HOURS before the start of the Passover holiday this week, a housewife hurried out of a supermarket with a carton of matzo, the unleavened bread eaten to recall the Biblical exodus from Egypt. It was a common scene across Israel as Jews prepared for the ritual Seder dinner—except that this woman was wearing a hijab, a Muslim headscarf, and the market was in Umm al-Fahm, an Arab city where the Jewish population is roughly zero. “My children can’t get enough of it,” she says. “I’ll probably come back for more later this week.”
For many Jews, Israeli and otherwise, the bland, wafer-like flatbread is a religious rite to be endured. Desperate for variety, they crush it into matzo brei, a fried batter mixed with eggs, or top it with cheese and sauce to make an ersatz pizza. When the eight-day festival ends, the leftovers disappear immediately into the cupboard, not to be touched until next spring.
Yet Israeli Arabs, who make up one-fifth of the population, can’t get enough of it. Grocers in Umm al-Fahm started selling matzo in mid-March, nearly a month before the holiday. In Jaffa, a mixed district on the southern tip of Tel Aviv, a few...Continue reading
Source: Middle East and Africa http://ift.tt/2pbU8Wg
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