Wednesday 17 September 2008

Orange trees on the border and death on a checkpoint

The solidarity campaigners, six of which stayed behind in Gaza, keep surprising me with their simple - at least what may seem simple to the observers of events - but effective activism.

I heard they are helping to replant some areas with orange trees on the borders, which the Israeli forces uprooted. Apparently the occupation forces, that forbid farmers from growing anything on their plots, isolate about 24% of the agricultural land in Gaza. These are lands on the borders, which the owners gave up cultivating, as they keep being destroyed by the Israelis.

Locals from the town of Al Fokhari, on the southeastern side of the Gaza strip, talked about how this activism boosted their moral and showed them that some outsiders care about the people of Gaza. http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/066DA418-299E-4C07-A7F9-CF30D2B2E55A.htm (sorry for those of you who can’t read Arabic, I could not find the English translation to the article, however you can have a look at the photos).

This gives me hope that things could be done to support the people of Gaza. The Gazaians, and rightly so, claim more Arab support should come. They must have heard of the Egyptian convoy that was stopped by the Egyptian security en route to Gaza. This must confirm what many are saying about the Egyptian government. They claim it serves the Israeli and American governments’ interests in the region. Some Yemenis are planning to do what the Egyptian failed to achieve during this month of Ramadan.

On the dark side, some kilometres away in another forgotten part of the world, a baby died because of lack of oxygen when trying to be born to this cruel world.

The soldiers did not let the mother, who was in her last stages of labour, and her family pass through a checkpoint to go to hospital because they didn’t have a permit. I felt a stab in my heart when I heard how desperate the father was, when he asked the soldier to have a look at the top part of the baby’s head that was already coming out.

This happened very early one morning, at half one after midnight in Za’atara check point near Nablus. In front of unmoved soldiers who stood there and did nothing in response to the desperate calls for help from the mother and the father. The father even offered the soldier to arrest him and his mother (who was in the car), to let his wife and brother (who also was in the car) pass to go to the hospital.

One of the soldiers was jailed for 14 days and removed to another area. I needn’t be cynical here, but I wonder what massage this could give to soldiers who face similar situations on a daily basis in the West Bank, especially around Nablus, which has been sealed off from the outside world with checkpoints for some time now?

I bet that many of these soldiers would be happy to take a break from this busy and cruel checkpoint. I am also sure the conditions of prison, these soldiers would be put in, are much more humane than the conditions thousands of Palestinian prisoners forced to accept in the Israeli prisons. The sentence, of that soldier, was much more lenient than the sentences given to those who refuse to serve in the occupation forces, who could face months or even years in prison.

The issue of the thousands of Palestinian prisoners (estimated to be 11000) in Israeli prisoners is worth reflecting on in the future. There are underage girls and boys, women and men, of which many have not seen a trial, cramped in horrible conditions without proper food or medical treatment. I never forget the elected MPs and ministers who were kidnapped from their homes and offices and put in prisons! I will tell you in the future about this radio programme dedicated to these prisoners.

Monday 8 September 2008

Halper, anti-semitism, the diving bell and the butterfly…

I mentioned Jeff Halper in a previous post. He was arrested on entry to Israel from the Gaza Strip, after he arrived there with the solidarity boats. In the below link he describes his time in Gaza and in the Israeli prison. http://palestinemonitor.org/spip/spip.php?article624

Since then, some other groups started talking about similar actions. I read of a plan by Egyptian politicians and intellectuals who are organising a trip in their cars to Gaza during the Ramadan month. These people are demanding the opening of the borders with Gaza. They are also accusing their government of being the tail of the Israeli and American policies in the region.

I went to a couple of discussions this weekend on Palestine, held by the Green Party during their annual conference. I could not believe the bullying and intimidation of a small minority of Green Party members who claim that criticism of Israel could be a form of anti-semitism. Fortunately most people in these discussions did not buy to this view, even the Jewish members.

We heard a talk by one of the founders of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign in Britain, who is a Jewish man from Brighton. Another speaker was an editor from Jewish Socialist journal. They both agreed that anti-semitism is a problem for some Jewish communities around the world, but they stressed that it is part of a bigger problem of racism. They admitted that a few of the critics of Israel could be anti-semitic, but the majority of people, who are critical of Israel’s policy and the Zionist movement, do so because they see in Israel as an oppressor controlling the Palestinian population without regards to international law and human rights.

