Next Year in al-Quds

Oly Food Co-op Annual Meeting Report

2010-11-07T20:55:00.000-08:00

So, a friend and I attended the Olympia Food Co-op's (OFC) annual meeting today. The meeting was generally quite well run.

However, at the outset, there was an earnest apology for selecting a venue that was not accessible for people who cannot climb a long flight of stairs. A site inspection should have been conducted before the meeting location was finalized. There was an effort to accommodate people who could not climb the stairs but that left them in another place linked by a video feed--a poor substitute for actually being at the meeting.

Another more minor shortcoming was in monitoring the length of board candidates' speeches. Each board candidate was allotted three minutes to address the membership. The thirty-second warning and time expiration notice were basically whispered to the candidates. Those need to be clearly audible/visible to everyone present.

I was close enough to the timekeeper that I could see and hear what was going on as Susan Godden Trinin demonstrated that she thought she was special and the rules that apply to everyone else didn't apply to her. Trinin, who spoke twice--on behalf of herself and fellow candidate Linda Sternhill Davis--defiantly went over-time both times.

Trinin wasn't alone, other members of Olympia's local Zionist whiner squad were also present today trying to perpetuate the dissension and division that, mainly, they have created over the boycott of Israeli goods. These people are playing, in no small part, to the timid, benighted souls who, as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King put it, prefer "a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice." Zionist kvetcher (but I repeat myself) extraordinaire Tibor Breuer tried but only briefly succeeded in hijacking the Q & A period.

However, it was clear from the financial overview and staff and committee reports that the co-op is moving forward. Membership and sales revenues were both up at both stores in the third fiscal quarter, most of which was after the passage of the boycott resolution. Kudos to OFC members, staff, and directors who have stood strong as Zionists far and wide have vilified them for taking a stand for justice and peace.

There were no stunning revelations when board candidates spoke. Vilification of the current board was the theme of the day in the remarks of pro-Israel candidates Kent Davis, Linda Sternhill Davis, Susan Godden Trinin, and to a lesser extent, Andrea Lipper. Lipper would actually be a worthy candidate if she had not aligned herself with apartheid Israel.

It was announced that another Zionist, Susan Schaeffer, had officially withdrawn from the election. There was no word on what part this blog's exposure of the "no-preconceived-notions, no-rigid-allegiances" candidate's dissimulation played in her decision to drop out.

Joshua Simpson, who informed me late last month that he was not an active candidate, was absent from the meeting and did not have a statement read there on his behalf. I saw him about an hour later at Coffee Strong.

T. J. Johnson's remarks only confirmed my earlier misgivings about him and his informal slate-mates Karen Bray and Kim Henderson. Like Lipper, Johnson has an impressive background but his unfounded criticism of the boycott process left my friend and I convinced that BDS Olympia had probably erred in endorsing Johnson. My first four votes went to Rochelle Gause, Erin Genia, John Regan, and incumbent Eric Mapes, who was, perhaps, the most articulate defender of the boycott of Israeli goods of all the candidates.

My final vote went to another incumbent, Suzanne Shafer, who also did not attend the meeting or have a statement read on her behalf. I understand that Shafer may now be an opponent of the boycott, and, if true, that's too bad, but she supported it or stood aside when it first came to the board for approval. For that and the other reasons discussed in the November print edition of Works in Progress (p. 13), Shafer got my vote.

In other circumstances, I might have voted for Teresa Young. Although I believe her to be sincere in her profession that she has "no position" on the boycott that wins her no points for integrity or moral courage. As a candidate for the OFC board, Young had the opportunity to make a public stand of conscience on one of the pressing global issues of our day. Today, in Rachel Corrie's hometown, she failed to answer the calls of justice and peace.

If you haven't voted yet, don't forget the election period ends November 15. If you have voted then feel free to forget it. ;-) Finally, thanks to the editors of Works in Progress for referring readers to this blog for information and updates on the election (November edition, p. 13).

See also:

Olympia Food Co-op Board Election Update

2010-10-30T22:11:00.000-07:00

Update: Oly Food Co-op Annual Meeting Report

Three weeks ago, I provided some information on the candidates for the Olympic Food Co-op (OFC) Board of Directors election, which ends on November 15. Since then one candidate has apparently dropped out of the race, Wally Cuddeford's name does not appear on the updated ballot.

I'll probably wait until the annual meeting to complete my ballot but at this point I'm planning to vote for all of the candidates endorsed by Olympia BDS, with one exception. I may change my mind but currently I do not plan to vote for T. J. Johnson. In his candidate statement, he says:

... I’m concerned that after 30+years the Co-op has lost focus. I want to re-energize and refocus the Co-op on its core mission - serving its members/owners, making good food accessible to more people and being the cornerstone of a vibrant, sustainable and equitable local food system.

In the co-op's online forum Johnson says:

While I conceptualluy [sic] supported [note the use of the past tense] the idea of an Israeli products boycott, I do not support the unilateral action taken by the board without member input. It was bad prcocess [sic]. The current board needs to dig out of the hole they created before the new board takes over in January. My agenda is way broader than the boycott. I want to redirect the organization's focus back to providing healthy local food accessible to all.

Johnson also claims credit for recruiting Karen Bray and Kim Henderson as board candidates, neither of them was endorsed by Olympia BDS and if they support the boycott of Israeli goods then it appears that they've done a good job of concealing it. Johnson claims to have an agenda "broader than the boycott" and while I think that is as it should be--for every candidate--I question whether supporting the boycott is any part of Johnson's agenda. Furthermore, his complaints against the current board and his emphasis on how the co-op has lost "focus" don't ring true to me.

I see no evidence (and Johnson offers none) that the co-op is not performing its "core mission". Also, support for the boycott of Israeli goods is consistent with the principles of the cooperative movement and the OFC's mission. Supporters of apartheid Israel are the people who threaten to derail things. The current board doesn't need to do any digging in my opinion. Let the boycott stand--it was passed in compliance with established procedures--move on and and ignore the racist whining of boycott opponents.

Powerful PACBI Protest of Jerusalem Quartet at Univ of Mich in Ann Arbor

2010-10-26T20:42:00.000-07:00

Audience members couldn't get into the performance without seeing people protesting apartheid Israel ...

The song is "Long Live Palestine" by the Iraqi-British musician, Lowkey.

BDS & The Olympia Food Co-op Board Election

2010-10-09T20:26:00.000-07:00

Update: Olympia Food Co-op Board Election Update

This post was temporarily taken down at the request of Olympia BDS while they prepared their candidate endorsements. You won't find any endorsements below but boycott supporters are well-advised to consider voting for the candidates endorsed by Olympia BDS. Because there are five openings and five obvious boycott opponents, vote-splitting among the eleven other candidates by boycott supporters could possibly lead to the election of one or more boycott opponents to the board.

Last July, after a two-year process and in an admirable act of conscience, the Board of Directors of the Olympia Food Co-op (OFC) voted unanimously to honor the Palestinian call for "broad boycotts ... against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era." In less than one week voting for Board members begins. The election takes place from October 15th until November 15th. Below you will find information about the candidates from an internet search and from the current OFC newsletter where you can find the complete candidate statements (which you should read before you vote) plus a ballot and voting instructions.

There is a field of sixteen candidates this year; members can vote for five. Two of the candidates are incumbents running for re-election, which means they ~~voted in favor of~~ supported or did not block consensus in support of the boycott of Israeli goods. They are: Eric Mapes and Suzanne Shafer (not to be confused with non-incumbent candidate Susan Schaeffer).

Notwithstanding the controversy over the boycott of Israeli goods, Karen Bray says in her statement: "The Co-op has done well in staying true to its mission statement." Boycott supporter? I'm not sure.

Candidate Wally Cuddeford says: "With the recent boycott drama, I am deeply concerned about pronouncements by people in the community that they intend to run for the board strictly with the goal of overturning the boycott. It is my firm belief that, whether you agree with the boycott or not, such a single-minded aim is reckless, irresponsible, and ultimately dangerous." Dangerous? That seems hyperbolic. In any case, Cuddeford is an active, open boycott supporter. You can read his comments at the August member's forum online here.

Kent Davis is "disturbed by the recent Board actions that have created a caustic environment in Olympia." He says: "The Food Co-op should concentrate on providing good food to the community and not get involved in political debate." According to his Facebook page, Davis also likes "Boycott Olympia Food Co-op". I'd say that makes him an boycott opponent. He is also Facebook friends with Linda Sternhill Davis (see below).

Accentuating the positive, Linda Sternhill Davis avoids staking out an open position on the boycott of Israeli goods. Regarding what she would like to see changed at the co-op, she merely says, "Addressing and healing the divisiveness that is currently affecting our Co-op and community." Judging by her Facebook page, though, she's probably a boycott opponent. She is Facebook friends with Akiva Tor, the Consul General of Israel for the Pacific Northwest, and Gary Acheatel, one of the founders of Advocates for Israel. Like Kent Davis, Sternhill Davis is a fan of Boycott Olympia Food Co-op.

Rochelle Gause is on the board of the Olympia Rafah Sister City Project. Here is how she closed her comments at the August member's forum: "In memory of the thousands of Palestinians who have lost their lives at the hands of our F-16s, Apaches, bulldozers and bullets, and in memory of our own Rachel Corrie who died to bring light to this situation, please honor the boycott. Thanks!" She is a boycott supporter.

Erin Genia was a 2008-09 Jessie Lloyd O'Connor Scholar, her bio says: "An exploration of the commonalities between Native American and Palestinian struggles led her to the Rachel Corrie Foundation 'Breaking the Silence' mural project and the Olympia-Rafah Mural project." Erin Genia is also listed as a member of the "alliance of Artists Against Apartheid", which supports the boycott of Israel. Methinks she is a boycott supporter.

Candidate Kim Henderson has been a "Co-op shopper and a volunteer stocker" for twenty years. Where she stands on the boycott is a mystery to me.

TJ Johnson is "concerned that after 30+ years the Co-op has lost focus." He wants "to re-energize and refocus the Co-op on its core mission - serving its members/owners, making good food accessible to more people and being the cornerstone of a vibrant, sustainable and equitable local food system." Notwithstanding these comments, Johnson is listed by Olympia BDS as a boycott supporter and Johnson was one of only two city council members who supported the failed proposal to form a sister city relationship between Olympia and the Palestinian city of Rafah

In her candidate statement, Andrea Lipper says, in part: "I am interested in being on the Board of Directors of our Co-op for 3 main reasons: 1) I want to help steer the Co-op's future growth in membership, revenues, and locations. 2) I want to work on strengthening the Co-ops internal policies including boycott policies." That's somewhat ambiguous. However, Andrea Lipper is quoted in a March 22, 2007 letter (accessible via infoweb.newsbank.com; login required) to The Olympian as opposing the Olympia-Rafah sister city proposal because "Rafah is the home of HAMAS ..." and "Ninety percent of Rafah's population voted for HAMAS ..." She suggested forming a relationship with an Israeli city instead. I'm thinking she's a boycott opponent.

John Regan says: "As a member of the BOD my decisions would be grounded in the Co-op's history, mission, commitment to social justice through economic development (including its decision to boycott Israeli products), as well as the challenges and opportunities presented by the marketplace." He appears to be a boycott supporter.

Susan Schaeffer graciously tells us that she's "an excellent administrator" and "a fairly new Co-op member" who "would like to be part of the Co-op moving beyond recent events." She claims to "bring no preconceived notions, and ... no rigid allegiances." Part of her "vision for the Co-op" is to "Find a way to repair the sense of community destroyed by the boycott." She wants to lead "in shifting the Co-op's mission from one of political theatrics to one of serving its members – all of its members . . . well." Curiously, in an August 13th letter to the Tacoma News-Tribune, the no-preconceived-notions, no-rigid-allegiances candidate Schaeffer writes, "I support my Jewish friends in their view of the Olympia Food Co-op boycott. If the board does not change its position, I will resign my membership." Yet, here she is two months later running for the Board of Directors. Go figure. I reckon she's a boycott opponent.

Joshua Simpson says, in part, in his candidate statement: "I would also like to see the Co-op always continuing to provide more and more local and cruelty free products to the Olympia community, while continuing to boycott products that are not conducive to developing a more 'socially and economically egalitarian society'." He continues: "The Co-op's main strength right now is it's adherence to its mission statement and goals, even when it ... faces strident opposition and threats." Simpson was listed by Olympia BDS as a boycott supporter.

Susan Godden Trinin is an active, open boycott opponent with two pieces in the September edition of Works in Progress: "The story behind It's Our Co-op's petition" and "Statement from anti-boycott Co-op member". In her candidate statement, former Board member Godden Trinin says:

We face some real, intense challenges in the wake of the recent boycott. I firmly believe the Boycott Policy must be reviewed, revised, retooled in the interests of opening up the process to more discussion, more opinions, more enfranchisement--consensus-based decision making. I believe a fresh voice, with experience and dedication, could be an asset in facing the challenges of this issue, and our expansion program as well.

Godden Trinin adds elsewhere: "I am a 30-year member of the Jewish community since my marriage and raising two Jewish daughters. I also feel that this experience helps my understanding of the complex and polarizing issues before us at this time."

Claims Teresa Young: "When I visit the Co-op on my shopping day, I always run into people I know and care about. ... The Co-op is more than just a store, it's our store. No matter what changes the Co-op may go through, I see the Co-op sticking to its roots and being guided by its mission and sense of social justice." Young, apparently, still shops at the co-op. That's a plus but her assertion "it's our store" echoes the rallying whine of the boycott opponents: "It's our co-op". I can't tell where Young stands on the issue. Can you?

Vets for Peace to Remember Folke Bernadotte in Seattle's Historic Scandinavian Neighborhood

2010-09-12T19:09:00.000-07:00

This Friday, members of the Greater Seattle chapter of Veterans For Peace (VFP) will go to Ballard, Seattle's historically Scandinavian neighborhood, to help raise awareness of the life and legacy of Folke Bernadotte, Swedish diplomat and UN Mediator. There are more than seven million Palestinian refugees worldwide. Jewish terrorists assassinated Bernadotte on September 17, 1948, because, at the very beginning of their exile, he advocated that the Palestinian refugees be allowed to be return home. Ironically, the Israeli holocaust museum, Yad Vashem, credits Bernadotte with helping to save no fewer than 2,400 European Jews during WWII. Yet, unlike Raoul Wallenberg, Bernadotte is not recognized as one of the "Righteous Among the Nations" and is largely forgotten. VFP members will be at Bergen Place Park to hand out leaflets about Bernadotte from 11:30 AM until 1:30 PM or all the leaflets have been distributed, whichever comes first.

