The current events unfolding in Egypt test the limits of healthy transition to democracy. The process of drafting the new constitution has come out as the outcome of dire political struggle, rather than the outcome of national consensus that would propel the country through transitioning to rule of law and economic and social development.

On 22 November2012, President Mohamed Morsi issued what was self-described as “Constitutional Declaration” giving the president very broad and unchecked powers. Among other things, the decree provides that all the president’s decisions, since day one, shall be immune from judicial review. The decision steered instant outrage of legal minds and laymen alike across the country, caused to happen one of the largest protests in Tahrir since 11 February 2011 and triggered, for the first time in Egypt’s history, a near-nation-wide “strike” of the judges and members of the public prosecution in response to the use of such openly reprehensible techniques in the “new” Egypt. The obvious purpose of that move was to cast immunity on the committee drafting the future constitution, and exclude judicial scrutiny of whether it was or continues to be validly composed—an increasingly open question also in light of the exodus of many members from the committee. Needless to say, that move is legally problematic. The presidency’s legal advisors may, of course, name these decisions whatever they wish to name them; but the truth remains that the “Constitutional Declaration” is at best an invalid presidential decree.       

Matters were then escalated further. The Muslim Brotherhood reacted to the national crisis stirred by the president’s decree by pressing fast-forward on the process of drafting and voting on the draft new constitution, though the constitutional committee is challenged in terms of its composition before the courts and though about twenty-two of its members (essentially all civil parties and the representatives of the Church) had deserted, objecting to the hasty manner in which the constitution was being drafted and to the non-representative nature of the document. Accordingly, the text of the constitution was finalized and put to final vote, literally in a race with justice: About eighty members of the constitutional committee voted on 234 articles in less than twenty-four hours in an enigmatic marathon involving no discussions of the final text.  

Reading the final text of the draft constitution, many articles are problematic, some are very problematic, and many are poorly drafted, as a matter of legal technique, and contain an excessive level of detail, which is most unusual in modern constitutions. For example, the constitution contains articles dealing with fishing activity, while leaving out baseline principles such as the broad rules governing taxation and its relation to income.

This is no place to comment on the draft article-by-article. But, the general impression that comes to the surface is one of a constitution drafted by the legislature(or legislature appointed body)for the legislature; and not one whose purpose, as that of all constitutions, is to fix the outer limits of legislative activity and impose clear limits on what parliament can and cannot do. The draft constitution places, under the discretion of the Parliament, the regulation of some of the most fundamental principles of social and personal rights. For example, the Parliament is entitled to regulate forced labor (because the draft constitution, somehow fantastically, does not prohibit it as an unqualified rule). The parliament under the new constitution is also entitled to regulate child labor, without much restriction.

Other concerns relate to limitations on the freedom of the media (article 48), and the failure to grant automatic voting rights to Egyptians abroad (article 56). Article 33 also sets out the fundamental principle of equality of citizens in abridged form, and removed the explicit and much needed reference (which was d’usage in all previous Egyptian constitutions) to the prohibition of unequal measures based on sex, religion or race.

The draft text also contains unnecessary relics from the old regime, such as the power of the president of the republic to oppose the enactment of bills voted by the parliament. The contours of this prerogative are far broader than their counterpart given for example by the constitution of the United States to the president. The draft constitution also leaves it to the law to regulate the appointment of the judges of the Supreme Constitutional Court (article 176), leaving the Court unprotected and the mechanism for its appointment at the hand of the very legislature that it is intended to control.

Additionally, according to some legal experts, article 76 of the draft constitution grants ordinary judges the authority to apply directly constitutional texts to individual cases, which, if intended, would open the door for very broad judicial discretion quite apart from the rigor and sufficient detail of legislative texts.

Unsurprisingly, various strata and factions of society and even branches of government openly displayed their firm opposition to the draft, including, among others, the Supreme Constitutional Court, a broad range of the judiciary, labor unions, the bar association and nearly all civil parties and youth and revolutionary movements.

Though the validity of the composition of the constitutional committee has come under scrutiny, which may make questionable all its legislative activity, the true problem lies elsewhere; and is one of baseline consensus about the road towards reforming the country politically, legally and otherwise.

