Ronit Vered schreibt in der Wochenendbeilage von Haaretz über das Restaurant Majda in der Nähe von Jerusalem – und über sein Ende, vielleicht / wohl nicht das einzige, das zu Ende geht …

„On the last Saturday of June, the Majda restaurant outside Jerusalem closed its doors for the last time, 14 years after it opened. „Summer 2024, the last meal,“ a note atop that day’s menu stated. And at the bottom of the changing, seasonal menu, penned as always in Michal Baranes‘ lovely handwriting: „Majda is closing at the end of this week. Thanks to all the good people who accompanied us over all the years. In the end things will be good. Yakub and Michal.

I too came to take leave of Majda, located in the Arab village of Ein Rafa, west of the capital. From the place, from the people, from the food. On the table in the beautiful garden – a green, tangled Eden of wild, decorative and edible vegetation – the waiter placed a jug of cold water, and on the neck of a bottle of rosé, which Yaakov Barhum makes himself from the grapes of a vine he planted in the yard, beads of moisture glistened in the heat of the day. On the plate of gazpacho made from red-yellow tomatoes, the foliage of the trees played games of light and shade, flitting between ice cubes and puddles of olive oil.

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„It’s very likely that the leaving tendency – or the attempt to move the center of one’s activity abroad – will only gather momentum. An end to the war is not looming on the horizon, and in contrast to previous rounds of fighting, the trauma will not make it possible to repress easily the fragmentary nature of the ability to maintain a stable, tranquil life here. The state creates difficulties for the food and restaurant industries here even in times of calm – in the form of draconian regulations, rigid kashrut laws and the high cost of living.


Living eternally by the sword and the absence of foreign tourists, an important element in the thriving of a restaurant scene, are death blows to an industry that has already found it difficult to stay afloat in recent years. It’s hard to blame those who are looking for other places in which they and their children can enjoy a life of sanity, but also where they can realize professional dreams and make an honorable living.“