"Conquer All the Violence": Three Questions for Norman Finkelstein

2010-06-23T15:03:00.000-07:00

This article first appeared on Palestine Think Tank along with an excellent piece by Saja last fall. The formatting there makes the article difficult to read.

"Conquer All the Violence": Three Questions for Norman Finkelstein
by Michelle J. Kinnucan

Well, Norman G. Finkelstein has thrown down the gauntlet for a "public brawl" by his decision to make public his resignation from the Gaza Freedom March coalition. Finkelstein says, vaguely, he resigned because: "During the week beginning August 30, 2009 and in a matter of days an entirely new sectarian agenda dubbed 'the political context' was foisted on those who originally signed on and worked tirelessly for three months." Apparently, two Palestinian activists, Omar Barghouti and Haidar Eid, living in the West Bank and Gaza, respectively, had the incredible gall to insist that the US-based, Code Pink-backed International Coalition to End the Illegal Siege of Gaza should deviate from the standard Left Zionist American line by clearly acknowledging "that Palestinians have for over six decades been denied their basic rights that they are entitled to under international law, including the right of return, and the fact that Palestinian civil society has adopted Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) as one of its main civil resistance strategies against Israel’s occupation and other injustices."

The coalition's newly adopted "Statement of Context" does indeed mention the Right of Return and BDS. This crossed one or more of Finkelstein's red lines. Now, I've read at least three books by Norman Finkelstein and I've heard him speak on two occasions. Additionally, I've watched debates and interviews with him and read some of his shorter online writings. Finkelstein has shown real courage and made important scholarly contributions to understanding Zionism and the Jewish state. It is unfortunate then that even as he has repeatedly been a victim of Zionists, Finkelstein is himself functionally a Zionist of the Left-liberal persuasion.

He does untold harm to the Palestinian people and the justice and peace movement by peddling his 'softer' but disguised Zionism to his adoring fans in the cloak of "the international consensus," etc. This makes him much more dangerous to the Palestinian solidarity movement than people like Netanyahu or Dershowitz because so many folks are unable or disinclined to see past the impressive surface to the heart of Finkelstein's pro-Zionist discourse. As Malcolm X once said, "I'd rather walk among rattlesnakes, whose constant rattle warns me where they are, than among those ... snakes who grin and make you forget you're still in a snake pit."

Not so long ago, but before Finkelstein's recent resignation, I had the occasion to view Finkelstein's November 13, 2008, speech on "Resolving the Israel-Palestine Conflict: What we can learn from Gandhi." This speech is still featured prominently on the front page of Finkelstein's personal web site. You can watch a video of the speech here or read the text here. Drawing upon that speech and other works of Finkelstein with which I am familiar, I address three questions/comments to Dr. Finkelstein. In the light of his public resignation from the Gaza Freedom March coalition, I think now is a good time to reevaluate his role in the larger movement and the shaping of its discourse. (Except where otherwise noted all Finkelstein quotes below are from "Resolving the Israel-Palestine Conflict: What we can learn from Gandhi").

First, you say:

If I propose that Palestinians adopt Gandhi's doctrine of nonviolent civil resistance, it is ... because of a compelling pragmatic insight of his. There is nothing violence can accomplish, Gandhi maintained, that nonviolence cannot accomplish—and with lesser loss of life. ... Palestinians have little to show for the violent resistance; indeed, nearly all the reckonings after eight years of bloodletting fall squarely in the debit column. It is at least arguable that the balance-sheet would have been better had Palestinians en masse adopted nonviolent civil resistance.

If you truly believe this then why is it that with scant exceptions you have never made it a point to speak directly or forcefully in favor of the ongoing, nonviolent Palestinian boycott campaigns against Israel? Specifically, I am referring to the 2005 call by 171 Palestinian political parties, unions, NGOs and networks for for broad boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel and the 2004 Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.

Second, you characterize "the occasional calls for eliminating the 'Zionist entity' and embracing a 'one-state' solution" as "not command[ing] international legitimacy" and "enjoy[ing] exactly zero international support." You ask: "Where is the legal or moral precedent for dismantling the 'Zionist entity' ... or a 'one-state' solution ... ?"

Why do you not acknowledge that at any time in the last forty-one years the Israeli government had the power to let Palestinians try to form a Palestinian state? The Israelis chose instead to colonize the occupied territories. Why do you not acknowledge that the "two-state solution," aside from being arguably unworkable now, is the very epitome of apartheid and that the global South African anti-apartheid campaign provides us with the applicable legal and moral precedent? Why don't you just avoid the "sterile debate" of one vs. two-state by embracing the goals of the Palestinian BDS campaign? They are:

1. Ending Israel's occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall;
2. Recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and
3. Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.

Third, you state:

The Caribbean poet Aimé Césaire once wrote, "There's room for everyone at the rendezvous of victory." Late in life, when his political horizons broadened out, Edward Said would often quote this line. We should make it our credo as well. We want to nurture a movement, not hatch a cult. The victory to which we aspire is inclusive, not exclusive; it is not at anyone's expense. It is to be victorious without vanquishing. No one is a loser, and we all are gainers if together we stand by truth and justice. "I am not anti-English; I am not anti-British; I am not anti-any government," Gandhi insisted, "but I am anti-untruth—anti-humbug, and anti-injustice."(188) Shouldn't we also say that we are not anti-Jewish, anti-Israel or, for that matter, anti-Zionist? The prize on which our eyes should be riveted is human rights, human dignity, human equality. What, really, is the point of ideological litmus tests such as, Are you now or have you ever been a Zionist?

At not inconsiderable cost to yourself, you have undertaken to expose the "Holocaust Industry" as an ideological construct used to, among other things, mask human rights violation by Israel. Isn't it ironic that having taken on this loaded subject you are now counseling others to disregard Zionism, another ideological construct?

Your invocation of Aimé Césaire and Edward Said is curious to say the least. Here is Césaire's poem in its entirety:

For it is not true that the work of man is finished
That man has nothing more to do in the world
But be a parasite in the world
That all we now need is to keep in step with the world.
But the work of man is only just beginning
And it remains to man to conquer all the violence embedded
in the recesses of his passion
And no race possesses the monopoly of beauty, of intelligence, of freedom
There is a place for all at the rendezvous of victory.

Yes, there is "a place for all at the rendezvous of victory" but your words do a disservice to Césaire, Said, and Gandhi when you suggest that the violent ideology of Zionism should remain untouched and unchallenged and when you casually, but misleadingly, equate British colonial rule of India with the creation of the Jewish state--Israel--in Palestine. In the context of Palestine, ending or radically transforming Zionism is assuredly a key part of "conquer[ing] all the violence," as Césaire put it.

It is inconceivable that Said would agree with your exhortation to neglect or downplay the ideological component of the Palestinian struggle for justice and liberty. In his 1979 "Zionism from the Standpoint of Its Victims," Said writes:

... effective political ideas like Zionism need to be examined historically in two ways: (1) genealogically in order that their provenance, their kinship and descent, their affiliation both with other ideas and with political institutions may be demonstrated; (2) as practical systems for accumulation (of power, land, ideological legitimacy) and displacement (of people, other ideas, prior legitimacy). Present political and cultural actualities make such an examination extraordinarily difficult, as much because Zionism in the postindustrial West has acquired for itself an almost unchallenged hegemony in liberal "establishment" discourse, as because in keeping with one of its central ideological characteristics, Zionism has hidden, or caused to disappear, the literal historical ground of its growth, its political cost to the native inhabitants of Palestine, and its militantly oppressive discriminations between Jews and non-Jews. ...

The fact also that no Palestinian, regardless of his political stripe, has been able to reconcile himself to Zionism suggests the extent to which, for the Palestinian, Zionism has appeared to be an uncompromisingly exclusionary, discriminatory, colonialist praxis . So powerful, and so unhesitatingly followed, has been the radical Zionist distinction between privileged Jews in Palestine and unprivileged non-Jews there, that nothing else has emerged, no perception of suffering human existence has escaped from the two camps created thereby. As a result, it has been impossible for Jews to understand the human tragedy caused the Arab Palestinians by Zionism; and it has been impossible for Arab Palestinians to see in Zionism anything except an ideology and a practice keeping them, and Israeli Jews, imprisoned. But in order to break down the iron circle of inhumanity, we must see how it was forged, and there it is ideas and culture themselves that play the major role. ...

It is one of the most frightening cultural episodes of the century, this almost total silence about Zionism's doctrines for and treatment of the native Palestinians

More recently in a 2003 interview with David Barsamian, transcribed in a chapter of Culture and Resistance entitled "At the Rendezvous of Victory," Said said:

Unfortunately, there's a significant number of Arab intellectuals who ... say "Let's stop talking about the evils of imperialism and Zionism. Let's start talking about our self-inflicted wounds." People like Fouad Ajami and Kanan Makiya . It's a profound self-abjection, which I deeply resent. It suits perfectly the neoconservative idea that people are responsible for their own disasters. As if imperialism never happened, as if genocide never happened, as if ethnic cleansing never happened. I just think it's outrageous.

During Israel's Hanukkah Massacre in Gaza last winter, Ilan Pappe highlighted the importance of confronting Zionism. He writes in "Israel's righteous fury and its victims in Gaza":

There are no boundaries to the hypocrisy that a righteous fury produces. ...

This righteous fury is a constant phenomenon in the Israeli, and before that Zionist, dispossession of Palestine. Every act whether it was ethnic cleansing, occupation, massacre or destruction was always portrayed as morally just and as a pure act of self-defense reluctantly perpetrated by Israel in its war against the worst kind of human beings. ... Today in Israel, from Left to Right, from Likud to Kadima , from the academia to the media, one can hear this righteous fury of a state that is more busy than any other state in the world in destroying and dispossessing an indigenous population.

It is crucial to explore the ideological origins of this attitude and derive the necessary political conclusions from its prevalence. This righteous fury shields the society and politicians in Israel from any external rebuke or criticism. But far worse, it is translated always into destructive policies against the Palestinians. With no internal mechanism of criticism and no external pressure, every Palestinian becomes a potential target of this fury. Given the firepower of the Jewish state it can inevitably only end in more massive killings, massacres and ethnic cleansing.

The self-righteousness is a powerful act of self-denial and justification. It explains why the Israeli Jewish society would not be moved by words of wisdom, logical persuasion or diplomatic dialogue. And if one does not want to endorse violence as the means of opposing it, there is only one way forward: challenging head-on this righteousness as an evil ideology meant to cover human atrocities. Another name for this ideology is Zionism and an international rebuke for Zionism, not just for particular Israeli policies, is the only way of countering this self-righteousness. We have to try and explain not only to the world, but also to the Israelis themselves, that Zionism is an ideology that endorses ethnic cleansing, occupation and now massive massacres. What is needed now is not just a condemnation of the present massacre but also delegitimization of the ideology that produced that policy and justifies it morally and politically. Let us hope that significant voices in the world will tell the Jewish state that this ideology and the overall conduct of the state are intolerable and unacceptable and as long as they persist, Israel will be boycotted and subject to sanctions. [emphasis added]

So, why is it that you, Dr. Finkelstein, have determined that Zionism is off-limits?

Protesting Tzuza--Recent BDS Action in Seattle

2010-05-06T22:44:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, May 2, 2010, eight people of conscience took a nonviolent stand for justice and peace in front of the Stroum Jewish Community Center‎ on Mercer Island, near Seattle, Washington. The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) action was hastily organized during a regional BDS workshop at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral to protest the performance of the Tzuza Dancers, an Israeli troupe hailing from Kiryat Malachi, Israel, a town built on the remnants of Qastina. On July 9, 1948, Qastina was violently ethnically cleansed of its Palestinian inhabitants by Jewish troops of the Giv'ati Brigade.

The protesters included members of St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, Voices of Palestine, and Greater Seattle Veterans for Peace. While there were a few middle-finger salutes, the action was generally well-received by members of the Mercer Island community with decidedly more passersby by honking, waving, smiling, and gesturing in support. Such a good and productive time was had that the protest was extended fifteen minutes longer than scheduled. The shows of support coming even from people entering the SJCC more than made up for the one angry, young man who repeatedly screamed at us from a distance, "No one cares about your message." He seemed to care a lot.

Folke Bernadotte: The 'Unrighteous' Dead

2010-03-30T23:34:00.000-07:00

Dan McGowan has recently had an interesting article published on Veterans Today concerning "Righteous Gentiles" and "Righteous Jews." In it he talks about, among other things, people who didn't make Yad Vashem's list of "Righteous Gentiles" and why, describing the cases of Muhammed V of Morocco, Khalil al-Sakakini, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Hans von Dohnanyi.

One guy Dan didn't write about but who you might think would be a shoe-in for a list of non-Jews who helped save Jews during WWII is Folke Bernadotte. He is credited by Yad Vashem with helping to save no fewer than 2,400 Jews during WWII. The real number may be closer to 11,000.

But Bernadotte will probably never be recognized as a "Righteous Gentile" for the simple reason that while serving as a United Nations mediator he was assassinated during a ceasefire in Palestine in 1948 by Jewish terrorists of the LEHI a.k.a. the Stern Gang, who also participated in the Deir Yassin massacre. One of the terrorist leaders who authorized his assassination was future Israeli prime minister, Yitzhak Shamir. Shamir once wrote:

Neither Jewish ethics nor Jewish tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat. We are very far from having any moral qualms as far as our national war goes. We have before us the command of the Torah, whose morality surpasses that of any other body of laws in the world: "Ye shall blot them out to the last man." We are particularly far from having any qualms with regard to the enemy, whose moral degradation is universally admitted here.

Another of Bernadotte's assassins, Natan Yellin-Mor, was elected to the Israeli Knesset shortly after the killing. No one was ever arrested for Bernadotte's assassination and the Israeli military honors LEHI veterans with a service ribbon. The quote below from Bernadotte helps illuminate the motives of the Jewish terrorists in killing Bernadotte. It is from a report submitted the day before his assassination.

