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Feeling haunted by tariff talk? Take comfort in how Great Britian was once soothed by a bubbe’s ghost
These are strange times, but that much weirder if you happen to be a dual citizen of Canada and the United States. In one sense, it ought to mean being blasé about such questions as whether Canada becomes the 51st state, something President Trump keeps threatening to make happen. It would just mean easier taxes for people like me and better flavours of Häagen-Dazs, right?
But somehow, I care. I really am dually loyal here. I want the best for the United States, which includes it not imploding just because one president is particularly deranged. And I want the best for Canada—the place where I live and am raising a family—and that starts with its continued independent existence, but extends to it not being cowed in trade war by a tech-bro-helmed puppet regime.
It seems unlikely that we’re about to see the U.S. do to Canada what Russia has to Ukraine—and unclear if the tariffs themselves are even going to happen—but I’m not sure the alleged grownups in charge know what their plans are. I feel no sense of smug for having initially (as in, in 2016) been one of those people saying, yeah right, Donald Trump becoming president, and am not particularly interested, this time around, in cultivated a jaded, this-isn’t-going-to-be-anything stance.
And no, I’m not convinced that by dismantling DEI and deporting campus antisemites, the new administration has Jews’ back. (Insofar as such developments are unambiguously beneficial to Jews. I’d say ambiguously at best, at best.) Jews need to buy eggs too, right? And that’s not even getting into the implications for kosher food prices if tariffs proceed.
Or if you’re more into kosher-style, I highly recommend the Ukrainian potato-onion pierogies from the new Multicook on Roncesvalles. Unmistakably made in Canada as there are women in the window literally making them before your eyes.
But it’s easy to doomscroll, which is why I suggest that you offset some of your own jaw-drops at the state of intra-North American relations with a sitcom from a time when none of this nonsense was going on. (Other nonsense, but not this nonsense.)
***
Did you ever find yourself wondering, what if Midsomer Murders, but Jewish and a sitcom?
From 1992 to 1994, a British sitcom aired by the name of So Haunt Me. It’s about the Rokeby family, who’ve moved on down to a less-nice house on account of the father having lost his advertising job. Things are looking a bit grim, but also a bit… spooky. Why was that mug moving like that? It’s clear something is afoot, and that it can’t be burglars because they’ve nothing to burgle.
The supernatural force turns out to be Yetta Feldman, a Jewish mother who once lived in the house, and as far as she’s concerned it’s still hers. She freaked out and drove away more than a dozen families but has decided that the Rokebies are honorary Jews and is fine with them staying. She sits in the kitchen, visible only to some of the newly-arrived family members, and complains about her own adult daughter—Carole with an e she specifies—having taken up with an unsuccessful musician. She grimaces when she overhears her this-life counterparts saying they’re going to make bacon. Bacon! But hers is a Jewish house. This she insists upon.
It’s all done very theatrically, where it’s acting rather than wild special effects conveying that one of the people on the set is a ghost. It seems like it might not work, but it does.
So Haunt Me stars George Costigan and Tessa Peake-Jones, both of whom have had Midsomer roles, but do you know who plays their sullen teenage daughter? Cully! Yes, Laura Howard, who plays Inspector Tom Barnaby’s aspiring-actress daughter on Midsomer, apparently got her big break on So Haunt Me. Same actress but a very different character, which I understand is what actual television critics refer to as range.
And then there’s Yetta herself, played by Miriam Karlin, a prolific British-Jewish actress. Like Grandma Yetta on The Nanny, this Yetta plays a specific Jewish mother, stereotypical but not just. Like The Nanny, it’s a show unafraid of Othering non-Jews, of showing the world from the perspective
I am but one episode in—with 18 more to go—and already thinking about the dissertation that someone could write (won’t, but could) about what the show means about the idea of Jews as settlers. Yetta views herself as the original and only authentic inhabitant! That’s why she’s not budging.
Yes, as has been pointed out to me, the haunted-by-Jewish-mother thing is a bit like Oedipus Wrecks, Woody Allen’s contribution to the 1989 anthology film New York Stories. In it, an Allen alter-ego character’s mother hovers in the sky, as a kind of visible spectre, telling him—before an audience of ordinary New Yorkers—how to live his life. Did Mendelson get the idea from Allen?
