Message from a Beiruti

Declaration from a Beirut Citizen, who is not a paid member in any party
May 9, 2008

The escalation of violence in Beirut Happened too quickly to make sound analysis or conclusions. But there are specific situations that did not happen:

There is no real surprise in the On-going armed clashes in the streets of Beirut (Please check your memory of Events concerning Lebanon in the last three years).
There is no occupation of Hamra neighborhood or others by Hizbullah forces.
There is no occupation, but street violence.
There are no check points that ask for ID and sect/religion.
There is no Sectarian Violence, only political Violence.
There is no theft/looting of broken spaces, places.
There is no attacking of homes and raping of women and young kids.
There is no WAR on the streets.

Now, as far as what is happening on the streets, last day & night, we were stuck at home, watching TV, surfing the net, reading the papers, writing a little...
We arrived at home under bullets raining in the upper direction above our heads... The loud sound doesn't provide you with accurate directions, so you feel it is coming from everywhere and going to everywhere including yourself...
After that, We continued to hear of bullets in the air, breaking the rhythm of usual night sounds in Beirut...

The night was pretty intense, the fighting did not stop very much... then Heavy Rain & thunder added Music to the Atmosphere... and it was hard while sleeping to distinguish the sound of a rocket propeller from that of Thunder, as if God and his party (Hizbullah) were musicians in the same Lebanese Orchestra...
The morning was much calmer, with few shooting moments... It seems that the gun fights have stopped in Beirut, we will see tonight...

We went out today in Hamra, the streets were empty, rare civilians out there, shopping or looking for an open store, throwing garbage...

(SIDE NOTE, Barbar Snack was Open, This place never closes!!!!!!! During the July 2006 war, Barbar was Open all the time... at that time, no fuel, no electricity, but Barbar had the Ovens hot and running bringing out Manakeech at a high rate 5 per minute... I Remember going to Barbar 10 years ago at 4 in the morning, Open again... I really think, that during Judgment day, and the billion of billions of people from different centuries and Archeological backgrounds will be waiting in line to be judged by GOD... well while waiting you can have a sandwich at Barbar, at any Lunar-Eternal Clock time... of course next to Barbar, will be aligned Religious stands providing forgiveness passes to Heaven on the condition to vote for their prophets in the next Heaven Munipal Committee Elections...)

Back to Beirut Streets, a lot of ''armed civilians/citizens'' were controling the streets, these people belong to The Opposition Forces, they were not actually Hizbullah but Syrian National Party Members who happen to have a ''cultural center'' in Hamra... Two streets above us, the Army was in control...
Some streets looked roughed up from fighitng... Building with Broken Glass, Broken walls...

What really happened in the big picture?

The opposition, lead by Hizbullah, decided to spread its control over the streets as a response to the political maneuvring and provocations of the Non United Government who is also trying to spread its control over the country thru state institutions, more specifically in light of official steps towards controlling Resistance Infrastructures...

It is a new phase in the on going conflict between the Legitimacy of the Government lead by March 14 parties versus the Legitimacy of the Resistance backed by Opposition Parties.

The Half-Government now in place controls the state, the Opposition controls the streets... Each party tries to gain more power in its field as a part of changing the rules of the game to its own interests... There is no real constant status quo in Lebanon, the situation is so fluid that it will remain dynamic...

The Surgical Operations were well prepared, targetting Future armed Forces... Yes Future has a militia just like the Opposition is operated by militias... the Operations were very intense but quick. It is clear that the Future Party has a poor presence on the streets... its fighters are poorly trained, no experience in such action... So the fights did not last long... now, the streets are in control by the Opposition to a very big degree... and the next step is to move back the conflict to the Politicians and not to keep it in the hands of fighters... This transition phase is very precise and delicate and it needs to happen quickly... Of course, the Opposition has gained some leverage in the negotiations for a Big Settlement in Lebanon...

Salam,

Living in Hamra Beirut - Abed

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Sha3bawi

From KABOBfriend Tarek:

sunday morning, i got up early and put on a shirt that reminds me a lot of my dad. it's chocolate brown and has the little button flaps on the shoulders and two pockets that button on the chest. my dad loves those shirts.

i was heading home.

i went to sha'ab once as a kid.

My family's village was always a mythical place painted in my mind by my dad's second-hand stories. I remember three things from my visit to sha'ab with my mom and deena almost 12 years ago -

1. the dust from the streets which i kicked up onto my shoes and my chubby ankles and calves.

2. distant members of baba's family feuding over where we would eat lunch.

3. a simple, boring rock that i picked up and put in a red velvet jewelry box which wouldn't close as a way of actualizing baba's myth.

when our bus pulled up to the bottom of sha'ab's hill (bus 68), the village was instantly different than i remembered it to be. i remembered walking in on a flat, grimy road and thinking..."psh. this is it?"

this time, i climbed the windy road to the top, curving around half finished homes and closed convenience shops. For the first few minutes, I wasn't actually sure I was in sha'ab as i looked around at the buildings, the new construction underway..."where is this place," i kept thinking to myself.

soon, though, i started to look around and feel a sort of familiarity with the people. a lot of the kids playing in the street had colored eyes and hair that was more brown than black, lawyers and engineers' names were proudly displayed: faour, el-khatib, and khaled - names i had recognized all my life as my townspeople; i soon saw a sign in arabic assuring me i had scaled the right path:

"مدرسة شعب الابتدائية على اسم الاستاذ كامل سعده" kamel sa'ade sha'ab primary school.

sha'ab is a town of bends and curves, of dust and dirt - of people. quaint is a fittingly kitsch but hardly sufficient description. nonetheless, as i neared the point where the street's upward incline leveled off onto a rocky plateau of construction, i thought to myself, looking over the endless grove of olive trees below, "well. this is it. sha'ab. that didn't take long."

as i pushed on, continuing down the hill, i saw two men in what will from this point forward be referred to as palestinian stance 1(one foot against a wall, second leg slightly bent at the knee, staring into the distance) and decided to test the reality and viability of a family tree.

in the most literal of translations.

"brother, allow me to burden you. where is the home of the el-khatib clan?"

"no. it's no burden in the least! welcome welcome. 1oo welcomes to sha'ab. why do you ask? (welcome.)"

"i'm tarek ziad said ismail el-khatib. i'm from here. from sha'ab. but from america. but from here."

"ahhhhhh! welcome welcome welcome. so you want to see your relatives! who from the house of el-khatib do you want to see?"

"i don't know. just show me some khatibs."

"well there's abu-something-or-other right here, he should be able to tell you. and if he doesn't know, then just follow that street all the way down until you see construction in the road, and that area is all el-khatibs."

"Ok great. Thanks."

And I was off. One of the pair yelled at me while I was walking down the hill, smirking,

"Who leaves America to come to this place anyway?"