It is ... undeniable that no settlement can be just and complete if recognition is not accorded to the right of the Arab refugee to return to the home from which he has been dislodged by the hazards and strategy of the armed conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine. The majority of these refugees have come from territory which ... was to be included in the Jewish State. The exodus of Palestinian Arabs resulted from panic created by fighting in their communities, by rumours concerning real or alleged acts of terrorism, or expulsion. It would be an offence against the principles of elemental justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to return to their homes while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine, and, indeed, at least offer the threat of permanent replacement of the Arab refugees who have been rooted in the land for centuries.

Update on Ajami

2010-03-14T16:37:00.000-07:00

I started my post on the film Ajami the day before the Oscar ceremony and in my haste to get something in print I left out one aspect of why Zionists like Ajami that I had considered but failed to develop in the article. It will suffice for my purposes here to quote a a couple of excerpts from the Hollywood Jew blog of Danielle Berrin (March 8, 2010). In "For Israelis, both despair and delight at 'Ajami' Oscar loss," Berrin writes:

Mixed feelings about the already controversial film were intensified after "Ajami" co-director, Skandar Copti gave a polarizing interview to Israel's Channel 2 TV hours before the Oscar telecast. In the interview, he denounced his ties to the State of Israel.

"I am not the Israeli national team and I do not represent Israel," Copti said.

The fallout from Copti's remarks lingered throughout the evening and divided the mostly Arab-Israeli cast from the rest of the guests in attendance. The Israeli Consulate, who hosted the expensive party at X Bar in Century City, put their best face forward despite the awkward atmosphere, determined to celebrate Israel's growing inroads in Hollywood.

"Tomorrow no one will remember what [Copti] said," Consul General of Israel Jacob Dayan said confidently. "They'll remember that this is an Israeli movie and that it will help make Israel a little stronger by reinforcing the relationship between Israel and Hollywood." ...

Copti, who is a Christian Arab, co-directed the film with Yaron Shani, an Israeli Jew. But, according to Copti, the collaboration is not suggestive of any broader comity between the two groups. During his Channel 2 interview, Copti said the film is "technically" Israeli because it received state funding, but he denied its figurative connection to Israel.

"I cannot represent a country that does not represent me," he said.

Even though that statement angered the film's Israeli supporters – "Ajami" received approximately $500,000 of its budget from the Israel Film Fund and Copti is a graduate of Israel's Technion in Haifa – some felt the remark was affirming.

"The film represents Israel exactly," said Israeli-American choreographer Barak Marshall. "It touches on almost all of the issues we face in Israeli society and it shows how broad the public debate is; that someone who is from Israel can negate his very connection to the state shows how wonderfully strong and alive our political culture is."

For Dayan, art that reflects a dynamic Israeli society and its status as a pluralistic democracy is an essential strength of statehood. But on the other hand, the fact that almost every Israeli film of note eventually gets usurped by politics is frustrating. ...

After "Ajami" lost to Argentina's "El secreto de sus ojos" (The Secret in their Eyes), those who were embittered by Copti's remarks quietly delighted in the loss, secretly slapping high five's and sending exultant text messages. But those associated with the film were visibly disappointed.

"So we lost again," Dayan said, mildly deflated. "But the fact is, this is our third time in a row in this category and every time we're there. This helps us better our connection with Hollywood and we have to be there again and again."

American Apparel Protest in Seattle Yesterday

2010-03-07T20:30:00.000-08:00

For two hours yesterday fourteen people of conscience protested outside the American Apparel store in Seattle's University District. The protest was sponsored by Voices of Palestine and the Greater Seattle Chapter of Veterans for Peace in recognition of Israeli Apartheid Week and in response to the 2005 call by Palestinian civil society for "broad boycotts ... against Israel". About two hundred handbills were distributed to passersby urging them to "Tell American Apparel to End its Links to Apartheid and Close its Stores in Israel." The handbills featured a photo of an American Apparel employee posing with two armed soldiers from North America serving in an Israeli combat unit. See video of the protest below.

To Protest Screenings of Ajami or Why Do Zionists Like Ajami?

2010-03-06T19:51:00.008-08:00

by Michelle J. Kinnucan

Ajami is an Israeli film that is in contention for an Academy Award this Sunday for Best Foreign Language Film. Whether it wins the Oscar or not, it has already gained a lot of international attention and accolades and it will probably be in American theaters soon. Clearly, as an Israeli film, it falls within the scope of Palestinian Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel (BDS).

However, as Palestine solidarity activists our critics and some of our allies will object if we target Ajami for protests and boycott actions especially because the film is about life in a Palestinian neighborhood and features Palestinian actors and a Palestinian co-writer/director/editor, Scandar Copti. But consider these excerpts from an interview with Copti in al-Jazeera in September 2009:

The Israeli Film Academy just announced that you won five Ophir awards, including best picture and screenplay - a first for a Palestinian filmmaker - and now your film will go on to represent Israel at next year's Oscars. What are your feelings about this?

I am happy that I'm being recognised as a filmmaker, and I value my rights just like any other citizen. But as a Palestinian citizen of the Israeli state, I have no equal rights. The idea of the citizen is non-existent for Palestinians living inside the Israeli state.

I am aware that Israel has exploited and tokenised Palestinians for their branding campaign, to show the world that Israel is a multicultural place that gives everyone an equal opportunity, even Arabs. Yet they won't even use the word Palestinian because we're not allowed to be Palestinian. Palestine does not exist for them ...

Your celebration comes at a time when trilateral peace negotiations are stagnant. Do you feel this is a development for Palestinian cinema, or is Israel using this opportunity to expand its public image with its Brand Israel campaign, which is meant to make Israel more 'attractive'?

I think they chose the film because it is a good film. It is a film that didn't scare them. It's a film that's humanising. It's a very dramatic and powerful film.

People who go to see Ajami will have lots of room to interpret and think about the reality of the situation without feeling the message was forced, or someone saying "this is all your fault".

The film has a lot of self-criticism about the society I live in, but not from a director's perspective or manifesto.

But will Israel exploit it? I'm sure they will. They tried to do so in Toronto, but I pulled my film out of the City to City whose focus this year was Tel Aviv, and had them place it in the world cinema category. I also did not go to Toronto because I was really upset with their decision. They want people to believe Israel is a diverse society that is accepting, which is not true.

Now, consider some thoughts in a BBC review by Palestinian attorney Raja Shehadeh (segment starts at 8:05 or listen to the review only below). Shehadeh is an Orwell Prize winner and founder of Al-Haq, a Palestinian human rights organization, he says:

[The world of Ajami is] a city of drive-by shootings, drugs, and racketeering, where men, young and old, are shot or stabbed to death on the slightest provocation and shady sheikhs in Arab dress sort out the blood money in what is supposed to pass as tribal justice. ... the unrelieved blood-letting punctuated only by moments of love and loyalty to family and friends leaves us in no doubt that the Jewish citizens of Israel exist in a jungle infested by bloodthirsty, uncivilized Arabs who live inside and outside its borders exactly as Israeli propagandists claim. If Israel is to make it, the story goes, this tiny bastion of civilization has no choice but to remain militarized and on full alert. What the film fails to open our eyes to is why life in Jaffa has come to this. After one of the senseless murders by Arab assailants, the Israeli television commentator explains that poverty and unemployment often lead to crime. But are these the only reasons that explain why things have become so bad in Ajami? The film makes no reference to what Jaffa has been and what it has gone through or the present threat of eviction facing many in its Ajami quarter. Before most of its inhabitants were forced out by Israel in the 1948 Nakba--the catastrophe--it was a prosperous city of over one hundred thousand citizens that was described as the "Bride of the Sea." After the establishment of Israel the city was left to rot. Nor does the film give any hint of the host of economic and travel restrictions imposed on the territories Israel occupied in 1967, restrictions which force another of its characters, Malik, a one-time resident of Nablus, to seek illegal employment in Jaffa and there, enduring daily hardships, he becomes involved in drug dealing and dies as a result. ... surely a film that wants us to open our eyes to reality should not serve ideology by compromising truth. In July 1936, Ben-Gurion, one of the founders of Israel, wrote, in his diary: "I would welcome the destruction of Jaffa, port and city. Let it come. It would be for the better. If Jaffa went to hell, I would not count myself among the mourners." ...

The final excerpt for your consideration shows how Ajami, as Scandar Copti suggested, is being exploited by Zionists. This passage comes from an article in Ha'aretz entitled "The cowardice, the vanity, the sin of boycotting Israel." As you read it please recall that it was written after Scandar Copti had it pulled from the "City to City" program of the Toronto International Film Festival, which was a focused effort to celebrate Tel Aviv and rebrand Israel after its massacre in Gaza the winter before. Author Bradley Burston writes:

Live in this tainted Holy Land long enough, and you come to learn that there are two kinds of political activists, much as there are two kinds of artists.

The first kind, the kind who changes the world, points to something that has yet to have been seen, something that seriously needs to be seen, and cries out, "Look at this."

The second kind, the kind who changes nothing, barks in a voice every bit as insistent, "Look at me."

I was privileged this weekend to attend a marriage of art and activism of the first sort, the new film "Ajami." Jointly directed by an Israeli-born Palestinian and a Jewish Israeli, spoken mostly in an Arabic salted with Hebrew, Ajami is an overwhelming work, clenched, compassionate, violent, perplexing, complex beyond facile comprehension. It is a creature of this place. It rings true.

Given the depth and breadth of its lens, and the fact that the directors worked for seven years to fit their story into two hours, it is all the more galling that earlier this month, political activists very much of the second sort, bluntly caught Ajami in the collateral damage of a scattershot anti-Israel campaign.

Ajami was among a number of dark and critical Israeli films, among them "Lebanon" and "Jaffa," which were effectively sniffed at and dismissed by the strident, star power-chasing protest at the Toronto International Film Festival, a protest so shallow and so misplayed, that it has had the effect of doing the occupation a distinct favor.

There is something in Ajami's nuance that helps explain why the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel, of which the Toronto protest was an ingenuously unacknowledged bastard cousin, has proven a wholesale failure.

What Ajami shows, in continually surprising revelations, is the essential core of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: people on both sides trying to protect their loved ones and keep them alive, often with heartbreaking consequences.

In short, Zionists like Ajami for the reasons pointed to by Raja Shehadeh. The film reinforces negative stereotypes about Arabs-Palestinians and decontextualizes life in Ajami from the socio-political reality of Jewish apartheid and the historical realities of the Nakba and the ongoing occupation of Palestine.

Update: 7 March 2010 - This post was republished in the Palestine Chronicle today. An article in Ha'aretz today confirms that Ajami was produced with funds from the Israeli government and Scandar Copti has created a stir by reportedly saying, "I am not Israel's national team and do not represent her".

See also: "Update on Ajami"

Michelle J. Kinnucan's writing has previously appeared in CommonDreams.org, Critical Moment, Palestine Chronicle, Arab American News, Electronic Intifada, Palestine Think Tank and elsewhere. Her 2004 investigative report on the Global Intelligence Working Group was featured in Censored 2005: The Top 25 Censored Stories (Seven Stories Pr., 2004) and she contributed a chapter to Finding the Force of the Star Wars Franchise (Peter Lang, 2006). Click here for information on how to contact her.

Ann Arbor Batsheva Protest Report & Photos

2009-02-15T17:02:00.006-08:00

Thanks to everyone who helped organize and participated in the Batsheva Dance Company boycott and protest. Seventeen protesters challenged indifference and defeatism on a snowy Saturday night along with twenty-one protesters on a cold, overcast Sunday afternoon. Two hundred leaflets were distributed, there was no violence, and no arrests.

Best of all, Zionist crimes in Palestine and American complicity in them did not go unchallenged when "Israel's leading ambassador" came to Ann Arbor just weeks after the Hanukkah Massacre that killed more than 1,300 Palestinians. Is there any better way to celebrate Valentine's Day than by demonstrating your love for justice, peace, and our brothers and sisters in Palestine by answering the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS)?

However, the struggle is far from over and this reminder from the BNC is still timely:

Occupied Ramallah, Palestine - 27 December 2008: Now, more than ever, the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee, BNC, calls upon international civil society not just to protest and condemn in diverse forms Israel's massacre in Gaza, but also to join and intensify the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel … Without sustained,effective pressure by people of conscience the world over, Israel will continue with its gradual, rolling acts of genocide against the Palestinians, burying any prospects for a just peace under the blood and rubble of Gaza, Nablus and Jerusalem.

Finally, thanks to the volunteer legal observers from the National Lawyers Guild and the American Civil Liberties Union and to those organizations for dispatching them. Thanks to Alan P. for the photos below (click here to see the rest of his Batsheva protest photos).

Ann Arbor Protest Tomorrow and Sunday--No Dancing on Gaza's Graves

2009-02-12T21:40:00.003-08:00

***PLEASE FORWARD***

Please join other people of conscience in Ann Arbor this Saturday and Sunday as we stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and answer their collective call for boycotts, divestment, and sanctions against Israel. Just a few weeks ago, the Israel rained down death and destruction upon the people of Gaza and now the Batsheva Dance Company, an Israeli government-sponsored group is coming to Ann Arbor, to dance on their graves.

As Ali Abunimah asked while the slaughter was still happening: "... what will happen after the demonstrations disperse and the anger dies down? Will we continue to let Palestinians in Gaza die in silence? Palestinians everywhere are asking for solidarity, real solidarity, in the form of sustained, determined political action. ... The global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement for Palestine provides the framework for this. Now is the time to channel our raw emotions into a long-term commitment to make sure we do not wake up to 'another Gaza' ever again."

NO DANCING ON GAZA'S GRAVES
PROTEST THE ISRAELI APARTHEID DANCE TROUPE COMING TO ANN ARBOR

7:30 PM Sharp, Saturday February 14, 2009
3:30 PM Sharp, Sunday, February 15, 2009
(performances start at 8 PM and 4 PM)
Power Center, 121 Fletcher (at Huron) UMich-Ann Arbor
(for map and directions click here)

Click here to download a PDF file of the most recent Ann Arbor Batsheva Dance Company protest leaflet.

This protest is sponsored by the Middle East Task Force with support from Home for Peace and Justice; MidEast JustPeace; Newaygo County People for Peace; Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends; Ann Arbor Coalition Against War; Palestine Office; Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice; the Rev. Naim Ateek, Director of Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, Jerusalem; and the Israel/Palestine Action Group of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship.

