So here’s a weekend story from the city on the hill. The mayor of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat – responsible for the highly controversial building projects in the East of the city – went out to dine at the posh Cavalier restaurant in the city. He was spotted by activists from the Sheikh Jarrah solidarity movement, who decided to combine business with pleasure, and sat down at the outside tables of the nearby Sira pub, one of the left’s most favourite, delightfully scruffy hangouts in the capital. Aside from their well-earned pints, the activists were holding signs protesting Barkat’s policy.

According to a report in Haaretz, their beer evening was soon interrupted by the city’s finest; one of the activists told the paper  the scene was soon graced by “several dozen policemen…  officers, municipal security guards, and the city hall spokeswoman.” The fearsome troop asked the activists at first not to get too close to Barkat’s restaurant; then, asked them to stop making so much noise; and then, overcome by a sudden urge for law enforcement, began pressing at various legal levers that could get the activists out of Barkat’s sight. The first law they chose to enforce was the one banning alcohol consumption under the open sky, and the policemen bravely and quickly evicted all the outdoor tables of the pub. Next, municipal inspectors appeared, and decided to take a sudden interest in the pub’s paperwork – validity of licenses, the works. Finding nothing wrong, they made do with merely continuing to block people from sitting outside – despite the fact, the pub proprietor said, that the establishment has a valid outdoors license. The license’s validity became miraculously relevant again as soon as Barkat has left the next door building.

I’ll buy  beer to whoever sends me a you-tube link describing a similar mob-cop moment from some American gangster movie.