"I do!"

"Well, you're an ahbal (a goof.)"

"Thanks."

I went to abu-something-or-others house near the top of the street, but the only person in was a 12 year old boy in a yellow sweatshirt hanging out the window."

Is abu-something-or-other home?!" I asked him. I slurred the something-or-other part because I wasn't sure at all what the name was.

"No he's not home!"

I walked over to the people sitting on their front porch across the street. It was a gorgeous, sunny day, and they were outside chopping the stems off of some type of leaf to cook as palestinians do.

"May God give you health."

"May he increase your health."

"Do you know where the el-khatib neighborhood is?"

"Abu-something-or-other across the street is el-khatib."

"I know. His son just told me he's not home."

"YOUR DAD'S NOT IN THE HOUSE?!" he yelled past me at the yellow sweatshirt kid who may have been named something-or-other, given his father's name.

"NO."

"Ah. He's not home," No shit. "Ok...well if you walk down this street to the end, you'll be in the el-khatib neighborhood. You can't miss it."

"Ok, thanks."

"Welcome welcome."

I kept walking down the street. Most of the houses in this area were mere skeletons; construction was the latest fashion trend, as rubble lie everywhere - a productive rubble, not the same as the ramallah rubble with a pile of candy wrappers and falafel sandwich remains attached. As I neared what I thought was the end of the street, I saw and older lady with her hijab halfheartedly tied around her head.

"Good morning. Do you know where the el-khatib neighborhood is?" I fully expected her, at that point, to open her arms and say, "You're standing in it! Ahla o Sahla! Welcome!"

Instead,

" Well...I think there are some down there. Did you try Abu-something-or-other up the road? He knows. Hey, girls!" She called over two teenage girls that were walking back up the way from which I had come. "Take this man up to Abu-something-or-other's house. He's looking for the house of el-Khatib."

Crimony.

Up again we walked, to Abu-s.o.o.'s house. Once again, the only person there - a boy in a yellow sweatshirt hanging his big goofy face out the window.

"Where's your DAD?!" "Not home!"

Just then, a pickup truck drove down the rode, and slowed next to the porch leaf-choppers.

"Where is he?" "This is the kid. He's looking for el-Khatibs. He's one of you."

I opened the truck door to find Omar - buzzed head, bright pink and white striped polo shirt, and huge silver chain.

"What's your name?" "Tarek Ziad Said Ismail El-Khatib. My grandfather lived here. Said Ismail. Abu-Ghazi. Ana Sha3bawi."

"You're related to me kid. Jump in."

We drove down to his father's house, where he parked the pickup in the road and ushered for me to walked into the outdoor area - too low to the ground level to be a porch, and too shabby to be a courtyard. He introduced me to his father, Abu-Marwan - a fair skinned man with a blondish mustache who sat alone shuffling 4 decks of cards, and his lips smacked together around his toothless mouth when he explained to me who was related to whom among the el-khatibs.

We never really established how we were related, but within 5 minutes Abu-Marwan (from the sheikh muhammad branch of the el-khatib clan) was insisting that i was family, and that regardless of whether he wanted to host me or not, that he was "majboor - forced" to have me. Because we were family.

His wife, daughter, and grandchildren came out of the woodwork, elated at the prospect of a new cousin. I was equally so. They brought me coke, cucumber, tomato, and za'atar (thyme) bread that they had baked that day, and argued over who i resembled the most among our family.

Soon, they called me inside,

"Tare2, the phone's for you."

I walked in, as they all crowded around the spin-dial phone. Im-Marwan handed me the receiver.

"Hello?" "Yes, Tare2? Tare2 what?" "Tare2 Ziad Said Ismail"

"Ahhh...so your grandfather is Said? Said whom?" "Said Ismail...Abu Ghazi. He left to Lebanon in 1948." "Ah so you have family in Lebanon? Who?" "Um...my Aunt Myassar is there. She's married to Khaled Yunus."

"Myassar is your AUNT?! Hold on we'll be right there."

5 minutes later, Abu Said, Im Said, and Insaf, whom I had spoken to on the phone, pulled up to Abu-Marwan's and hopped out of the car. My dad's sister Myassar had visited them in the early 1980's when she was still able to travel here, and they knew her from then.

Im Said was on the verge of tears. "The people of Sha'ab are coming back. The people of Sha'ab must come back."

She went on, telling me how she didn't know anyone anymore in her village. It was all foreigners - Arabs from other towns that had settled in Sha'ab. Perhaps the greatest tragedy of the Nakba is not the destruction of homes or the loss of land, but the sheer annihilation of familiar community.

"Where are your father’s sisters and brothers?" I explained proudly, “Well, he has a brother in the UAE, one in California, another in Texas but he was in Saudi for a while, one in Canada, a sister in Lebanon, one in Syria, and another in Turkey..."

Im Said shook her head the whole time.

"Yaaaa haram. What a shame. They belong here. They belong in Sha'ab so I can know them and know their children!"

After thanking Abu-Marwan profusely for his generosity, I was whisked off by Abu-Said and friends to his home in the upper part of town.

"Look over here...look my son..." Im-Said told me pointing west, toward the setting sun..."That's all Sha'ab. All of those olive trees...grove after grove...this is your village my son." And it was.

They quickly zoomed me around the city, showing me an abandoned - yet preserved - church that was over 300 years old, my grandfather's home, and the well from which the villagers used to fill bucket after bucket of water.

At home, Abu-Said told me about himself. He had worked for years in Haifa as the manager of a supermarket, living there and raising his children. Sha'ab had been closed off as an Israeli settlement until 1970, but when the time came to retire, Abu Said told me, he decided to come back home. His sons have followed suit and now live in the three floors above him.

Child upon child piled into the house, each of them with bright green eyes and frizzy hair.

Im-Said and Insaf made molokhiyeh and sumac-spiced chicken, apologizing for having only been able to throw something small together.

I laughed. 4 hours before, I had been ready to turn back to Jerusalem, and now I had an entire family urging me to come back so I could properly see my village. I agreed.

As I walked out Im-Said limped after me, a heavy bag at her side, insisting,

"Take this. Take this I swear it's nothing." I opened the bag - a 3 liter corn-oil bottle - filled with olive oil.

"This is from Sha'ab. Use it to your heart's content, and if you need more - it's your village. Just come back for it."

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A Reader Reflects: First Annual Bay Area Arab Women's Conference

This report was submitted by Kristel.

I had the honor of attending the first annual Bay Area Arab Women's Conference this past Friday, March 14, in Mountain View, California. This event was organized by the Arab Cultural and Community Center of San Francisco and featured a diverse compilation of speakers and subject matters. Topics ranged from discussions on Arab women in the realm of politics, health, media, community activism, identity, and cultural expression.

