beirut blues

the first Palestinian Circus School

They are great, fighting hard to get the first Palestinian Circus School going and really deserve all the help they can get.....

This is their appeal:

Concerns: Israeli aggression frustrating plans of the First Palestinians Circus School

Ramallah, July 25, 2006

Dear friends,

We at the First Palestinian Circus are very sad to announce you that due to the current instability in the region, our first big activity, the training workshop of three Belgian circus artists already had to be cancelled at the very last minute.

All the work that had been put into the three weeks training is gone by an ugly wind that the Israeli helicopters moved over Lebanon. As in an Arabic saying: "the bullet that doesn't kill bothers” and these bullets seem to bother our life, culture, studies and dreams.

Not wanting to render to despair, and continuing to pay the price of the brutal Israeli aggression, we have decided to continue the workshop among those motivated people who have some basic skills to organize a first circus initiation workshop, Between the 2nd until 18th of August  2006 with the grand opening day for the circus school at the 18th of august.

We will continue to work hard to start up the First Palestinian Circus School in Ramallah.   

Although to be able to do this we do need some support. Due to the cancellation of the Belgian workshop, we lost out on the necessary funding to pay accommodation, catering, transportation, and many circus materials we already bought.       

Therefore we are calling out to all our friends over the world to give the First Palestinian Circus School a little push to stand up and accomplish its dreams.

What can you do?

- Support the basic costs for the workshop in August and the start up of the

Circus School in September by donating some money on account number 461556-5-510  of the Arab Bank, in El Ram, BR Code 9110  mentioning: Shadi Zmorrod The First Palestinian Circus School
- Ship or send us some specific circus materials.
- Come to Palestine and provide us with some training in circus techniques, pedagogical approaches of working with circus to develop the social and meteoric skills of children.      
- Pass this message on to other possible interested people.   

Do you want to be kept informed of what we are doing? , we ask you to send us a little Message to s.zmorrod@gmail.com mentioning: please keep us informed of future developments of the First Palestinian Circus. And we will make sure we send you a regular update.   

Please contact us for any further information.   

Thank you very much for your consideration and time, and hope to meet you in the future.

 

Best regards from Occupied Palestine,

Shadi Zmorrod
Initiator of the First Palestinian Circus School
s.zmorrod@gmail.com
+972 54 567 1911
Ramallah
Palestine

A Haifa Life

A short article appeared on the New York Times on A.B. Yehoshua, on July 30, 2006. The great writer answered a number of questions on the present situation and on his new book, coming out soon. Here are the highlights:

Q: As one of Israel’s most acclaimed novelists and public intellectuals, you happen to live in Haifa, which is close to the Lebanese border and among the towns in northern Israel struck this month by Hezbollah's rockets. What has it been like there? 

It’s a bizarre combination. It’s like Yom Kippur on the one hand, because the streets are empty and there are no cars. On the other hand, you can eat if you like.

the new government in Beirut

Beirut bands hold benefit for internally displacce
Concert may be capital's last for some time
July 24

The New Government and Scrambled Eggs, two of Beirut's best-known underground bands, took the stage at in Gemmayzeh's Club Social Saturday evening and channeled their melancholy and anger into music. Then they gave the profits to charity. Staging a concert during a siege rather defies conventional wartime social norms.

Chomsky, Pinter and Saramago on Palestine

Resistence from the literati. A poignant letter, published in The Independent on 21 July 2006.

Palestinian nation under threat

Sir: The latest chapter of the conflict between Israel and Palestine began when Israeli forces abducted two civilians, a doctor and his brother, from Gaza - an incident scarcely reported anywhere, except in the Turkish press. The following day the Palestinians took an Israeli soldier prisoner - and proposed a negotiated exchange against prisoners taken by the Israelis, of which there are approximately 10,000 in Israeli jails.

That this "kidnapping" was considered an outrage, whereas the illegal military occupation of the West Bank and the systematic appropriation of its natural resources, most particularly that of water, by the Israeli defence forces is considered a regrettable but realistic fact of life, is typical of the double standards repeatedly employed by the West in face of what has befallen the Palestinians, on the land alloted to them by international agreements during the last 70 years.

Today outrage follows outrage; makeshift missiles cross sophisticated ones. The latter usually find their target situated where the disinherited and crowded poor live, waiting for what was once called justice. Both categories of missile rip bodies apart horribly - who but field commanders can forget this for a moment?

Each provocation and counter-provocation is contested and preached over. But the subsequent arguments, accusations and vows all serve as a distraction to divert world attention from a long-term military, economic and geographic practice whose political aim is nothing less than the liquidation of the Palestinian nation.

This has to be said loud and clear for the practice, only half declared and often covert, is advancing fast these days, and, in our opinion, it must be unceasingly and eternally recognised for what it is and resisted.

