What would happen if a venue told a group like Rage Against the Machine or Public Enemy that it could not perform unless it allowed the US Military Band to open for it?

I doubt the request would be met with much support, or that any venue would ever impose such restrictions on its performing artists, and yet that is precisely what happened to Lebanese composer and musician, Marcel Khalife, at the Ray and Jon Kroc Corps Community Center in San Diego. Khalife, on a tour in the United States, was informed by the venue that his show was to be canceled because it was “divisive” and “unbalanced,” and that the only remedy would be to have an Israeli perform on the same day.

What “divisive” and “unbalanced” mean in this context is a mystery, but they are definitely no strangers when it comes to art about the Palestinians. Just recently, a similar campaign was conducted against a mural depicting the apartheid wall in San Francisco made by artists in the youth community organization, HOMEY. Before a hearing at the San Francisco Arts Commission, the HOMEY artists were forced, due to a lack of resources, to enter into a “compromise” that the wall would be made to look less realistic, like the ominous symbol (and reality) of separation and disunity that it is, and more like a happy place surrounded by flora and hope. They were also asked to remove the kuffiyeh from one of the characters.

Increasingly, symbols that assert the Palestinians’ right to resist the brutality and violence of Israeli hegemony are being demonized and censored. Artwork and poetry that denounce Israel’s project of separating Arab from Jew in historic Palestine are called “divisive” and “unbalanced,” whereas actual instances of physical, ideological, and institutional separation–look, for example, at the apartheid wall, or at the separate lower schooling systems for Arabs and Jews in Israel, or more generally at the Zionist ideology of the state–are rationalized away, somehow escaping this label of “divisive” when that is exactly what they do, explicitly and unabashedly: divide and separate. Somehow, Israel has managed to twist this separation into a step towards peace, but just as other cases in history have shown, Palestinians and Israelis will never be separate but equal, and as long as they are not equal, there will likely be no lasting or meaningful peace.

The strange logic that supports this system of censoring all who recognize the Palestinians on equal terms goes beyond “divisiveness,” though. It’s directly related the idea of “bias” when it comes to any discussion that has to do with Israel. Even with strong evidence and reasoned analysis, anybody who concludes that Israel’s policies are unjust or discriminatory is treated as a “biased” party, and calls are made for “both sides” to be given a voice. The “other side” is always somebody whose line matches that of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Imagine if a venue hosting an engagement for a speaker against the war on Iraq was criticized for not presenting “both sides,” the other side being the now discredited position of the Bush administration.

That is what we need to accept, as well, when it comes to Israel and Palestine: that not all “sides” (and I speak here of rhetorical sides, more like analyses and opinions, not of any primitive ’sides’ like ‘the Israeli side’ or ‘the Palestinian side’) are equal. These are not sides relating to values that can never be reconciled, like when it comes to non-legalistic debates surrounding things like abortion and gay marriage. They are sides that relate directly to the world around us, and to our political interactions with it. They cannot all be true (though all of them can impart some useful information, usually not about what they intend).

Just like the Bush administration’s side in the Iraq war debate has been discredited, it is time to accept the fact that the Israeli government’s side on the Palestine issue has been equally discredited, and that repeatedly airing that side is not a matter of being “fair to both sides,” but rather, of sheer naivety and idiocy.

Khalife has found himself in the middle of this because he has elegantly and beautifully put earlier poetry of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish to music. But it is especially strange to see him in the middle of this because music, and art more generally, has never been perceived as a field of dispassionate objectivity where one can be accused of being “unbalanced” or “biased.” The arts are traditionally considered a place for hyper-subjectivity, a place of independent and honest expression, a place where the only “side” is one’s own. Is it that those who have shut down his show wish to see the stunning limits of faux objectivity in other fields, extended to the arts? I would hope not. The objectivity of those fields is untrue anyway: we should be seeking the opposite. That is, the authenticity of the arts should subsume the rest of our existence, and we should totally abandon the harmful idea that we can exist in ‘objective’ worlds.

