However do we really need a whole article in Le Monde over this matter?
"It’s been 30 years since the French pharmacist Joel Dreyfuss moved to the Holy City after his first 20 years in Strasbourg, in eastern France. He had quite a revealing experience when he was back last summer visiting the French Alsace region, and went out shopping. He found himself demanding something with an “I want…” like a true Israeli, and thus was denied his request by a local shopkeeper. He also got a good lecturing to: “Here Sir we say “hello”, “please”, “thank you” and “goodbye””. Joel Dreyfuss was stunned: “That’s when I realized how rude I had become!”
It may begin with the language itself. Linguists will explain that while both English and Hebrew (unlike French and other Latin languages) have no current distinction between the formal and informal “you,” English is technically missing the informal use of the word – and Hebrew has no formal “you.”This bears consequences: no social barriers, no signs of respect and no real popular notions of politeness and courtesy. In schools, teachers have given up: students don’t say hello, they do not ask permission to speak, or to rise from their chair. In fact, they copy their elders: in shops, most Israelis shout and shove people aside to cut their place in line.
The newly arrived European and Ashkenazi Jewish women get used to it: no one will hold the door for them, no one will let them go first, and people on the street