Please Send an E-Letter
We only need seven (7) more people to send e-letters to reach our goal. If you haven't already done so, please send a Batsheva e-letter today. Click here: http://michiganpeacenetwork.org/eletters/index.php?eid=19

New Graphic for Ann Arbor Batsheva Protest

2009-02-12T21:22:00.003-08:00

Nigel Parry has graciously adapted a graphic prepared for the Minneapolis Batsheva protest so that it can be used for the Ann Arbor protest this weekend (see below; click to enlarge).

Chicago Batsheva Protest Photos

2009-02-10T23:24:00.002-08:00

Below are two photos from the Chicago Batsheva protest. For more photos click here.

Minneapolis to Protest Batsheva

2009-02-08T19:49:00.001-08:00

Reposted from the Minneapolis Anti-War Committee web site.

BOYCOTT & PROTEST THE BATSHEVA DANCE COMPANY

Start: Feb 18 2009 - 7:30pm

7:30 PM Wednesday February 18, 2009
Northrop Auditorium, 84 Church St. SE, University of Minnesota

The University of Minnesota is bringing the Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv to Minneapolis for one performance. This is a violation of the 2004 Palestinian call to "comprehensively and consistently boycott all Israeli academic and cultural institutions”and the 2005 call of 171 Palestinian civil society organizations for broad boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. This Dance Company is funded by the Israeli government and is considered a “leading ambassador” of the Israeli government. Particularly in the aftermath of the recent invasion of the Gaza Strip, and the ongoing occupation of Palestinian land, it is time to honor the call for a boycott of Israel called for by Palestinian civil society and solidarity groups around the world, including South Africa. The challenge posed to us today in ending the apartheid like policies of the State of Israel is no different than the challenge that people of good faith faced in the 1980s in
responding to calls to boycott the white supremacist government in South Africa. We urge you to join us as we nonviolently oppose this performance as part of building a sustained BDS campaign.

“The latest Palestinian Call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) – supported by a large majority of Palestinian civil society – does not target Jews or Israelis qua Jews; on the contrary, it actually addresses conscientious Israeli Jews, urging them to support efforts to bring about Israel’s compliance with international law and fundamental human rights, both necessary elements in reaching true peace based on justice. Many around the world recognize the extent of Israel’s breach of international law. The real challenge now is to do something about it. Only by applying effective international pressure against Israel similar in scope and comprehensiveness to that successfully used to end apartheid in South Africa will intellectuals and academics be fulfilling their moral obligation to stand up for right, for justice, for equality and for a chance to validate the prevalence of universal ethical principles. By doing so, they will also serve
in the most effective manner the cause of coexistence and real peace.” by Omar Barghouti (a founding member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel)

What you can do:
1. Call, write, or send an e-letter to Ben Johnson, Director of Concerts and Lectures, asking him to cancel the show and honor the boycott against Israel: phone 612-624-4473, fax 612-626-1750, email benjohn@umn.edu,
Department of Concerts and Lectures, 109 Northrop, 84 Church St. SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455
2. Write letters to the editor of the Minnesota Daily and local media
3. Don't buy tickets to the Batsheva performance. If you already have tickets then exchange them for another show
4. Please join us in nonviolently protesting the Batsheva perform

The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee’s call to boycott is supported by The Middle East Committee of WAMM, Coalition for Palestinian Rights, Middle East Peace Now, Jewish anti-Zionist Network-Twin Cities (IJAN-TC), the Palestinian Institute of Minnesota, the Anti-War Committee and other people of conscience who are taking a moral stand against Israel’s oppressive policies
More info: http://www.pacbi.org/ http://www.bdsmovement.net/

Update: 6 Days to Go--No Dancing on Gaza's Graves

2009-02-08T17:02:00.005-08:00

***PLEASE FORWARD***

In this update:
1. Protest reminder
2. E-letters at 80% of goal
3. New supporters
4. New Batsheva article on Palestine Think Tank
5. Photos from Pittsburgh protest

1. 08 Feb 2009 - Israel's apartheid Batsheva Dance Company comes to Ann Arbor next Saturday. This recital is part of an ongoing campaign to polish the image of Israel in the American consciousness and, thus, to help secure continued American financial, diplomatic, and military support of the Jewish state even in the aftermath of the recent Israeli massacre in Gaza. Please plan to come and nonviolently protest the Batsheva Dance Company on Saturday and Sunday. Let us answer the call of the Palestinian people for broad boycotts, divestment and sanctions against Israel.

Click here to download a PDF file of the most recent Ann Arbor Batsheva Dance Company protest leaflet. Click here or see below for protest details and more updates.

The Batsheva Dance Company:

Israel's leading cultural ambassador
Israeli government-funded
Israeli soldier dancers
No Arab dancers

NO DANCING ON GAZA'S GRAVES--PROTEST THE ISRAELI APARTHEID DANCE TROUPE COMING TO ANN ARBOR
7:30 PM Sharp, Saturday February 14, 2009
3:30 PM Sharp, Sunday, February 15, 2009
(performances start at 8 PM and 4 PM)
Power Center, 121 Fletcher (at Huron) UMich-Ann Arbor
(for map and directions click here)

This protest is sponsored by the Middle East Task Force with support from Home for Peace and Justice; MidEast JustPeace; Newaygo County People for Peace; Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends; Ann Arbor Coalition Against War; Palestine Office; Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice; the Rev. Naim Ateek, Director of Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, Jerusalem; and the Israel/Palestine Action Group of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship.

2. The Middle East Task Force's e-letter has now reached 80% of its goal. If you haven't already done so, there's still time to sign the e-letter and you don't have to live in Michigan or Ann Arbor to take a stand against Israeli apartheid. Please sign today. Click here to sign the e-letter or see a list of those who have already signed. The purpose of the e-letter is to ask University Musical Society (UMS) Executive Director Ken Fischer and members of the UMS Board of Directors to honor the Palestinian people's boycott against Israel by canceling the Batsheva Dance Company performances and by ending all scheduling of Israeli performers.

3. Since the last update the Dearborn-based Palestine Office and the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice have stepped up to support the Batsheva boycott and protest. Other new supporters include the Rev. Naim Ateek, Director of Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, Jerusalem and the Israel/Palestine Action Group of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship. Thanks to everyone for their support. It's not too late add your organization's name to the list of supporters.

4. Click here to read a February 2, 2009, action alert about the Batsheva Dance Company on Palestine Think Tank.

5. Click here to see two photos from the Pittsburgh Batsheva protest.

Naim Ateek Supports Ann Arbor Batsheva Protest

2009-02-08T16:23:00.004-08:00

The excerpt below is from an e-mail dated January 30, 2009.

Michelle, Thank you for your email. I shared it with Rev. Naim Ateek ... He clearly stands behind any non-violent action that helps bring an end to policies of injustice, and, therefore, supports what you wish to do in boycotting this dance troupe. For your information, I am in contact with a group in Pittsburgh which is taking similar action when the dance company performs there in February. Thank you again for your work for peace and justice. The voice of the Church needs to be heard. Blessings, Tina Whitehead, Sabeel, Jerusalem

Photos from the Pittsburgh Batsheva Protest

2009-02-08T16:07:00.002-08:00

Thanks to Fayyad for the two photos below from the Pittsburgh Batsheva protest.

New Batsheva Article on Palestine Think Tank

2009-02-04T12:52:00.003-08:00

Reposted from Palestine Think Tank:

No Dancing on Gaza's Graves - Boycott and Protest Batsheva Dance Company

By Guest Post • Feb 2nd, 2009 at 8:24 • Category: Action Alert, Culture and Heritage, Israel, Music, Poetry, Events, Newswire, Palestine, Resistance, Zionism

WRITTEN BY Michelle J. Kinnucan

An Israeli apartheid dance troupe started its North America tour in Houston on Wednesday, January 28, 2009. Between then and March 1, 2009 it will go to fourteen more American and Canadian cities. That troupe, the Batsheva Dance Company, is currently scheduled to perform in Purchase, NY on January 30-31 and then it's on to (in order): Princeton, NJ; Philadelphia, PA; Pittsburgh, PA; Chicago, IL; Columbus, OH; Ottawa, ON; Ann Arbor, MI; Minneapolis, MN; Vancouver, BC; Santa Barbara, CA; San Diego, CA; Los Angeles, CA; and New York, NY.

As I wrote in The Electronic Intifada last November, the Batsheva Dance Company has been a recipient of Israeli public financing since the 1990s. According to a report in The Independent of London, the dance company has no Arab performers and is "proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador." As I also wrote, "Ohad Naharin, the dance company's current Director, served in the Israeli army. In a 2005 interview with a Canadian newspaper, Naharin stated that 'I continue to do my work, while 20 km from me people are participating in war crimes … the ability to detach oneself from the situation — that is what allows one to go on.' Needless to say, the victims of Israeli 'war crimes' cannot avail themselves of the luxury of detachment." It is particularly egregious that the Batsheva Dance Company is scheduled to perform in Vancouver, British Columbia as part of the 2009 Cultural Olympiad in the run up to the 2010 Olympic Games. Since when is polishing the image of a violent, racist state part of the Olympic spirit?

As Omar Barghouti, a Jerusalem-based freelance choreographer, cultural analyst, and founding member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (www.PACBI.org) said last month in The Dance Insider: No Israeli dance company "has ever taken a position calling for an end to the occupation, not to mention recognizing UN-sanctioned rights of the refugees or ending racial discrimination against the state's 'non-Jewish' citizens … none of [the dance companies] has ever challenged reserve service in the occupation army, despite the fact that punishment for doing so is minimal in Israel (unlike Germany in the '30s, say). … Those same dancers are part-time occupation soldiers, manning roadblocks, protecting colonies, evacuating homes and demolishing them, killing children and letting pregnant women die at checkpoints by preventing ambulances [from passing through], letting young bleeding youth bleed to death without medical aid, etcetera. What a bunch of liberal dancers! And what do their institutions do? Nothing."

I urge American and Canadian Palestinian solidarity activists to use letters, petitions, leaflets, demonstrations, signs, and other nonviolent means to encourage cultural organizations and their patrons to boycott the Batsheva Dance Company and to raise awareness of Israel's crimes and the BDS campaign to liberate the Palestinian people. Local campaigns are already well underway in Ann Arbor, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and other cities, plus the newly formed U.S. Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel is spreading the word, too. As Desmond Tutu used to say during the struggle against South African apartheid–which also employed BDS, including cultural boycotts–it's time join the winning side, the side of justice. Today, that side is the side of the Palestinian people.

For more details on the dance company's performance schedule please go here or check the web site of their North American booking agent, H-Art Management, at www.h-artmanagement.com/calendar.html.

Michelle J. Kinnucan is a member of Middle East Task Force of Ann Arbor. Click here to contact her. Her writing has previously appeared in CommonDreams.org, Critical Moment, Palestine Chronicle, Arab American News, and elsewhere. Her 2004 investigative report on the Global Intelligence Working Group was featured in Censored 2005: The Top 25 Censored Stories (Seven Stories Pr., 2004) and she contributed a chapter to Finding the Force of the Star Wars Franchise (Peter Lang, 2006).

New Ann Arbor Batsheva Protest Leaflet Available

2009-01-28T22:54:00.007-08:00

Click here to download a PDF file of the most recent Ann Arbor Batsheva Dance Company protest leaflet.

Four Cities Now to Protest Batsheva Dance Company

2009-01-27T01:15:00.003-08:00

Their tour hasn't even started yet but protests against the Israeli apartheid Batsheva Dance Company are now planned or in the works in Ann Arbor, Chicago, Vancouver, and Pittsburgh.

There's still time to sign the e-letter to UMS and you don't have to live in Michigan or Ann Arbor to take a stand against Israeli apartheid. Please sign today.

Send UMS an E-Letter--Boycott the Israeli Apartheid Dance Troupe

Chicago to Protest Batsheva Dance Company

2009-01-26T23:56:00.002-08:00

Received via e-mail:

Boycott the Batsheva Dance Company's U.S. Tour!

Picket at the Chicago Performance

When: Sunday, February 8...12:30-2:00 PM
Where: Auditorium Theatre - 50 E. Congress, Chicago

Israel's latest brutal war on Gaza killed over 1300 people and injured over 5000; with over 400 children killed and another 1500 injured. These numbers are expected to rise as more bodies are discovered beneath the ruins. Meanwhile, Israel's ongoing and illegal siege still does not allow crucial necessities into Gaza.

Israel's leading dance company, Batsheva, is touring the US and Canada starting January 28th through March of 2009. As cultural ambassadors and representatives of the Israeli state, Batsheva was asked to denounce the racist and brutal policies and crimes of their government against the Palestinian people, and refused.

"Writing October 26, 2008, in The Independent of London, Jenny Gilbert reports that the dance company is "funded by Israel's government, its performers include none of Arab extraction, and it is 'proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador.'"

Activists across the country have been planning and organizing a boycott of Batsheva Dance Company for several months. The most recent Israeli atrocities in Gaza have added another sense of urgency and another layer of public anger towards Israel. In 2005, hundreds of Palestinian civil society organization called on activists and institutions around the world to organize and join the movement of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel. The calls for boycott include commercial, academic, and cultural aspects, and have been echoed by numerous Israeli and international artists, academics, and thinkers.

For more information on BDS: http://www.bdsmovement.net/ and http://www.pacbi.org

Endorsing organizations [ list in formation: ] International Solidarity Movement-Chicago chapter, Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago, Chicagoans Against Apartheid in Palestine

To endorse please contact: ISMinChicago@aol.com or 773-267-5198

Vancouver Activist on Batsheva Dance Company

2009-01-26T23:44:00.002-08:00

The letter below was posted as a comment to "Pittsburgh to Protest Batsheva Dance Company." It has been slightly reformatted here for readability.

Dear Dance House Productions,

I want to let you know that as an active arts member of Vancouver's dance scene, supporter of New Works and collaborator with many of Eponymous's arts clients, I however will be boycotting your presentation of Israeli Batsheva Dance Company's 'Deca Dance' on February 20th and 21st 2009. Under the present political circumstances it would be impossible to enjoy such an event. I prefer to add my own artists voice to the many others that are calling for a boycott of Israeli cultural events due to the illegal military and civil actions occurring at this time in Israel.

I will be actively encouraging others to join the boycott and I sincerely ask you to reconsider your involvement in this event.

I have no doubt that history will look back on this in much the same way that they now do of the 1980's cultural and sporting boycotts of South African apartheid.

