Author Archives: Arab America

The SUV slows as it approaches a military kiosk at a break in a dull gray wall. Inside, Ramzi Aburedwan, a Palestinian musician, prepares his documents for the Israeli soldier standing guard. On the other side of this West Bank military checkpoint lies the young man’s destination, the ancient Palestinian town of Sebastia. Fellow musicians are gathering there that afternoon to perform in the ruins of an amphitheater built during Roman times. In the back seat, his wife, Celine, tends their one-year-old son, Hussein, his blond locks curling over the collar of his soccer jersey.

Ramzi is in a hurry to set up for the concert, but it doesn’t matter. The soldier promptly informs him that he cannot pass. “Those are the orders,” he adds without further explanation, directing him to another entrance 45 minutes away. Turning the car around, Ramzi then drives beneath Shavei Shomron, a red-roofed Israeli settlement perched high on a hill, and then an “outpost” of hilltop trailers planted by a new wave of settlers. Finally, he passes through a series of barriers and looping barbed wire, reaching the designated entrance, where another soldier waves him through. He arrives in time for the concert.

I witnessed the checkpoint incident, one of thousands of small daily indignities suffered by Palestinians, from the front seat of Ramzi’s SUV in 2010. We had met 12 years earlier when posters of Ramzi, pasted all over Ramallah, had captured my imagination. In a photo taken in 1988 during the first Palestinian intifada, eight-year-old Ramzi was hurling a stone at an unseen Israeli soldier. Juxtaposed behind it, on the same poster, was another photo taken 10 years later of 18-year-old Ramzi pulling a bow across viola strings.

The poster was an advertisement for the National Conservatory of Music in Palestine and a metaphor for the hopes of many Palestinians at the time: that the era of the Oslo Peace Accords would bring an independent Palestinian state. In the story I produced at the time for National Public Radio, Ramzi expressed a double wish: to perform in the first national symphony orchestra of Palestine and someday to open music schools for Palestinian children.

“I want to see many conservatories opening up in all of Palestine,” he told me.  A lovely dream, I thought, though an unlikely one for a teenager from a refugee camp who had been raised by his impoverished grandparents. Still, shortly thereafter, a determined Ramzi landed a scholarship to study the viola in France.  A year or two later, we lost touch.

Then, in late 2009, in a chance encounter at a West Bank Italian restaurant, I saw Ramzi again. “What are you doing here?” I asked him. “I thought you were still in France.”

“No, I’m back,” he replied. “I’ve opened a music school here in Palestine.” (It also has branches across the West Bank and in refugee camps in Lebanon.) In other words, exactly what he had told me he wanted to do as a teenager in the al-Amari refugee camp. Six months later, in June 2010, I began to document his dream — now a reality — to build a music school in occupied Palestine.

Now, his SUV bound for Sebastia is cutting through the West Bank, a land smaller than the state of Delaware but dotted with more than 600 checkpoints, earthen barriers, and other obstacles to normal travel. His detour and the incident that accompanied it are part of a system that hems Palestinians into ever more confined enclaves surrounded by Jewish settlements over which looms Israel’s military presence. Yet this kind of everyday humiliation and confinement remains unknown to most Americans. Despite the torrents of press coverage here about Israel and its relationship with the United States, the daily reality of half the people in a century-old conflict is essentially off the American radar screen.

The reasons for this are rooted in culture, politics, and money.  Millions of Americans were raised on the Leon Uris version of Israeli history, as told in his novel Exodus.  In that story, the focus was on the heroic birth of the Jewish state out of the ashes of the Holocaust. “Arabs” — that is, Palestinians — remained on the sidelines of the tale, pathetic, obstructionist, and violent.  That long ago became the American media’s basic narrative of the struggle in the region: that Israel, surrounded by a sea of enemies, must be secure. But like the narrative that dominated media discourse before the U.S. invasion of Iraq — that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction — the facts on the ground are often ignored.

Money clouds the picture even more. Millions of dollars from billionaire casino magnate and Israeli settlement advocate Sheldon Adelson (who has also advocated using nuclear weapons against Iran) and billionaire Paul Singer, on the board of the Republican Jewish Coalition, as well as from the bankrollers of neocon William Kristol’s Emergency Committee for Israel, have further distorted the conversation.  In the process, such funders have helped elevate war hawks like Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton to prominence.

The money and political leverage of backers of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has had a similar effect on some Democrats.  It helps explain, for instance, the growing challenges from New York Senator Charles Schumer and New Jersey’s recently indicted Senator Robert Menendez to the Obama administration’s framework nuclear agreement with Iran.  But the problem has been around for so much longer.  For years, as journalist Connie Bruck revealed last September in the New Yorker, AIPAC has strong-armed elected officials, the recipients of the lavish campaign donations it facilitates, into drafting legislation favorable to Israel.  Such bills are often written by AIPAC staff and then introduced under the name of some member of Congress.

All of this has had a ruinous effect on debate in this country about Israel and Palestine.  Almost invariably left out of any discussion here is the devastating impact on Palestinian lives of Israel’s military occupation, which goes hand-in-hand with relentless settlement expansion that undermines any prospect of a just and lasting peace in the region.

Being Confined

American politicians frequently declare that “Israel has a right to defend itself.”  Seldom does anyone ask if Palestinians have that same right, or even the right to enjoy freedom of movement in their own homeland.