The natural hope and aspiration of the people of Egypt, after sixty years of oppression and autocratic rule, was to have a constitution that unifies Egyptians around a new leadership which would lead the country’s economic, social and democratic take-off and compensate for the generations of lost development.

Reality, however, is different: The process of drafting the constitution came out as the expression of political struggle. The President has just decided to put the draft constitution to public referendum, which is scheduled to take place on Saturday 15 December 2012. On facing side, the Supreme Constitutional Court is scheduled to rule today on the validity of the composition of the constitutional committee, a ruling that could have sweeping consequences on the legitimacy and legality of the draft text. Yet again, the President’s Constitutional Declaration may be held as having cast immunity on the constitutional committee, and hence on the process of producing the new Constitution. The fate of the future constitution, along with that of the entire country, lie in the balance.

Considering the current national crisis, the division of the country, and the imminent escalation between the judiciary and the presidency, thesingle most unfortunate thing that should not have happened after a revolution of the greatness and unanimity of the January 25 Revolution, was to have a constitution that divides, and not one that unites. Much of the blame goes to the original sin, namely that the new constitution did not come first as the key and initial step of the political transition after the Revolution, before elections and partisan politics kicked in.

في خضم التعليقات حول امبريالية المحسوبية الأميركية، والمفهوم الأنثوي للأمن، والحركة الديمقراطية في المكسيك يظهر مقال "الفن والصحوة العربية"، لنعمة خليل في Foreign Policy Focus  في الثاني من آب، 2012 كوصف مضيء وممتع للانتاج الفني الذي بدأ يستحوذ على الاهتمام العالمي خلال "الصحوة العربية." لقد شهدنا الكثير من الاحتفاء بالفن العربي منذ 2001[i]، ولكن وضع مقال خليل في منتدى أميركي- للناطقين بالانجليزية عن السياسة الخارجية يثير أسئلة عن العلاقات الدولية التي تُمارس عن طريق الانتاج الثقافي1) [ii] لماذا "الفن"؟ 2) لماذا "الصحوة"؟ 3) لماذا السياسة الخارجية؟ لماذا تشكل هذه المصطلحات أبجديات النقاش؟ أريد أن أقول هنا إن هذه المقاربة للفن هي الوجه الآخر لسياسة التدخل الانساني التي تقلل وتحد من إمكانية مشاركة الضحايا في السياسة الدولية. 

تؤكد خليل في كتالوجها عن عملها الجديد أن "الفن كان دوماً تجربة مستمرة للشباب الثائر تقوي المجتمع المدني والعملية الديمقراطية" (ما أركز عليه).  وقد تردد صدى هذه الأمثلة في مؤتمر عقد مؤخراً في رام الله بتمويل أوروبي لجمع الاقتراحات من "منتجي الثقافة" حول الطرق التي يمكنهم عن طريقها أن يسهموا في المجتمع المدني.  إنه من المقلق أن مقال خليل يمكن أن يُقرأ وكأنه طلب منحة من الاتحاد الأوروبي، كما أن وضعه على موقع سياسي يحوله إلى دعوة لنوع جديد من التدخل الانساني. يمكننا أن نرى، من خلال أردية الفن المزينة بتقنية الألوان، رأياً حول ماهية الانسان وكيف يمكن للبشر الذين كانوا "نائمين" أن يعيشوا ويختبروا عالماً من القوة غير المتكافئة.

لم يكن كانون الثاني، 2011 هو المرة الأولى التي "استفاق" فيها العرب، فقد ذكر العديد من المعلقين علامات على الصحوة العربية منذ أن انتفض جون أنطونيوس على الهيمنة العثمانية. كم مرة يجب على العرب أن يصحو قبل أن يمارسوا حياتهم اليومية؟ أو فلنقل إن السؤال الأكثر منطقية والذي يمكن استخلاصه من هذا القول هو :" ما هي سرعة العرب في العودة إلى النوم بعد هذه اللحظات التاريخية المهمة؟" ما هذه الشعوب المخدَّرة؟