Not necessarily!
I heard a podcast interview with show creator Paul Mendelson where he was explaining that he had pitched So Haunt Me first, but been told it was too ethnic, and that you couldn’t have a show with kids and a dog. This—the casual antisemitism, ageism, and dog-o-phobia of the television world of 1980s Britain—is why he instead made sitcom May to December, which first aired in… 1989. Once that show was a success, he was given license to do So Haunt Me.
Because this is how I spend my limited time on the planet, I had been wondering whether there was anything Jewish about May to December. Does Scottishness serve as a proxy for Jewishness? (Mendelson himself grew up partly in Glasgow so it might be that Scottishness is serving as a proxy for… Scottishness.) Is the sarcastic humour different from that of other Britcoms? (No, they’re all like that.)
Effectively, no, there is nothing obviously Jewish about May to December, unless you take law offices as inherently Jewish environments. There are the jokes about middle aged soliciter Alec’s adult daughter Simone being a Nazi, but this is meant as, she’s uptight and conservative, not that she is rounding up Jews. Mendelson has said that every episode includes people having cake and coffee, and that this is a Jewish quality, but there is also the thing where Alec pours himself (or is poured) a Scotch when he gets home, which seems gentile-coded.
The only thing I can think of is that the age-gap relationship at the core of the show is played a bit like an intermarriage plot. It’s all about whether others approve or disapprove. The couple’s always surrounded by some mix of disapproving killjoy women and approving, would-if-I-could-saying men. Is Alec’s wife Zoë’s youth a stand-in for non-Jewishness? Is it, deep down, a shiksa plot?
These are all questions I would like nothing more than to ask Paul Mendelson, should he wish to discuss his earlier works on a podcast produced by The Canadian Jewish News. Just putting this out there into the universe. If you will Britcom legends as podcast guests it’s no fairytale.
The CJN’s opinion editor Phoebe Maltz Bovy can be reached at pbovy@thecjn.ca, not to mention @phoebebovy on Bluesky, and @bovymaltz on X. She is also on The CJN’s weekly podcast Bonjour Chai. For more opinions about Jewish culture wars, subscribe to the free Bonjour Chai newsletter on Substack.
The post Feeling haunted by tariff talk? Take comfort in how Great Britian was once soothed by a bubbe’s ghost appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Israel Blocks Ramallah Meeting with Arab Ministers, Israeli Official Says
A closed Israeli military gate stands near Ramallah in the West Bank, February 18, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
Israel will not allow a planned meeting in the Palestinian administrative capital of Ramallah, in the West Bank, to go ahead, an Israeli official said on Saturday, after Arab ministers planning to attend were stopped from coming.
The move, days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government announced one of the largest expansions of settlements in the West Bank in years, underlined escalating tensions over the issue of international recognition of a future Palestinian state.
Saturday’s meeting comes ahead of an international conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, that is due to be held in New York on June 17-20 to discuss the issue of Palestinian statehood, which Israel fiercely opposes.
The delegation of senior Arab officials due to visit Ramallah – including the Jordanian, Egyptian, Saudi Arabian and Bahraini foreign ministers – postponed the visit after “Israel’s obstruction of it,” Jordan’s foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that the block was “a clear breach of Israel’s obligations as an occupying force.”
The ministers required Israeli consent to travel to the West Bank from Jordan.
An Israeli official said the ministers intended to take part in “a provocative meeting” to discuss promoting the establishment of a Palestinian state.
“Such a state would undoubtedly become a terrorist state in the heart of the land of Israel,” the official said. “Israel will not cooperate with such moves aimed at harming it and its security.”
A Saudi source told Reuters that Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud had delayed a planned trip to the West Bank.
Israel has come under increasing pressure from the United Nations and European countries which favour a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, under which an independent Palestinian state would exist alongside Israel.
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that recognizing a Palestinian state was not only a “moral duty but a political necessity.”
Palestinians want the West Bank territory, which was seized by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war, as the core of a future state along with Gaza and East Jerusalem.
