There are approximately 30 Alaskan Yupik (yes, they are Eskimos!) words for snow and its various formats. That means that when Eskimos are discussing the winter weather they have at least 30 words on hand to make their point. If you want to discuss snowflakes or fine snow with rain particles, there are several options for making yourself understood. Talk about leaving no room for misunderstanding:
"Yes Atka, I know I said I would bring my dog sled and come visit you today but the forecast is calling for falling snow that has rain particles in it which will eventually get a crusty top layer when it is no longer freshly fallen, so I cannot come. Maybe tomorrow, when the snow cornices are about to collapse and all threats of severe blizzard snow has passed to the East, then I will try again."
There you go. Perfectly clear.
So why is it, that in the 152nd largest country in the world, where there are more than eight million people often crammed into unreasonably small areas, there is absolutely no Hebrew concept of personal space? In all fairness there is an actual phrase -- merachev ishi -- which means personal space, but no one who has lived here for very long knows what it is.
I am going to pause here for a moment so that you can think about the dilemma. Trust me, I tried to understand it, but I could not come up with even one reasonable answer. Take your time.
(doe a dear a female dear, ray a drop of golden sun, me a name I call myself, fa..... I am just amusing myself while you think)
So, now you know. There is no good reason why Israelis do not understand the concept. The country may be very small and many places are very cramped (like the Kotel on Tisha B'Av, Holy Bagel immediately after Tisha B'Av, the cell phone depots five minutes before the doors open in the morning, Park Ra'anana on Yom Ha'atzmaut, and the grocery stores hours before Rosh HaShana) but anyone with half a brain knows to avoid those locations.
If you go to an outdoor banking machine at a busy time of day you can rest assured that the person standing behind you in line believes that standing six inches behind you is enough to give you the perception of privacy -- and yet gives them a good enough view of the screen so that if you hesitate when entering your data, they can promptly give you advice on what you are doing wrong.
If you are standing in front of the selection of dried fruit in a cramped health food store and they want to get past (preferably with a full knapsack in tow) you to the nuts, then they can just squeeze between you and the display -- which is only six inches from your face -- without saying excuse me, knocking you over or even consider walking behind you.
If you are in line to pay at the grocery store and the customer behind you either notices something desirable in your cart or thinks that an item you are placing on the conveyor belt is not good for you or can be purchased elsewhere for less money, then they have no hesitation in sharing that information with you.
And if you are on the street and someone approaches you for any sort of conversation, they are not going to start speaking to you until the two of you are almost nose-to-nose. In my case that is often nose-to-chest, but you know what I mean. Why start a conversation if you cannot see the whites of the other person's eyes, not to mention the stye on his or her left eye lid?
I think the differences between the Eskimos use of language and the Israelis use of language could be called linguistic relativism. Eskimos will go to great lengths using additional suffixes and prefixes to make themselves understood. Israelis really only use words when the flailing of their arms, rolling their eyes, clickingi/tisking their tongues, shrugging their right shoulder ever so slightly, or other aggressive body actions fail to communicate their point.
It's very telling that the first person to discuss this concept (no, I didn't invent it) was a man names Willhelm Von Humbolt in the 19th century and he saw language as the expression of the spirit of a nation. Of course he did; Israel didn't exist at the time and the Israeli non-verbal communication spirit --executed within centimeters of your face -- had not yet been born.
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