Although the speakers all articulated themselves well and shared rich perspectives and vital information, I felt the heart of the conference came from the mere fact that Arab/Arab-American women gathered together in one room. This act alone garnered an overwhelming sense of solidarity, especially as every participant could identify with battling warp perspectives non-Arabs hold of Arab women, and the very personal struggles Arab women have in dealing with their own community.

Dr. Suad Amiry touched upon an element of these two struggles in her speech titled after her book, "No Sex in the City: The Generation of Secular Women in the PLO." Dr. Amiry expressed her frustration derived from the labeling of Arab women as either the subservient/oppressed type, or the overly emotional/mourning type. Those having such limited views of Arab women do a great injustice, as the contributions, lifestyles, and points-of-view of Arab women get overlooked. The exploration of these eclectic and unique differences among Arab women can give others great insight and understanding into a people often misunderstood.

Dr. Dina Ibrahim, in her talk about Arab women in the media, chimed into this subject as well. Her simple statement of how often people assume her to be "Mexican" or something other than Arab, as she doesn't fit the stereotypical look of an Arab (i.e., not wearing a hijab), emerged a powerful testament to the daily struggle of the Arab/Arab-American woman. The collective chuckle at the presumption of being an ethnicity other than Arab proved Dr. Ibrahim was not alone! I can most definitely relate, as can every one of my Arab cousins/friends.

The conference attendees also found unity when discussing issues plaguing women within the Arab/Arab-American community. Dr. Suad Amiry talked about her having to take great strides to conceal the identity of the women featured in her book, who spoke about their first loves, other romantic relationships, and their sex lives. These women feared "gossip" would construe as a result of their stories. Discussions related to health were also a cause of fear, which Dr. Sally Al-Daher and Nadiah Mshasha, MPH, reflected upon. For example, a result of the extensive survey they conducted on Arab/Arab-American women exposed that they tend to not conduct monthly breast exams as recommended by their gynecologists. The reason for this comes from being embarrassed to touch oneself; these acts are considered "aib," or shameful in Arabic.

Whether we discussed our strengths or areas of improvement, it felt empowering to have a forum focused on Arab/Arab-American women. Rarely does this outlet exist in the community, so being surrounded by women that could whole - heartedly empathize, relate, and most importantly, care - just felt good. I only hope this sort of momentum continues and escalates to an even grander, more encompassing scale in the future.

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Doritos Recognizes Palestine!?!

Sent in by an alert reader.

I found my bag of Doritos the other night and while I was trying to get all those Doritos fragments, I guess I got tired so I crumbled the bag up and thats when I saw the word "Palestine" of all things. The back of the bag recognizes Palestine and this Palestinian-American kid. I've attached a picture as evidence, I dunno if you guys spotted this yet but I thought I'd share. For a bag of chips to recognize my country speaks volumes to me.

- wally d.

As a not, Daniel Zoughbie, who is the Palestinian-American profiled on the bag, put together an amazing micro-clinic project that empowers communities to care for themselves in basic, but life-saving ways.

Wally, was it Cool Ranch (my favorite)?

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Palestine Week at UNC

From this morning's Daily Tar Heel:

West Bank tales from two Tar Heel alums
By: Brian Phelps, Stephen Lassiter
1/28/08

Today marks the first day of Palestine Week at UNC. As May 2007 graduates of the University and teachers in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Palestine, we write to invite you to the week's events.

While the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is immensely complicated, the organizers of Palestine Week have tried to make it as accessible as possible. The Tuesday program "Israel and Palestine for Beginners" is specifically tailored for that purpose. Students have the opportunity Wednesday to hear firsthand accounts of what it's like in Palestine from Tar Heels who have visited.

Living and working here for five months has been an exercise in trying to make sense of what's going on around us. We are regularly perplexed by the stories we hear and the experiences we have. Given this opportunity, we feel obligated to share them.

When we asked our ninth-grade students to write an essay about important events in their lives, we didn't expect to receive the stories we did. We knew that Israel has held the West Bank under military occupation for 40 years, but what exactly does that mean?

It means some of our students have never swam in the Mediterranean, despite being able to see it from West Bank hilltops.

It means many of our students are prohibited from using Israel's airport, only 30 miles away, and instead must travel four hours to the airport in Amman, Jordan.

It means some of our students have not left the West Bank in years because, despite living on their own land, the Israeli government would bar their re-entry.

It means one of our students could visit her sister undergoing chemotherapy in Jerusalem only twice over many months because she needed a permit from the Israeli government to do so.

It means our students, only 13 and 14 years old, have written about running away from Israeli soldiers and tanks.

It means Christina, the best friend of one of our students, was beaten by Israeli soldiers because she tried to go around a military checkpoint while running late to school. The ambulance taking her to a Jerusalem hospital was delayed at the same checkpoint.

Christina was dead on arrival.

We fully acknowledge that Palestinians have no monopoly on suffering and that the suffering of the Jewish people throughout history is virtually unparalleled. But like the Jewish academic Norman Finkelstein, we're wary of using past atrocities to justify current ones. To present a few statistics, the ratio of Palestinians to Israelis killed in 2007 is 373 to 13. The ratio of prisoners held by each side is 10,000 to 1. The ratio of homes demolished as a part of official government policy is 18,000 to 0.

With the exception of these extraordinary living conditions, our students are hardly different from American high school students. They are talkative, rambunctious and eager to get away with anything they possibly can.

Coincidentally, four of them were born in North Carolina. Two were recently admitted to MIT and Duke University. All of them have taken English since first grade. Our ninth-graders are reading "The Diary of Anne Frank," and students in the International Baccalaureate program read Shakespeare and "Wuthering Heights." A group of seniors recently produced its own cinematic version of "Romeo and Juliet," set in Palestine. You can view its trailer by searching "In Fair Palestine" on YouTube.

These stories might not fit with the image of Palestine you had in mind, as they certainly did not when we first heard them. To learn more, take advantage of Palestine Week and take advantage of us. Send us an e-mail, and check out our blog and pictures. If you're ever in the neighborhood, let us know. As fellow Tar Heels, it would be our pleasure to host you.

Stephen Lassiter and Brian Phelps can be reached at their blog: makingcoffee.blogspot.com.

For more information on Palestine Week at UNC, please visit http://unc.palestineweek.org.

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Blind Israeli Injustice

(UNTITLED)
Dena Takruri
Written in Al-Bireh, Occupied Palestine

Jordan River Border
December 16, 2007

In line to check our bags through security, I make small talk with the young Palestinian man standing in front of me with his Israeli passport in hand. We speak in Arabic and he tells me he’s from Haifa and was just visiting relatives in Amman. He asks me if I’m also originally Palestinian and I tell him yes, but born and raised in the states. Smirking, he replies, “in the end we’re all just simply Palestinians.” I smile, yet soon enough I’d see exactly what his words imply.