إن تناول نعمة خليل يتجاوز في مفهومه إسداء النصح للأعين المغمضة. إنه مثل أي أسطورة جيدة، يُعد وصفة لانعاش المخدرين وعوائلهم المنتشرة حول العالم. الصحوة تخلق الفن، ومن خلال صناعة مستقبلك المهني يمكنك أن تضع قدماً في الحياة العامة، وتتمتع بالاستقلالية. إن المثل الذي تفتتح به نعمة خليل مقالها هو مشروع فاتن الرويسي المعنون "شارع الفن-الفن في الحي،" والذي تم فيه إعادة طلاء السيارات المحروقة التي احرقها التونسيون وهم "يعبرون عن غضبهم وألمهم،"  محولين بذلك هذه القطع من صور للدمار والأسى" إلى "مشروع ايجابي، مفرح" يتكون من " أشياء مزهرة بألوان رائعة مزينة برسوم الجرافيتي الثورية" (وهو ما أركز عليه). إن أسلوب الفينيقي الواعي لذاته يحول الرسوم الجرافيتية من فعل تخريبي متعمد يهدف إلى تأكيد السلطة على العاصمة والمناطق الخاصة، إلى زينة خالصة ملصوقة على شعارات نمطية. لكنها تعد أنه "بعد عقود من الرقابة والخوف"، فإن المجتمع المدني والديمقراطية يمكن أن يولدا أخيراً.

أريد أن أناقض افتراضات نعمة خليل، تحت طائلة اتهامي بأني جمالي وثني، عن طريق طرح الأسئلة التالية: لماذا يُعد حرق السيارات بشكل تلقائي "تدميراً"، ولماذا تُعد خربشة بعض الكلمات بشكل أوتوماتيكي  أمراً "إيجابياً" و"مفرحاً"؟ لقد كتب العرب كلمات مثل "الحرية" و"الثورة" لعقود، إذن ما هي الاضافة التي نحصل عليها حين ننظر إلى هذا النشاط من خلال عدسة الفن؟ كيف يمكن للاشارات الفنية أن تصبح دليلاً على الصحوة، وبالتالي تصبح أساساً لاقتراح سياسة معينة؟ حين نعود بذاكرتنا إلى المدرسة الفنية للانتفاضة في فلسطين في  الثمانينات، وأسلوب "النهضة الفنية" في بدايات تكوين الدولة في لبنان ومصر، فإنه يمكننا أن نسأل أيضاً " كيف يجب على الفن أن يقدم نفسه ليكون معترفاً به من قبل صانعي القرار؟" 

في البداية فلننظر إلى التدخل الانساني قبل أن يأتي دور الفن: يمكن للبعض أن يجادل أن مشاريع كهذه تصبح فاعلة عن طريق الاعتراف بإنسانية المستقبلين لها بالحد الأدنى الذي المطلوب لإبقائهم "أحياء" (حيث تكون القيمة نفسها عرضة للتعريف من قبل المجتمع المتدخل). [iii]إنهم، وهم يزعمون قيامهم بحماية هذا الحد الأدنى، فإنهم يقولون لحكومات العالم: "نعم، يمكنكم أن تعتبروا الكونكريت، [iv]ومكيفات الشعر وأراضي الملاعب غير قانونية لأنها ليست ضرورية، ولكن لا يمكنكم أن تحرموا ضحاياكم من الحد الأدنى من متطلبات التغذية والصحة للفرد لأنها الحد الأدنى الذي لا يمكن بدونه أن تستمر الحياة." ورغم الكرم الذي يبدو في هذه التدخلات، إلا أنها تمنع وبشكل فاعل كل المستفيدين من توسيع وجودهم كبشر على حساب المتبرعين، حيث يتضح أن أراضي الملاعب، لا تعد فقط "مهمة" ولكنها أيضاً قد تعد خطرة لأنها مفتوحة لاستعمال "ثنائي"، أي بمعنى  أنها قد يتم تحويلها إلى استعمالات تهدد حياة المتبرعين أنفسهم.  وهذا التحويل قد يكون ممكناً في أوقات الفقر لأن "الحاجة أم الاختراع"، كما ينص القول المأثور.