The speakers drew comparisons between the Israeli government actions, and the Apartheid and the Nazi regimes. They stressed that it is important to note the similarities and differences when comparing these regimes. For example, the Israeli policies of segregation embodied by roads only for settlers, and the separation wall are similar in their aim to the Apartheid regime aim’s of segregation from the black community. However, the right wing white party wanted to use the black workforce to their benefits. So in a way it was an industrial policy. The Zionist movement’s main aim, however, was to grab land by uprooting Palestinians from heir homeland without exploiting their work force. As for the Nazi regime, you only have to visit a checkpoint in the West Bank or see the concrete grey wall that is punctured with watchtowers, to understand the comparison. They look just like the images you see of entrances to the concrete walls surrounding the camps in central and eastern Europe of the 1930’s and 40’s.

Far from the world of politics, but not completely unconnected, I want to tell you about a film I watched last week. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, a film based on a book written by Jean-Dominique Bauby, who was an editor in the French Elle magazine before he suffered a stroke. He wrote a book about his experience of the Lock -in syndrome that caused him almost total physical disability. Blinking with the left eye was his only means of communicating with the outside world.

The viewer sees the world from Jean’s eye, and surprisingly the world he sees is a beautiful hopeful world, full of poetry and imagery. He tells us he lost everything but his memory and imagination which set him free like a butterfly. It is a story of human nature and hope. It is a story of compassion and positive human regard.

Jean was a prisoner inside his own body, hence the metaphor of the diving bell, but he also felt like a free butterfly with his memory and imagination. This image brought me home to my own experience. Feeling trapped and unable to control my destiny is a horrible and a claustrophobic feeling. In using my memory and imagination, in dreams and language for instance, I feel free. I feel free to play with my imagination and construct reality according to my views on how the world should be. I dream of revolutions and transformations which make me feel free like a bird. Perhaps Jean -Dominique Bauby chose a butterfly because its life span is shorter than a bird. He died 10 days after the publication of his book.

As for the people of historical Palestine, Israelis and Palestinians, the current reality may make us feel trapped, but we should hold on to our memories and imagination. The memories that made our histories and identities. Memories of homes, friendships and co-existence. Memories of exile, camps, gas chambers, disposition and massacres. Our imagination should lead us to a world of liberty, justice and piece. Imagination that could turn into reality if we remember, acknowledge and forgive.

Monday 1 September 2008

Language

“But what he still wants to do, in whatever form, is tell stories: ones which are true even when they’re not exactly real.” (From an interview with Mike Skinner from the Street. See: guardian.co.uk/film.)

Telling stories is one function language has in our lives. Language is vital in preserving our histories and identities. Through the use of language we tell stories about who we are and what we are here for.

I am reminded of one song my family sang around the kitchen table my auntie was using to make Kubi Neyie (a Palestinian dish using raw mince as its main ingredient). The beginning of one of its verses roughly goes like this: “And we went to Al-Manshyie to eat Kubi Neyie… (for those of you with knowledge of the Palestinian accent of Arabic, there is a rhyme going on between Al- Manshyie and Kubi Neyie).

I recently discovered that Al –Manshyie is actually a name of two villages destroyed and abandoned during the Palestinian Nakbe in 1948. It is common, in Palestine to find two or more towns, often in different parts of the country, with the same name.

This discovery reminded me of the powerful role traditional songs play in peoples’ lives. Words, in songs, can revive the memories of those erased places and displaced people. The song represents the facts that decent people lived in this land. They worked hard to live decent lives, and there were times when they visited each other to celebrate and eat local delicacies.

The other day I was listening to Reem Banna, a Palestinian singer from Nazareth, who sings songs written by local poets including her own mother, Zuhaira Sabbagh. The words written in a poetic language, full of local imagery, smells of flowers and emotion.

These songs made me think of the power language has in this world, and what it means to me. What it means to a person like me who speaks three languages. My mother tongue, my oppressor’s tongue and a third language that belongs to previous oppressors.

I have a love - hate relationship with my oppressor’s language, and at the moment I am in the middle of one of my love phases. I have just finished one novel, and already started the next one. I like the sound of it and its richness, which are in many ways similar to my own language. They both come from the Semitic family.

Using Hebrew, for me, is meeting the oppressor and befriending her/ him. Through her/ his language I can tell her/ him my story and listen to hers/ his. I can learn my acquaintance’s past and present. I can learn about her/ his likes and dislikes and how we could coexist forever.

We can learn how similar we are to each other, but dissimilar in many other ways. A book I am reading at the moment tells a story of people who were made to feel like exiles in their homeland, just like my family who in the 1940’s survived a war that made them an oppressed minority in their own country.