I feel I should be brave enough to take the personal effort to make my feelings known to you directly, so you don't think its just radicals out there, and do not confuse this with anti-semitism. Boycotting Batsheva is a very real response for many mainstream Vancouverites, including myself. I have travelled to Israel and the West Bank several times, so this is a carefully considered decision. After weighing all the options I have decided to join the international call for a cultural boycott.

Boycott is a tactic which allows people, as distinct from their elected governments, to apply pressure on those wielding power in an unjust way. It is directed not against people but against oppressive and unjust policies and regimes in order to bring about change. However it should also be noted that the dance company members have included past and present Israeli soldiers in the junior ensemble.

Batsheva operates throughout the year with its 2 companies (Batsheva Dance Company and the junior Batsheva Ensemble) and 40 dancers. With 250 annual performances in Israel and around the world, the company is considered Israel’s leading cultural ambassador. As you must be aware Israel has been violating UN resolutions and international law, and has no right to be regarded as an ordinary member-state with whom Western democracies should be engaged in cultural exchange. By hosting a dance group which represents Israel, you implicitly collude with Israel's crimes.

sincerely
jamie griffiths

http://www.naomiklein.org/articles/2009/01/israel-boycott-divest-sanction
http://www.danceinsider.com/f2008/f0912_1.html
http://ingaza.wordpress.com/

jamie griffiths
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Pittsburgh to Protest Batsheva Dance Company

2009-01-25T12:02:00.002-08:00

Reposted from KABOBfest:

Boycott Israeli Dance Company on US/Canada Tour

By Fayyad

Call for Action: Israel’s leading dance company, Batsheva, is touring the US and Canada starting January 28th through March of 2009. As cultural ambassadors and representatives of their country, Batsheva was asked to denounce the racist and brutal policies and crimes of their government against the Palestinian people, and refused.

Activists across the country have been planning and organizing a boycott of Batsheva Dance Company for several months. The most recent Israeli atrocities in Gaza have added another sense of urgency and another layer of public anger towards Israel. In 2005, hundreds of Palestinian civil society organization called on activists and institutions around the world to organize and join the movement of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel. The calls for boycott include commercial, academic, and cultural aspects, and have been echoed by numerous Israeli and international artists, academics, and thinkers.

Join this effort and protest the Batsheva performance in your town:
(schedule and other resources below)

1) Contac the sponsors and hosts of the event, and demand they cancel and/or end their sponsorship of the event.
2) Contact the media in your town and inform them of your intention to boycott and protest the performance
3) Write op-ed and letters to the editor to explain your reasons for the boycott call.
4) Turn out at the event, protest and picket, and call for people to boycott the performance, bring your signs and photos from the attack on Gaza.
And don’t forget to forward this call to your contacts in cities on the tour.

Reasons for Boycott and Talking Points:

- Boycotts were instrumental to ending South African apartheid. Such international pressure is needed to bring an end to the Israeli occupation.
- Israel's military occupation of the Palestinians violates international laws and their inalienable rights to self-determination and sovereignty.
- Artists and academics who speak up against Israel's military occupation of the Palestinians are not a target for boycott
- Boycott is not meant to punish or isolate artists; it is a conditional measure that is intended to push the Israeli government to make peace by ending the occupation.
- Artists are cultural ambassadors of a country, and often employed by their government to promote the country.
- Boycott sends a message to the Israeli public and the government, strengthening the hand of those working for peace among them.
- Over 540 Israeli professors and public intellectuals signed a letter calling for a boycott of Israel.
- Cultural and Academic boycotts have been called for by Palestinian civil society, and solidarity groups around the world, including South Africa
- Since Israel is a democracy, it should actually respond to international opprobrium.
- Batsheva explicitly refused to distance itself from Israel’s military occupation and racist policies.
- Batsheva is a Jewish-only dance company, despite the fact that 1 in 5 Israelis are not Jewish.
- Batsheva's choreographer and artistic director, Ohad Naharin, served in the Israeli military, the same forces that just killed nearly 1000 civilians in Gaza.
- Several dancers in the company are in the army reserves; reserve units conducted this month's invasion of Gaza.
- No Batsheva dancer has challenged or objected to military duty, despite the growing movement of conscientious objectors in Israel.

Schedule (http://www.h-artmanagement.com/calendar.html):

January 28 - Houston, TX
January 30-31 - Purchase, NY
February 2 - Princeton, NJ
February 3 -, Philadelphia, PA
February 5 – Pittsburgh, PA
February 7,8- Chicago, IL
February 10 - Columbus, OH
February 12 - Ottawa, ON
February 14 - Ann Arbor, MI
February 15 - Ann Arbor, M
February 18 - Minneapolis, MN
February 20,21- Vancouver, BC
February 24 - Santa Barbara, CA
February 26 - La Jolla, CA
February 28 - Los Angeles, CA
March - Brooklyn, NY

Letter Sent to Batsheva from Pittsburgh Groups:

To: Naomi Fortis- General Manager
Cc: Dance Company Members,
Batsheva Dance Company,
6 Yechieli Street, Tel Aviv 65149

Re: Your Scheduled Performance in Pittsburgh, PA

It is in somber spirits that we, residents of Pittsburgh, receive news of your planned visit to our city. Your government has just commenced a brutal, three-week attack on the besieged, starved populations of Gaza, during which more that 1300 Palestinians were murdered, including at least 419 children and 108 women. In addition, 5300 Palestinians have been injured, 4,000 homes, schools, hospitals, and shelters have been destroyed and more than 20,000 others were severely damaged.

Artists are often the conscience of their communities. We submit to you, as artists conscious of the suffering caused in besieged Gaza and the occupied West Bank, to voice your unequivocal opposition and denunciation of the Israeli government’s policies toward Palestinians, from brutal occupation, to Apartheid-like policies against non-Jewish citizens; policies that have inflicted more than sixty years of suffering, dispossession, and discrimination on the Palestinian population and resulted in deaths and casualties among Israeli civilians as well.

It is our hope that we receive your prompt response that makes clear a position you take against the policies of your government, at which point you will be most welcome in our city. However, it is our intention to call upon our community to boycott and protest your presence, should you remain silent and complacent of your government’s policies, and continue to whitewash and provide cover for your government’s crimes by serving as cultural ambassadors.

As citizens of the United States, the members of our coalition denounce similarly devastating military actions perpetrated by our government, and we simply ask you to do the same.

In commitment to bringing lasting peace and decency to all peoples,
(Signed, multiple Pittsburgh groups)

PRESS RELEASE: Groups Launch Campaign To Boycott Israeli Dance Troupe Performing in Pittsburgh

Several Pittsburgh organizations have launched a campaign to boycott the February 5th performance of the leading Israeli dance company, Batsheva.

The organizations, including Pittsburgh Palestine Solidarity Committee, Students for Justice in Palestine, Code Pink, Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee, Anti-War Coalition, among others, contacted the host, Benedum Center, and event sponsors asking they cancel the event and end their sponsorship.

The local coalition, which had earlier approached Batsheva with a letter demanding that the dance company denounce the policies of the Israeli government, has received no response and plans to protest and picket the event should it proceed as scheduled.

A movement of divestment and boycott (economic, academic, and cultural) against Israel modeled after the movement against apartheid South Africa has been building in the US and Europe for over eight years. In July 2005, dozens of Palestinian civil society organizations issued a call in support of a wider Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement (http://www.pacbi.org/boycott_news_more.php?id=66_0_1_10_M11), until Israel ends its racist and brutal policies of discrimination and military subjugation against the Palestinian people.

Calls for divestment and boycott have intensified in recent weeks in the wake of Israel’s attack on Gaza, with prominent journalists and scholars publishing articles calling for BDS. In a letter published in the Daily Star on January 12th, more than 900 academics, mainly US-based, called for the apartheid remedy to be applied to Israel (http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=98940). This call followed a similar one signed by more than 300 UK-based academics, artists, and cultural icons (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/16/gaza-israel-petitions).

Israel’s attack on Gaza, during which it shut out journalists from entering the strip, left more than 1300 people dead, a third of whom are children, nearly 5600 injured, and more than 20,000 homes destroyed or severely damaged. So far Israel has prevented relief and aid workers from entering Gaza, severely restricting the entry of food and medicine.

Batsheva’s artistic director, Ohad Naharin, is a veteran of the Israeli military, and several members of the dance company are members of the army reserve. Reserve units conducted this month’s invasion of the Gaza strip.

Batsheva Dance Company Tour

2009-01-23T20:16:00.003-08:00

Below is the list of dates, hosts, and venues for the Batsheva Dance Company's upcoming North American tour. This list was accurate and complete as of December 2008. Go to the web site of their North American booking agent for updates and corrections: www.h-artmanagement.com/calendar.html.

January 28, 2009
Society for the Performing Arts
Jones Hall
Houston, TX

January 30-31, 2009
The Performing Arts Center
SUNY-Purchase
Purchase, NY

February 2, 2009
McCarter Theatre Center
Princeton, NJ, U.S.A

February 3, 2009
Dance Affiliates
Zellerbach Theatre
Annenberg Center For The Performing Arts
Philadelphia, PA

February 5, 2009
Pittsburgh Dance Council
Benedum Center
Pittsburgh, PA

February 7-8, 2009
Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University
Chicago, IL

February 10, 2009
Wexner Center for the Arts
Mershon Auditorium
Columbus, OH

February 12, 2009
National Arts Centre
Theatre
Ottawa, ON

February 14-15, 2009
University Musical Society
Power Center
Ann Arbor, MI

February 18, 2009
Univ. of Minnesota
Northrop Memorial Auditorium
Minneapolis, MN

February 21-22, 2009
DanceHouse
Vancouver Playhouse
Vancouver, BC

February 24, 2009
University of California, Santa Barbara
Arlington Theatre
Santa Barbara, CA

February 26, 2009
University of California, San Diego
Mandeville Auditorium
San Diego, CA

February 28, 2009 - March 1, 2009
University of California, Los Angeles
Royce Hall
Los Angeles, CA

March 4-7, 2009
Brooklyn Academy of Music
Howard Gilman Opera House
New York, NY

Send UMS an E-Letter--Boycott the Israeli Apartheid Dance Troupe

2009-01-22T18:17:00.013-08:00

***PLEASE FORWARD***

No Dancing on Gaza's Graves--Boycott the Batsheva Dance Troupe

Please ask Executive Director Ken Fischer and members of the Board of Directors of the University Musical Society (UMS) of Ann Arbor, Michigan to honor the Palestinian people's boycott against Israel by canceling the Batsheva Dance Company performances scheduled for February14-15, 2009, and by endings all scheduling of Israeli performers until such time as the boycott against Israel is ended by the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee.

The Batsheva Dance Company is funded by the Israeli government, it has no Arab performers, and is "proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador." Ohad Naharin, the dance company's director, is an Israeli army veteran and current Israeli soldiers/reservists also belong to the company.

To send an e-letter to Ken Fischer and UMS Board members asking them to cancel the upcoming performance go to http://michiganpeacenetwork.org/eletters/.

Please plan to join us outside to nonviolently protest the performances unless the UMS cancels them. The protest is sponsored by the Middle East Task Force with support from Home for Peace and Justice; MidEast JustPeace; Newaygo County People for Peace; Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends; Ann Arbor Coalition Against War; Palestine Office; Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice; the Rev. Naim Ateek, Director of Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, Jerusalem; and the Israel/Palestine Action Group of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship.

Click here to download a PDF file of the Ann Arbor Batsheva Dance Company protest leaflet.

No Dancing on Gaza's Graves--Boycott the Batsheva Dance Troupe

2009-01-14T21:36:00.021-08:00

NO DANCING ON GAZA'S GRAVES

PROTEST THE ISRAELI APARTHEID
DANCE TROUPE COMING TO ANN ARBOR
7:30 PM Sharp, Saturday February 14, 2009
3:30 PM Sharp, Sunday, February 15, 2009
(performances start at 8 PM and 4 PM)
Power Center, 121 Fletcher (at Huron) UMich-Ann Arbor

(see map below or click here)

Sponsored by the Middle East Task Force with support from Home for Peace and Justice; MidEast JustPeace; Newaygo County People for Peace; Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends; Ann Arbor Coalition Against War; Palestine Office; Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice; the Rev. Naim Ateek, Director of Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, Jerusalem; and the Israel/Palestine Action Group of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship.

Occupied Ramallah, Palestine - 27 December 2008: Now, more than ever, the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee, BNC, calls upon international civil society not just to protest and condemn in diverse forms Israel's massacre in Gaza, but also to join and intensify the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel … Without sustained,effective pressure by people of conscience the world over, Israel will continue with its gradual, rolling acts of genocide against the Palestinians, burying any prospects for a just peace under the blood and rubble of Gaza, Nablus and Jerusalem.

The University Musical Society is bringing the Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv to Ann Arbor for two performances. This is a violation of the 2004 Palestinian call to "comprehensively and consistently boycott all Israeli academic and cultural institutions" and the 2005 call of 171 Palestinian civil society organizations for broad boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. The Batsheva Dance Company is funded by the Israeli government, it has no Arab performers, and is "proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador." Ohad Naharin, the dance company's director, is an Israeli army veteran and current Israeli soldiers/reservists also belong to the company. We urge you to join us as we nonviolently oppose these performances as part of a sustained BDS campaign.

What you can do:
1. Call, write, or send an e-letter to Ken Fischer and the UMS Board asking them to cancel the show and honor the boycott against Israel (go to http://michiganpeacenetwork.org/eletters/).
2. Write letters to the editor of the Michigan Daily and Ann Arbor News.
3. Don't buy tickets to the Batsheva performance.
4. If you already have tickets then exchange them for another show.
5. Please join us in nonviolently protesting the Batsheva performances unless the UMS cancels them.

Click here to download a PDF file of the Ann Arbor Batsheva Dance Company protest leaflet.

RSVP (not required) on:

Click on the image below to enlarge it.

Batsheva Dance Company in the News

2009-01-01T20:34:00.003-08:00

In an article out today, the Detroit News refers to the Batsheva Dance Company as one of "three edgy dance companies [to be] presented by the University Musical Society (UMS)" and says:

Next up at Power Center is Israel-based Batsheva Dance Company, Feb. 14-15, featuring a different program at each performance choreographed by artistic director Ohad Naharin. The Feb. 14 show offers "Three," a three-part dance to the music of Bach and two contemporary scores. The next afternoon features "DecaDance," with 10 excerpts from Naharin's body of work.

