The search for Bernie Sanders’ former kibbutz has apparently heated up in Israel. Ha’aretz reported that the Kibbutz Movement has taken to social media (Facebook to be exact) to generate leads on where the current Democratic presidential candidate might have volunteered in the 1960s. Non-Hebrew speakers can click on Google translate to get some comic suggestions. The crowd might not always have wisdom, but it always has fun.
Alas, my own lead came up dry. An elderly kibbutz researcher I know from Kibbutz Mefalsim (which has many South Americans) recalled an American volunteer on his home kibbutz named “Bernard” (which Sanders went by as a young man). A search through the Mefalsim archives turned up no evidence of Bernie, however.
Still, I want to stake my claim to the Sanders’ Search Reward right now by saying I’m 99% he stayed on Kibbutz Mefalsim!
Of course, the bigger question remains: Why won’t Bernie ‘fess up to the kibbutz where we briefly stayed? What went on there that he wants to hide? Yes, it was the 1960s. We don’t need to stretch our imaginations. Perhaps it was in Israel that he learned to play the bongoes like this…