What do you do in America?-Where do you study?-How long have you been studying altogether? Count all the years-What exactly did you study in undergrad?-What does that mean?-And now you’re studying the same thing?-Who pays for your studies?-Who paid for your plane ticket?-So what will you work when you graduate?-Media? But why? That’s not what you’re studying.-Have you visited any other Arab countries before coming here? Syria, Lebanon, Iraq? Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran? Have you carried anything for someone?-Are you carrying any weapons now?

Why have you come to Israel?
Why have you come to Palestine?
Vacation.

Vacation?! Why would you come here for a vacation? Why not somewhere nice, like California?
I’m from California.

Where will you stay in Israel?
Ramallah.

Who will you see there?
My grandparents. They’re very old.
Feels like a safe enough answer. What could be more benign than grandparents? They must hear that one frequently...No wait. I forgot that it’s our grandparents that possess one of the most formidable weapons: Memory.

So why exactly do you come to Israel?
I didn’t know there was a way to get from Amman to Ramallah without having to cross into your state. We don’t choose to pass through the occupier in order to get to the occupied, you know.
I have a break from school, so I’m seeing family.

For a moment, I pause to contemplate the face of the border soldier sitting before me. She can’t be any older than me, I think. I try to briefly strip her of her role and imagine her life beyond the uniform. I ponder how she spends her nights off, what novel most moved her, what she might affectionately call her lover. Yet such thoughts are all too fleeting and soon enough I resume my inability to see anything beyond the repressive establishment she represents.
There’s a reason I shudder each time I see someone wearing army green and feel instantly defensive and inferior each time I hear an Israeli accent. You’re it.

Write down the address of where you will stay.
I can’t. They don’t exactly have street names.

What is their phone number?
I don’t know it.

Write down the names of the people you’ll be staying with.

Now write down your name, address in America, cell phone number and email.

She furtively talks to the other border soldier sitting beside her. Discreetly, I listen and try to make out as much Hebrew as I can.

I was fourteen years old when I first began to study Hebrew. The only Palestinian in a class full of American Jews, I spoke of how I believed in peace, in tolerance, and in coexistence. But deep down lay another reason I was not so candid about. To learn the language of the oppressor was crucial, I knew. You taught me this lesson at a very young age. It was always reinforced at the border, where I had my first experiences with racism, power, and oppression. I was six years old at the Allenby border when you crushed before my eyes a gold necklace pendant shaped as the map of Palestine with a small Palestinian flag painted on it. It was a gift. “This is my homeland,” I anticipated telling all of my classmates, excited to finally prove to them that where I come from really does exist! I thought if I could plead with you in a tongue you best understand you might exercise some mercy. Somehow I doubt speaking Hebrew here and now would work to my favor.

You can go take a seat on one of those chairs.

The entire border crossing is empty with the exception of me. Periodically, a new batch of 1948 Palestinians with Israeli passports enters. They check their bags through the security process, get stamped and go. The whole process takes no longer than 10 minutes. Meanwhile I sit alone and wait.

One hour passes-
I try reading a few pages of Love in the Time of Cholera but to no avail-the anticipation prevents concentration on anything else.

Two hours pass-
It could be worse, I think. At least I’m not feeling the vicarious shame of watching my mother being strip searched like the several other previous times at the Israeli border.
Funny how we learned the word for “terrorism” in Hebrew but never learned “occupation.” I’d say the two are synonymous.

She comes back out and sits beside me. In her hand is a form that has all the information I gave her neatly compiled. She points to the names “Bahjat Tahboub” and “Yusra Tahboub.”
Who are they?
My grandparents.

What is their address and phone number?
I told you, I don’t have them.

She leaves.

I wonder what my grandmother would think if she knew the Israeli Airports Authority was busy researching her identity at this moment. Poor Tata, what threat could she possibly pose to the state of Israel? She’s a frail old woman who weighs no more than 95 pounds and depends on a walker to move about. No one in the family will admit it, yet we all know she’s depressed. She stubbornly refuses to leave the house unless a trip to the hospital demands of it. Perhaps she’s sparing herself the disappointment and anguish of seeing her country’s landscape marred by uprooted trees, an apartheid wall, checkpoints, infectious settlements and splattered bloodstains of foolish infighting. By staying inside, she avoids having to juxtapose those images to her imagined ones of ‘what could have been’ were it not for the opportunism, concessions, and corruption of her very own. This is how she escapes her people’s dismal reality-this is where it’s safer.

And yet although she decided long ago that home would be her permanent refuge, nothing can mitigate her concealed pain of never being able to see her first-born son, who has been forced to live in exile for the past 30 years. The passing of the years never healed the wounds, for how can one peacefully reconcile not being allowed into Palestine indefinitely or not being permitted to see her own flesh and blood? And so the years passed with a torturous vacancy haunting them both. She missed his wedding and he missed her maqbluba. She missed the birth of her grandchildren and he missed her 70th birthday. She missed the grand opening of his new business, and he missed spending the eids with his mother and family. Next month she’ll miss the first wedding of her grandchildren, his eldest daughter. God only help him when he has to miss her funeral…

Palestine is where we learn how love is painful, justice is an abstraction, and nationalism is a crime.

Another half hour passes. I’m bored and hungry.

“Where do you like more, Dandoona? Palestine or America?” This is the inevitable question I am asked hundreds of times by hundreds of people each time I visit. I hate that until now, I’m too scared to search myself for an answer…

Another 40 minutes go by. I begin to feel as though I’m in the waiting room of hospital waiting to hear an update from the doctor of a loved one in critical condition. No, no, I feel more like a wrongly accused criminal in a courtroom awaiting my sentence. What offense I’ve allegedly committed, I’m not too clear about (I sense it has something to do with being Palestinian, though). It is at the Israeli border where I feel most vulnerable and impotent. Here, we’re just balls in their hands for them to play with as they please. We put our tails between our legs, answer their invasive barrage of questions, and hope it earns us entry into the homeland.