لننظر الآن إلى كيفية عمل الفن كنشاط إنساني. الفن هو ذاك الشيء الذي يوجد بذاته، وأعني به الفن الجيد، أما الأشياء الأخرى، والتي تصنع بدون وعي كافٍ بالذات وبدون جذور مؤسساتية، فهو دعاية أو صنعة. حسب فلسفة كانت عن مفهوم الانسانية، فإننا نحقق أعلى قدراتنا كبشر في عالم اللاجدوى. نحن هنا نستمتع بما هو صحيح لا لأننا  سنستفيد منه ولكن لأنه ببساطة صحيح.  هو ما نطلق عليه في تصرفاتنا بالأخلاقي، وفي تنظيم الحياة بالجمالي. وبهذا المفهوم يحصل الانسان على كرامته، أما أولئك الذين لا يرون سوى الفائدة المادية منه فإنهم يفتقدون إلى الكرامة. هذا المشروع يحتفل بهذا الوجود المتفرد، بحلم الأمة في الحرية والكرامة. تعبر كل سيارة عن وظيفة معينة، والتضامن، والأمل في مستقبل الحركة الثورية.

أن تطلق على شيء ما لفظ  فنيفإنك تفرغه من أي معنى سياسي، وحياتي، وتاريخي تقليدي. إنه أخذ السيارات (أشياء ذات قيمة مادية ورمزية في المجتمعات الطبقية) وتحويلها إلى أشياء مشرقة ملونة (بعد أن تم تجريدها من قيمتها المادية في فورة ضد سيطرة الطبقية).  إن مجسمات "الربيع المرسوم" التي لم تعد سيارات في أزمة ولكن مناظر "للابتكار الجمعي"، مرشوشة بكل أدب "بتعبير ذاتي" لم يعد يُرى كجرافيتي عنيف وينظر إليها على أنها تنطبق مع التركيب الفلسفي لكانت كمؤشرات ومحفزات على مقدمات الانسانية: الكريم، الأخلاقي، والمسترشد بدوره، غير المقيد بعلاقة خانقة مع ما هو يومي، وغير المقيد بعلاقات الآخرين مع الاستغلال اليومي. وكنتيجة مباشرة، فإن الشخص الذي يروج للجماليات الكريمة والمكرِّمة، والنشاط الأخلاقي هو نموذج لأقصى قدرات الانسانية.

يحتفي الانتاج الفني بالحياة في ازدهارها، ليس بالمفهوم الكمي ولكن في أقصى صور الاحتفاء بالحرية. في هذا الاحتفاء لا يكتفي الضحايا بإسقاط الدكتاتوريين، ولكنهم أيضاً يظهرون تقديرهم لكل ما هو قيم في جوهره ولجوهره. نحن هنا لا نقول إن الآمال الاجتماعية لا يتم استثمارها فعلاً في الفن الحقيقي، ولكننا نحدد هنا الفرق الجوهري بين الدعاية الفنية والأشياء المزينة التي تشكل "واقعاً مميزاً." إن الجولات الجديدة في الجمالية تبرز لنا وصول الأمة المخَدّرَة إلى عتبة الانطلاق للانسانية المطلقة. وقد فعلوا ذلك دون اللجوء للعنف أو لأي عامل آخر قد يهدد أقصى الحدود الإنسانية الشخصية للمانحين السابقين. إنهم يكشفون للمانحين أنهم لا يستحقون هؤلاء الدكتاتوريين، ولكن تجربتهم الفنية في الوقت ذاته يجب أن يتم تشجيعها وإلا فإنهم سيفقدون الوعي ويتقهقرون مرة أخرى إلى سبات عميق أو إلى عنف أسوأ. 

