Pesach…someone would come into the Wadi with a truck with boiling water. They would dunk all the cooking pots they cooked in, the pots…they would put it into it, to boil it…boil it in boiling water. That’s how they would be made kosher for Pesach. We would do the holidays very nicely. The holiday was very beautiful. The whole family would meet, all the children, (more) children, (more) children and (more) children. We would wait for the Pesach and Rosh HaShana holidays. We would be maybe 30-40 people. It was very beautiful. And we would sing the Pesach Hagada. They would begin it in Hebrew and after they would say it in Arabic. I can tell you…like “one is Gd”, the would sing “Allah hu Allah hu la illah illahu”. It was very….beautiful. And we felt…and we left, and we came here. And all the time my family would reminisce about Lebanon. We were forced to leave, like everyone left in the end. Some left by force. I mean, things happened…thank Gd nothing happened to us. We left in time. In the year…we kept […]. The Lebanese Jews travelled and emigrated, and started wanting to marry the daughters off. Someone would come living in Mexico, one lived in…they tried….they wanted to only marry each other to preserve the Lebanese traditions and upbringing. And…it was very important, till today. Then we left and lived in Brooklyn. I returned to (be) with the community. And we got involved with them again, and the children got to know the community more. Because here we weren’t…we weren’t with the community. We (Lebanese Jews in Israel) were very few because everyone who came settled in Bat Yam, in Ramat HaNasi. We lived in Herzliya. The whole family is all over the world and our friends are all over the world. And I communicate with all of them. I was in Mexico, I was in every place…I knock on the doors and say “hi, coucou!”. And afterwards, I arranged a meeting with all my friends from my class. I made a meetup for them here in Israel. I organised an outing for them on two Fridays. And we sang our school sings we used to sing…we would sing before leaving the class. We would sing…in French and in Arabic we would sing the Lebanese national anthem. And that of Syria - I don’t know why.

As I said before, my dad worked at a bank - an Algerian company. At two, or two thirty, he would leave work and go to Boulous Fraire on the Normandy hill. They sold electronics there. And at night, he would accompany mom to the club. The club was open every day from Sunday to Thursday from four o’clock. Women would go there to play cards. They would get dolled up, dressed, do their hair, put on blush, and be tip top. High heels and handbags, everything tip top like Lebanese women. And the men would accompany them too. They would all be sitting together and play a card game, tell jokes and coming home. On Saturday night we would go have dinner with dad at the restaurant, and on Sunday we would also spend time with them. And on summer holidays, the three months of the of summer, we would go out to Hamdoun and Aley. Some of the Jews in Hamdoun and some in Aley. Some would be at the beach and on the weekend would go out to the mountains. And all the Jews would do that together, and the neighbourhood together. In Beirut, Wadi Abu Jmil, there are no remnants (of Jewish life) other than the Great Synagogue. But in Hamdoun there are still a few remnants. The road to […]. Then…the woman did not work (in those days). Very few would work. You could count the girls, very few would work. But my mother would teach at the American University, teaching English. And she would swim, do swimming competitions. And she won three times - twice in Beirut and once in Syria. They took her to a pool in Syria. It was before (19)48. That’s the story they told me about them. She had…she was number one in swimming. We would go to the beaches often. And we would meet there at the beach […], we would meet the Christian families who were from the Phalanges. Pierre Gemayel, doctor Fattal. All of those people would come. We were with them…they were very good relations between the Jews and…even with Muslims. We had Muslim friends, everything was good. After that, after the Six Day War, things changed. The beach…we would all meet, all the Jews, was Long Beach. Every day we would leave the hose at seven in the morning, until nine at night when it closed. We would spend every day, every day, every day at the beach, all of us together, the children. And the mothers would also meet there and play cards…in French, [other names]. And we would…be together. And […] together from the house. Very, very beautiful memories.