I have spent the last five years documenting both the harsh realities of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Ramzi Aburedwan’s dream of building a music school that could provide Palestinian children with an alternative to the violence and humiliation that is their everyday lives.  I sat with children in the South Hebron hills, who had been stoned by Israeli settlers and set upon by German shepherds as they walked two miles to school.  I met a 14-year-old girl who was forced to play a song for a soldier at a checkpoint, supposedly to prove her flute was not a weapon.

Farmers in villages shared their anguish with me over their lost livelihoods, because the 430-mile-long separation barrier Israel has built on Palestinian land, essentially confiscating nearly 10% of the West Bank, cuts them off from their beloved olive groves.  I’ve seen men crammed into metal holding pens before being taken to minimum-wage jobs in Israel, and women squeezed between seven-foot-high concrete blocks, waiting to pray at Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa Mosque.  I’ve spoken with countless families who have been subject to night raids by the Israeli military, including one young mother, home alone with her one-year-old boy, who woke up to the sight of 10 Israeli soldiers breaking down her door and pointing guns at her. They had, it turned out, raided the wrong apartment. The baby slept through it all.

Ramzi and the teachers at his school, Al Kamandjati (Arabic for “The Violinist”), see it as an antidote to the sense of oppression and confinement that pervades Palestinian life.  And it’s true that the students I talked to there regularly reported that playing music gave them a transformative sense of calm and protection — and not only in the moments when they picked up their instruments and disappeared into Bach, Beethoven, or Fairuz.

Rasha, the young flute player detained and forced to perform at an Israeli checkpoint, told me that music enabled her to face previously overwhelming difficulties. “I felt like I was in a forest, all by myself in a little cottage with no people, no noise, nothing,” she recalled. “Mountains, sea, something pure blue, not like the Dead Sea. It was an escape to another world, a better world. I owned that world.”  Her teachers reported that an angry, traumatized girl was growing into a self-aware, self-respecting, and assertive young musician.

Nevertheless, creative expression, however personally transformative, can’t alter the reality of the increasing confinement of Palestinians or of Israel’s creeping militarization of their lands, all of which is a direct result of settlement expansion.  At the time the Oslo Peace Accords were signed in 1993, just before I first started traveling to the Holy Land, about 109,000 Jewish settlers had claimed West Bank Palestinian lands.  They were encouraged by Israeli incentives that made it cheaper to be a settler than a city dweller.

In the years that followed, a network of new West Bank roads reserved only for settlers and VIPs began to crisscross land supposedly set aside for a Palestinian state.  Each year, despite the ongoing “peace process,” thousands more settlers arrived and with them came more Israeli military bases.  Sixty percent of the West Bank remains directly controlled by the Israeli military, which guards the settlements, the surrounding “buffer zones,” and the exclusive roads that whisk Jewish settlers into Jerusalem and Tel Aviv for work, prayer, shopping, and the beach.

More than two decades after the beginning of the Oslo era, 350,000 Jewish settlers live mostly on the hilltops of seized West Bank lands, and Palestinians are increasingly confined to an archipelago of “islands” within a sea of Israeli military control. In reality, what now exists in the Holy Land is a single state controlled by Israel in which some enjoy full rights as citizens and others next to none.

Ironically, the reelection of the hyper-nationalistic Benjamin Netanyahu to a fourth term as Israeli prime minister only clarified the essential truth on the ground.  His election-season pronouncement that a Palestinian state would never be on his negotiating table (whatever his post-election backtracking) said it all: Israel’s 48-year-long settlement-building project and military occupation is now and will remain the preeminent fact of the conflict.  In other words, the two-state solution is dead.  If Americans grasp that, the conversation here can now shift to one focused on human, civil, and voting rights.  However, Palestinians living under occupation have understood this one-state reality for a long time and are not waiting for Americans to come to grips with the obvious facts on the ground.

In recent years, Palestinian civil society and its supporters internationally have moved in new directions, embracing direct nonviolent confrontation with Israel.  Last summer, when negotiations on a new peace settlement led by Secretary of State John Kerry collapsed spectacularly and the Obama administration uncharacteristically blamed Israeli intransigence, Palestinians and their supporters cited the need to embrace a new strategy that included the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, or BDS.  With it came a renewed push by the Palestinian Authority to win U.N. recognition as an independent state and membership in the International Criminal Court, which could result in war crimes charges against Israeli leaders.

The BDS campaign has claimed some modest victories.  In May 2013, physicist Stephen Hawking canceled a visit to a conference in Israel.  In early 2014, actress Scarlett Johansson was forced to resign as an Oxfam global ambassador after she refused to cut her ties as a pitchwoman to the beverage maker SodaStream which operates a factory in the occupied territories.  The boycott of the company appeared to significantly affect its bottom line.

Last June, the Presbyterian Church USA narrowly voted to divest from Caterpillar, makers of the D-9 bulldozer responsible for demolishing thousands of Palestinian homes and plowing under tens of thousands of Palestinian olive trees.  Late last year, the European Union announced a ban on importing food from Israeli settlements; and earlier this year, after reportedly losing a $4 billion Massachusetts commuter rail contract due to pressure from Boston BDS activists, the French infrastructure conglomerate Veolia sold off much of its operations in Israel.