"He has a very distinctive movement vocabulary," [UMS programming director Michael] Kondziolka says. "It's not about anything but the movement. It's powerful work."

An article in Tuesday's The Dance Insider fills us in on just how "edgy" Israeli dance troupe's are:

On Sunday I asked regular Dance Insider contributor Omar Barghouti, a Jerusalem-based freelance choreographer, cultural analyst, and founding member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (www.PACBI.org), to reiterate the justification for including dance companies in this overall boycott.

"PACBI, including I, call for boycotting ALL Israeli dance companies due to their complicity," Barghouti explained. "None of them has ever taken a position calling for an end to the occupation, not to mention recognizing UN-sanctioned rights of the refugees or ending racial discrimination against the state's 'non-Jewish' citizens (the remaining indigenous population).

"A dancer here or there may say things here or there, but none of their groups has ever taken a position. This is complicity.

"Also, none of them has ever challenged reserve service in the occupation army, despite the fact that punishment for doing so is minimal in Israel (unlike Germany in the '30s, say). This is an even deeper level of complicity. Those same dancers are part-time occupation soldiers, manning roadblocks, protecting colonies, evacuating homes and demolishing them, killing children and letting pregnant women die at checkpoints by preventing ambulances [from passing through], letting young bleeding youth bleed to death without medical aid, etcetera. What a bunch of liberal dancers! And what do their institutions do? Nothing." [Indeed, in October 2006, as cited by Michelle J. Kinnucan in the web-based magazine Electronic Intifada, Naharin told Dance Magazine that two of the dancers in his junior company were Israeli soldiers.] (To read a related article by Barghouti in these pages, click here.)

In addition to PACBI, international organizations and individuals supporting a boycott include UN general assembly president Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, the British Committee for the Universities of Palestine (on Monday, Israel bombed the Islamic University of Gaza as well as the culture ministry -- exactly how are these centers of Hamas power?), renowned art critic John Berger, choreographer Ornelia D'Agostino, composer Brian Eno, dancer/choreographers Serene Huleileh and Zkynap Tanbay, dancer and musician Magdalene Joly, movement artist Rainer Knupp, dancer Maria Munoz Guillen, writers Eduardo Galeano and Arundati Roy, and filmmaker Elia Suleiman.

No More Gazas!--Protest the Batsheva Dance Company--Tues. 1/6 Israel Boycott Meeting

2008-12-27T19:00:00.010-08:00

***PLEASE FORWARD***

In the wake of the recent Israeli war crimes in Gaza, the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee has called upon people of conscience around the world "not just to protest and condemn in diverse forms Israel's massacre in Gaza, but also to join and intensify the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel to end its impunity and to hold it accountable for its persistent violation of international law and Palestinian rights." Likewise, Ali Abunimah writes:

... what will happen after the demonstrations disperse and the anger dies down? Will we continue to let Palestinians in Gaza die in silence? Palestinians everywhere are asking for solidarity, real solidarity, in the form of sustained, determined political action. The Gaza-based One Democratic State Group reaffirmed this today as it 'called upon all civil society organizations and freedom loving people to act immediately in any possible way to put pressure on their governments to end diplomatic ties with Apartheid Israel and institute sanctions against it.' The global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement for Palestine provides the framework for this. Now is the time to channel our raw emotions into a long-term commitment to make sure we do not wake up to "another Gaza" ever again.

People in southeast Michigan will have a special opportunity to heed this call on February 14-15 when the Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv comes to Ann Arbor, courtesy of the University Musical Society. Now is the time to begin building opposition to the Batsheva Dance Company's performances as part of a sustained BDS campaign. A recipient of public financing since the 1990s, the Batsheva Dance Company is clearly an Israeli apartheid cultural institution that includes Israeli soldiers in its ranks. Writing October 26, 2008, in The Independent of London, Jenny Gilbert reports that the dance company is "funded by Israel's government, its performers include none of Arab extraction, and it is 'proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador.'" For more information on the Batsheva Dance Company, please see "Organize to stop apartheid dance troupe's North America tour" in The Electronic Intifada

Batsheva Dance Company Boycott Organizing Meeting
When: Tuesday, January 6, 2009 at 7:30 PM
Where: Memorial Christian Church, 730 Tappan Ave (at Hill), Ann Arbor
What: This is a special meeting sponsored by the Middle East Task Force of Ann Arbor and the Detroit/Ann Arbor Friends of Sabeel -- North America. The purpose of the meeting is see if and how the various Palestinian solidarity groups in Ann Arbor and southeast Michigan can work together to respond to the scheduled performance by the Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv on the University of Michigan's Ann Arbor campus. This meeting is only for people who support the 2004 Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel and the 2005 Palestinian Call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel.

See also:

"[Palestininan] Union urges immediate boycott following Gaza university bombing" in The Electronic Intifada
"Give peaceful response a chance" featuring Omar Barghouti in The Dance Insider

Protest in Support of the Boycott of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra

2008-11-12T21:17:00.001-08:00

To download a leaflet (PDF) of this post, click here.

When the elephant has his foot on the tail of the mouse, and you say you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. —Archbishop Desmond Tutu as qtd. in A Passion for the Possible by William Sloane Coffin, p. 36.

PROTEST!!!

IN SUPPORT OF THE BOYCOTT OF THE JERUSALEM SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

The University Musical Society is bringing the Israeli government-sponsored Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO) to perform in the Hill Auditorium on the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor on Sunday, November 16th. This concert and the UMS hosting of it violate the calls of Palestinian civil society for broad boycotts, including cultural and academic boycotts, against Israel until it recognizes the Palestinian people's inalienable right to self-determination and fully complies with international law.

Please call or write UMS President Ken Fischer (734-647-1174, kenfisch@umich.edu) and ask him to cancel the JSO concert and the February 14-15, 2009, recital by the Israeli government-sponsored Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv.
Please join other people of conscience and faith as we nonviolently protest outside the Hill Auditorium on Sunday, November 16, 2008, at 3:00 PM (concert starts at 4 PM).

Don't give the stage to Israeli Apartheid! Boycott the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra!

(Read the full text at http://bdsmovement.net/?q=node/211)

"The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) calls on the hosts in the fourteen American cities where the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra is scheduled to perform between October 26, 2008 and November 16, 2008 to rescind their invitations to the Orchestra. We urge the hosts to support the Palestinian civil society's call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, including the boycott of Israeli cultural institutions. …

"Since the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra is one of the primary promoters and exporters of Israeli cultural life, one of its functions is to boost Israel's image on the world stage. In this way, the truth about the Israeli occupation of Palestine becomes suppressed, and its institutionalized attacks on Palestinian cultural heritage are ignored. Any attempt by the US hosts of the tour to develop ties with this Orchestra, therefore, amounts to condoning Israeli apartheid.

"As such, we call upon the Orchestra's scheduled hosts to be mindful of the appeal issued in 2006 by Palestinian filmmakers, artists and cultural workers … to end all cooperation with Israeli art, film and cultural organizations and institutions sponsored by the Israeli government.

"We urge the hosts to condemn Israel for its racist and discriminatory practices, rather than condoning them. Finally, we call upon all American citizens of conscience to support the Palestinian BDS Call, and to boycott all cultural institutions supported by the apartheid Israeli state."

Sponsored by the Middle East Task Force of Ann Arbor. Contact: metfinexile-owner@yahoogroups.com
For more information on the JSO and the Batsheva Dance Company, go to: nextyearinalquds.blogspot.com
For more information on the global boycott of Israel go to: www.pacbi.org or bdsmovement.net

Update: Apartheid Orchestra Protested

Israeli Apartheid Institutions: The Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra & the Batsheva Dance Company

2008-11-10T21:21:00.002-08:00

The Middle East Task Force of Ann Arbor, Michigan is organizing a nonviolent protest outside the Hill Auditorium on Sunday, November 16, 2008, at 3:00 PM in support of the boycott of two Israeli cultural organizations touring the US. Both organizations will be hosted by the University Musical Society (UMS), based in Ann Arbor. The rationale for the boycott is adequately developed in the letter to UMS President Ken Fischer here. The purpose of this post is to provide more information about the two organizations in question, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO) and Batsheva Dance Company (BDC).

According to a recent article on the ardently pro-Israel web site, ISRAEL21C:

The orchestra was founded in the 1940s as an adjunct to BBC radio in Mandatory Palestine, and became the Kol Israel (Voice of Israel) national radio orchestra with the establishment of the State of Israel. In the 1970s, it was expanded and became the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA).

In the same article it is revealed that the "IBA now provides NIS 6 million of the JSO's annual NIS 9 million budget, with the remainder coming from the Friends, the Municipality of Jerusalem, the Ministry of Science, Culture and Sport, and independent income." Elsewhere, it is stated that "the Friends" provide 15% of the JSO budget, indicating that Israeli government agencies provide somewhere between 66.7% and 85% of the JSO's budget.

JSO Conductor Leon Botstein brags that the JSO is, "very international, with a very wide age range and a very wide political span - from extreme left to extreme right - and I admire the civility with which it handles itself". Oddly enough for an orchestra that hails from Jerusalem, a city where Palestinians make up about one-third of the population, there are, apparently, no Palestinians in the orchestra. As ISRAEL21C reports, "About 40% of JSO's players come from the former Soviet Union, 25% are native-born Israelis, 10% come from the US, a significant contingent from Romania, along with Greece, Germany and Japan." Of course, it may be that some of the "native-born Israelis" are Palestinians.

No matter, though, it's clear from its history and funding that the JSO is a creature of Zionism and the Jewish state. As the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) has declared, "Since the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra is one of the primary promoters and exporters of Israeli cultural life, one of its functions is to boost Israel's image on the world stage. In this way, the truth about the Israeli occupation of Palestine becomes suppressed, and its institutionalized attacks on Palestinian cultural heritage are ignored."

Likewise, the Batsheva Dance Company is an Israeli apartheid institution. An October 26, 2008, article in The Independent of London reports:

On Tuesday night at Sadler's Wells, secret service officers were seen checking under the seats. The next night outside Riverside Studios, protesters tried to persuade punters to boycott the show. What contemporary dance company could possibly merit such attention? An Israeli one, apparently. Batsheva is hardly a political entity, but it's funded by Israel's government, its performers include none of Arab extraction, and it is "proud to be considered Israel's leading ambassador".

According to a 1998 article in Dance Magazine, the BDC was founded 1964 by Batsheva de Rothschild of the wealthy banking family. Although she "was born in London in 1914" and "grew up in Paris" she settled in Israel the same year she started the BDC. Rothschild also "served in Israel as a driver when her car was mobilized for the Yom Kippur War of 1973" and supported "housing for [Jewish] newcomers [to Israel] in the early 1950s". According to Dance Magazine, the BDC "has relied on public financing" since the 1990s.

METF Responds to Imad Hamad of the ADC

2008-10-08T23:34:00.004-07:00

In May of this year, the Middle East Task Force, a small group of folks based in Ann Arbor, MI began organizing a protest against the Zionist "Fair to Remember" at the Michigan State Fairgrounds on August 21, 2008. The Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit had started advertising their celebration of Israel's creation a few weeks earlier.

At any given time, about half of our group were Arab Americans and we called the event the "Fair of Shame" because Israel's creation was a Nakba or "catastrophe" for Palestinians and other Arabs and Muslim people. In 1947-48, hundreds of Palestinian civilians were killed by Jewish forces, more than 350 Palestinian villages were ethnically cleansed and later destroyed, driving some 726,000 Palestinians from their homes into exile. The fallout from the Nakba still reverberates in Palestine, the region, and, not least of all, in the hearts of the three Palestinian Americans--all born in Palestine before 1948--who helped us organize the protest.

Concerning the protest, the Detroit News (8/21/08) reported, "Some leaders in the Arab American community of Metro Detroit said there is little support for the protests ... 'There was an attempt to adopt a joint statement between the Arab-American and Jewish communities,' said Imad Hamad, Michigan director of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. 'It did not happen, but the demonstration was announced without much input from the community and I would not expect many people from the Dearborn community to participate.' "

From the very beginning reaching out to the metro Detroit Arab and Muslim community and its leaders was a priority for us. We even delayed announcing a time and place until late June in order to give others an opportunity to meaningfully participate in the planning. And nothing would have pleased us more than having the more established leaders of metro Detroit's Muslim and Arab communities take charge of the protest planning.

Local representatives of Friends of Sabeel-North America were contacted in May and that organization declined to formally support the protest due to concerns about being accused of "anti-Semitism." The Palestine Office was contacted in May or early June and declined to participate citing unspecified legal liability concerns. Several Muslim and Christian religious leaders were approached and most expressed some support but, apparently, did little or nothing, to turn out members of their community at the protest.

For example, in June, one prominent imam wrote that the planned protest was a "Great idea" but as far as we can tell no one from his mosque attended it. Beginning in July, Mr. Hamad himself was contacted by e-mail, phone, and fax. One of our Palestinian members also met with him personally. I, personally, left two phones messages at Mr. Hamad's office but got no response.

Some of us have personally seen thousands of members of the Muslim and Arab community turn out in Dearborn on November 29th, the International Day of Solidarity with Palestine. We can only speculate why so many people stayed away from the Fair of Shame protest. In any case, it is not for us to say whether it was wrong for any given person or group to fail to support or attend the Fair of Shame protest. But Mr. Hamad's complaint about lack of input into the protest planning is without merit. We went to great lengths to reach out and if community leaders did not want to work with us then they could have easily worked around us and organized a protest of their own.

The same holds true, of course, for Metro Detroit's non-Arab, non-Muslim majority community leaders, who, if they haven't actually colluded in supporting Zionism, have generally done precious little to oppose the Zionist-driven, US taxpayer-funded killing and injustice in Palestine and surrounding countries. The words of Kathim Al-Sahir should speak to all of us. Here are a few lines from his song, "Ah Ya Arab" (Oh, Arabs):

My Arab brother
I am bewildered
What changed the revolutionaries' sword into a cane?
What changed the Arabic tongue into a wooden tongue?
Oh, my people ...
We didn't sell Arabs out, not even during the worst of calamities ...

