The Brewish State: Israel’s craft beer bazaar

It’s widely known that Israel has penetrated the wine market, with some of its sophis-ticated Israeli blends surpassing historically excellent wines from areas such as the Napa Valley or Bordeaux. But what about beer? 

For decades, Israel has offered solely the Maccabi and Nesher brands. Not anymore.

“There is a huge push of people making beer at home. The country is approaching over 30 craft breweries in the last year or two, making nearly 200 beers,” says Avi Moskowitz, owner and founder of Beer Bazaar, Israel’s latest brewery and bar, which is located in Jerusalem’s Shuk Mahane Yehuda.

An immigrant entrepreneur and start-up aficionado, Moskowitz says making craft beer is like working in a laboratory, something Israelis are accustomed to. But brewing beer is also quick — one can brew a keg in a couple of days — and that’s ideal for the stereotypically impatient Israeli.

“You can tinker with it and come up with so many flavors. There is no limit to what you can do with beer,” Moskowitz says..

Indeed, Israeli beer makers are tapping into this market.

The first microbrewery in the area was actually opened by a Palestinian in 1995 in the village of Tayibe. But a low marketing budget and restrictions on alcohol in Islamic culture prevented the beer of the Taybeh Brewing Company (taybeh meaning “delicious”) from successfully penetrating the marketplace until around 2000. 

In 2006, New York native David Cohen opened Israel’s first microbrewery, Dancing Camel. Cohen says he started brewing beer in the 1980s in his home. He kept up the passion through his aliyah in 2003, and today owns one of the most successful breweries in Tel Aviv. 

“From the beginning, the focus was to whenever possible use local ingredients, spices and fruits that would give the beers an Israeli accent, that they could be identified as Israeli beer,” Cohen says.