Supporters of BDS believe they are building momentum from these victories as part of a strategy of shaming Israel in the international arena.  In the process, economic pressure and international condemnation have replaced the Oslo-era approach of well-intended dialogue.  That, activists say, created an impression that all was getting better on the ground, while actually facilitating the building of more settlements and the ever-greater confinement of Palestinians.  In recent years Palestinian groups, including Ramzi’s Aburedwan’s music school, have embraced BDS.

Life in the Fast Lane

After the concert in Sebastia — part of an Al Kamandjati “Music Days” festival — Ramzi drove through the darkness toward Ramallah.  His wife and baby son slept fitfully in the backseat. The SUV curved along West Bank Highway 60, passing again beneath Shavei Shomron, glowing yellow in the night sky.

He chatted with me about what it meant that Al Kamandjati had recently joined the BDS campaign.  He viewed it as an assertive step toward Palestinian freedom.  “Because we believe in pacific resistance and in our right to be here,” declared the school’s Music Days program, “we ask all people who believe in human rights and in freedom to boycott Israeli products as well as cultural and academic institutions until Israeli understands that it cannot kill a people’s will by force, respects the international laws, and ends the occupation.”

In this way, Ramzi, like many of his students and teachers, sees himself as part of a larger movement of nonviolent action to protest the occupation and support Palestinian independence. “You have to insist on the positive energy,” he told me, his eyes fixed on a white necklace of lights that represented Palestinian villages to the south. He stroked his bearded chin. “The more you believe in what you are doing, the more you keep going on. It’s like a snowball.” Light pooled in an orb in front of the SUV as it cut through the darkened land.  “I see it in the young, who are living in just a whole world of music.”

To the east, the lights of the Palestinian village of Beit Wazan came into view.  Of his students, he said, “Their world is music now. Their life is now committed to the music.”

He slowed down for the two-lane Zatara checkpoint. On the left was the express lane for the vehicles of settlers and VIPs with their telltale yellow license plates. On the right, the Palestinian lane, where all the plates were white with green lettering, and a long line of cars already were idling for a seemingly endless wait.

Ramzi took one look at that dismal line and quickly decided on his own version of nighttime direct nonviolent confrontation with Israeli rule.  He swung his white-plated SUV into the empty left lane and pulled up at the guard post reserved for settlers, other Israelis, and the few privileged Palestinians who had special connections.

“Why do you come here?” the soldier asked indignantly. “You wait in the other line.”

“I would like to know,” Ramzi replied in English, “if there is a difference between Israeli babies and Palestinian babies.”

“What?” the startled soldier replied.

“I said,” Ramzi repeated, his tone sharpening, “is there a difference between Israeli babies and Palestinian babies? Between your babies and my babies. I would really like to know the answer to this question.”

The soldier peered in at Celine, awake now beside their blue-eyed toddler snoozing in his car seat. The French soccer jersey with Hussein’s name on the back — a gift from Celine’s sister — was still on him. The young soldier hesitated, glanced back at Ramzi, then waved them through: one tiny victory in a long struggle with no end in sight.

Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

In my last flight to Paris, I was fortunate of sitting next to a young man who seemed cautious; with an excessive head turning motion. He seems like he is waiting for something to come or to happen. We avoided each other for a few thousand miles until I started playing an Arab movie on my laptop. It is dangerous behavior nowadays especially on airplanes. I was told not to bring anything hard or ethnic on the plane. I stopped ordering the special meal made for Muslim “hellal meal” with no pork. I will even eat pork if I have to.
The young man introduced himself as “I’m from Israel and we love to listen to Arabic music there.”  We both started talking and we agreed on lots of things; and in the most part we kept politics out, you could say, we weren’t in our usual combative argumentative mood. Yes, the Jews had a rotten deal in history and they deserved a break. The Palestinians happened to be the victims of that break, and most Arabs would agree that: the Israelis are there and they need to live together with the Palestinians in peace side by side as long as they don’t take or bomb the Arab side.

