Ha'aretz Roasted Online For "Iconic Israeli Street Food" Story Fail

I'm not sure what the folks at Ha'aretz were thinking earlier this week or how they thought their story on "shawarma, the iconic Israeli street food" would play out, but the results when they proclaimed the results are pretty much what you might expect. The jokes pretty much write themselves.

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Iconic Israeli 😂 street food😂😂😂 holy crap batman.. the jokes keep on rolling out of this one! Must be like KFC the iconic Japanese sushi roll😂😂😂

— Babber Raja (@Babber_Raja) January 8, 2019

not only stealing lands.. but also traditions and food !

— sunshine (@sunshineonmoon1) January 9, 2019

Haaretz : "Shawarma, the Appropriated Arab Street Food, Is Making an Overly Priced Comeback in Tel Aviv."

Shawarma itu #kuliner asli #Palestina. pic.twitter.com/jC45GjQl7x

— NokishitaIchiza | 一座軒下 (@nokishitaichiza) January 10, 2019

Feijoada, the iconic russian street food, is slowly making a comeback in Moscow.

— Rocco (@municionx) January 8, 2019

Cheeseburger, the iconic Indian food, is making a comeback in New Delhi.

— کمونیست (@wazzamata) January 9, 2019

Didn’t know that shawarma is Polish food 🤨

— Faowaz Al-shammary (@faowaz) January 10, 2019

Of course, there is the possibility that Ha'aretz just has a different definition of "iconic" than most people. We know that the Israeli government and media for the first part doesn't understand the meaning of apartheid and oppression, so perhaps it's just something that got lost in translation.

Is iconic the Israeli word for stolen?

— Squirrel of Doom 🐿 (@squirrel_doom) January 9, 2019

Is apartheid, the Iconic Israeli means of oppression also making a comeback to the West Bank and Gaza?

— dwd.yns (@PineapplePaki) January 9, 2019

The incident even inspired the use of a hashtag #FreeShawarma used along with the #FreePalestine hashtag.

WTF did you just say Haaretz??

We are not doing anything for #Palestine, but don 't you dare touch our #Shawarma#FreeShawarma#ShawarmaIntifada https://t.co/iuV31nyzWA

— SyriansRISE_UP (@SyriansRISE_UP) January 8, 2019

Dear @FoodNetwork : Shawarma is not Israeli. It's stolen. Like the land. #FreePalestine #FreeShawarma pic.twitter.com/YApiMmuj53

— Amer Zahr (@AmerZahr) September 14, 2017

Then there were some folks who were just picking fun at the ridiculous nature of Ha'aretz's attempt to claim shawarma as authentic Israeli cuisine.

"Pizza, the iconic Chinese street food, is slowly making a comeback in Beijing"

— Supreme Hakim🇱🇧🇸🇾 (@PhoenicianState) January 8, 2019

they colonizing our food too

— AYCE // CLEAN🤙🏽 (@aycemalik2) January 8, 2019

Tabouleh, the iconic Israeli food. Kafta, the iconic Israeli food. Pizza, the iconic Israeli food. Hamburger, the Iconic israeli food. Hot Dog, the other iconic Israeli food. Shitopeemix, the iconic Israeli food.

— JMO (@jewchrishlim) January 8, 2019

and Hummus is a traditional Thai food making a comeback in Damascus...

— Sam Ka7il (@SKa7il) January 8, 2019

Some commenters even referred to the piece as "hasbara" a Hebrew word referring to propaganda and applied to those who employ propaganda by commenting, editing Wikipedia and other ways to affect public opinion.

Other tweets and comments at the Facebook page were more politically motivated with some users calling for BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) of Israel.

Haaretz, this is repugnant Hasbara and attempted gastronomic theft. Shawarma is Middle Eastern. It wasn't invented by Israelis. גנבה גסטרונומית דוחה.

— Ofer Neiman (@ofer_n) January 8, 2019

yeah come back after it disappeared in 1948? hmmm I wonder how that happened? #BDS

— اسطفان (@Zghartawi) January 8, 2019

More than a few folks pointed out that it takes the idea of "cultural appropriation" further than some might have considered possible. There are those who consider white people doing yoga or serving burritos and fajitas a form of cultural appropriation. I can't agree there as "appropriation" means to take someone from someone else. In the case of Israel, however, the attempt at spinning a narrative that they were responsible for hummus, couscous, tabbouleh and shawarma is laughable at best.

To be fair, it's not just Israel that's done this. My mom saw tabbouleh for sale at a grocery store being sold under the name "Israeli salad." She pointed out it might be more apt to call it an "Arabic salad" but apparently whoever was working at the time didn't quite get the reference.

This is like the highest level of cultural appropriation I've ever seen.

— TØM CΛT (@TomtheBasedCat) January 8, 2019

:Always lying😤.This coverage goes to show how complicit you are with the apartheid regime.This isn’t only gastronomic theft and cultural appropriation, it is Occupiers's way of erasing the indigenous people’s culture and ethnicity.https://t.co/oZX3Dc4N2z

— محمد بشير (@mohamedbesher_) January 10, 2019

Israel: The world champion of cultural appropriation.

— lexicon Road (@LexiconRoad) January 10, 2019

A few folks weighed in on possible reasons for this. One theory that came up a few times was the possibility that Israel steals other regional cultures' foods and other aspects of their way of life because they don't really have one of their own.

Israel has no identity, the only thing she knows best is stealing others identities. Since when shawerma is an Israeli food? Or, could the European Ashkenazi brought it with them from Europe?

— Tuff Blue 🌀 (@TuffBlue) January 9, 2019

Falestini food not Israelis or they want now to steal our recepie after steal our land

— Zoila Juma Yacoub (@JumaZoila) January 8, 2019

When Israelian don't know what to steel next pic.twitter.com/0oMktumxMT

— Zez B (@zez_b) January 9, 2019

It’s not Israeli. So very few things are Israeli. Apart from war crimes of course. They have lots of those.

— booksvcigs (@booksvcigs) January 9, 2019

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Whatever it was they were shooting for, they missed the mark. In fact, I haven't seen such hilarious unintended consequences come out of Israel since their PR stunt painting a jet pink for breast cancer awareness raised more awareness about the medical crisis Palestinians and Jews living in the occupied territory of the West Bank are facing.

At Twitter, the article received 46 comment replies. Not a lot unless you compare that to the typical engagement on their Twitter page. As a for instance, you would have to add the replies to the last 28 tweets on their timeline to equal the amount of engagement there.

At Facebook, the deluge of negative comments reached nearly 900 total. Some of the top comments there were some real hits and hilarious hot takes there as well.

"Clearly 'Shawarma' is Hebrew for 'I'm stealing your food.'" "Do they even know how to pronounce shawarma? This is a new level of pathetic! Trying over and over to steal people's culture cause u don't have one of your own! Assholes." "Gefilte fish delicacy makes its way back to the streets of Jerusalem. Says no one EVER." "They don't get food, so they have to steal food. Why else would they need $38b over ten years from the US?" the only "iconic israeli street food" is rubber bullets with a topping of white phosphorus. Your delusional state is quite frightening honestly."



Oh well, I suppose if Oscar Wilde is right they're on to something as, "there is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." Considering the lack of engagement on their Facebook and Twitter feed for the average story is nothing or next to nothing. Apart from the shawarma story, the only recent post with nearly as much engagement was a story about potential UFOs with 69 replies. I guess whatever works, right?

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