By now I’m antsy and start pacing. I approach the window to ask what is taking so long, especially considering that the entire border is empty. Before I can ask, she opens the door and accosts me. It’s about time. She looks at me accusingly and addresses me curtly:
We found your Palestine ID. You cannot enter from here. Try the Allenby border.
My heart instantly drops, as I am aware of the consequences of that statement. Having a Palestinian ID comes along with all the restrictions that most Palestinians must suffer. It means I can no longer fly in to Tel Aviv, visit any Israeli city, or enter Jerusalem. The latter, of course, is the biggest blow of all.
I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was born in the US and the American passport is all I’ve ever held.
We can’t let you in from here. (she points) Go get your bags, you have to leave.
No, I won’t leave. I always enter with my US passport and you have no right to turn me around. You have to respect my US citizen rights.
I told you, you have a Palestine ID and we found it! You can’t enter from here.
What difference does it make which border I enter from? Plus this is the border I last exited from! I understand that is your policy. Why must you complicate everything?
If you have a hawiyya, you can’t enter from here! This border is only for foreigners and Israelis.
So what does my US passport mean to you!?!
It doesn’t matter. You have a hawiyya.
This is unfair! Who are you to tell me what my identity is?
Okay tell me, where were your parents born?
I’d love to know where yours were born…
Here!
Aha! There you go then.
I’d like to talk to somebody else please. You’re denying me entry and not explaining anything to me.
You cannot talk to anyone else. Go get your bags, you can’t stay here any longer.
I’ll hold you accountable for the sins of your grandparents so long as you perpetuate the crimes of the present.
I won’t leave until someone explains the situation to me.

Reluctant and annoyed, she returns to the office to bring someone else to talk to me. Out storms another female officer, also probably my age or younger. She’s angry.
What? What is it that you want?! I’m in charge now!
You don’t need to speak to me like that. I haven’t said or done anything wrong.

She catches herself and defensively puts up her hand.

Ok, ok. What do you want?
I’ve entered with my US passport several times and I left last time from this border. Why are you pulling this now?
You have a hawiyya and you’re not allowed to enter. This is the policy.
I don’t have a hawiyya.
We have your number!
I was born and raised in the US and I’ve lived there my entire life. This is how I’ll enter.

She snaps and raises her voice even louder.

Listen, don’t stand here and talk to me about a diplomatic passport! You have a Palestinian hawiyya number and that’s that! We have nothing to do with the Sulta! Go deal with this at the Allenby border.

I try to think of what to say next but am stifled by my frustration and exasperation. Instead, I absorb the scene that has unfolded before me and the blatant asymmetrical power dynamic between us: three women of the same age with claim to a same homeland, two somehow possess the right to let her in and third possesses only ability to hope and plead. How triumphant they must feel to watch me stand before them and deny my Palestinian identity (card). Ashamed and conflicted, I regret the thought that has just occurred to me: Have I just betrayed Mahmoud Darwish by telling them instead to “Record!” my American identity while rejecting my Palestinian one? This is painful… I tell myself to calm down and not to dare allow them the satisfaction of seeing that they’ve gotten the better of me, but the combination of sleepless jetlag, disappointment, and powerlessness prevails. Resistance, in this case, is futile and my eyes start to tear up. As they stare at me, their demeanor and facial expressions momentarily change. They are used to mistreating Palestinians and Palestinians are used to being mistreated, but to see a Palestinian so visibly upset seemingly catches them off guard.

There’s nothing else we can tell you. Go get your suitcases and we will walk you out.

I’m defeated. In a somber procession, I push the cart holding my suitcases outside of the border terminal to the bus stop across the street. From there I’ll have to take a short bus ride back to the Jordanian border to cancel my exit stamp and reenter Jordan. I demand to hold my passport, they tell me not yet, I have to wait. Only when they are assured that I am seated securely on the bus do they return it. I quickly flip through the passport’s pages to find these agonizing words stamped in cruel red ink: “Entry Denied.”
You don’t have to pay for the bus ride, we took care of it.
Just fuck off and leave me alone…

“Home is an addiction, it throws us against death, detaches us from forgetfulness, and yet we cannot be without it.”

Allenby Border
December 17, 2007

Allenby is full of Palestinians and Jordanians eager to cross in and spend the holidays with their families in the West Bank. Although the abundance of people means waiting longer, I’m at once put at ease by the fact that I have company this time.
Yesterday’s protocol and interrogation replay themselves. This time it takes only 20 minutes for them to come out and inform me that I have a Palestinian hawiyya number and that I must take a seat and wait for them to figure out what to do with me.
In the meantime, I enjoy chatting with the people around me. Everyone shares his or her story of why they are being barred from entering. Collective sufferings prompt interesting conversations; I’m astounded by the stories I hear.
I also notice that Palestinian holders of foreign passports have also been held for hours without any explanation. It is clear that Israel wants to make their process of entry as difficult as possible to deter them from wanting to return again.

Finally a young soldier comes out with my passport and calls my name. His name is Moshe and he explains to me that my mother recorded my name under her Palestinian ID number long ago and that I cannot enter Israel without “tasreekh.” He says my mother should have this paper and that I should go call her in San Francisco because without it, I cannot enter. I tell him:
This is ridiculous. You’re talking about a piece of paper from over 15 years ago. She won’t have it, and anyway there’s no way I can get it from her. Let me enter and I’ll do all the paperwork from there.
But how can I trust you?
Are you afraid you’ll let me enter Israel and I won’t leave?
Yes.
Wow. At least he’s honest…
That won’t be the case. I’m a student in America, I’ve shown you my university id. I’ve just come for a vacation. And anyway, if you’re scared I’ll stay, why are you forcing the hawiyya on me? With that, I have a right to live here permanently!

Moshe tells me he’ll see what he can do. What follows is hours of waiting interrupted by intermittent reappearances by Moshe. Each time, he gives me a new contradictory piece of information and each time I fire back responding that what he’s requesting doesn’t make sense and that the situation is a lot less complicated than how they’re treating it.

After over five hours, I am finally handed back my passport and a form filled out in Hebrew with my picture and information on it. This is to suffice as a temporary tasreeh until I can get a proper one along with a Palestinian identity card from Ramallah. I receive no visa. Instead, my passport has a large new stamp that reads in Hebrew. And under my name is the following number which from here on out defines my existence in this small land that causes such a big commotion: 948523815.

In the taxi ride from Jericho to Ramallah, I talk to a fellow passenger who is a professor at Birzeit University. I tell him about my last two days and he responds with the following:
“You should be very happy and proud that you have the Palestinian hawiyya now. This is a small victory in our large struggle. We’ve just increased the number of Palestinians by one, and soon you’ll pass on the identity number to your children and our numbers will continue to multiply. I know this experience was frustrating and difficult, but it’s good in that it has increased your sense of belonging here. Now you’ve suffered like we suffer, you understand our plight better and have strengthened your commitment to ending it. So don’t be upset. Thank them for returning you to your roots.”