But the area is now criss-crossed with settlements that have squeezed some 3 million Palestinians into pockets increasingly cut off from each other though a network of military checkpoints.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said the announcement this week of 22 new settlements in the West Bank was an “historic moment” for settlements and “a clear message to Macron.” He said recognition of a Palestinian state would be “thrown into the dustbin of history.”
The post Israel Blocks Ramallah Meeting with Arab Ministers, Israeli Official Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Gaza Aid Supplies Hit by Looting as Hamas Ceasefire Response Awaited
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. REUTERS/Ramadan Abed
Armed men hijacked dozens of aid trucks entering the Gaza Strip overnight and hundreds of desperate Palestinians joined in to take supplies, local aid groups said on Saturday as officials waited for Hamas to respond to the latest ceasefire proposals.
The incident was the latest in a series that has underscored the shaky security situation hampering the delivery of aid into Gaza, following the easing of a weeks-long Israeli blockade earlier this month.
US President Donald Trump said on Friday he believed a ceasefire agreement was close but Hamas has said it is still studying the latest proposals from his special Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. The White House said on Thursday that Israel had agreed to the proposals.
The proposals would see a 60-day truce and the exchange of 28 of the 58 hostages still held in Gaza for more than 1,200 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, along with the entry of humanitarian aid into the enclave.
On Saturday, the Israeli military, which relaunched its air and ground campaign in March following a two-month truce, said it was continuing to hit targets in Gaza, including sniper posts and had killed what it said was the head of a Hamas weapons manufacturing site.
The campaign has cleared large areas along the boundaries of the Gaza Strip, squeezing the population of more than 2 million into an ever narrower section along the coast and around the southern city of Khan Younis.
Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies entering the enclave at the beginning of March in an effort to weaken Hamas and has found itself under increasing pressure from an international community shocked by the increasingly desperate humanitarian situation the blockade has created.
The United Nations said on Friday the situation in Gaza is the worst since the start of the war began 19 months ago, with the entire population facing the risk of famine despite a resumption of limited aid deliveries earlier this month.
Israel has been allowing a limited number of trucks from the World Food Program and other international groups to bring flour to bakeries in Gaza but deliveries have been hampered by repeated incidents of looting.
At the same time, a separate system, run by a US-backed group called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has been delivering meals and food packages at three designated distribution sites.
However, aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF, which they say is not neutral, and say the amount of aid allowed in falls far short of the needs of a population at risk of famine.
“The aid that’s being sent now makes a mockery of the mass tragedy unfolding under our watch,” Philippe Lazzarini, head of the main U.N. relief organization for Palestinians, said in a message on the social media platform X.
NO BREAD IN WEEKS
The World Food Program said it brought 77 trucks carrying flour into Gaza overnight and early on Saturday and all of them were stopped on the way, with food taken by hungry people.
“After nearly 80 days of a total blockade, communities are starving and they are no longer willing to watch food pass them by,” it said in a statement.
Amjad Al-Shawa, head of an umbrella group representing Palestinian aid groups, said the dire situation was being exploited by armed groups which were attacking some of the aid convoys.
He said hundreds more trucks were needed and accused Israel of a “systematic policy of starvation.”
Overnight on Saturday, he said trucks had been stopped by armed groups near Khan Younis as they were headed towards a World Food Programme warehouse in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza and hundreds of desperate people had carried off supplies.
“We could understand that some are driven by hunger and starvation, some may not have eaten bread in several weeks, but we can’t understand armed looting, and it is not acceptable at all,” he said.
Israel says it is facilitating aid deliveries, pointing to its endorsement of the new GHF distribution centers and its consent for other aid trucks to enter Gaza.
Instead it accuses Hamas of stealing supplies intended for civilians and using them to entrench its hold on Gaza, which it had been running since 2007.
The post Gaza Aid Supplies Hit by Looting as Hamas Ceasefire Response Awaited first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Seeks Changes in US Gaza Proposal; Witkoff Calls Response ‘Unacceptable’
US President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy-designate Steve Witkoff gives a speech at the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena on the inauguration day of Trump’s second presidential term, in Washington, DC, Jan. 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
Hamas said on Saturday it was seeking amendments to a US-backed proposal for a temporary ceasefire with Israel in Gaza, but President Donald Trump’s envoy rejected the group’s response as “totally unacceptable.”
