Dove's Eye View

Lebanon to let Palestinians obtain work permits

Thanks to Jonathan for alerting me to this piece of good news: The Daily Star - Politics - Lebanon to let Palestinians obtain work permits.

While Palestinians in Lebanon still will be banned from holding professional positions, they will be allowed to work in manual and clerical jobs (and they have been working as manual laborers for two generations now, just illegally).

This new action goes part of the way towards righting an injustice which harms all of Lebanese society, not just its Palestinian residents.

Artistic Resistance

This piece explores how artists confront the Occupation: MIFTAH--Artistic Resistance.

in the image of the Berlin Wall, the Annexation Wall is also becoming a canvas on which to express Palestinian frustration, suffering and hope surrounding Israel’s illegal occupation.

This form of artistic resistance is a powerful form of non-violent resistance that has tremendous impact. It is said that a picture speaks a thousand words. And if you walk alongside the 650 km-long Wall, which is increasingly becoming brightly-colored, you will see and hear the tragedy of this structure for both the land and the Palestinian people: ghetto, prison, apartheid and pleas for freedom.

Artistic resistance in Palestine represents more than a release of built-up tension and exasperation caused by the Occupation, but it is also a peaceful tool which normalizes and humanizes the Palestinians in a world that falsely views them as violent “militants” and “terrorists.” These are the images that should be portrayed in the media, because they truly tell the story of the physical, mental and emotional distresses that Palestinians experience every day.

Furthermore, this type of activism should be commended and encouraged as a positive alternative to both the brutality of Israeli military occupation and extremist responses. The nature of the beast (a.k.a. Occupation) lends itself to circular contradiction: do Palestinians lay low and gain the international community’s sympathy through its “good conduct” record? Or actively rebel and give Israel more of an excuse not to stop its suppression of Palestinian people? These are questions not easily answered, because they are buried in political, economic and social norms and policies.

Turning Point in Middle East Peace

Zbigniew Brzezinski & William B. Quandt have this to say, via MIFTAH: Turning Point in Middle East Peace

The statement US President George W. Bush delivered at the conclusion of his recent meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas deserves serious attention.

It has been much discussed by the Israeli press but drew scant commentary in the US media.

The president, in his formal presentation, declared that any final-status agreement between Palestinians and Israelis "must be reached between the two parties and changes to the 1949 armistice lines must be mutually agreed to".

Lest there be any misunderstanding, the president said "Israel should not undertake any activity that contravenes the roadmap obligations or prejudices final-status negotiations with regard to Gaza, the West Bank and [occupied] Jerusalem. ...

"A viable two-state solution must ensure contiguity of the West Bank. And a state of scattered territories will not work. There must also be meaningful linkages between the West Bank and Gaza.

"This is the position of the United States today. It will be the position of the United States at the time of final-status negotiations".

Bush's declaration was a significant and helpful restatement of some long-held American positions.

If these principles are actively embedded in Washington's policies over the months ahead, they could help further the president's stated goals of resolving the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict, promoting democracy in the Middle East and undercutting support for Islamist terrorism.

Emphasized section is a quote from a recent Bush speech.

Play Opens Eyes About Conflict

Len Traubman forwards this link about a play in Israel: MIFTAH--Play Opens Eyes About Conflict.

Tel Aviv — “Show me your identification,” the soldier, wearing a helmet and camouflage flak jacket, barks at unsuspecting theatergoers trying to reach their seats.

Faces go pale. But nervous laughter follows once it becomes clear that the soldier is not really a soldier at all, just an actor in the play they are about to see — a production about the Palestinian-Israeli conflicted called “Plonter,” a Hebrew slang word for a mess.

The idea of a checkpoint in the middle of a darkened theater may be absurd, but the absurdity of the conflict is what “Plonter” is all about. The play, which debuted at the respected Cameri Theatre last week, is the creation of its cast, a mix of Israeli Arab and Jewish actors who drew on real life scenes from the conflict, including some from their personal experiences.

During the series of scenes and vignettes that make up the production, the nine actors switch back and forth between portraying Israeli and Palestinian characters, speaking in both Hebrew and Arabic.

In one scene, Yousef Sweid, an Arab Israeli who grew up in Haifa, plays the role of a senior Israeli officer overseeing the cover-up of an army shooting of a Palestinian boy. In the next scene, he’s a Palestinian militant wearing a black-and-white checkered keffiyeh and firing an automatic rifle in the air, calling for vengeance.

Linked at Miftah, originally from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Hayan Charara Poems

Hayan Charara sends links to his poetry. "Keep an eye out for the new collection, The Sadness of Others, from Carnegie Mellon (comes out at the end of the year)."

See poems here, here and here.

Excerpt from The Sadness of Others:

A week ago, my father
unpacked his boxes
in another country, a place
so much unlike here.
His home is again
his homeland. His home--
not mine, nor my sister’s,
who after watching his plane
disappear into a cloudless sky
drove forty miles to our mother.
She, our mother,
is a headstone
in a flat cemetery
behind the interstate. She,
my sister,
like my mother, is finally alone.
And I am so far away,
unable to distinguish
which I love more,
her or her sadness.

