The Insult: Six points toward clarification
The Insult: Six points toward clarification
by Terri Ginsberg February 5, 2018
http://mondoweiss.net/2018/02/insult-points-clarification/
Controversy has arisen in recent weeks over the 2017 film, The Insult [Qadiat raqm 23 (Case #23)], Lebanon’s submission to the 2018 Academy Awards. The film’s director, Ziad Doueiri, who also directed West Beirut [À l'abri les enfants] (Sheltered Children)] (1998), is a proponent of Israeli normalization, a political strategy by and large rejected by Palestinians and their allies because its position concerning the Israeli occupation of historic Palestine entails an unacceptable compromise with Zionism. Normalization not only accepts a Jewish presence in the region–-something to which most proponents of either the one- or two-state solution would agree–-but consents to its continuation in the form of Zionist hegemony. Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) supporters, who reject normalization, are calling for a boycott of The Insult, not only because, in line with normalization tactics, it was made with Zionist funding, but because Doueiri “previously lived and worked with Zionists while making [his 2012 film] The Attack” (Mada Masr, 1 Feb. 2018), a pro-Israeli take on suicide bombers, and used an Israeli production company to help fund it (Dina Abumaria, 29 Oct. 2017). For these activists, boycotting The Insult is consistent with the divestment aspect of the BDS Call. [read more]
Film Review of 1948: Creation and Catastrophe
Film Review of 1948: Creation & Catastrophe
by Terri Ginsberg January 2018
http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.13169/arabstudquar.40.1.0073?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Nakba means “catastrophe” in Arabic. Since 1948, it has come to denote the permanent expulsion and dispossession of more than 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and lands, and the rape, pillage, and massacre of thousands more, by Zionist militias during the years leading up to the establishment of the Jewish state of Israel in historic Palestine. The Nakba caused a large proportion of the Palestinian population to become refugees in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Egypt and produced a significant Palestinian diaspora spanning Europe, the Americas, North Africa, and the Middle East. This ethnic cleansing of Palestine was denied until recently by the dominant forces within the international community, the neo-imperialist agenda of which was bolstered most notoriously by former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir’s 1969 excoriation of the then-alliance between Egypt and the Soviet Union: the political front against the advance of communism and radical labor was for her—and in large part remains—the suppression of Palestinian liberation. Forty-two years later in 2011, Israel, politically much further to the right than it was during Meir’s time, passed a law that denies state funding to any public or government entity that memorializes the Nakba as an occasion for mourning. [read more]
Challenges of Pluralistic Societies with Dissimilar Cultural Identities and Religious Legal Traditions: ADR and the Role of Religious Mediation and Arbitration
Challenges of Pluralistic Societies with Dissimilar Cultural Identities and Religious Legal Traditions: ADR and the Role of Religious Mediation and Arbitration
by Gloria Morán October 2017
http://www.statoechiese.it/images/uploads/articoli_pdf/Moran.M_Challenges.pdf
SUMMARY: 1. The Challenges of Pluralistic Societies with Dissimilar Cultural Identities and Religious Traditions: from a Melting Pot to a Cultural Mosaic – 2. European Catholic Tradition of Dual Legislation and Jurisdiction: 2.1. The Development of the Religious Jurisdiction: from the Episcopalis Audientia under the Christian Roman Empire to the Homologation of Religious Decisions by a Civil Judge – 2.2. The Development of Secular and Religious Jurisdictions: from the Leges Barbarorum et Romanorum under the Principle of Personality to the Medieval Dual Jurisdiction in Europe – 2.3. Religious Minorities under Christian Rulers – 3. Muslim Legal Tradition of Plural Jurisdictions: 3.1. Muslim Empires and the Dhimma System –3.2. Islamic Communities in Transition: from the Pre-colonial Era to the Colonial Rule – 3.3. The Exceptionality of Palestine and Israel- 4. Toward a Global World: Legal Pluralism and the Development of ADR. The Role of Religious Mediation and Arbitration: 4.1. The American Experience in Religious Arbitration: the Jewish Beth Din Courts and the Challenge of Islamic Arbitration – 4.2. Confronting the Fear of Islamic Arbitration Tribunals in the UK, Canada, and Australia – 5. Conclusions. [read more]
The Jewish right of return
European states should welcome and facilitate the return of surviving European Jews and their descendants.