His words move me, yet I still can’t help but feel an unsettling ambivalence. Were we foolish and arrogant to think all of those years that we were the exception with our mighty blue American passports? Who am I to lament being prohibited from entering Jerusalem when there exists an entire population that has lived in Palestine its whole life and has long been forbidden from visiting it? But at the same time, don’t we pay our US taxes that help fund this vicious occupation that slowly seeks our obliteration? To be recognized as American citizens and given a visa seems but a meager consolation prize to expect to help us allay our guilt. I can’t deny how angry I am. What I have just experienced demonstrates the unjustified discrimination routinely practiced by the Israeli state; this is the epitome of racism. It is outrageous that Israel gives itself the right to completely disregard any other nationality or passport that a Palestinian holds. I am surprised, yet not shocked, as this latest episode is but a microcosm of the larger phenomenon of institutionalized Israeli racism and denial of rights to Palestinians. Today, the lesson is clear: to Israel, any Palestinian is nothing beyond a loathed Palestinian and must be oppressed accordingly. Sadly, the young man from Haifa I first talked to at the Jordan River Border captured it most accurately: “In the end, we’re all just simply Palestinians.”

The Author is an MA candidate in Arab Studies at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service

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The Palestinian Youth Network

The following is a guest posting by KABOBfriend Samar - who would like to share her experience attending the first conference of the Palestinian Youth Network with the KABOBcommunity. Enjoy!

I was invited to a conference sponsored by a new France-based organization called the Palestinian Youth Network (PYN). At first I did not know what was the vision or the political affiliation of this organization, but the fact that I was going to meet with 120 Palestinians from different regions was exciting and so I decided to participate.

I arrived in France late in the evening of November 22nd to find the conference's participants taking part in an impromptu celebration of Palestinian folkloric song and dance. I was super excited and introduced myself to everyone there - singing and dancing along with my brothers and sisters in Diaspora. Needless to say, the evening was inspirational.

The next day the work started. A conference agenda was distributed to everyone to familiarize them with the upcoming activities. It was packed with different lectures and workshops. It was overwhelming, as the activities started at 9AM and continued till 9PM. We had different lectures on various topics such as the refugees’ status and camps’ conditions, the Palestinians living in the land occupied in 1948, Palestinians right to return, the role of the Arab countries and the situation in Palestine, occupation and its effect on the new generation, one state/two states solutions, human rights violations, and international law.

We also participated in different workshops on various topics such as dialogue, leadership training, media communication, advocacy, and lobbying. Later, we were divided into small groups to discuss the Palestinian community’s activities in the countries we represent - during which participants shared ideas, knowledge, and experiences.

The motive behind establishing the PYN and organizing this conference was to connect Palestinians living in Palestine and the Diaspora, raise awareness on important issues of Palestine and to help Palestinians living under occupation. The organization recognizes the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) as being the sole representative of the Palestinian People, as well as the importance of restructuring the PLO and reactivating its institutions in Palestine and the Diaspora. It also emphasizes the Palestinian National principals and rights, foremost among them the right of return and the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as the capital.

The conference ended by commemorating the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian people with a peaceful demonstration in Paris, supporting the struggle of Palestinians. French and international organizations in solidarity with the Palestinians, as well as important Palestinian figures and the General Union of Palestinian Students in France, participated in the demonstration.

I arrived back in the United States on November, 30th inspired and reinvigorated to delve into the work we promised to do - which is mainly to raise awareness on the Palestinian cause and continue building the network of Palestinian youth. I have to say that this was by far the best experience I have had. I built relationships with amazing Palestinians all over the world. I also got the chance to listen to the lives my brothers and sisters are leading in the occupied territories.

All was well until last Monday. Less than 10 days after the conference had ended, the General Coordinator of the PYN, Seif, was detained by the Israeli occupation forces while entering the occupied Palestinian territories via the Allenby (Al-Karama) Bridge. During the detainment, he was extensively asked about the PYN and his participation at the conference. He was released after 7 hours of interrogation and being thoroughly searched. Even though Seif has been detained before, the press release stated that " Saif Abu Kishek;s detention comes as a result of his participation in the second annual conference, the founding conference of the Palestinian Youth Network (PYN).

After finding out that Saif was detained, I was extremely shocked and could not believe that he got arrested. I was frustrated when I knew the reason behind his detainment, which is his participation in a peaceful conference that was comprised of Palestinian youth. I felt like even though the conference was held for educational and networking purposes, still Israel felt the need to arrest Seif.

This incident is another example of Israel violating another basic human right, depriving Saif of the right of movement even though he had the proper documentation to enter his homeland. One should keep in mind that this is happening in a place which claims to be one of the most democratic states in the Middle East.

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He said Palestine

GUEST POST from KRISTEL

He said, "Palestine." And it wasn't just once- he said it over and over and over again!

Whenever someone says the word "Palestine," quivers of joy run up and down my body, but this time, I begged for him to stop, as he used the word like pestilence, tainting the minds of all who were listening and reinforcing existing, and fundamentally flawed, stereotypes.

Many of you may chastise me for even subjecting myself to such ludicrousness, but I was weak and allowed myself to sit through a three-part Dr. Phil series about a young American girl, Katherine, and her infatuation with Abdullah, a Palestinian boy living (as Dr. Phil stated a billion times over) in Palestine, whom she met on MySpace.

You may have heard of this story a few years back, as Katherine (then 16) made headline news as she attempted to meet Abdullah in Palestine. She got as far as Jordan until the FBI stopped her and flew her home, so she never met her love.

Recently, at the ripe age of 18, there was nothing holding her back. Her family, desperate to keep attention to this situation for fear of Katherine’s safety in the big, bad world of Arabs, called Dr. Phil to intervene- and intervene he did.

Before I talk about the racist undertones of the show, I have to say the following: Abdullah was the worst representation of an Arab man I have ever seen in that he verbally and physically abused Katherine. This is abhorrent and in no way justifiable, but unfortunately this behavior is not isolated to Arabs alone- the issue is universal. Hearing him talk made me sick.

However, what also made me sick was the correlation (so obvious to an experienced eye) the show made between the image of Abdullah and that of all Palestinians. It's quite complex to explain, but here are a few disturbing observations:

