"Army Radio reported on Monday that a street naming
committee in the Jerusalem Municipality voted against renaming Eshkol Street to
Rachmo after some residents complained the change could lead authorities to
think they are Arabs. “If you name our street Rachmo, they [the authorities]
will think we are Arabs and delay us at the airport,” a resident of Eshkol
Street reportedly said during a heated debate at the Jerusalem Municipality.
According to the report, the street was to be named Rachmo after legendary
restaurant owner Rachamim Ben-Yosef, whose eponymous eatery “Rachmo,” has become
a Jerusalem landmark. According to the report, the proposed street-name change
lost momentum after one resident wrote in a letter that “the name Rachmo has an
Arab sound to it. It is unacceptable that a street in west Jerusalem should have
an Arab name. During security checks at the airport they ask us our address, and
we if we tell them ‘Rachmo Street’ we will immediately be suspected of being
Arabs and suffer all the delays that result from that.”" (thanks "Ibn Rushd")