We talked about families, living in the US and football (soccer;) and we started talking about food, “my favorite food is the Jewish Falafel” he swaggered. This is the first time that I heard of food having faith. As an Arab who grew up in Egypt, I have been eating falafel all my life, believing that falafel is just a Mediterranean food.  Through history the Zionist founder fathers, knew it early on, to acquire the land of Palestine, you need also to appropriate its cultural; by claiming its food, music, and arts. All I’m saying is that Falafel is a regional food: Mediterranean food, made by the people who live there. Like Pizza is an Italian food not a Catholic food, Ooze is a Greek drink and not an Orthodoxy drink. So if you were an Arab Jew or a Jew who happened to live in the Mediterranean area along with Arabs and you made or ate Falafel; it is still a Mediterranean food, an ethnic food not a religious food. The problem I have nowadays with some fundamentalists Jews that they vehemently think that everything a Jew does, hears, or says is inherently Jewish. So if a few Jews had lived in Jerusalem 2000 years ago, now it is the promise land for millions of Jews around the world, mostly European Jews. Muslims around the world don’t claim Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of the prophet Muhammad as their promise land.  We all know now what happened when some Muslims claim an Islamic state, the whole world is bombing the shit out of them even Muslims themselves. 
Now, my defensive reflexive mechanism is gearing up. Hey, here is the deal my Israeli friend; I don’t care if you claim Palestinian land, water, or even olive trees: but you can’t claim my beloved falafel. Welcome to the falafel war. Everyone in the Middle East claims an authentic purity in their Falafel. Now the Israelis got into the falafel fray and as Min Liao’s stated in his piece Middle East Crisis, “Jews say that ancient Jews ate falafel in Egypt and Syria; and tourist brochures proclaim falafel to be “Israel’s national snack”. Arabs feel as if an important cultural recipe has been stolen and bastardized, and insist on falafel’s romantic Arab “roots”.
Even now, McDonalds is making falafel its own and is offering McFalafel in Egypt. Egyptians however will add a twist to Falafel, they call it Taamiah and make it with fava beans pronounced “foul”; and not from Garbanzo Beans (Chickpeas) as all other Arabs will make falafel. Food reflects the cultural and the values of the people making it and eating it. Falafel is the most democratic food in Egypt; it is eaten daily by all the Egyptians cutting through the rich and poor, young and old, women and men, Sisi supporters along with Brotherhood’s. I still believe, if there is any hope to put Egypt back together, Egyptians need to start a falafel conversation.  Falafel breaks through all socio-economic classes, and for most Egyptians falafel along with foul, is the most reliable meal of the day; falafel shields Egyptians from the harsh daily life, or from any culinary assault like the one on that flight to Paris.  Falafel is how Egyptians start their day. It is mostly eaten at breakfast where you can see people congregated around small street food cart enjoying communal meals in a harmony in the mist of street chaos and noises.
Falafel is a cultural food, eaten mostly at breakfast where people want to start their day with familiar food. An Egyptian breakfast is typically a combination of Falafel, or Fava beans, feta cheese, and some kind of green, tomatoes, fresh onions, or cucumber; unlike the American breakfast, an Egyptian breakfast is a peaceful meal; where you don’t have to kill for bacon, or crack eggs to get your omelet.  

Source: www.tcdailyplanet.net

It’s Saturday morning and St. Michael Orthodox Christian Church smells downright delicious.

Along the wall of a large room, 24 16-quart pots sit in a row with butter and garlic resting at the bottom of each one.

A dozen or so people are seated at a massive table in the center of the room, each working diligently to fill cabbage leaves with a fragrant mixture of ground beef, rice and spices. They make small talk in a combination of Arabic and English, greeting newcomers warmly with “Christ is risen.”

When they make enough cabbage rolls to fill a pot, everyone cheers loudly.

“It helps us keep going,” Tammy Haddad tells me before scurrying back into the kitchen.

Since early February, Haddad and dozens of church volunteers have been working every weekend — and often during the week — to create thousands of Middle Eastern and Greek dishes from scratch.

St. Michael’s Mediterranean Festival started as a humble church fundraiser, an opportunity for congregants to get together and cook the Greek and Middle Eastern dishes that remind them of home and family.

But their cooking proved so delicious that this little fundraiser has blossomed into a hugely popular all-day fest that last year fed 7,000 people.

It takes a lot of hummus to feed that many hungry mouths.

“It’s just really gone, well, viral,” Haddad said. “It’s really become a gathering of our community.”

It’s become a gathering of local foodies as well — and for good reason. Every item is made from scratch, with most of it cooked the day before the fest. The church makes its own seasoning blends and relies on dozens of volunteers to prepare dishes in the weeks leading up to the fest.

The gyros and kabobs are an obvious fan favorite — and often run out early — but we scour this fest for the uncommon goods like awamat, a Lebanese donut served in rose water and simple syrup. There’s also spanakopita, a beautifully savory and crumbly pastry made with filo dough, spinach and feta.

They serve both Middle Eastern and Greek coffee, along with iced versions of both. There’s beer and wine, too — and it’s hard to find anything more refreshing than a cold bottle of Greek beer on a warm Saturday afternoon.

And you just haven’t lived until you’ve crumbled fresh, warm baklava over a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

The aforementioned cabbage rolls are part of a plate lunch served inside the church. This year, they prepared 6,500 cabbage rolls to make up 1,200 lunch plates.

“Last year we made a little over 5,000 and it wasn’t enough,” Haddad said.

It seems nearly impossible for Med Fest to quell the hunger its food invokes. Last year, their massive store of food started to run dry at 3 p.m.

Of course, food isn’t the only part of Greek and Middle Eastern culture that’s celebrated at Med Fest. All day long there’s live music and traditional dancing, along with a massive kids’ area and a bazaar filled with jewelry, herbs and everything you need to make a strong cup of Greek coffee.

But the food is what keeps us coming back year after year.

Despite their stores of 800 baklava, 4,500 grape leaves and 16 gallons of hummus, it’s best to eat early and often.

Because when the food runs out, you’ll have to wait ‘til next year to get your next fix.

St. Michael Mediterranean Festival
When: 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Saturday
Where: St. Michael Orthodox Christian Church, 690 North 15th St., Beaumont
Cost: Free admission, food and beverage coupons $1 each

Source: blog.beaumontenterprise.com

Cervantes’ Other Side made history on Monday night by hosting, for the first time ever, DMV area rapper Oddisee. A Sudanese-American emcee/producer, Oddisee brought to Denver his D.C. flavor. He came with supporting acts FO Chief and Kontrast, AG Flux, and Toine Jameson. The tour date in Denver happened to fall on the day Oddisee dropped his newest album, The Good Fight.