JOHN BERGER

NOAM CHOMSKY

HAROLD PINTER

JOSÉ SARAMAGO

MIEUSSY, FRANCE

(Published in The Independent, July 21, 06)

Expulsion by the sovereign

An issue that particularly affects me. Amira Hass, for whom I have great admiration is writing a series of pieces on the issue.

Expulsion by the sovereign

By Amira  Hass

It might seem that there is no less appropriate moment than now to  discuss bureaucratic troubles, even if they are the lot of thousands of  people who live in the Gaza Strip and on the West Bank, and whom Israel  forbids to return to their homes and families. How can we talk about  closed border crossings when in the Gaza Strip and in Israel families are  mourning their dear ones who were killed, and Israel is on the verge of  war on several fronts?

But on the other hand, the bureaucratic troubles are also  a front in and of itself - the demographic front. And on this front,  Israel is actually chalking up successes. The latest is an expulsion  order that it is implementing mainly with respect to Palestinians who are  citizens of the United States and other Western countries, and also in  the cases of non-Palestinians who are married to Palestinians, and of people working in the territories. As opposed to the belligerent  declarations on the military front, the civilian generals from the  Interior, Justice and Defense Ministries have not publicly announced  their expulsion order.

There are four specific categories of people who are  citizens of Western countries, who are affected by this order:  Palestinians born in the territories (including East Jerusalem), whose  Palestinian residency was revoked after 1967; Palestinians born abroad;  non-Palestinians who are married to Palestinians; and foreign citizens  who work in academic institutions or humanitarian organizations  in the territories.

The vast majority are Palestinians who have returned to live here with their families on their private and national land, have come to invest in the private sector, or have joined research-related and academic institutions. Until recently,  their American and European passports protected them, even after Israel  issued (in late 2000) a similar expulsion order against citizens of Arab  countries who have families and work in the occupied territories. All  these are people living in the Gaza Strip and in the West Bank - not in  the State of Israel.

Israel did not permit those included in the first three  categories to register as residents, but allowed them to remain as  tourists - i.e., to leave the country and to renew their visas every  three months. The same was true for members of academic institutions and  other non-Palestinians. But suddenly, since March or April, it turns out  that a change has taken place in the long-standing policy: People went  abroad to renew their visa and when they returned, Israel's Border Police  refused to give them one. Do you have an elderly and ailing father? Are your children in school? Were you born here, like your parents and grandparents? Is your work here? Who cares. Israel is the sovereign and  Israel decides.

In addition to the hundreds who have already received the  expulsion order de facto, and many thousands who will be affected, there  are also tens of thousands of Palestinians who come to visit their  families here every year. Most of them are and will be forbidden to  enter.

Although the Interior Ministry repeatedly claims that  this is not a new policy, but only a "refreshing of  procedures," the State Prosecutor' Office (its High Court of Justice  department) defines this as a "policy" (whose formulation is  still pending). Because a change in the practice and the procedures that  were in force for many years is not a matter of "refreshing,"  but a policy.

The U.S. Embassy, which is aware of the new problem being  encountered by its citizens, says it cannot intervene in the sovereign  decisions of a state. And that is the issue: Israel - by its very control  over entry via the international borders (including Rafah, where only  Palestinian residents may cross), and over the Palestinian population  registry - continues to be the sovereign in the Gaza Strip and on the  West Bank. Even without a military presence there.

The lowliest clerk in the Interior Ministry and  Population Registry has the authority and the opportunity to intervene in  the critical affairs of every Palestinian man and woman: when and whom  they will marry, whether they will live together, whether they will raise  their children together. The power of the most minor Israeli clerk over  the lives of the Palestinians is greater than that of any minister in the  Palestinian government.

And yet the Western countries continue to demand that the  Palestinian Authority behave like a sovereign with respect to a territory  and a population that are under Israeli control, and they continue to be  tolerant of another policy of mass expulsion that Israel is implementing  against their citizens as well.

Last update - 10:55 14/07/2006

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=738422&contrassID=1&subContrassID=0&sbSubContrassID=0

Arab Book Fair

From Monday August 7th to Saturday August 19th, The London Review Bookshop will be holding an Arab Book Fair, a special promotion of contemporary Arab authors in English editions, to coincide with the Banipal Live 2006 tour, whose first event will be at the shop on August 15th at 7 pm. Poets Joumana Haddad from Lebanon and Abed Ismael from Syria together with fiction writers Ala Hlehel from Palestine and Mansoura Ez-Eldin from Egypt offer an entirely fresh perspective on daily life in the Arab world. For information on the tours' other dates, contact www.banipal.co.uk or info@banipal.co.uk