The book was written in Hebrew by an Israeli writer with Iraqi origins, Sammy Michael. The Main Character is Nouri an Iraqi Jewish boy who lived in Baghdad in the 1940’s. Nouri was the name of the boy in my first Arabic schoolbook when I was 7. Nouri, the Arab, lived in Yaffa.

Palm Trees in the Storm tells us the story of a minority who, at the start of the novel, lived happily among the dominant culture. You can hardly tell, from the novel, the difference between the Jewish and the Arabic names.

The Jewish minority progressively began feeling intimated by the Arabic Muslim majority who, according to the book, supported the Nazi’s in Germany. I don’t know much about modern Iraqi history, as we were not taught modern Arabic history at school. Another sign of attempts to erase our history and identities.

It looked bad for the Jews in Iraq during that period. A period in which Iraq was used to settle conflicts between bigger powers (Germany and Britain), not very different from the situation in Iraq or Lebanon today.

Nouri’s family were defiant to survive, and they were one of the lucky ones to do so. However, they suffered losses of neighbours, jobs and properties. Let alone the emotional trauma the war left them with. The story ends when an aunt and uncle, together with their baby son, decided to travel to Eretz Yesrael (the Zionist phrase for historic Palestine), where they hoped to be safe and begin a new life in the land of their ancestors.

In Palestine, at that same period, my grandparents were struggling to live in Haifa, as the Jewish militias approached and started expelling the Palestinian residents. My granddad lost his job in the railways, and my grandmother lost her 13-year-old brother in an attack on a bus.

They decided to move to Nazareth were they started a new life after many losses and after becoming an oppressed minority. They did not have Eretz Yesrael to go to, where they were given all the benefits from the newly formed Israeli government. A government that gives housing benefits, citizenship and many other incentives for all those Jews who wish to ‘ascend’ - The word used to signify a higher better place for the Jews – to Israel.

While Palestinian refugees are banned from their right of return (that a UN resolution gave them). In their own homeland, my family is banned from many jobs. They are banned from acquiring land that belongs to the state (most of it is destroyed villages). My family also bares the emotional and social burdens of isolation, oppression and identifying with the oppressor.

My grandparents, at that time, and until the 60’s were banned from travelling to visit relatives in nearby towns unless they have a special permit. Of course, I am not blaming Nouri’s family or any Jew who suffered in his or her own country and looked for a better place to live in. I believe that all people have the right to live safely anywhere they wish to live. Even Palestine, if all of those who were displaced return, should be a refuge for all: Jews, Arabs and others.

What I am doing here, is pointing out to the importance of language to me. Through the words of this novel, I was able to know some of my oppressors’ stories. The words made me empathise and identify with them. The novel made me realise how similar we are to each other, but also it made me realise that our destinies were different.

This is my personal experience of language, or more accurately, languages. But it comes from a long world tradition of using language to tell about everyday realities, and create reality to help us bear this world, which at times can get too much.

I note the works of Kafka, to Darwish, to Elias Khoury, and musicians such the likes of L. Cohen and M. Khalifie. Yes and Mike Skinner, together with all the decent musicians and writers in the West. Those who use language and tell stories that are true, but not necessary real.

Perhaps, I am trying to tell you that I will be attempting to do just this in by blog. I want to use language to relieve my pain and, in my own way, create my own reality and make the world a better place to live in.

This sounds like an idealistic, and perhaps, unrealistic fantasy, but it makes me hope for a better future. I will let this fantasy stay in my thoughts and help it evolve on it’s own pace.

Language is not only an evidence of the past. It makes me live in the here and now. Through language I can name my present emotions and thoughts. In words I can describe my inner and outer experiences. In words I can live the moment and become more aware of my own truth, that is not always possible or real.

Language is also a way to look at our future. If we wish, it could be a future of justice, equality and peace for all.

Thursday 28 August 2008

Solidarity

During the last weekend, I was looking hard for any news about the two boats that sailed to Gaza to deliver some aid and express solidarity with the largest number of prisoners in the world. Some reported the event which, in my opinion deserved a larger cover. See:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/aug/22/israelandthepalestinians?gusrc=rss&feed=uknews

See also: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7579502.stm

Aljazeera and Al-Ayyam (an independent Palestinian daily) did follow the story though. For those of you who read Arabic see: http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/6C83F205-2BAD-4AD3-8469-88A06078FFD1.htm

And:

http://www.al-ayyam.ps/znews/site/template/Doc_View.aspx?did=92312&Date=8/27/2008

For English see:

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/08/20088231408112340.html

The two vessels sailed from Cyprus and carried medical aid and 46 activists from a range of countries, ages and backgrounds: including a holocaust survivor, a Catholic nun and Tony Blair’s sister in law (Cherie Booth’s half sister). The Israeli government threatened to stop them reaching Gaza’s waters which are controlled by the occupying forces, but they did arrive in the end. However, Jeff Halper, form The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), was arrested by the Israeli Police on his way back to his home in Al Quds / Jerusalem. A Palestinian with an Israeli passport was forced not to join the boats because he and his family, who lives in the West Bank, received threats.

