At the heart of the ethos of israel in its first decades is this idea of the qibuts, which is a communal farm. And that kibot's leadership, the founding leadership of the country, is discredited by the yonkipor war. Part of it is that the world changes. So the communal ideals of communism or a, even the sixties, had a kind of communal feel to them. But i agree that this is still a much more communal place than the united states.
In October 1973, an unhappy Leonard Cohen was listening to the radio on his Greek island home when he heard that Israel was at war. He headed to Tel Aviv, exchanging a personal and creative crisis for a national one. Absent a plan and even a guitar, Cohen wound up serenading Israeli soldiers at the front. Journalist Matti Friedman talks about his book Who by Fire with EconTalk host Russ Roberts and explains how a songwriter and a nation were transformed in the crucible of war.