Signed,

Michelle J. Kinnucan
On behalf of the Middle East Task Force

Oakland Press Tortures Truth

2008-09-13T20:56:00.001-07:00

In an unsigned editorial last Monday, entitled "Hateful news article hurts chances for understanding," the Oakland Press weighed-in on the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit press release condemning the Arab American News (AAN) and Michelle J. Kinnucan for the article, "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating racism and making money at it." The AAN and the author responded with editorials of their own which have both been submitted for publication to the Press. They appear below and in the AAN print and online editons.

Shame on The Oakland Press
Friday, 09.12.2008, 02:00pm

In an editorial this week, The Oakland Press attacked The Arab American News for running an opinion piece by Michelle Kinnucan on the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit's celebration at the Michigan State Fairgrounds of Israel's 60th anniversary. ("Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating racism and making money at it," The Arab American News, Issue 1174, August 9-15, 2008, pages 14 and 15.)

The piece was thoroughly documented and footnoted and we believed there was merit to the writer's argument that resources belonging to the people of Michigan were being used to fundraise for and celebrate the founding of a state that does not deserve to be supported.

Consider that Israel confers citizenship privileges based on one's religion, that Israel has no constitution, that Israel has no recognizable borders, that Israel flies in the face of international law as it expands illegal settlements among a captive civilian population, that Israel is slowly starving to death a million and a half people in Gaza, that Israel is constructing a wall between its residents and the Palestinians in the West Bank which runs deep inside Palestinian territory and creates an apartheid state with Palestinians in bantustans.

Consider all the military checkpoints, the barbed wire, the use of live ammunition against women and children, the relentless home demolitions, the repeated military incursions into Palestinian cities and villages, the murder of innocent civilians on a scale far wider than any terrorist incidents, the imprisonment of 10,000 people including pregnant women and children.

Apparently the article hit too close to home for some of Metropolitan Detroit's pro-Israeli activists. And apparently, like Israel, they don't intend to play by the rules.

Instead of contacting The Arab American News by telephone, facsimile, email, snail mail or personal visit, and registering their opposition, the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit decided to blanket all area media except us with a press release condemning the paper for printing the article. Only then did our telephones begin ringing as reporters called for our feedback.

The article was clearly identified as an opinion piece under the heading of Other Voices. There was nothing in the article to justify claims by the group lobbying against us that it was a hate-filled piece. We're comfortable with our decision to publish the piece and comfortable with the writer's subsequent repudiation of the claims made in the press release. ("My response to the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit," Michelle Kinnucan, The Arab American News, Issue 1177, August 30-September 5, 2008, pages 14-15.

This week, in an astounding betrayal of all tenets of press freedom and fairness, The Oakland Press joined the pro-Israeli activists in attacking our decision to print someone else's opinion. Huh? One newspaper attacks another for standing up for freedom of speech and of the press?

In a poorly written editorial, The Oakland Press accused The Arab American News of "bias (sic) journalism," even as they themselves absconded on the obligation of proving their points. To make outrageous charges but then say it's all too bad to document, which is what the paper did, sounds like the very definition of biased — and cowardly — journalism to us. There was no courtesy call from The Oakland Press to us.

Had anyone at The Oakland Press checked, they would have avoided the mistakes they made which certainly compromise the credibility of their attack on us. They name the wrong sponsoring organization for the original event and they state that The Arab American News employs the writer, which it does not, And then there's this gem: "Other religious and ethnic groups have learned to live together in the United States and the Jews and the Muslims can also, if, particularly in this case, the Muslims are allowed to." What is that supposed to mean? And do they not know the difference between an Arab and a Muslim?

The editorial says: "There may be fighting in the Middle East but we don't need it here. We don't want it here. We don't have to have it here."

But we have to allow one party to the conflict to divert resources away from Americans and toward the conflict without saying anything about it? And we don't expect the families of the other party to the conflict living here to say anything about that? Come on.

We welcome any opportunity for dialogue that does not come laden with the imperative that "we cannot discuss Israel." But that's exactly what we have always heard about dialogue with the pro-Israeli community.

Which, in the end, just goes to prove Kinnucan's point that Israel and its supporters are not held to the same ethical standards of behavior, the same honor code, the same rules, as the rest of society.

Shame on The Oakland Press and no one else.

The Oakland Press tortures the truth
By Michelle Kinnucan - The Arab American News
Friday, 09.12.2008, 02:00pm

One of the gratifying things about the Fair of Shame protest on August 21st was the response of so many of the Israeli youth. As we stood outside the Jewish Federation's celebration of Israel's creation, dozens of big, yellow school buses passed by. Because traffic was backed up the teens inside had a chance to read our anti-Zionist, pro-Palestinian signs, to speak with us, and to tell us where they were from. "Israel," they said, and many of them gave us smiles, peace signs, thumbs-ups, and other signs of approval when they saw what we were doing.

From the ranks of such young people come the hundreds of "sarvanim" or "refuseniks" who show their moral courage by refusing to serve or obey orders in the Israeli military because it violently oppresses Palestinians and people in neighboring countries (military service is compulsory for most young Jewish Israelis). Such young people populate the ranks of groups like Zochrot, which raises "awareness of the Nakba, the Palestinian catastrophe of 1948," in part, by erecting signs at the sites of the hundreds of Arab villages ethnically cleansed and destroyed by Zionist forces.

I am reminded, too, of another young Israeli I met a couple of years ago: Jonathan Pollak, who was seriously injured when Israeli troops shot him in the head with a teargas canister in 2005. Pollak was working with the International Solidarity Movement in the village of Bil'in where, he says, "Palestinians are protesting, and others with them, against the theft of their land, against the steps the Israeli government and Israeli army are taking to make their lives impossible — basically to commit a quiet ethnic cleansing."

Of course, the young Israelis in the buses were still going to a celebration of the creation of Israel but they suggest that the youth don't necessarily buy all the hoary fairy tales that their elders peddle about Israel. This certainly includes the oft-repeated lies regurgitated in the Oakland Press editorial of September 8, concerning my August 8th article in The Arab American News (TAAN), "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating racism and making money at it."

The Press claims, "Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East … [and] one of the most open and tolerant nations. I put these lies to rest in my response to the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit (published in the TAAN on August 29). Suffice to it say, even the State Department's 2007 report on human rights noted, "Institutional, legal, and societal discrimination against Israeli Arabs, non-Orthodox Jews, and other religious groups continued" in Israel. Mossawa, the Advocacy Center for Arab Citizens in Israel, has documented that "At least twenty Israeli laws discriminate against the Arab minority …" Further, no country that, as Israel does, militarily dominates and occupies millions of people for more than forty years, extending to them neither citizenship nor any real say in the rule over them, can honestly be called a democracy.

The Press also complains there was no "policy of ethnic cleansing of Arabs from its lands" in 1948 when Israel was founded. In fact, "Plan Dalet" envisioned the "systematic eradication of Palestinian population centers" and was hatched by the Haganah in 1947. Plan Dalet is well-documented by Palestinian and Israeli historians such as Walid Khalidi, Ilan Pappe, and Benny Morris. The infamous April 1948 massacre at Deir Yassin of over 100 Palestinians, half of them women and children, occurred under Plan Dalet.

The Press got one thing right. Israel is "tolerant" … of torture, that is. As Louis Frankenthaler of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel wrote earlier this year, Israel "continues to use torture. … One may choose to believe that torture has been 'abolished in Israel' but it continues with impunity." A 2006 scientific poll for the BBC in 25 countries found: "The largest percentage endorsing torture was found in Israel. … A majority of Jewish respondents (53%) favor allowing governments to use torture … In contrast, Muslims in Israel … are overwhelmingly (87%) against any use of torture." Maybe Israeli tolerance for torture is what inspired the Press to torture the truth so viciously when they criticized the TAAN and my article.

More Fair of Shame News

2008-08-23T14:51:00.003-07:00

Here are some Fair of Shame articles not included in my post yesterday:

"Jewish community in Metro Detroit celebrates Israel's 60th anniversary." Detroit News. 8/21.
"Al Nakba: Nothing to Celebrate." Playfulspirit For Peace blog. 8/21.
"This Fair Will Be Remembered." Detroit Jewish News. 8/22.
"My response to the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit."
The Arab American News. 8/29.

Updated: 8/31/08

8/21 Protest Report--Jalut Nervous

2008-08-22T18:33:00.002-07:00

It was a classic Dawud vs. Jalut--i.e. David vs. Goliath--confrontation at the Michigan State Fairgrounds yesterday as 60-70 spirited human rights activists faced off against thousands of racists and their friends coming to celebrate sixty years of Jewish supremacism in apartheid Israel. The Nakba celebrants showed their gleeful allegiance to the country that brutally occupies Palestine and has repeatedly invaded or attacked Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan.

Jalut was backed by a substantial uniformed and undercover police presence and they were kept in check by courageous legal observers from the National Lawyers Guild. While Dawud held his ground, Jalut was clearly rattled as evidenced by the glum demeanor, frequent middle finger salutes and other obscene gestures and shouts of the fairgoers. These frightened, angry folks know that while Zionist power seems invincible to some, Israel's days are numbered. Israel's ignominious retreat from Gaza, the humiliating defeat of the IDF by Hizbullah in Lebanon in 2006, the growing BDS movement, and the caterwauling about the "demographic threat" all signal the coming demise of the violent racist project that is Israel. The Jewish Federation's "Fair to Remember" yesterday is reminiscent of the South Africa's apartheid supporters partying at Sun City while their brutal regime goes down the toilet.

Below is the text from "Demonstrators protest apartheid at State fairgrounds" in today's Arab American News.

DETROIT — Dozens of pro-Palestinian, anti-occupation activists demonstrated outside the Michigan State fairgrounds on Thursday.

They protested a celebration of the 60th year since the creation of the state of Israel, put on by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit (JFMD). Invitees of the JFMD had access to all the rides and other features of the State Fair one day before it opens to the public.

Activist Michelle J. Kinnucan organized the protest, enraged at the idea of holding a celebration of what she calls the "violent ethnic cleansing and colonization of Palestine in 1948," in a poor neighborhood in Detroit.

She said attendees seemed surprised by the demonstration, and hopes their presence will help to get people thinking about the plight of Palestinians.

"They weren't expecting it," she said. "You never know what's going to be effective. You have to do what you can. One of the things that we can do is stand out here and let them know that a celebration of the Naqba is not going to go unchallenged."

Protester Emilio Louchino, 16, an Ann Arbor high school student, said he became conscious of the conflict through reading about it online and hearing anecdotes about West Bank checkpoints from friends who serve in Jordan as members of the Peace Corps.

"I'm just here to speak my mind," he said. "It will maybe make people think about this."

He said the group got some hostile responses from passersby, but that they didn't let it discourage them from trying to raise consciousness of the issue.

"People don't realize that the biggest money in the entire world budget for foreign aid goes to Israel," said Thomas Olechowski, of Detroit. "And most of it goes to arms. It's being done in our name... The exploitation of the Palestinians is the same as the exploitation of the people in the community I live in in Detroit."

Demonstrator Elaine Rumman, 78, a Palestinian American from Ann Arbor who has family living in Bethlehem, said watching hundreds of people enter the State fairgrounds for the event made her intensely sad, but that her pain was eased by the presence of as many as 70 mostly non-Arab protesters outside the event.

"It makes me proud of them. These are the people who have conscience," she said. "Always, justice will rise up, whatever will happen."

AAN Article Online; Zionists Outraged

2008-08-14T13:42:00.006-07:00

The Arab American News published Michelle J. Kinnucan's article "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating Racism and Making Money At It" online. Predictably, its online publication has infuriated Zionist cyberwarriors. Their comments display three staples of Zionist rhetoric or hasbara: 1) Diversion by subject changing 2) Ad hominem attacks and 3) Outright falsehoods.

The article appears in the 8/9-8/15 print edition of the Arab American News on pages 14-15. For the annotated version of the article go to the Palestine Chronicle here.

Updates:

"COUNCIL CONDEMNS 'ARAB AMERICAN NEWS' ARTICLE." Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit. 8/27/2008.
"Newspaper article criticized as anti-Semitic." Detroit News. 8/28/2008.
"My response to the Jewish Community Relations Council of Metropolitan Detroit." Arab American News. 8/29/2008.

Last revised: 9/4/2008

Arab American News Covers Zionist Fair of Shame in Detroit--Support Still Needed

2008-08-09T18:35:00.004-07:00

**PLEASE FORWARD***

The organizers of the August 21 Fair of Shame protest got a boost yesterday when the Arab American News published Michelle J. Kinnucan's article "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating Racism and Making Money At It" and the protest flyer in its 8/9-8/15 print edition on pages 14-15. Look for the article on the AAN web site in the next few days. In the meantime, you can find it online at the Palestine Chronicle (here) and Media Mouse (here).

There are less than two weeks to go until the Fair of Shame, please help make this a protest that Zionists and anti-Zionists alike will remember for a long time.

What you can do:
1. Publicize the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest.
2. Get organizations you support and work with to publicly endorse the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest.
3. Help organize and plan the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest (next meeting is Friday 8/15).
4. Attend the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest--bring friends, signs, and banners.

Protest 8/21--No Celebrations of Racism in Detroit--Call for Support

2008-08-06T21:06:00.003-07:00

***PLEASE FORWARD***

No Celebrations of Racism in Detroit--Call for Support
Protest the Fair of Shame and "Israelization" in Detroit

When: Thursday, August 21, 2008, Time: 5 PM to 7 PM
Where: Michigan State Fairgrounds, 1120 W. State Fair Ave. (at Woodward) in Detroit. Meet in the grassy area just north of the SmartBus State Fair Transit Center off Woodward Ave.

In 1975, the United Nations affirmed that "zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination" (UN GA Res. 3379). Resolutions can be revoked but the truth cannot and what was true in 1948 and in 1975 is true today--Zionism is racism. Just as all humanity is interconnected, all forms of oppression are interconnected and so on August 21, 2008, a diverse group of advocates for peace and justice are expected to protest when the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit stages its "Fair to Remember" at the Michigan State Fairgrounds on that date. We will protest the exclusive, no-risk sweetheart deal granted by a state agency to a largely affluent community to stage a celebration of racism in a largely economically disenfranchised city. The celebration of 60 years of Israeli apartheid in Palestine is a slap in the face to those oppressed by centuries of de jure and de facto American apartheid. We will protest a triumphalist celebration of ethnic cleansing, robbery, and anti-Arab racism in Palestine--a celebration of what its victims call the Nakba, Arabic for "catastrophe"--just a few miles from one of the largest Arab communities outside the Middle East. We will protest the Jewish Federation's "Fair to Remember" because we know it is, in reality, a "Fair of Shame" made possible by the hijacking of US foreign policy realized in the form of inordinate American diplomatic, financial, and military support for the Apartheid State of Israel.

