The same day as the re-opening of the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket in Paris, Israeli music artist Gad Elbaz released an English-language music video shot in the Jewish section of Paris. Dubbed by the Jewish Standard as “a fully remixed and re-imagined version of Hava Nagila – an early Zionist call to optimism,” the video features “crowds of Jews and other Parisians dancing through the city’s Le Marais historic Jewish quarter” to the classic Jewish folk song.
“We chose to record there to march as Jews in pride and with heads uplifted,” said Elbaz. “To say we are here to strengthen the Jews of France and Europe in their spirit and pride, not with protests and cries of war but rather with drums, dance and eternal Jewish singing that has been strengthening our existence for two thousand years of exile.”
Elbaz dons a kippah at the beginning of the video, a notable sign of defiance in the wake of warnings issued against wearing Jewish religious headcoverings in public throughout Europe.
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