“My initiation into the mysteries of Israeli identity began through Hebrew music.

In the summer of 1982, a few weeks before moving to Israel, I attended a concert in Manhattan by the Israeli band, Habreira Hativit, which literally means “the natural choice” but which the band translated as “the natural gathering,” a more precise description of its essence. They were the first Mizrahi band to break into the mainstream, bringing the devotional music of eastern Jews into the Israeli playlist, a soundtrack for the political revolution that was replacing Labor Ashkenazi Israel with Menachem Begin’s Likud. That was enough to earn the band a central place in Israel’s cultural history. But as I discovered that evening, the agenda of Habreira Hativit was even more ambitious.”

Read the full op-ed on Times of Israel