• Dr. Phil is a mainstream media figure, which as we know, sparingly use the word "Palestine." Why would he incessantly use the word if not to substantiate any negative images already in the minds of most Americans about Palestinians? Additionally, I believe the word was used to make a point that this boy was not from "Israel." But Israel is so easily used when describing where the Palestinian designer Rami Kashou, a contestant on Project Runway, is from. Dare we think that someone with such great style could be from Palestine?
• When Dr. Phil tried to be specific, he would say Katherine was in the "Gaza Strip," which was completely inaccurate, seeing that Abdullah's family lives in Jericho, which is in Palestine's "West Bank" region.
• The images projected of the area seemed quite unfamiliar to me. Seeing as I've been to Palestine a handful of times, the sudden flashes of Palestine on the screen, only represented images Americans are accustomed to seeing (scary, foreign, conservative) and not the real OCCUPIED Palestine filled with Israeli-only bypass roads, checkpoints, settlements, a suffocating apartheid wall. Ok, maybe he wanted to avoid being political, then why weren't images of the real Palestine shown? Maybe it would have made Palestinians look too humane?
• Katherine's family fear for their daughter was astronomical, but I question- would this be such an issue if the guy she fell in love with was Swedish? What if she went to Sweden instead of Palestine- do you think a three-part series would have evolved then? I know what you're thinking- Palestine is more volatile, more dangerous. Um, kind of true- but not really. Regardless, the true basis for their fear has more to do with Abdullah being an Arab, than anything else.
• By the third episode, Katherine was back home and dating an "American" boy; this of course comes before she even broke-up with Abdullah, which she later did on the show. Dr. Phil commented that doesn't it "feel" right, it just "fits," to which Katherine concurred. What Dr. Phil was really saying was, "Isn't dating an American (and by that it's fairly safe to assume, not an Arab-American) BETTER?" As Dr. Phil says, 80% of questions are really comments in disguise.
• The continued use of the word "terrorist" and trying to make an association with it and Abdullah was despicable. Ok, he's a dog- but a terrorist? Why are we so apt to accuse someone who is Palestinian, Arab, or Muslim of being a "terrorist?" This word, in connection with every Arab/Muslim in existence, is so overused and so overdone. I am just so over it!
• At one point Katherine mentioned her concern about what would transpire on the show and what Abdullah's family would think of her as a result of it. To that, Dr. Phil in all his glory replied, "Do you really care about what people in the Gaza Strip think???" This comment was followed by a boisterous applause. Again, Jericho is NOT in the Gaza Strip, but more importantly, how demeaning is it to insinuate that the opinion of "those people" don't really count; it's only "ours" that are important.

Being a prospective graduate student of psychology, I know educating students in "cultural competence" is a pressing issue for schools, as the field has been dominated by people with little understanding of different cultural paradigms (like Dr. Phil). Dr. Phil is an utter disappointment to me; he lacked good judgment, never tried to debunk any stereotypes arising from this story, and never even did any sort of geographical or cultural research to present a more balanced, or even educated, perspective.

Oh...and did he even THINK how psychologically distressing the show would be to a fellow American of ARAB decent? Oops, I forgot, why should he CARE about what we think???

In conclusion to my venting novel (and I thank those that have stuck by and read every last word), I must regurgitate what an associate of mine recently said to me, "Well, what are the American people supposed to think when all we know of the Palestinians are the likes of Yasser Arafat?" And to that I say, if you are judging 9.5 million people on Yasser Arafat and MySpace's Abdullah, then I think your brain has a lot more educating it needs to do with itself. But if we were to play by these rules, then the next time I see a blond-hair, fair-skinned white man with a shaved head coming towards the building I work in, my ass is running the other way as the building will inevitably be blown up, right? Pathetic.

PALESTINE- I think we should ban the use of this beloved word by the unintelligent folks out there, as the utterance of it from anyone other than someone who truly "understands," is in my opinion, a dreadful injustice.

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Guest Post: Fellow Columbia Anthro Grad Student Weighs In On the Noose Incident

(By Al-Kami)

Let's protest! No, let's not and say we did.

Nooses are so last year. My only issue with the whole noose thing is that it's really uncreative.

Columbia is supposedly a place where everyone is entitled to free speech, right? Why someone would feel that they are not entitled to spew hate at a university where the President insists that he too can be prejudiced is beyond me. Just be yourself! Hate openly. Don't hang a noose and run. Rather than leave nooses out of dislike for a black professor, why not rally like everyone else at Columbia does and spew racist views about black faculty (or whomever) in front of Low library? It's your right! There might even be some good media coverage! And we all know that's really the point of our university protests.

Why we even give these people (or this person) so much attention is beyond me. "Idiot hangs noose outside of black professor's door and incites hundreds to rally and protest in the rain" - seems like a job well done. We are giving this fool way too much credit. I think the only way he/she/it/they would deserve this much attention is if they intelligently (wow, I laughed as I typed that) present their views in front of an audience. (Otherwise, we have no idea what you're really trying to convey chap! You bored? Lonely? Didn't get enough attention at home?) Cowards are at the bottom of the racist pool. Take off the hoods and show your face - the air is so much cleaner when it's not covered by a sheet. And then we
can hear your lovely voice.

I understand that some have conveyed concerns about feeling unsafe due to Columbia's secretive" handling of on-campus hate. Students believe that they should be in the know when there's bathroom graffiti, and nooses-a-hangin'. These are certainly valid concerns when dealing with haters who aren't also cowards. When Jessica wrote "Ann-Marie is a slut" on the bathroom walls, no one feared for their safety. They either laughed at Jessica, with Jessica, or assumed she was immature. An adult at a university promoting hate via bathroom scribble is hardly a person that anyone should fear. Nor is a person who isn't even creative enough to come up with a new and improved hate crime that hasn't been highly publicized on television for the past few months. These people are cowards looking for attention. What we are doing is validating their actions and giving them the attention they need. When those protests take place, the "hater" that did the hating is probably amongst those protesting. In fact, he/she/it/they are probably the ones that come up with the protest chant. Either that or they're sitting inside of a warm room with a cup of cocoa looking at all the "coloreds" yelling in the rain. And at whom? And for what?

It is my opinion that none of these cowardly actions deserve our missing very expensive class time. But, for those that feel something needs to be done, the protest thing will not suffice. We constantly protest in front of Low, and then go for pizza and forget about it. If students really want to do something, a news conference needs to be organized where individuals can express their feelings about the situation. If that route is unavailable, get a video camera and put something on youtube. Express yourselves to the masses - not to random kids on the way to Elementary French. In the message it should be expressed that everyone at Columbia has a right to free speech, and therefore it is unnecessary to hang anonymous nooses. Invite all noose hangers and graffiti writers to stand on the steps of Low and voice their concerns. Invite them out of cowardice and into humanity. Everyone has a right to speak, so secret hate crimes are really unnecessary. I'm sure everyone will find that none of these people will step up, proving their cowardice, and the point that they should be left alone to carry on their uncreative, eighth grade, petty hate as they feel necessary.

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GUEST POST: "Why won't this work?"

[A guest post by my friend, Joe Kitano.]

Here’s the thing I don’t understand about Palestine and Israel.
Well see, there’s seems to be a
perfect solution in my head
that seems so workable
I don’t know why it hasn’t been tried.
So what I’d like, KABOBers,
is for you to tell me why this can’t happen.
And I realize that I speak from a place of ignorance,
but more importantly,
I think with an American mindset.
A mindset that believes in democracy and/
Well, let me just lay it out, yuh?

