00:04on the island close your eyes and listen carefully you can hear the
00:16open it is hebrew language although hebrew is the island's second language it is something
00:22of the israel influencing you kosher restaurants houses stickers of israeli soldiers killed since
00:30october 7th and even the notorious israeli fluorescent ko samui and the neighboring
00:37kofangan are two small islands in thailand that have become the epicenter of rising tension among
00:43israelis some of them tourists some residents of thailand israelis in their essence many times
00:49especially after the army they come like i've come to conquer and the face are very frightened by
00:55this by the loud tone of speaking with the hands this intensity the harsh israeli behavior is more
01:01extreme because it has received legitimacy back home so whoever comes here from the country even
01:08for a visit they already come with heightened israeli aggression
01:23s in a large foreign community escaping a tumultuous region when one walks around the island it is
01:30easy to have sympathy for those dealing with an emerging autonomous zone that can feel alienating
01:35over the past few years in the face of political upheaval economic instability and ultimately the
01:42war many israelis
01:50moved to thailand three families moved to kofangan and i got excited about the idea by the time we
01:56arrived there were already about 300 families they came here in masses and it suddenly turned the
02:01island into such an israeli island that all kinds of beaches no one knew suddenly became beaches where
02:07they put speakers with mizrahi music and played paddle ball despite their aspiration to escape
02:12increasingly the trauma of the war in israel lingers in thailand many of them seem to be haunted by home
02:19like a phantom it is not only their desire to replicate home through communal and culinary experiences
02:25but also their lack of interest in thai society and a constant preoccupation with what is happening over
02:31there it's as if i have a kind of post-trauma from just being an israeli citizen and i'm sure
02:37i'm not
02:37the only one and i'm still a relatively mild case but it affects me i'm less present i'm a worse
02:43father
02:44i want to be a good father to my daughter i raised my children here they don't know sirens or
02:50explosions
02:50they aren't afraid of that if israeli guys are sitting here and there are fireworks people just drop to
02:56the floor with their hands on their heads they are in trauma even though they are 4 000 miles away
03:14i choose to vote because i choose to be part of it and by the fact that i choose to
03:18be part of it
03:19i create a connection even though my vote probably won't influence much
03:23yes because for every one vote of mine there are i don't know 10 votes of haradim or 10 votes
03:28of that
03:28it doesn't matter to me it seems to me that if the government changes in the country there will be
03:33better energy for everyone meaning it will be better here too because this distilled right-wing ideology
03:38is causing damage to the name for others it is the economy or how the results of the election might
03:44affect their future in thailand i want to return to the country but i want to return to a country
03:49where
03:49one can live the economy is very very expensive just like before i left 27 years ago security it
03:56pains me that they didn't finish the job elimination eliminating hamas destroying gaza as far as i'm
04:03concerned it's a mistake that it wasn't done i told my wife with bb in power i'm not coming back
04:12slowly but surely these islands are forced to become a mirror image of israel
04:16a replica facing many of the problems the same paralyzing trauma and division against the wall
04:25oh yeah