In addition to the practical aid for the deaf that these boats were transporting, it was a symbol of breaking the blockage that the Israeli government and the international community embossed on this narrow strip of land. The isolated Gazans welcome any outsiders who can show some sympathy to their situation, which is getting worse every day despite the recent ceasefire and the promises of easing the blockage which have not been fulfilled.

In a recent visit to Beit Hanina (a northern suburb of Al Quds) I was encouraged to visit nearby Ramallah which is just 20 minutes drive from there, pass the apartheid wall and the Qalandia check point which looked like an entrance to a concentration camp. I drove there with two friends in a car with an Israeli number, which apparently is illegal. People were very welcoming and seemed so keen to show outsiders their city which they are proud of. The hustle and bustle of Ramallah seemed resilient to the long years of cruel occupation and all that comes with it: restrictions of movements, intimidation, violence, economic difficulties and isolation.

We visited Al Muqataa (Palestinian Authority Presidential head quarters), ate lunch which included “the best falafel I ever had” as my friend put it, and got a photograph in a photo studio of the three of us as a souvenir. However, we didn’t get the chance to taste the famous Rukab ice cream.

To me this visit meant that occupation can be challenged by us, normal people who want justice and freedom for all. In this visit we gave some hope for the people of Ramallah that the outside world still thinks of them, just like the message to the people of Gaza the 47 solidarity activists brought with them on two humble boats.

Wednesday 27 August 2008

Propaganda and racism

Talking to friends about the strong propaganda element of the recent Olympics in China, I realised that propaganda can take many different forms and it exists everywhere in the world, including Britain.

Wikipidia defines propaganda as “a concerted set of messages aimed at influencing the opinions or behaviors of large numbers of people. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense presents information in order to influence its audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or gives loaded messages in order to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the cognitive narrative of the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda. Propaganda is the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist”. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

Propaganda in other parts of the world may not be as obvious as the case in China, where there is a propaganda minister who promotes the single party government’s line and punishes everyone who has a different opinion.

In Britain it is more descised. The Research, Information and Communication Unit (RICU) of the Home Office will soon be dispatching some propaganda material to government offices, embassies and media outlets to convince people Al Qaida is in decline. See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/aug/26/alqaida.uksecurity

From media outlets to local government and central government, we see common views and concerted set of messages on many subjects, such as drugs and immigration. People who don’t hold these views are sidelined and marginalised.

I remember one day expressing my opinion on the very strong campaign lead by the media on the storey of Madeleine McCann, who went missing in Portugal last year. As often the case, my opinion on the subject was different from most people around me. I was a sympathiser but thought this coverage wouldn’t be the same if the girl’s life circumstances were different, that is: if she comes from a different socio-economic group with less power and money, and was less blond and pretty. My colleagues who I discussed this with, thought I was ‘callous’.

Some more examples of this propaganda game: The Independent newspaper campaign against Cannabis, the tabloids assault on immigrants without documents, and the very recent Team GB ‘made us proud’ campaign lead by the London Mayor, the PM and most of the media outlets. I was appalled of the amount of coverage which made people feel there is nothing else in the world we need to worry about.

Talking to the same group of friends this weekend, I told them about my recent trip to the Middle East, and how most people we met were so open about their discrimination against other groups of society.

I was telling them about how in most conversations, we had in the Holy Lands, people had to make sure they put down people of other religious or racial backgrounds. From cousins who called Muslims cows, to a seven year old boy who was scared of Arabs who live in the woods to a taxi driver who told us that Christian Arabs have a better mentality, than the Muslim Arabs.

One friend responded with a relief that “at least here in the West people are not that racist”. He continued that only very few people with extreme right wing opinions can be racist. The rest of us did not agree with his assessment of the situation. One of us said to him that people are cautious of using non Politically Correct language but they may hold racist views expressed in ways not very obvious to us. Another friend told us of his colleagues in the office that hold some racist views against Minority Ethnic groups.