يقولالرساماليمني،فاديالحربيإن"الكثيرمنالناسيظنونأنالثورةفياليمنبنيتعلىالعنف، […] ولكنبالنسبةليأراهامبنيةعلىالفن،لأنالفنحقإنساني،إنهالحرية. " لقدتلطختالثورةفيالواقعبالعنف  […] فيتضاربحادمعالمشاهدالسلميةفيميدانالتغيير،حيثيستمرالفنفيجمعالناسسوية.لقدخلقتحركةالشبابللثورةوالعدلمساحةفيخيمةاستعملتكأستوديوفيميدانالتغييرللفنانين. [..] "يلعبالفندوراًهاماًفيالوعي. إنعددالأشخاصالذينيأتونإلىالأستوديوالخاصبنامؤشرإيجابيعلىالدولةالمدنيةالتينأملفيبنائهافيالمستقبل."

إن الدعم للفن الذي تدعو إليه نعمة خليل يجب أن ينظر إليه كنوع آخر من التدخل الانساني، مع كل التعريفات المصاحبة عمن يمكنه أن يشارك في الانسانية، ولمن تكون الفائدة النهائية، وكيف. من الطرافة أن نرى "الاستخدام المزدوج" لأشياء في هذه العلاقة حين يقوم الضحايا السابقون بتحويل الأشياء العملية إلى إبداعات فنية ثمينة: حيث تصبح السيارات "أشياء مزهرة بألوان مفرحة"، وتصبح الجدران "أقمشة رسم بيضاء"، ومساحة في ميدان رئيس في المدينة تتحول إلى خيمة-أستوديو. هذه هي النسخة السلمية لمعضلة الاستخدام المزدوج: عرض غني للقدرة على تحويل الأشياء التي تتخذ من القول المأثور"الحاجة أم الاختراع" منطلقاً لها. يفجر الأشخاص المبدعون الوعي في الآخرين بالأشياء التي لا يعلمون مدى أهميتها في حياتهم، ولكنهم يجب أن يتعلموا إذا كانوا سيصبحون مواطنين صالحين. ما إن يظهر الناس ميلهم "للاستخدام المزدوج" السلمي، فإنهم عندها يستحقون بالفعل أن يحكموا أنفسهم ويؤسسوا مجتمعهم المدني:  

يخلقالفنحواراًبينالفنانوالجمهور. وتحتالأنظمةالشموليةالسابقة،كانهذاالحوارفيأغلبالأوقاتأحاديالبعد. وكنتيجةللفورةفيالعالمالعربي،فقدتوسعهذاالحواربشكلكبير. فيالحقيقة،فقدساعدعلىتبنيمجتمعمدنيأكثرحيويةوحددالطريقنحومؤسساتديمقراطيةأكثررسوخاً. 

إذا كان مقال نعمة خليل يبدو وكأنه طلب منحة للاتحاد الأوروبي، فإن هذا يوضح القيود الجديدة التي يفرضها مفهوم "الصحوة" في الفن: أولاً، هناك عبء الاعتماد على الدعم الخارجي للانتاج الفني. على سبيل المثال، فإن دعم الاتحاد الأوروبي يتطلب إنجاز معاملات لا حصر لها، واستعمال مصطلحات مربكة، وقضاء ساعات لا تنتهي في تقديم تقارير عن أسلوب العمل. إن الموضوع هنا لا ينحصر بما يتطلبه من طاقة وخيال لانهاء الإجراءات العملية، بل إن الأمر في حقيقته هو ما عبر عنه فنان فلسطيني مؤخراً بقوله إن الجهد الجسدي قد تم استبداله بالابتزاز النفسي والتفسير المهيمن لماهية "الفن". لذلك، فإننا وفي الوقت الذي نحيي فيه الجرأة التي ينتقد بها الفنان الحكام الفارين، فإننا نتساءل: هل يجب علينا أن نصغي إلى الهمسات ضد الراعين والمانحين المسافرين ليلاً والذين يعملون من خلال حراس البوابات الذين غالباً ما يكونون متحزبين وجامدين كالأنظمة الحاكمة السابقة؟

