Saturday, October 18, 2014

Arabs from Israel risk arrest for 'Arab Idol' show... Israel and Suha Arraf Differ on Nationality of ‘Villa Touma’... & Escape to a World of Palestinian Surprises

In this Friday, Oct. 10, 2014 photo provided by MBC Press Office, Palestinian singer Manal Mousa, 25, performs during the Arab Idol Show broadcast by MBC Arabic satellite channel in Zouk Mosbeh neighborhood, north of Beirut, Lebanon. Her goal is to win Arab Idol, the Arab world's premiere television song competition. The journey Mousa and another singer Haitham Khalaily, 24, have taken from their villages in Israel to the competition in Lebanon could comprise a television drama of its own - featuring travel to an enemy country, Israeli security interrogations, and the complicated identity crisis of Israel's Arabs. (AP Photo/MBC Press Office)
[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]
http://news.yahoo.com/arabs-israel-risk-arrest-arab-idol-show-143214862.html
Arabs from Israel risk arrest for 'Arab Idol' show

MAJD AL-KRUM, Israel (AP) — Their goal is to win Arab Idol, the Arab world's premiere television song competition.

But the journey Manal Mousa, 25, and Haitham Khalaily, 24, have taken from their villages in Israel to the competition in Lebanon could comprise a television drama of its own — featuring travel to an enemy country, Israeli security interrogations, and the complicated identity crisis of Israel's Arabs.

The two singers are competing for more than just fame: they want to be a part of the cultural world that has been largely off limits to them because of the decades-long Arab-Israeli conflict.

"This is a chance for Haitham," said Waheeb Khalaily, Haitham's father, in his home in Majd Al-Krum, a village in the Galilee, in northern Israel. "For the Arab world and the whole world to hear him and say that he represents a Palestinian people that clings to its land."

In the bitter conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors, Arab-Israelis are stuck in the middle. Though citizens of the Jewish state, they share the ethnicity, language and culture of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Arabs who remained in Israel after its creation in 1948, and their descendants, today make up 20 percent of the population. Many identify as Palestinians rather than Israelis, watch Arab satellite television and dream of traveling throughout the Middle East. But their Israeli citizenship bars them from most Arab countries because Israeli passport holders are prohibited entry....READ MORE

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The Hand That Feeds Bites Back

Israel and Suha Arraf Differ on Nationality of ‘Villa Touma’





Suha Arraf identified her film Villa Touma” as Palestinian at the Venice Film Festival. Israel, which helped fund the movie, objected. Credit Villa Touma
 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/movies/israel-and-suha-arraf-differ-on-nationality-of-villa-touma.html?emc=edit_tnt_20141018&nlid=67297737&tntemail0=y&_r=0

Villa Touma,” a darkly comic fable directed by a Palestinian-Israeli screenwriter, Suha Arraf, had been experiencing an identity crisis well before it got to Canada. At the Venice Film Festival a week or so earlier, Ms. Arraf (“Lemon Tree”) listed the film as “Palestinian,” and in doing so kicked up a media and bureaucratic storm. Since most of her financing came from Israeli state sources, the political establishment argued that “Villa Touma” should have been considered Israeli. The Israeli Film Council demanded the return of more than $500,000 Ms. Arraf raised from the Israeli Film Fund, the Economic Ministry and the national lottery.





Suha Arraf, who wrote and directed “Villa Touma.” Credit Kathleen McInnis
The response online and in the Israeli press to Ms. Arraf, was not, generally speaking, kind. “It was crazy,” Ms. Arraf said in Toronto. “They said I stole Israeli money, they said I’m a whore, of course, and a suicide bomber.” She continued: “When I talk about it here, and people hear about the story, they start laughing and ask me to write a comedy about it. A comedy. Nobody would believe me if I wrote the script.”

Set in 2001, the film tells of three Christian sisters who have cloistered themselves since the 1967 Six-Day War inside their once-elegant Ramallah home in the West Bank (though, aside from some exteriors there, the film was largely shot in Haifa, Israel). When a niece comes to live with them, their insular existence starts to dissolve. Featured are the Palestinian actresses Nisreen Faour, Ula Tabari and Maria Zreik, along with Cherien Dabis, the Palestinian-American director (“Amreeka”), making what she called a long-delayed acting debut.

“It was so refreshing,” she said of Ms. Arraf’s script. “It’s about a world we’ve never seen, a segment of Palestinian society that’s just lost. It’s about women’s lives, their intimacy. The humor was there, the pacing was there.”...READ MORE

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GIGI HADID
Fashion Model, USA

“My dad was born in Palestine and immigrated at a very young age. I think the most inspiring thing about my parents is that they came from nothing and through hard work and determination they both reached their goals…they always taught me the importance of making a name for myself regardless of the past success of my family, be financially independent, and using my success to help the less fortunate.”

Read more about Gigi Hadid at Palestinian Surprises website: http://bit.ly/1vP1UCO

Sherri Muzher is a journalist, scholar, and activist who has dedicated much of her writings to dispelling Palestinian stereotypes, clarifying myths, and presenting the Palestinian perspective... Muzher was born and raised in Michigan. Her parents left the Occupied West Bank in 1969 with hopes of brighter days for their future children... Escape to a World of Palestinian Surprises

The Palestinian Surprises website and facebook page are tools for the Palestinian people to recognize and publicize the best of their achievements in Diaspora and the homeland, and to show our rich culture, heritage and history. These achievements are in science, education, politics, music and every aspect of Palestinian life! Palestinian Surprises is thus also a resource to dispel negative stereotypes of Palestine and of Palestinians.

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