If I was running things,
if I was the George Washington of Palestine,
(assuming there could be someone like that)
I would lay it out like this:
“We give up. Sorry about all the bad blood.
The West Bank and Gaza are yours.
It’s not the Occupied Territory, it is Israel.
The hardcore right-wing Zionists were right.
God said everything between the Jordan River
and the sea belongs to the Jews.
We agree. We are in Israel.
Jerusalem is the eternal capital,
and we here in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank
are all citizens of Israel.
Our brothers and kinsmen
that were chased out of the country in 48,
well sorry guys, you shouldn’t have left.
Stay in Jordan and Egypt and wherever,
maybe we can work something out later.
But everyone inside the borders now are citizens of Israel.

Yay! (crazy eh? Well, bear with me.)

Now we former Palestinians, now Israelis…
we all get a vote, right? This is a Democracy, right?
I mean, that’s what great about Israel.
With all these kingdoms and dictatorships all around,
this is the one democracy. A shining beacon, if you will.
The “Palestinian-Israelis” get to vote, so do we.

Now as of 2005, according to Wikipedia and the CIA factbook,
There are 5.4 million Jews in Israel and 1.7 non-Jews
(Muslims, Christians, Druze and so forth)
There are 3.6 million Palestinians (93% Muslim, 7% Christian)
in the Occupied Territories.
Mmm… interesting.
And your Knesset isn’t like US Government;
even little parties get some representation.
If our cause stays unified,
we would control almost half of the Knesset.
So pretty much whoever wants to be Prime Minister
is going to have to deal with us.
And hey, we don’t want too much:
just repatriation and equal rights.
Land of Israel Refugees
in Egypt and Jordan.
Not even all at once. No no.
A slow licensing process, maybe some government aid,
but none of their old land back, just citizenship
(and a vote).
Oh and the inequities of education, sanitation, infrastructure
and health care,
no no, that must stop.
The hospitals and schools in Nablus should be just
as good as the ones in Tel Aviv.

And then in one grand gesture
I would turn to all my Palestinian brothers and sisters
I would say
–well maybe not exactly like this-
but I’d turn to them and say,

“START FUCKING!”

As it stands right now,
the birth rate among Palestinians is 50% that of Jewish Israelis
There could be a Palestinian majority in 5 years.
See, as the George Washington of the Palestinians,
I would explain to my people that there are four ways to vote:
Vote with your vote.
Register, make every vote count.
Vote with your money.
Buy right, boycott brands.
Vote with your feet.
If you don’t like the municipality, move.
And finally, vote with your dick.
You think a government policy is hateful and discriminatory,
have a whole bunch of kids and teach them to think the same way.
Teach your kids – Muslim, Christian, whatever – that a democracy
shouldn’t have a state religion.
So then in five years,
(which by the way is a blip in the history of the struggles of this land),
Non-Jews are now the majority population in the state of Israel,
and the Prime Minister, he’s a non-Jew too.
Heck, maybe I’ll take the job.
Well, there you go, end of the Jewish State.

Isn’t that what the desire is?
Isn’t that what they’ve wanted since 1948
That was 59 years ago!
In a tenth of that time we could eliminate the Jewish State entirely
and no one would get hurt.
No shootings, no pogroms, no ghettos, no jihad.
Just simply the organized will of the people to vote and fuck.

So why won’t this work?

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"The Kingdom": Film Review

After a student-group-sponsored, free, advanced screening of "The Kingdom" at my school, my friend who attended the viewing with me and I decided to write up our own reviews of the film to anchor the effusive criticisms that poured out of mouths like a broken faucet...lest we find ourselves in hours upon hours of arm-chair philosophizing. I mean we grad students for reals yo! We got over 1000 pages of dense, overly-pontifical writing to comb through per week and we have been trained to run our mouths for hours upon hours!

So, we went into the film deseperately clinging to every ounce of childlike optimism we had left bodies, hoping that damaging and stereotypical imagery in the trailer didn't necessary constitute a damaging, stereotypical film. Unfortunately, our hopes died in the cinematic cemetary of warm-hearted idealism within the first minute of this eeriely-reminiscent of "Delta Force" action-drama. Here is my friend "Abu Mack" (that's right, his name does mean "Mack Daddy")review, mine will be posted shortly:

"Delta Force IV"

"The Kingdom", the new Saudi-Arabia-we-explain-it-all action flick, from the first few seconds of the preview: a condensed panorama of minarets, missiles, angry brown eyes, and falcons, always falcons. This movie, which should be called Delta Force IV: is plain evidence that the business of entertaining America has not moved beyond Chuck Norris and Not Without My Daughter. I thought we all had agreed these were cultural embarrassments never to be repeated again? Even the worst mistakes deserve a sequel I guess.

Basically, the movie is a Middle Eastern Studies grad student's wet dream paper topic. The symbolism is so clumsy it knocks you unconscious with a club foot: the most innocuous arabs are the ones you should fear the most (24), you can never tell the good arabs from the bad arabs, the only good arab is the one who kills his own people with impunity. American military and civilian bases in Saudi Arabia are ahistorical apparitions that are good and wholesome, like baseball/ Saudi Arabia has a dark, evil history full of malice and oblique camera angles. Arabs don't know what technology is and need America to help them sort out their own internal problems. And the most parano-hygienic people on the planet are dirty, sweaty monkeys at the end of the day.

At least it was a university screening which I didn't have to pay for, meaning I could complain without funding anything objectionable, conscience clear. The sound quality was terrible, running every racist double entendre through an echo chamber until it was a triple or quadruple entendrementendre. A fratboy in the row in front of me kept floating taco farts our way. And during the most brutal, video-game, dehumanizing scenes of America-on-Arab violence, the COLUMBIA student audience cheered with glee. When the mopy, mouse-like Jennifer Garner, in a sweeping gesture of imperial feminism, drove a dagger into the crotch of a Saudi fundamentalist-- after a sensuous brawl that resoundingly drove home the point that domestic violence is a staple of arab lands-- the students yelled as if a touch-down had been scored. Where? not in this flop of a movie. I was reminded of Noam Chomsky's words about spectator sports and mass entertainment preparing a nation for war. It's so interesting, with American moviemaking, how the women characters are portrayed as soggy wet blankets (the emotional cores of films), who commit violence out of an always "defensive" mother instinct, who stick by their fallen husbands, take mercy on the innocent bystanders, just as they obliterate a whole section of the same society aged 18-35 and male. And Jamie Foxx, as the irreproachable black athlete-hero, whispers vengefully to an American victim, "I'm going to kill them all", he allows all the personal and political capital he generated in his previous, progressive films, to cloak the inhuman message of this movie behind the impenetrable barrier of race.
Please make sure this movie goes straight to video, preferably Saudi bootleg.

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CIA Report: Arabs Spotted at Milwaukee's Waterfront

KABOBfriend Noor is not somebody to miss out on a fest. Esp