Photo from Oddisee’s Facebook
The night started off with FO Chief and Kontrast from Denver’s Fresh Breath Committee and, as usual, Denver fans came out to support their local hip-hop scene. The night then moved on to the styling of AG Flux. Mr. Flux came out and greeted the crowd with a casual, “Wassup Cervantes?” After boasting about his residence in Colorado, he introduced his DJ, Styles Davis on the “1’s and 2’s.”

After a few songs, he brought out FO Chief for a few tracks; the two co-directing the stage through a taste of the new project the two are working on. Once FO Chief left the stage, Flux called the crowd to come to the front and listen as he belted out a few more.

During the intermission between acts, Oddisee’s friend, photographer and fellow emcee came out to do a small introduction. Wearing a Steve Francis jersey, he rapped a few tracks and introduced the man who is–“just a tall ass rapper to me”–Oddisee.

By the time the man of the hour greeted the stage, the venue had filled and eager voices cheer on his opening lines, including him admitting he has never been to Denver. However, he also admitted that no other place stalks his social media quite like the Mile High City, which the audience eagerly accepted as a compliment.

He opened with “Ready to Rock” and a solid background echos him throughout the room as he calls for the “Yep! We’re ready to roll!” from the viewers.

Photo from Oddisee’s Facebook
He made a point to dedicate a moment to Balitmore, first stating that part of him was disheartened upon hearing the news on the day his album was released, however after much thought decided he was happy about it since he thought it might help heal some of the victims, a powerful sentiment that resounded with the spectators.

He enthusiastically performed “Killing Time,” which speaks to any hip-hop fan with the lyrics, “Grew up on that rap-a-lot/grew up on that Native Tongues/beats be like I trap allot, rhymes like all I say son.” From there the show got into “Yeah & Nah,” which, much like the tracks before it, had the audience rapping in unison with the operator on stage. As devoted as the fan base of the night was, Oddisee eventually had to give a taste of his new material, blowing everyone away, only to take it back again with 2013’s “Own Appeal.”

After bringing Toine back on stage for a few songs, the night was coming to an end. After a quick break, he ran back on stage for a much-demanded “Tangible Dream,” but then the show was over. For a first timer, Oddisee sure seemed at ease with the Denver atmosphere. Here’s to hoping he makes himself a regular, and to his delivering one great show.

Source: 303magazine.com

When I have children of my own some day, I always vowed that I would make Kahlil Gibran’s ‘The Prophet’ a bible for them to live by.

Featuring a series of prose and poems about love, marriage, children, freedom, good and evil, I am sure that I am not the only one who has been inspired by the book written by the Lebanese-American author in 1923.

The book has since been translated into at least 40 different languages and has had over 100 million copies printed.

As a fan of the man, it’s a thrill to know that Gibran’s legacy lives on and will be screened into an animated feature film, directed by Disney’s veteran, Roger Allers, who also directed “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King”.

Source: www.malaysiandigest.com

Giving voice to American Muslim women, a California show will depict the negative portrayals of veiled women post 9/11 in a bid to create dialogue, amid soaring Islamophobia.

“I hope it’s entertaining and I hope it creates dialogue,” Rohina Malik, a Muslim Chicago playwright and actress, told Times Herald.

“I’m looking forward to the after-show discussion where we can really have an honest conversation.”

Malik was talking about her play, Unveiled, coming to the Benicia Historical Museum at the Camel Barns on Sunday, April 26.

Written in 2008, the play tells the stories of love, compassion, culture and tolerance from the eyes of five Muslim women. Its concept comes from an expression in the Qur’an, which asks people to remove the veil from their heart. 

    Read more …

 – 9/11 American Muslim Dilemma on Stage

 – US Media Bias Distorts Islam Image

“The world premiere sold out so quickly, and I realized that Americans are really hungry to hear from a Muslim voice, especially with the current climate,” said Malik, who is of Indian and Pakistani descent.

Mixing fiction and personal experience, the one-woman show aims to highlight abuse faced by veiled Muslim women in the US.

“People are stereotyping and it’s really dangerous,” she said.

“Discrimination never starts with a gun or a knife, it starts with the environment.”

Born in London and of South Asian descent, Malik is also a resident playwright at Chicago Dramatists, and an artistic associate at the 16th Street Theater and Voyage Theater Company in NYC, in addition to being a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.

Her work has been produced or developed at The Goodman Theatre, Victory Gardens Theater, 16th Street Theater, Brava Theater, Crossroads Theater, Chicago Dramatists, and Theater Project Baltimore.  

She was also recently awarded the Y Award with the Evanston YWCA for her work to end racism and empower women.   

Reviewers Rejoice

Racism. Hate crimes. Love. Islam. Culture. Language. Life. Five Muslim women in a post-9/11 world serve tea and uncover what lies beneath the veil in this critically acclaimed one-woman show.

And well ahead of the June 1 premier of Unveiled at New York’s Voyage Theater Company, reviews are already exalting Malik’s efforts.

The Chicago Tribune’s Chris Jones said of the one-woman play, “Rohina Malik, the hugely talented writer-actress at the center of the Victory Gardens solo show “Unveiled,” is a remarkable new theatrical voice in Chicago. In her rich, upbeat and very enjoyable 70-minute collection of five character studies of Muslim women in modern-day America, Malik gives voice to characters from whom we hear far too little in the theater.”  