Marcel Khalife is playing in San Francisco on October 10. For more information, check out the tour schedule.
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Hossam is posting frequent updates regarding a huge strike of over 15,000 textile workers at the Ghazl el-Mahallah textile factory in Egypt. According to him, this is the largest textile factory in the Middle East, with over 27,000 workers. The Egyptian government has declared the strike “illegal,” potentially opening the way for a police confrontation with the strikers. As far as I know, the Western media has yet to pick up on this story.

Factory workers, male and female, strike together as they occupy the factory compound. Image is from the Egyptian Workers blog. Click for more info.

Among other things, the strikers are asking for the union and factory leadership to be sacked and for increases in salaries and food allowances to match price inflation. Threatened with government interference, the strikers are looking for statements of support from international labor organizations, as well as coverage of their strike from international media. The state-owned company that owns the factory is the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company, which exports internationally. For more information, on labor activities at this factory, read this informative report in MERIP.

If anybody knows of any ways to determine who the clients of this factory/company are in the United States, now would be a good time to uncover them so that we can apply local pressure in support of the strikers.

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Four and a half years and 75,000 Iraqi and 3,800 American deaths later, the best thing America has to show for the invasion and occupation of Iraq is this single story, which is turning out to be more about easing a guilty American conscience than it is about helping those whose lives have been irreversibly destroyed by a trigger-happy American president.

How many of those now driven to “support” Youssif will mobilize to stop the war? Withdrawal comes first, then reparations.

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Is it really so surprising that those who support apartheid should be afraid of the Handala, that never-dying symbol of a never-dying Palestine, and of an image of the illegal wall Israel is building in and around the West Bank?

Click on the image for more information.

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This is the sculpted pillar that can be found on the bridge at Michigan Avenue in Chicago. All I could think about after seeing this, besides the many other troubling things I encountered
during my visit, was this: really? Are you serious? This genocide is still something we are proud of in America?

And not too far away, maybe a few blocks (I can’t remember the exact location right now), lay this monument to the false visions of George Washington, the man who sanctioned slavery and the genocide of the Native Americans:

It reads, “The government of the United States, which gives to Bigotry no Sanction, and to Persecution no Assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.”

Which America is that, I wonder? I have not seen it, though it would be nice to, some day.

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Hussein Ibish, above, believes he will single-handedly free Palestine with his American passport.

In his column of September 14, 2007, Hussein Ibish made one telling statement: “Any successful approach to pro-Palestinian advocacy in the United States should therefore emphasize the benefits to the United States, and indeed to Israel, of freedom for the Palestinian people.”

This suggestion comes at a time when the vast majority of Americans in decision-making circles are convinced of the exact opposite: that Israeli hegemony over the Palestinian people, and Israel’s status as a regional superpower, is in fact one that benefits the United States. It is nearly impossible to suggest otherwise considering the substantial cooperation between the militaries, intelligence communities, economies, and governments of both countries. Hell, an Israeli firm is contracted to train the campus police all the way at my California school. If Israel is good enough friends with the University of California, then we have a long way to go before making a convincing argument that Israel is not good enough for “US interests”–the same interests that have a history of spreading war, overthrowing democratic governments, and installing puppet leaders around the world. Contrary to Ibish’s thinking, “US interests” are not defined by the Arab love he thinks will follow a US-sponsored Palestinian state.

This small fact aside, we should also be troubled by anybody who views the Palestinian people instrumentally, as either beneficial or detrimental to so-and-so’s interests. In this problematic thinking, which was instrumental in bringing about the Israeli state in the first place, whenever Palestinian freedom is not beneficial to the United States or to Israel (like today, yesterday, and every day in at least the past 60 years: the existence of the Palestinians is in fact quite inconvenient for Israel, and this will always be the case until Israel changes its state ideology), Ibish loses all justification for supporting the Palestinian people in their just cause. The truest, most persistent, and most promising support for the Palestinian people is that which rests on ethical principles, not on opportunism and self-interest.

