It’s time once again to celebrate the unofficial High Holy Day for Bay Area Jews: “Israel in Gardens.” The annual event is back, just in time to get everyone in the swing of summer and feeling great about Israel.
After last year’s turn at SBC Park, the daylong party returns to Yerba Buena Gardens in downtown San Francisco. As much as we love the ballpark, we’re happy about the venue change. The gardens provide a more intimate setting. Moreover, unlike last year, there’s no admission charge, which makes “Israel in the Gardens” accessible to all.
Organizers promise more than just more of the same. In addition to the great music, delicious food, Israeli products for sale, kid’s activities and community booths we know and love, “Israel in the Gardens” will offer some new twists this year. The Israeli fashion show, the Israeli film festival and the joint American-Israeli storytelling are only a few of the new attractions adding to the variety.
If all of this seems like hawking, it is. We have no hesitation urging all Jews in the region to turn out to this event in force. Not only is “Israel in the Gardens” a uniquely fun family event, it is arguably our community’s most visible moment on the secular calendar.
There is no way to minimize the importance of just being seen.
The Bay Area is home to a multiverse of competing ethnicities and interest groups, some of whom are not shy about voicing a hatred of Israel. Those routine marches down Market Street led by viciously anti-Israel groups like International ANSWER and (International Solidarity Movement) are depressing enough.
We need to show the world the size and strength of our pro-Israel local Jewish community. And that’s one thing “Israel in the Gardens” accomplishes year after year.
Not only does the event show the outside world what we’re all about, it shows the inside world as well. Strolling across the lawn of Yerba Buena, being one in a sea of smiling Jewish faces, we reinforce our own deep connections with the global Jewish community.
Walk the gardens this year and you’ll hear English, Hebrew, Russian and Spanish spoken. Maybe –– if you’re lucky –– you’ll even hear some Yiddish or Ladino. The fact is, it just feels good to be among so many Jews. The festival is the next best thing to walking down Dizengoff or Ben Yehuda Street.
So mark your calendars right now, block out the time and come spend the day at “Israel in the Gardens” on Sunday, June 5. It’s our day in the sun.
CopyrightJ, the Jewish news weekly of Northern California