A “terrific show… intellectually engrossing work of theater,” declared Chicago Tribune’s Nina Metz.

Tom Witom, Pioneer Press: “Unveiled offers a provocative, insightful and uplifting theater experience.”

“A compelling 70-minute piece, rich with illuminating surprises drawing the audience into worlds that are, both unique and truly universal. It is terrifically entertaining,” stated Catey Sullivan of the Chicago Examiner.

Web Behrens of the Chicago Free Press advised, “The stories are important, to be sure, but the cumulative effect is weighty.”

Malik’s free show is co-organized by the St. Paul’s Episcopal Church of Benicia, in association with its outreach program, the Abraham Path Initiative, which encourages the understanding of the Abrahamic faiths, mainly Christianity, Judaism and Islam.  

“It’s important to learn about people’s cultures from hearing their stories,” Rev. Jeanne Forte said.

“Especially post 9/11, there’s so much negativity portrayed in the media about Islam. I think it’s really important to hear and learn the positive stories, especially from a Muslim woman.”

Post 9/11 Attacks on US Muslims

In the aftermath of 9/11, hate crimes against people of Middle-Eastern descent increased from 354 attacks in 2000 to 1,501 attacks in 2001 according to a report published by the Journal of Applied Psychology written by Debra L. Oswald.

Another report, prepared by the Arab American Institute, published three days after the Oklahoma City bombing (which was committed by anti-government white American Timothy McVeigh), “more than 200 serious hate crimes were committed against Arab Americans and American Muslims. The same was true in the days following September 11.”

Fast forward to 2015, marked by the post Charlie Hebdo shootings in France and executions carried out by the Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria, escalating a renewed series of attacks on Muslims in the US.

A February report published by the Global Research Centre highlights that 2015 is already gearing up to be a banner year for Islamophobic attacks against Muslim Americans.  

On February 10, three Muslim-American students—Deah Shaddy Barakat, 23, his wife Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha, 21, and her sister Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, 19—were found shot in the head, execution-style, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

The two young women were wearing traditional hijabs when they were killed.

The man who turned himself in to authorities in connection with the murders had previously brandished guns at the victims and threatened them.

Before the shooting, Yusor Abu-Salha told her father, “Daddy, I think he hates us for who we are and how we look.”

On February 12, an Arab-American man was brutally attacked by two white men at a Kroger supermarket in Dearborn, Michigan. The attackers also taunted his daughter, who wears a hijab, making references to ISIS and Muslims. The attackers called the man and his daughter “r–head” and said, “Go back to your country.”

On February 13, the Quba Islamic Institute in southeast Houston, Texas was the target of an arson attack that destroyed a substantial portion of the building and caused an estimated $100,000 in damage. On February 17, police in Austin, Texas arrested a man for threatening to bomb an Islamic center as well as a Middle Eastern restaurant.

Last month, a “Texas Muslim Capitol Day” event (the declared purpose of which was to “engage American Muslims in the political process”) was attacked and disrupted by anti-Muslim thugs. Another attack was organized on “Muslim Day” in Oklahoma City. The attacking group’s Facebook page screamed, “Get Islam Out of America.”

The rate of hate crimes against Muslims in the United States stands at five times what it was before September 2001, according to a Washington Post report.

A Gallup News Service poll found that out of all religions, Americans harbor the most negative feelings towards Muslims.

The American political and media establishment bears a significant portion of the responsibility for these trends.

Since the 9/11 attacks, US Muslims, estimated between 6-8 million, have complained of discrimination and stereotyping  in their communities due to their Islamic attire or identities.

An Economist/YouGov poll found that a 73 percent of Americans believe that US Muslims are victims of discrimination amid recent attacks against the community.

Source: www.onislam.net

The Mexican actress and director described the movie version of the Lebanese author’s spiritually-uplifting book as a “love letter to my heritage”.

She said the adaptation, which features an all-star cast, was a “personal film” because her Lebanese grandfather loved The Prophet.

“Through this book, I got to know my grandfather. Through this book, I had my grandfather teaching me about life,” said the star, who has been in Lebanon since Friday.

The Prophet, now in its 163rd edition, is widely considered the second most-read book in the world, after the Bible.

The movie adaptation, screened in Beirut on Monday evening, features the voices of Hayek, along with actors Liam Neeson, Alfred Molina and Frank Langella.

A collection of poems and prose, originally written in English, The Prophet has been translated into more than 40 languages since its first publication in 1923.

It tells the story of Almustafa, who before returning to his homeland, speaks to residents of the city of Orphalese about different aspects of life — love, work, children, friendship and death.

The movie is entirely animated, with dream-like fantasy sequences as Almustafa — called simply Mustafa in the film — shares his wisdom before being expelled by authorities because of his rebellious poetry.

Divided into 26 chapters, verses from “The Prophet” are often quoted at births, weddings and funerals around the world.

“Your children are not your children, they come through you but not from you,” one popular line reads.

“When love beckons to you, follow him, though his ways are hard and steep,” reads another, a regular at weddings.

Gibran wrote most of his books in the United States, where he headed the New York Pen League, the first Arab-American literary society, although he was born in Lebanon under Ottoman rule.