The Palestinian terrorist group said it was willing to release 10 living hostages and hand over the bodies of 18 dead in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons. But Hamas reiterated demands for an end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, conditions Israel has rejected.
A Hamas official described the group’s response to the proposals from Trump’s special Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff as “positive” but said it was seeking some amendments. The official did not elaborate on the changes being sought by the group.
“This response aims to achieve a permanent ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and to ensure the flow of humanitarian aid to our people in the Strip,” Hamas said in a statement.
The proposals would see a 60-day truce and the exchange of 28 of the 58 hostages still held in Gaza for more than 1,200 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, along with the entry of humanitarian aid into the enclave.
A Palestinian official familiar with the talks told Reuters that among amendments Hamas is seeking is the release of the hostages in three phases over the 60-day truce and more aid distribution in different areas. Hamas also wants guarantees the deal will lead to a permanent ceasefire, the official said.
There was no immediate response from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office to the Hamas statement.
Israel has previously rejected Hamas’ conditions, instead demanding the complete disarmament of the group and its dismantling as a military and governing force, along with the return of all 58 remaining hostages.
Trump said on Friday he believed a ceasefire agreement was close after the latest proposals, and the White House said on Thursday that Israel had agreed to the terms.
Saying he had received Hamas’ response, Witkoff wrote in a posting on X: “It is totally unacceptable and only takes us backward. Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week.”
On Saturday, the Israeli military said it had killed Mohammad Sinwar, Hamas’ Gaza chief on May 13, confirming what Netanyahu said earlier this week.
Sinwar, the younger brother of Yahya Sinwar, the group’s deceased leader and mastermind of the October 2023 attack on Israel, was the target of an Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza. Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied his death.
The Israeli military, which relaunched its air and ground campaign in March following a two-month truce, said on Saturday it was continuing to hit targets in Gaza, including sniper posts and had killed what it said was the head of a Hamas weapons manufacturing site.
The campaign has cleared large areas along the boundaries of the Gaza Strip, squeezing the population of more than 2 million into an ever narrower section along the coast and around the southern city of Khan Younis.
Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies entering the enclave at the beginning of March in an effort to weaken Hamas and has found itself under increasing pressure from an international community shocked by the desperate humanitarian situation the blockade has created.
On Saturday, aid groups said dozens of World Food Program trucks carrying flour to Gaza bakeries had been hijacked by armed groups and subsequently looted by people desperate for food after weeks of mounting hunger.
“After nearly 80 days of a total blockade, communities are starving and they are no longer willing to watch food pass them by,” the WFP said in a statement.
‘A MOCKERY’
The incident was the latest in a series that has underscored the shaky security situation hampering the delivery of aid into Gaza, following the easing of a weeks-long Israeli blockade earlier this month.
The United Nations said on Friday the situation in Gaza is the worst since the start of the war 19 months ago, with the entire population facing the risk of famine despite a resumption of limited aid deliveries earlier this month.
“The aid that’s being sent now makes a mockery of the mass tragedy unfolding under our watch,” Philippe Lazzarini, head of the main U.N. relief organization for Palestinians, said in a message on X.
Israel has been allowing a limited number of trucks from the World Food Program and other international groups to bring flour to bakeries in Gaza but deliveries have been hampered by repeated incidents of looting.
A separate system, run by a US-backed group called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, has been delivering meals and food packages at three designated distribution sites.
However, aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF, which they say is not neutral, and say the amount of aid allowed in falls far short of the needs of a population at risk of famine.
Amjad Al-Shawa, head of an umbrella group representing Palestinian aid groups, said the dire situation was being exploited by armed groups which were attacking some of the aid convoys.
He said hundreds more trucks were needed and accused Israel of a “systematic policy of starvation.”
Israel denies operating a policy of starvation and says it is facilitating aid deliveries, pointing to its endorsement of the new GHF distribution centers and its consent for other aid trucks to enter Gaza.
Instead it accuses Hamas of stealing supplies intended for civilians and using them to entrench its hold on Gaza, which it had been running since 2007.
Hamas denies looting supplies and has executed a number of suspected looters.
The post Hamas Seeks Changes in US Gaza Proposal; Witkoff Calls Response ‘Unacceptable’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.