We call upon supporters of justice and peace to help nonviolently protest the "Israelization," as the Jewish Federation puts it, of the Michigan State Fairgrounds.

What you can do:
1. Publicize this call and the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest.
2. Get organizations you support and work with to publicly endorse the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest.
3. Help organize and plan the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest (next meeting is Friday 8/8).
4. Attend the 8/21 Fair of Shame protest--bring friends, signs, and banners.

Sponsored by Middle East Task Force. Endorsed by Michigan Peace Team, Ann Arbor Middle East Film Society, Jewish Witnesses for Peace and Friends, Huron Valley Greens, Green Party of Michigan

See also "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating Racism and Making Money At It" in the Arab American News or "Celebrating the Nakba and Making Money At It" in the Palestine Chronicle.

Updated: 8/17/08

Thanks to Ron Scott, MECAWI, & Media Mouse

2008-08-06T20:57:00.003-07:00

Thanks to Ron Scott for publicizing the Fair of Shame protest on his radio show, "Fighting for Justice" on WDTW, 1310 AM.

Thanks to the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI) for publicizing the Fair of Shame protest on their web site.

And thanks, finally, to Media Mouse for publishing "Detroit Jewish Federation: Celebrating Racism and Making Money At It."

Poster Quotes on Israel & Zionism

2008-08-06T20:48:00.004-07:00

Here are the quotes that appear on the Fair of Shame protest posters:

Here in Palestine Jesus is again walking the via dolorosa. Jesus is the powerless Palestinian humiliated at a checkpoint, the woman trying to get through to the hospital for treatment, the young man whose dignity is trampled, the young student who cannot get to the university to study, the unemployed father who needs to find bread to feed his family; the list is tragically getting longer, and Jesus is there in their midst suffering with them. He is with them when their homes are shelled by tanks and helicopter gunships. He is with them in their towns and villages, in their pains and sorrows.

In this season of Lent, it seems to many of us that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him. It only takes people of insight to see the hundreds of thousands of crosses throughout the land, Palestinian men, women, and children being crucified. Palestine has become one huge golgotha. The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily. Palestine has become the place of the skull.

–Naim Ateek, Lent, 2001

My sympathies are all with the Jews…But my sympathy does not blind me to the requirements of justice. The cry for the national home for the Jews does not make much appeal to me. The sanction for it is sought in the Bible and the tenacity with which the Jews have hankered after return to Palestine. Why should they not, like other peoples of the earth, make that country their home where they are born and where they earn their livelihood?

Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and in-human to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct. The mandates have no sanction but that of the last war. Surely it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so that Palestine can be restored to the Jews partly or wholly as their national home.

–Mohandas K. Gandhi, November 20, 1938

… I have come to join you today to add our own voice to the universal call for Palestinian self-determination and statehood.

We would be beneath our own reason for existence as a government and as a nation, if the resolution of the problems of the Middle East did not feature prominently on our agenda.

When in 1977, the United Nations passed the resolution inaugurating the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people, it was asserting the recognition that injustice and gross human rights violations were being perpetrated in Palestine. In the same period, the UN took a strong stand against apartheid; and over the years, an international consensus was built, which helped to bring an end to this iniquitous system.

But we know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians …

–Nelson Mandela, Dec. 4, 1997

… the Israeli government is placed on a pedestal [in the U.S.], and to criticize it is to be immediately dubbed anti-Semitic, as if the Palestinians were not Semitic. …

People are scared in this country [the U.S.] to say wrong is wrong because the Jewish lobby is powerful – very powerful. Well, so what? This is God’s world. For goodness sake, this is God’s world! We live in a moral universe. The apartheid government was very powerful, but today it no longer exists. Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pinochet, Milosovic, and Idi Amin were all powerful, but in the end they bit the dust.

Injustice and oppression will never prevail. Those who are powerful have to remember the litmus test that God gives to the powerful: What is your treatment of the poor, the hungry, the voiceless? And on the basis of that, God passes judgment.

–Desmond Tutu, April 13, 2002

Did the Zionists have the legal or moral right to invade Arab Palestine, uproot its Arab citizens from their homes and seize all Arab property for themselves just based on the "religious" claim that their forefathers lived there thousands of years ago? Only a thousand years ago the Moors lived in Spain. Would this give the Moors of today the legal and moral right to invade the Iberian Peninsula, drive out its Spanish citizens, and then set up a new Moroccan nation ... where Spain used to be, as the European zionists have done to our Arab brothers and sisters in Palestine? ...

In short the Zionist argument to justify Israel's present occupation of Arab Palestine has no intelligent or legal basis in history ... not even in their own religion. Where is their Messiah?

–Malcolm X a.k.a. Al-Hajj Malik al-Shabazz, Sept. 17, 1964

Complete Fair of Shame Schedule

2008-08-06T20:41:00.002-07:00

From the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit web site:

Complete Fair Schedule

All rides, food and attractions at the Michigan State Fair will be open to our attendees. In addition, there will be Israel-focused activities and exhibits as well as musical entertainment. You will not want to miss the All-Star Musical Tribute to Israel, held in the band shell, which will be sure to provide an unforgettable moment for our community.

Rides, games, and fair vendors will be open from 3:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. Other special events are as follows:

3:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

Israel-themed interactive activities open

3:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

Kosher Food Vendors open

4:00 p.m. to 7:15 p.m.

Family Entertainment in the Family Grove

7:00 p.m.

Pre-show, including musical performances, video, and light show

8:00 p.m.

Multi-Media Concert, emceed by Peter Himmelman

9:15 p.m.

Fireworks

9:30 p.m. to 11:00 p.m.

Young Adult Concert/After-Show featuring Moshav Band

All children upon entry to the State Fair will receive an Israeli ID card. For each Israeli-themed activity completed throughout the day, they will receive a stamp on their ID cards. When children have acquired 6 stamps, they will be invited to make an Israeli Flag out of Sandy Candy to then wave proudly at the evening concert.

Israel-themed activities

Picnic Grove

Shalom Street’s “All Shuk Up” Exhibit
HaKovah Sheli Paper Hat-Making by the Rad Hatter
Exploring Israel
Tziporri - Archeological Dig
Eilate of Sugar - Sandy Candy Israeli Flag-Making
Tree Planting presented by Jewish National Fund (JNF)
Candle-Making presented by Tamarack Camps
Magen David Adom Ambulance
Teen2Teen Interviews presented by the Jewish News
IsraelSixty sale merchandise and other Judaica
Israel Ministry of Tourism

Department of Natural Resources (DNR)

“Gefilte” Fishing in the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee)

Family Entertainment at the Caesarea Stage (Family Grove Stage)

4:00 p.m. to 4:45 p.m.

Peter Himmelman

5:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.

Corinne Stavish

5:45 p.m. to 6:15 p.m.

Kidz Klez

6:30 p.m. to 7:15 p.m.

Israeli Dance Spectacular

Fair of Shame Featured in Palestine Chronicle Article

2008-08-01T22:04:00.003-07:00

Below are the first four paragraphs of an article by Michelle J. Kinnucan and published online by the Palestine Chronicle on Wednesday. The article is entitled "Celebrating the Nakba and Making Money At It."

On Thursday, August 21, 2008, one of the country's wealthiest communities will celebrate the Nakba--the violent ethnic cleansing and colonization of Palestine in 1948--in a poor neighborhood in Detroit. And if all goes well, a large group of folks, representing metro Detroit's large Black and Arab communities and other Palestinian solidarity activists, will be on hand to nonviolently send the message that triumphal celebrations of racism and genocide will not go unchallenged in Detroit.

Detroit's State Fair neighborhood is named after the entity that dominates its landscape--the state-owned Michigan State Fair and Exposition Center (MSFEC). Last year, the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit (JFMD) finalized a contract with the State of Michigan for the use of the fairgrounds. The contract was memorialized in a letter, a copy of which was obtained through the Michigan Freedom of Information Act.[1]

The Jewish Federation was granted a no risk sweetheart deal for its "Fair to Remember," part of its year-long "IsraelSixty" campaign celebrating the creation of Israel in 1948. The contract provides that "All of the normal operations of the Fair shall be available for use by the patrons of the JFMD including games, rides, and exhibitions." If no one shows up for the Federation's event, the Federation pays nothing, no deposit is forfeited, no cancellation fee is lost, and the MSFEC earns nothing while incurring all of the costs associated with running the fair. All the risk is assumed by the MSFEC, a state body.

And no other fair-goers will pick up any part of the tab because the contract provides "that the use of the Fair by JFMD shall be exclusive and that no individuals that are not the invitees of JFMD ... shall be allowed access to the Fair." As the Jewish Federation brags on its web site: "We will have exclusive use of the State Fairgrounds (including rides and attractions) the day before it opens to the general public, which allows us to 'Israelize' the State Fair."[2] The JFMD encourages people to contact their "Israelization team" with ideas about how to transform the fairgrounds. Palestinians and their friends know what loss and suffering the "Israelization" of Palestine in 1948 and 1967 has meant for the "people of the land" (Ezra 9:1-2).

MPT Endorses Fair of Shame Protest; New Posters Available

2008-07-30T20:45:00.001-07:00

The organizers of the Fair of Shame protest are happy to report that the Michigan Peace Team has recently endorsed our nonviolent protest planned at the Michigan State Fairgrounds on 8/21. The next protest organizing meeting will be in Detroit on August 8th at 7 PM. For more information write to fairofshame@yahoo.com .

We are also happy to report that we have several new posters available. The posters are identical except that they feature quotes on Israel/Zionism by five different prominent leaders in the struggle for justice and peace. They are all 11" x 17" tabloid size. Please print them out and post them in your church, mosque, synagogue, library, favorite bookstore, or cafe--you get the idea. At bottom is an image of the Malcolm X poster (click on the image for better resolution).

Download the posters:

Fair of Shame in the Detroit News

2008-07-15T01:31:00.000-07:00

The Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit's Fair of Shame was mentioned in the Detroit News yesterday. Below is the full story with a comment in italics.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Israel fair to echo 1949

High point of Jewish community's celebration of 60th mixes joy of past event with the present.

Gregg Krupa / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- The high point of the Jewish community of Metro Detroit's year-long commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel is slated for Aug. 21 at the State Fairgrounds in Detroit.

"A Fair to Remember," presented by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, is intended to recall a similar event in 1949 when thousands of Detroiters gathered at the fairgrounds in a joyous celebration of the anniversary of Israel.

"It is meant to re-establish the fact of the Jewish community Metropolitan Detroit and its support of Israel," said Scott Kaufman, director of "Israel at 60," to be held the day before the Michigan State Fair opens. "But it also is intended to have a celebration at a time when what we are hearing is mostly bad news, bad economic news, people losing jobs and houses, and the gas prices ... We are kind of looking at it as St. Patrick's Day, or Cinco de Mayo, or the big Arab-American festival -- just kind of an ethnic celebration of community."

Actually, Scott, your Federation's Fair of Shame is more akin to an American celebration of the Wounded Knee Massacre, a Japanese celebration of the Rape of Nanjing, or a German celebration of the Fall Weiss. You see, St. Patrick's Day is a celebration of the peaceful introduction of Christianity into Ireland by a former slave. And, Cinco de Mayo is a celebration of the Mexican defeat of French imperial forces in Mexico. By contrast, your Fair of Shame celebrates the conquest of the indigenous people of Palestine in 1948, well after the establishment of international norms of conduct that the mostly European and North American Jewish invaders refused to abide by. In fact, you are celebrating previous and ongoing crimes against humanity and war crimes.

The rides, food and attractions of the State Fair will be accessible to those attending the event, along with Israel-themed activities, exhibits, shopping at shuks -- Israeli market stands -- and kosher Israeli food. In the evening, an All-Star Musical Tribute to Israel is scheduled at the band shell, with Grammy-nominated children's composer Peter Himmelman and the Israeli rock and reggae group The New Moshav Band performing.

They'll be joined by the Greater New Mount Moriah Baptist Church choirs of Detroit, the Word of Faith Choir from the Word of Faith International Christian center in Southfield and the Drummer Boyz of Pontiac.

The event, for which the Jewish Federation has rented the fairgrounds, is from 3-10 p.m.

Tickets are required for entry and each automobile must have a pass to park on the Fairgrounds.

Tickets and parking passes, including handicapped parking passes, are now available at jewishdetroit.org/israelsixty, or by calling (877) 772-5425. Tickets range from $12.95 to $24.95. Strollers and wheelchairs will be available, on site, for rental.

"The vehicle for the event is the 60th anniversary of Israel," said Zina Kramer of Bloomfield Hills, one of several volunteers working to prepare for the occasion. "But the reason I wanted to be involved is that I see it as an event that has the potential to bring together a lot of people who don't always come together with the Jewish community and, perhaps, along the way they will learn more about Israel and the Jewish community in the area. I also think it will spur a greater interest in Israel on the part of the Jewish community."

Protesting "Israelization" of Michigan State Fair

2008-06-07T17:56:00.000-07:00

Protest the Zionist Fair of Shame!!!

No Celebrations of Genocide, Theft, & Racism

This August, the Jewish community "will have exclusive use of the State Fairgrounds" to celebrate Israel's 60th anniversary. The Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit is calling it "A Fair to Remember" (see announcement below). We think it's a fair to be ashamed of. Following the lead of Palestinian civil society organizations and in view of the multi-faceted oppression that is the reality of Israel, we regard participation in "celebrations" of the Nakba/Israel's establishment as collusion in the perpetuation of the dispossession and uprooting of refugees, the prolongation of occupation, and the deepening of Israeli apartheid. We call upon all supporters of justice and peace to nonviolently protest the "Israelization," as the Jewish Federation puts it, of the Michigan State Fairgrounds.

When: Thursday, August 21, 2008
Time: 5 PM to 7 PM
Where: Michigan State Fair & Exposition Center, 1120 W. State Fair Ave. (at Woodward) in Detroit. Meet in the grassy area just north of the SmartBus State Fair Transit Center off Woodward Ave.

To co-sponsor or get more info, send an e-mail to fairofshame[at]yahoo(dot)com

Click on the image below to enlarge it.