– Realising ‘old dream’ –
Hayek said visiting Lebanon had allowed her to realise an “old dream” of visiting the birthplace of Gibran, the country’s most famous writer.

She said she hoped her adaptation of the book would demonstrate “to the world that there is an Arabic writer who wrote philosophy and poetry, who brought all religions and all the world together, and has sold more than 100 million copies around the world for many generations.”

“We wanted to do (him) justice, we want the world to remember” him.

Despite his popularity among readers, Gibran’s most famous work received a lukewarm reception at the time of writing from American critics, who criticised it as simplistic and moralising.

Hayek’s adaptation, first screened at the 2014 Toronto Film Festival, is an international effort involving 10 directors and nine producers from Canada, France, Lebanon, Qatar and the United States.

It will begin screening publicly in Lebanon from April 30, and in the United States during the summer.

Hayek said the adaptation was animated in a bid to better convey Gibran’s message to a younger generation, with the script produced by Roger Allers, who directed Disney’s “The Lion King”.

The film is scored by French-Lebanese composer Gabriel Yared, who worked on “The English Patient”.

Hayek also acknowledged the region’s ongoing political turmoil during her visit to Lebanon, meeting with some of the nearly 1.2 million Syrian refugees living in the country.

“I was very moved by many of the stories. There was a girl, for example, because of the traumas she was paralysed, and she was able to walk with me yesterday thanks to the psychological aid,” she told AFP.

“I was deeply moved by their courage and their hope.”

Hayek said the whole trip to Lebanon had been full of emotion.

“There are too many things that are emotional, from reconnecting with my roots and being able to see the house of my family… to the love of the people, to the refugee camp, to the kids with cancer that I went to see today, to the reaction of the people after seeing the movie,” she said.

In tribute to Gibran, her visit also included a stop in his hometown of Bsharre, where the writer was buried after he died in 1931, aged just 48, of tuberculosis.

Source: www.haveeru.com.mv

The Obama administration expects a commitment to the two-state solution from the next Israeli government and from the Palestinian Authority, National Security Adviser Susan Rice said.

“President Obama has made clear that we need to take a hard look at our approach to the conflict, and that resolving it is in the national security interest of the United States,” Rice said Wednesday at the annual meeting of the Arab American Institute.

“We look to the next Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority to demonstrate — through policies and actions — a genuine commitment to a two-state solution,” she said.

Obama administration officials said they would “reevaluate” their approach to advancing peace in the wake of comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the eve of his reelection last month in which he appeared to count out a two-state solution.

The reevaluation included reconsidering the degree to which the United States shields Israel from critical resolutions in international forums such as the United Nations.

Netanyahu said he had been misunderstood and had meant only that he counted out the two-state solution for the moment, contingent upon, among other things, a more accommodating Palestinian Authority.

Rice’s speech appeared to be a signal that the Obama administration is now in a wait-and-see mode and is willing to give Netanyahu time to form a new government to see whether he has recommitted to the two-state solution.

Rice, to applause, also decried Israel’s settlement policies.

“Like every US administration since 1967, we have opposed Israeli settlement activity and efforts to change facts on the ground,” she said. “It only makes it harder to negotiate peace in good faith.”

Source: www.jpost.com

Since Sept. 11, 2001, popular media has tended to represent Islam as monolithic and menacing, a faith whose adherents spend their time plotting to murder infidels, oppress women and instill sharia law in Western democracies. While the actions of groups like the Islamic State seem to confirm the worst stereotypes, the worldviews of extremists do not account for the belief systems of the majority of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims, who are, by journalist Carla Power’s account, “people as diverse as Pathan tribals and Kansan surgeons.”

Weary of the stereotypes and “blithe generalizations about ‘the Islamic world’ and ‘the West,’ ” Power, who holds a degree in Middle East studies from Oxford and has worked as a foreign correspondent in Muslim countries, decided to strike back. “If the Oceans Were Ink” is a unique account of the Islamic faith that focuses on the perspective of Sheikh Mohammad Akram Nadwi, a scholar and imam whom Power has known for more than 20 years. It is an unusual book, simultaneously an exploration of faith and of Islam as it is lived by those who know it most intimately.

“If the Oceans Were Ink: An Unlikely Friendship and a Journey to the Heart of the Quran” by Carla Power. (Holt/ )
The journalist became acquainted with the imam in the 1990s, when both were conducting research on Islamic scholars and mystics at a think tank, the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. Their paths crossed during the intervening years, as Akram achieved renown as a religious scholar and Power established herself as a successful journalist. After years of reporting on strongmen, politics and identity in Muslim societies, Power decided that she wanted “to explore the beliefs behind that identity and to see how closely they matched my own.” She asked Akram if he would take her on as a student. Over the years, Power had developed great respect for his scholarship, particularly his extensive biographical dictionaries on early Islam’s female scholars, whose lives have almost disappeared from the scholarly record. Through this work, Akram hopes to remind Muslims of the importance of women’s education and contributions to society.

Source: www.washingtonpost.com

The 2015 Cinetopia International Film Festival in Detroit and Ann Arbor is doubling from five days to 10.

Bigger and better is also the aim of its June 5-14 schedule, which boasts more movies (100 screenings of 72 films) and more venues than ever (including festival newcomers like the Redford and Maple theaters).