Ibish, who entertains the idea that he is not a supporter of “ethnic nationalism,” concludes that those “serious” about peace must work for a “Palestinian state alongside Israel.” In other words, Ibish’s idea of “serious” peace is that which results in a state defined for Jews and another defined for Arabs. Putting aside the question of whether or not this is practically possible, we should ask: is there a grosser example of “ethnic nationalism” than Ibish’s suggestion, anywhere, and can any of the academics Ibish smears (who actually call for one state defined by neither ethnic identity) actually be guilty of this? The truth is that Ibish himself is guilty of what he accuses his opponents. This paradox, which even Ibish himself may not have picked up on, is quite typical for those who believe they can achieve liberation by collaborating with the same people who are in the business of dominating them.

It is no coincidence that Ibish is especially shocked by the idea that some might blame “other Palestinians and Arabs” for the criminal situation in Palestine. Ibish’s “lament” in this regard is most striking, especially for somebody who opposes “ethnic nationalism” while espousing liberal values that might be believed to be antithetical to the implications of this “lament.” While communal solidarity is important in the fight against apartheid, it would be a grave mistake to believe that every single Palestinian is equal in that fight: indeed, there are those Palestinians, and especially those Arabs, who have benefited in material and political terms precisely because of the occupation, and precisely because of their participation in the never-ending “peace process,” which time is showing us is actually a process of destroying Palestine piece-by-piece.

The most troubling part of Ibish’s vision for a Palestinian state is that it will be unsustainable. If it is to rely on never-ending “international backing,” which itself is an impossible goal, then that state will disappear with that support. Not even the Zionists relied so carelessly and so exclusively on “international support” to establish their state. It is also difficult to imagine what kind of Palestinian state can occur if a group with such pervasive social roots as Hamas is one that can simply be discarded and ignored by his strangely exclusionary idea of democracy. Does Ibish think a state of any form can actually be formed without that segment of Palestinian society playing any role whatsoever? That state will not last: it has already failed, as recent events have shown.

What we need is not defeatism, as Ibish is proposing. Neither is it the redemptive approach that Ibish suggests of Americans wielding their passports to save the Palestinians, who Ibish appears to take for granted will never have a chance of helping themselves. We should be working to empower those who are leading the authentic struggle against the apartheid system, whoever they may be. This cannot happen by “engaging the political system” in the way Ibish thinks we should: not because of some irrational obstinacy on our part, as Ibish the Rational imagines, but because of the very nature of that political system. The only way we can “engage” the political system, is if we engage it in on contrarian terms. In remaining outside of the system while actively opposing it, we will shape it. The other alternative is Ibish’s: that we attempt to oppose the system by participating in it. But if we follow that path, it is our shape that will change.

Immortal Technique said it more gracefully: “The problem with always being a conformist is that when you try to change the system from within, it’s not you who changes the system; it’s the system that will eventually change you. There is usually nothing wrong with compromise in a situation, but compromising yourself in a situation is another story completely.”

The mural above, in San Francisco at 24th and Capp, illustrates the spirit of resistance common to struggles against external domination around the world. It is currently under attack by the censors of the Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Community Relations Council. Click on the image for more information on how to help.

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The first issue is out. Click below to get to the table of contents or to download the PDF.

My articles in this issue are…:

On Parades and Protests

There was a time in American history when protests were not tolerated by those in power. We need only look back at the civil rights era to find the authorities violently repressing protestors calling for social equality and an end to the war in Vietnam, in the same way that similarly organic protests continue to be put down in other parts of the world today.At that time, protests were a genuine and effective way to oppose government policy because they were at once outside of the prevailing political system, and at the same time opposed to it….

Confessions of a Madrasa Grad

Few people I associate with know that my earlier schooling took place in a madrasa. I still find myself, from time to time, recognizing that some of my beliefs and habits today have their roots in my time at that madrasa. I see similar residue on the many people I know that also came out of such institutions. There’s some truth to the belief that the madrasas have dangerous and long-lasting effects on those who attend them….

If you’d like to submit an article for the next issue, click here and send it in by September 21, 2007! For those wondering, this is also the reason I have not posted much lately. I think the style of this blog might change in the future considering that I will be piping most of my writing to the a-Rab.

If you want a hard copy of the issue, make sure to get in touch with me.

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