ثانياً، هناك جوانب من الفن العربي لا تتطرق إليها نعمة خليل لأنها يجب أن تستثنى لأجل أن يبدو الجانب الإنساني المستهدف صاحياً، وشاعراً بالمسؤولية، ومستحقاً للاهتمام. ومن ضمن هذه الجوانب النقد الخارجي، ومعاداة الاستعمار، والليبرالية الجديدة، والنقد الاقتصادي الداخلي، والأيديولوجيات الواضحة، وأي شيء يفتقد لفضاء من التلقائية، واللطف، والمرح الذكي. يمكن للمرء أن يغفل بعض الخيارات الجمالية، ولكن إذا أغفلت بعض الاتجاهات الفنية ووسائل الإعلام بعضا من الأنماط المتداولة، هل يعني هذا أن الانماط الأخرى التي تنال الاهتمام هي أكثر إشراقاً وحيوية؟ هل أصبحت العالمية مرادفاً للإدراك؟

أخيراً، فإن تاريخ الانتاج الفني في المنطقة يكاد لا يرى عبر هذه العدسة، ومن خلال نظرة أشمل فإن نعمة خليل، وبالضد من حدسها، تستثمر في فكرة أن العرب لم ينتجوا فناً أبداً في السابق يتمتع بالعالمية والحيوية. أين هم الرسامون الفلسطينيون الذين عبروا عن النكبة والانتفاضة مثل سليمان منصور، واسماعيل شموط؟ وأين هم الرسامون اللبنانيون الذين عبروا عن القومية العربية والشيوعية، مثل سلوى روضا شوشير، وعارف الريس، وسيتا مانوكيان؟ أين هم الفنانون أصحاب الثقافات المتعددة مثل جبرا ابراهيم جبرا، وعبد الرحمن منيف، وفاتح المدرس؟ هل كانوا نياماُ أم أن عقائدهم كانت تشكل كوابيس لصناع السياسات؟

تكمن الخطورة في أن "الفن" يصبح، في مثل هذا النوع من قصص الصحوة، إسماً رمزياً للضمير الحي. إن دلالات هذا المصطلح- جريء، شخصي، أصيل- تخفي الانسجام المفروض في هذا التدخل الانساني المتطرف. طالما استمر العربي الغافل في البحث عن الإبداع ذي الاستعمال المزدوج والذي يحمل صفات جمالية، وأخلاقية، وكريمة فإنه يمكن أن يُقبل في العائلة الانسانية.  لكن التحذير واضح:  إذا انجرف نحو العنف والايديولوجية ( فيما إذا فاز الاسلاميون في الانتخابات وتوقفوا عن تشجيع الفن "كأداة لبناء مجتمع مثقف")، فإنه سيخسر استقلاله. انظر إلى العراق حيث ترى أكثر الثقافات ازدهاراً في الشرق، والمشخصة من خلال مدارس فنية حرة وفرص فنية مهنية وفيرة، قد تم قتلها. لقد تعالت الصيحات حين تم نهب آثار قديمة تعبر عن "الموروث الانساني"، لكن الصمت لف كل ما يخص الفن الحديث وكأنه لم يوجد يوماً. في الحقيقة، فإن العديد من الفنانين العراقيين، غير المشهورين على نطاق واسع، الذين بقوا في العراق بعد 1991، تحولوا إلى إعادة انتاج لوحات فنية استشراقية من القرن التاسع عشر. لقد اعادوا اكتشاف سوق مستقلة للوفود الدبلوماسية والانسانية الذين أرادوا أن يعيدوا إلى بلادهم صوراً لعامة الناس المخدَّرين، الكسالى على أسرتهم والذين يديم حصارهم بكفاءة نفس أعضاء الوفود هؤلاء عن طريق إبقائهم على أجهزة " المحافظة على الحد الأدنى من الحياة."

إذا اعتبرنا الفن كأنه سياسة تتبع مفهوم "من هم مثلنا"، فإننا عرضة لاعتماد تعريف كانت النخبوي عن الانسانية، وهو المستمد من التفكير في رجال عاشوا قبل مئتي عام  في أمان مادي واجتماعي. إنه تعريف لا علاقة له تقريباً بظروف الحياة التي وفرت الأساس لهذه "الصحوة." من في الحقيقة الذي صحا؟ ومن الذي يخاطر بأن تتم هدهدته ليتحول إلى كائن سلبي ويغادر إلى أرض الاحلام؟

[نشر المقال للمرة الأولى  باللغة الإنجليزية على جدليةوترجمه إلى العربية علي أديب.]