“It ends up being a really rich 10 days that’s more geographically inclusive, with really great films,” said Russ Collins, founder of Cinetopia and CEO of Ann Arbor’s Michigan Theater, of the schedule announced today.

To kick off things on June 5, the new animated movie “Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet” will be screened for free on the north lawn of the Detroit Institute of Arts. Produced by Salma Hayek and based on the famed poetry book, it’s an anthology film featuring acclaimed animators like Bill Plympton and Tomm Moore (“The Secret of Kells”). Beforehand, there will be an outdoor concert at dusk featuring a live jazz take on Holst’s “The Planets.”

And that’s just the beginning. Cinetopia 2015 is chock full of intriguing titles to fulfill its goal of bringing southeast Michigan some of the best features and documentaries from the best film festivals around the globe.

This year’s lineup includes “Back on Board,” a documentary about Olympic diving legend Greg Louganis and his emergence as a gay activist, and “Imperial Dreams,” a drama about an aspiring young writer just out of prison and ready to build a new life in Watts.

Audiences can see Sundance festival sensation “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” before it hits theaters this summer. And moviegoers of all ages can enjoy a free outdoor Michael Jackson-themed sing-along and dance party at Campus Martius.

From little-known works getting their first showing in the region to classics like “Ghostbusters” being discovered by new generations, Cinetopia is all about “the sense of discovery that’s possible at a festival,” according to Collins.

This year, Cinetopia is joining forces with the Arab American National Museum’s Arab Film Festival, which will run in sync and present several new movies together, including “Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.”

Another special tie-in is the University of Michigan’s Orson Welles Centennial Symposium, inspired by the Welles archival material housed at the U-M Libraries. There will be screenings of Welles classics from “The Magnificent Ambersons” to “A Touch of Evil.”

Source: www.freep.com

Hayek was recognised in the Individual Achievement category for her role as producer of the animated film “The Prophet”, inspired by Khalil Gibran’s book.
“I’m a citizen of the world, and my country is humanity, kids are poets from the moment they’re born; they get Gibran’s message without thinking about the meaning of individual words,” Hayek said during the award ceremony here on Wednesday, reports Efe.
The institute highlighted the Salma Hayek Foundation’s work to end violence against women and attract global attention to humanitarian crises.
In Gibran’s “The Prophet” nine directors interpret the work of the poet from Lebanon.
One of the selected poems tells the kaleidoscopic and symbolic story of an imprisoned poet and a mischievous little girl.
The movie, brainchild of Roger Allers (“The Lion King”) and Bjarne Hansen, illustrates the poems of Gibran, and includes contributions from artists from around the world.
“Animating a work already read by 120 million people around the world was a challenge, so I recruited nine leading animation directors and gave them total freedom to imagine a story based on his poems,” she said.

Source: www.mid-day.com

U.S. National Security Advisor Susan Rice strongly reaffirmed the Obama administration’s commitment to the two-state solution that leads to a sovereign Palestinian state. 

“The U.S. remains firmly committed to an independent, viable and contiguous Palestinian state, living alongside a democratic Jewish state of Israel in peace and security.” Rice said. 

Her remarks came in a keynote address to hundreds of Arab Americans from around the country Wednesday at the Arab American Institute Foundation’s Kahlil Gibran Spirit of Humanity Awards Gala.  

Rice said while reassessing the U.S. approach to the Palestinian Israeli conflict, President Obama made it clear that resolving the conflict is in the national security interest of the United States. 

She defined the requirements needed for the long-stalled peace deal.  “There must be robust provisions for Israel’s security, the occupation must end and the Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves in their own sovereign state.” she added. 

Rice called on the upcoming new Israeli government and the Palestinian authority to demonstrate through policies and actions a genuine commitment to a two-state solution.  

She said the Obama administration opposes the Israeli settlement activities and efforts to change facts on the ground because it makes it harder to negotiate peace in good faith. 

Rice reaffirmed the administration’s vision for a feasible peace agreement. 

“Both Israel and an independent Palestinian state need secure and recognized borders based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed upon swaps.” Rice said. 

She said the U.S. continues to believe that a comprehensive peace between Israel and the Palestinians is “necessary, just and possible.” 

The White House national security advisor underscored the progress that the U.S.-led coalition managed to achieve in the effort to degrade and eventually destroy the so called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. 

“Together we have conducted more than 3500 airstrikes in both Iraq and Syria, damaging or destroying upwards of 5700 ISIL targets,” Rice said.

She said while IS lost control of 25 to 30 percent of the populated areas it had seized in Iraq, and was forced to slow down its advance in Syria, rooting out the Islamic State from Syria would not be possible as long as the civil war persists. 

Rice said the U.S. firmly believes that there is no military solution to the Syrian conflict and pledged that the administration will continue to pursue a negotiated political transition. 

As for the crisis in Yemen, Rice said there is also no military solution and that is why the U.S. is working with all the parties to end the violence so that the U.N.-led political negotiations can resume promptly. 

The White House national security advisor indicated that reaching a final agreement with Iran on its nuclear program would remove a huge security threat but nevertheless would not cease U.S. confrontation with Iran on its destabilizing role in the region. 

Rice stressed that while there are no quick fixes to challenges facing the U.S. in the Middle East, the Obama administration is committed to continue working with its partners to promote “security, prosperity and dignity throughout the Middle East.”  

Source: www.voanews.com