I was reminded of my cousin who lives in a North European country who was born to a European mother. He told Eastern European workers to “go home” in an argument he had with them. His dad’s European girlfriend could not understand how her country gives “everything” to Iraqi refugees but they don’t have any desire to “integrate” into their new society in return. She was talking of a couple in their sixties who don’t speak any language but Arabic, and were forced to leave their home because of war and violence that were caused by the occupation of Iraq, which this Northern European country’s government supported. I did ask her to imagine her parents, who do not speak any language but their own, forced to leave their home. Would it be easy for them to adapt to a new way of life forced on them?

A very recent cruel murder of a student from Qatar in Hastings (see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/aug/27/ukcrime.race) is a reminder to us that racism is rife in the, allegedly non racist and politically correct land of Europe.

I do have many other stories of non tolerance against other different groups of society here in the West. The Queer communities (people who don’t conform to the mainstream love and sexual life styles), which by now after the introduction of the civil partnership, you would expect society to tolerate more. I am sure I will come to them in later entries and give them the space they deserve.

Tuesday 26 August 2008

Stereotypes and language

I recently read a newspaper headline about a report written by MI5 on stereotyping terror suspects in the UK (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/aug/20/uksecurity.terrorism1) . It discussed the inaccurate profiling of the typical terrorists who is a single mad man from Asian background who’s in his 20’s. They stressed that terror suspects can come from diverse backgrounds and they’re not madder than the average population.

People who get involved in extremist activities, according to this report, may be married with children. They could be not that committed to Islam. They could come from White British, British African, or British Caribbean backgrounds.

I have been stressing out about how the media, the government and society in general create these generalised images of terror suspects, which I believe could lead to more intolerance of the Muslim communities in the UK.

I always stress out but rarely do something about my destress. I wait, often very long time, until someone else challenges these stereotypes. My surprise was that it was a governmental body that did it. I am yet to see this translated into action.

Language can manipulate our thoughts and beliefs in ways we are not necessarily aware of. The language, used by media outlets, on the IsraelPalestine conflict is one good example.

A journalist called Seth Freedman:(http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/21/israelandthepalestinians.middleeast ) , who had served in the Israeli Army, was recently describing a visit to a Palestinian family in the West Bank town of Nilin. This town together with others have been leading the way in peaceful protests lead by civil organisations against the apartheid wall.

Freedman was watching the Al Aqsa (aliened to Hamas) channel reporting on the violence of some illegal settlers against the Palestinian population, which included firing a rocket into a Palestinian town. He was reflecting on how the report’s language was so different than what we are used to in the Western media.

The use of words such as colonisers (instead of settlers), the occupied forces (instead of the Israeli Defence Forces) and apartheid wall (instead of the security barrier) which depict a more accurate picture of what is happening in historic Palestine, is so controversial here in the West.

Some Jewish organisations complain that the BBC is more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, despite its use of language that is used by the Israeli government to descise the facts on the ground.

That’s another thing I used to stress about all the time but never did anything about. And here comes this journalist and describes the topicin a fair way. Who knows? Maybe through this blog I will start some attempts to challenge language used by the mainstream media, which could lead to people being misinformed .

Introduction to Yalo

Yalo – 21/08/2008

The idea of this blog started one evening after a therapy session. I was wondering what I should do to improve my tolerance to difference, and contribute to a world that tolerates difference better.

As someone who felt not at home wherever I went because of the differences I have from the cultures around me, my “life is all about reconciling differences “ (as my therapist put it).

Through this blog I would like to be able to reflect on my thoughts and feelings on many topics I feel inspired by. This will be for self-reflection as well as sharing my thoughts with others.

I am hoping to be commenting on news items, cultural events, books, films, arts and some personal events.

To write in a blog is like writing a letter and placing it on a worldwide town square where it could sit there and decay forever. A passer by who had some time to spare could come across it, and she/ he could be inspired, appalled or just entertained by what she /he sees. She / he could post a comment to me to share her feelings and thoughts about what I write.

How will a blog reconcile difference?

Information, I believe, is the engine of tolerance, while ignorance or misinformation is the fuel to fear and the excluding of the ‘other’.

In this blog, I will attempt to reflect on things around me to expand my knowledge of my ‘self’ (own identities, internal world, and social groups I identify with) and the ‘other’ (people that may be different to me in their culture, race, sexuality, age...etc). I will try to inform the readers of events and opinions which they may not encounter in many other places.

I decided to call it Yalo after the main character in the novel, with the same name, by Elias Khoury.

He was a very different person living in Beirut, the mother of cities where differences between residents are often seen as extremely hard to reconcile.