park

We'll be able to fly wherever we want
And then come back home, because it's over
If someone asks "What's up?"
We'll tell them that now it's allowed

Other than that, there's nothing to talk about
Other than that, it won't help
One thing will work out
And another will pass

Other than that, we're already here
And we have nowhere to leave to
So even if we don't achieve anything
At least we'll start with a good ending

Other than that, time is already up
And we have nowhere to leave to
We've talked about every ending in the world
At least we'll start with a good ending

Other than that, we're already here
And we have nowhere to leave to
So even if we don't achieve anything
At least we'll start with a good ending

And finally, some further explanations:

 

1. The writing on the highway, which was often blocked by protesters, now reads “The Last War,” a reference to Yehoram Ga’on’s song, “I promise you, my little girl, that this was the last war.”
2. The yellow ribbon, the symbol of the “bring the hostages home movement,” is removed from the car door handle, because it’s no longer necessary. They’re home, as Bloch’s lyrics say.
3. A reservist’s IDF call-up letter
4. Protesters against judicial reform sign placards
5. Throughout 2023, until the war, lines of buses were used to bring people to anti-judicial reform protests. Now they’re bringing people from the north to a “sanity party” at Re’im, the site of the Nova massacre
6. Dome of the Rock in peacetime
7. “How good it is that you’re all home.” Shoppers in a store watching the news of the return of the last of the hostages
8. A photo of the mass anti-judicial reform protest has been transformed into a celebration of the hostages’ return
9. Words at the bottom read: “All the hostages are now in Israel”

 

 

1. “Finally, they’re home”
2. “All the hostages are on the way to their families”
3. Instead of being about hostages, the big ads on the sides of Tel Aviv buildings are now about a Taylor Swift concert.
4. The portable bathrooms are for the Taylor Swift concert, presumably. They’re reminiscent of the Nova music festival victims, who hid in them, but were killed as Hamas terrorists shot through them with automatic weapons.
5. A sign that says, “Discover Beirut $199”
6. The Dome of the Rock is now not the scene of Israeli police having to subdue rock throwers, but something very different
7. Form exempting reservists from further service
8. The IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv, identifiable by its tower that is visible from most of the city, has been turned into an amusement and water park
9. There’s a Middle East Union and Israelis can travel to any country just by showing their Israeli ID card

 

1. Passengers on an Israeli train ride past the pyramids
2. Israeli and Iran judo competitors hug (at present, Iran refuses to compete against Israelis)
3. Hiking by a Syrian archaeological site, now that the well known “Israel Trail” has become the “Levant Trail.” The orange, blue, white stripes are already found throughout Israel on the trail that runs from Eilat to the very north, and now, in Bloch’s vision, it extends into other countries, too.
4. Israel makes it into the Soccer World Cup
5. Israel in the World cup
6. Taylor Swift concert in Israel

Kind of hard to believe. Obviously. But if in the summer of 2023, someone had imagined out loud what happened on October 7, that, too, would have seemed surrealistic. So who knows?

Better to dream than to dread. And thanks to Bloch’s song and video, Israelis are doing a bit more of that.