These Teens Don’t Want Your Pity

Image by Tomer Appelbaum
Crossposted from Haaretz
The curtain rises on a teen in a wheelchair, an escort beside him. Evyatar Banai’s song “Yesh Li sikui” (“I have a Chance” ) plays in the background. The teen says: “I’m standing here today, but not everyone is standing with me; there are some who are different.”

Image by Tomer Appelbaum
Very soon the audience watching the performance of “Na Lashevet” (“Please be Seated”) understands that the intention is not to arouse pity, but also not to make them feel comfortable.
An actor on a wheelchair suddenly bursts onto the stage and shouts: “Hello, hello! What is all this nonsense? Clear the stage! You,” he indicates the musician, “stop playing your whining songs. Lights, put on more lights! If any of you expected a performance with violins, moments of poetry and feeling – sorry, you’ll be disappointed. There won’t be any dribbling children with a melancholy look. So swallow your saliva. Those of you who can, relax in your chairs, whether they’re mechanized or not. We’re starting!”
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 3
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 4
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ includes 17% tariffs on Israeli imports, even as Israel cancels tariffs on US goods
-
Fast Forward Hillel CEO says he shares ‘concerns’ over campus deportations, calls for due process
-
Fast Forward Jewish Princeton student accused of assault at protest last year is found not guilty
-
News ‘Qatargate’ and the web of huge scandals rocking Israel, explained
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.