Despite the gloom, Lebanon is changing

From The Daily Star (Beirut): - Opinion Articles - Despite the gloom, Lebanon is changing, by Michael Young Rami Khouri. (Updated - thanks to reader GH for pointing out my error in attribution.)

How refreshing! An Arab parliamentary election whose results were not known three months ahead of time, and did not result in the ruling party winning a victory of over 90 percent, as has been the norm in many Arab countries in the last half century.

Lebanon's parliamentary elections, which concluded with the fourth round of voting on Sunday, brought in both some new faces and a new opposition majority that has the opportunity to make some history. This brings to a close the second of three phases of a modern drama of Arab political transformation and renewal that could ultimately prove to be historic for the entire region.

Despite the spate of assassinations in recent months, including the bomb attack yesterday that killed the former secretary general of the Lebanese Communist Party, George Haoui, Lebanon remains the Arab country with the best chance to break away from half a century of governance by policemen or warlords in business suits. It can spark other changes throughout the region if it moves toward a more modern, democratic political system. We shall soon find out if this is to be, though, clearly, there are forces resisting this trend.

VC pair put their Tunisia ties to work

Thanks to Alison for this link: VC pair put their Tunisia ties to work.

The men, one American and one Tunisian, plan to raise money from investors, many of them in the Middle East. Their firm, called Minah Ventures, will then invest in Silicon Valley entrepreneurs with Middle Eastern roots and help them launch their start-ups. As the start-ups grow, they would hire researchers and developers in the Middle East and also outsource there.

The venture is one of the first to focus on valley investment in and out of the Middle East, long a troubled region that has made outside entrepreneurs wary. Minah Ventures will be helped, its founders say, by many Middle Eastern expatriates who live in the valley, have backgrounds in technology, and want to do something for their homelands -- without necessarily going there.

``They like the idea of helping the region get on its feet,'' said co-founder Matt Pedley. ``It pulls at their heart strings.''

Pedley and co-founder Ghazi Benothman are thinking big, setting their focus on the region from Morocco in northwestern Africa to Pakistan's border with India. Minah Ventures is a play on the acronym from ``Middle East North Africa.''

They've already recruited two other partners -- one based in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, the other in Boston -- to tap the Middle Eastern entrepreneur community there. And just three weeks ago they won a $10 million pledge from the government of the Emirates, which will be their anchor investor. They're aiming to raise $90 million more.

The Dove has Lebanese cousins in Dubai who are very busy building engineering/electronics firms. There's plenty of talent in the Arab world and its expatriate communities - good to see somebody is doing something about developing that talent, instead of complaining that there aren't enough jobs or investors.

Thanks to Alison, who found it on Silicon Beat.

Posting will resume shortly

I've been out of touch for several days. My older son had a scary bout of salmonella - some designer chickens in Alice Waters' Edible Schoolyard are most probably the culprit. His mother is the responsible party (chickens can't help themselves, and neither can 5 year olds) -- I didn't remember to wash his hands after he'd been messing around the coop, and then he went off to gather raspberries to eat from the bush. La de dah, how very organic of us, eating raspberries from the Chez Panisse Foundation garden. The subsequent symptoms put him in the hospital on intravenous fluids and antibiotics for three days.

Children's Hospital Oakland expects the parent to be with the child around the clock; I compromised by driving home to sleep, but I spent 16 hours a day there from Saturday through today at dinner time. Thus no posting.

Moral of the story - if you must play with chickens, wash your hands. With soap.

Normal posts will resume shortly. The ever alert Alison Chaiken has sent me something via e-mail already.

Mom wants to know

The phone rang at 6 pm.
"This is one of your admirers," said a voice with a familiar Virginia twang.
"Hi, Mom."
"You told me if I want to know how your conference went, I should read your blog."
"Yes, Mom" (uh-oh, what did I say?)
"It was sort of a brush-off."
"Oh Mom, I didn't mean it that way, the kids were screaming and driving me nuts."
"I know, dear, I'm just teasing you. Anyway, I'm looking at the blog now and I don't find anything about the conference."
"Click on the June 2005 archive and scroll down." (Mom narrates what she sees out loud - refer to recent posts)
"But honey, I don't see a post where you say 'I went to the RAWI conference and spoke at this panel, and did this and that.' You wrote about Evelyn Shakir, and Randa Jarrar, and all these other people. Is it against blog etiquette to talk about yourself? I thought I was going to hear about you."
"Guess I'll have to write about it now, Mom."

Then when I log on tonight, I get a note from Mom, with a link to Randa's live blog from Hunter College, site of the RAWI conference. Did you see what Rockslinga wrote? she asks.

Okay, Mom, okay!

It's late and we've had a sick kid on our hands this week, so I'm not going to write anything at the moment, but here's a photo of Randa and Laila just before our panel discussion on Literary bloggers.

Then again, this still won't make Mom happy, because the picture doesn't include me. No photos of me in the digital camera, since I'm always the one taking the pictures. Sorry Mom! It's too bad for the rest of you, because my new post-chemo hair was very hip looking (it's gotten shaggier this week, less austerely minimalist).

Finding a Surprising Welcome: A Different Face of Syria

From the New York Times: Finding a Surprising Welcome: A Different Face of Syria - a travel piece that renews my longing to go to Damascus.