אם אין תור ארוך, נמשיך ישר עד הבנק.

there is no

Breakdown of אם אין תור ארוך, נמשיך ישר עד הבנק.

• אם: if
• בנק: bank
• ישר: straight

Questions & Answers about אם אין תור ארוך, נמשיך ישר עד הבנק.

What does אם mean here?

Here אם means if.

So the sentence starts with a condition:

• אם אין תור ארוך = If there isn’t a long line
• נמשיך ישר עד הבנק = we’ll continue straight to the bank

A learner should also know that אם can sometimes mean whether in other sentences, but here it is clearly the conditional if.

Why does the sentence use אין and not לא for there isn’t?

In Hebrew, אין is the normal way to say there is no / there isn’t / there aren’t.

So:

• אין תור ארוך = there is no long line / there isn’t a long line

By contrast, לא is used mainly to negate verbs:

• לא נמשיך = we will not continue

So a very important distinction is:

• אין = negates existence
• לא = negates an action or verb

Why is there no separate word for there is or there are in אין תור ארוך?