by Ghada Karmi December 11, 2014
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/12/jewish-right-return-201412118156571815.html
This violent and irrational Israeli hatred and maltreatment of Arabs needs an explanation. In my view, it derives largely from the destruction of European Jewry during World War II. For example, the 60,000 Jews of Thessaloniki were virtually exterminated after the Nazis deported most of them in 1943 to perish in concentration camps. Only 1,200 were spared [...] The solution to this tortured situation lies in what may be called the Jewish right of return. Under this right, Europe would welcome back its previous Jewish citizens, at least those still alive, and their descendants, offer them compensation, fund their resettlement and provide jobs and housing. [read more]
The “long journey” to Palestine: Resolution 194 continues to haunt the Palestinian-Israeli conflict 65 years after it was passed
by Ghada Karmi December 9, 2013
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/12/long-journey-palestine-201312944419714964.html
In ignoring the Palestinian right of return, Israel has been guided all along by its first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion’s thinking. On July 18, 1948, he wrote in his diary, “We must do everything to ensure they [the Palestinian refugees] never do return. The old will die and the young will forget.” But despite Israel’s best efforts and the betrayal of their rights by the world powers and various Arab leaderships, Palestinians have not forgotten. [read more]
Playing for Time: Vanessa Redgrave and the Labor of Performance
by Terri Ginsberg September 17, 2013
http://www.olivefilms.com/films/playing-for-time-blu-ray/
Excerpt from review by Jeffrey Kauffman in Blu-ray.com:
“While there are no on-disc supplements, this is the rare Olive release with a fairly hefty insert booklet which features a fascinating essay called “Playing For Time: Vanessa Redgrave and the Labor of Performance” by Terri Ginsberg, Ph.D. Ginsberg, the author of Holocaust Film, gets into the whole sordid history of Redgrave’s Oscar speech, her pro-Palestinian activism and the uproar her casting in this film caused, but she also devotes time to the film itself as well as to other performers like Jane Alexander. This is a compelling read and comes highly recommended. While I typically only score non-disc supplements if the disc also has supplements, in this case the excellence of the essay deserves an exception.”
Strike or a War for Syria?
by Fouzi El-Asmar September 4, 2013
[in Arabic] http://www.alquds.co.uk/?p=81132
The Obama administration is adopting the Israeli position on Syria, blindly accepting information about Syria from Israeli intelligence, despite strong domestic and international opposition, including from Congress and the Pentagon. [read more]
The Palestinians’ last option: A struggle for equal rights
by Ghada Karmi June 23, 2013
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/06/20136236557920902.html
Palestinians must dissolve the PA and demand the same rights as Israeli citizens [...] I would argue that by adopting this plan, they will lose nothing but their illusions, and at this serious juncture in Palestinian history, it may be the only way to avert the annihilation of their cause. It will be a hard road, but the one chance to build a democratic state that replaces apartheid Israel and eventually enables the refugees to return to their ancestral homeland. [read more]
Has US policy in the Middle East been dropped?
by Fouzi El-Asmar June 5, 2013
[in Arabic] http://www.alquds.co.uk/?p=51160
US Middle East policy has not changed its goals, but it is moving in the direction of keeping control over areas of influence without paying as high a price in lives and money. [read more]
Review of The Gatekeepers
by Terri Ginsberg June 2013
http://www.academia.edu/3635595/Review_of_THE_GATEKEEPERS
[R]ecalling the exploitation of New German Cinema by the West German government in its attempt to curry international favor after the shame of World War II and the Holocaust, The Gatekeepers emerges in the context of Israel’s recent hasbara (“public relations”) initiative, a campaign for propagating positive images of Israel that will distract attention from its foundational and ongoing ethnic cleansing of Palestine by affirming its cynical self-designation as a beneficent, essentially peaceful, eminently self-critical “Jewish democracy.” [read more]
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Ghada Karmi on BBC
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Ghada Karmi on The Islam Channel
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Ghada Karmi on Russia Today
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Raymond Baker: "Obama and the Arab Uprising" [click here for full program]
Fouzi El-Asmar on Russia Today
[click image to view show (in Arabic)]