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[i] أنظر أيضا النقد المهم التالي لهذه الظاهرة : جيسيكا وينجر، "لعبة الانسانية: الفن، الاسلام، والحرب على الاسلام." فالدورية الأنثروبولوجية، 81، رقم 3 (صيف 2008). 651-681: مايماناه فرحات، "تصوير العالم العربي: إبراز الحرب على الارهاب من خلال الفن." في كالالو، 32، عدد4 ( خريف 2009)، 1223-1231. 

[ii]في الحقيقة، إن مقال خليل ليس إلا نموذجا لنمط محدد. أنظر أيضاً علي خالد، "من الربيع العربي تأتي الصحوة الفنية." في مجلة ناشونال، الثامن عشر من مايو، 2011. إضافة إلى دعوات تنظيمية. أقامت جامعة هارفارد مؤتمراً هذا الربيع بعنوان "الصحوة العربية: إزدهار في الفن والتراث." يجب أن تتم قراءة نقدي كرد على هذا المنظور بشكل عام، خصوصاً في كيفية تقديم نفسه كمرشد لواضعي السياسات. 

[iii]  إن النقاش التالي حول "الحد الأدنى من الانسانية" هو إلهام من عمل غير منشور لبيتر لاجيرجوست، والذي تكرم بمشاطرته معي. 

[iv]  بشكل عام، يستثني تعبير "الفن" المادة التي تناقشها- رسوم الجرافيتي، والموسيقى الشعبية، الكاريكاتور، واللافتات، والمناظر الطبيعية، وصبغ السيارات. يثير هذا أسئلة عن الشيء الذي نكسبه من استعمال هذا المعنى الكلاسيكي بشكل مختلف.

In his second attempt to obtain United Nations recognition of Palestine as a state, on 29 November 2012 Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas requested the General Assembly to accept the bid for non-member observer state status. An overwhelming majority of countries—138 of them—voted yes. The vote’s implications are largely symbolic for the time being, but it does mean that “Palestine” signifies the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel in 1967. 

Now, rather than “Palestine” signifying a nation, it can be considered an official state within the parameters of international law. The aftermath of the vote will demonstrate that even decades after most states attained independence and recognition, the differences and tensions between nation and state remain crucial.

Symbolic Implications of the UN Vote

The symbolism of the UN vote is clear. The status of the PA was upgraded to that of a non-member state. However, in as far as the Palestinians’ ultimate goal is independence and sovereignty, the new status means very little. The state of Palestine is nothing close to historic Palestine, which Abbas tossed aside recently when he disavowed the Palestinians’ right of return. Statehood in this case may just be little more than a slight change in wording to the non-member observer status that the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) held since November 1975. A majority of UN members previously recognized Palestine as a state, and many did so after Yasser Arafat’s unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood in 1988. 

The symbolism is also embedded in the status of President Abbas and the PA itself: PA authority is only accepted in the West Bank since the split between Fatah and Hamas in 2007. Moreover, Abbas’s term of office expired in 2009, but because of the split (among other factors) there have been no Palestinian elections since 2006. The PA’s provisional mandate as the “self-governing authority” in the territories expired in 2000. In fact, Abbas had no popular mandate even to ask the UN to recognize a state. 

Another symbolic implication of the vote is that it precludes the PA to consider a one-state solution. Even further, since Israel does not have internationally-recognized borders, it is hard to envision how to draw the borders of a Palestinian state. 
 

Practical Implications of Statehood 

A major implication of statehood is that the Palestinian Arabs themselves must be transformed from members of a non-sovereign nation into the actual citizenry of a state. While an implication such as this is indeed real, historic and practical, it needs to be fleshed out in the coming months and years. A good place to start on this transformation, along with other practical implications of statehood, can be found within a number of discussions that have taken place since the prior UN bid in September 2011 before the Security Council—promptly vetoed by the US—for full membership. For instance, in April a conference took place at Hebron University in the West Bank that brought together a number of academics and policy-makers from the West Bank, Gaza (via video link), Jerusalem and Israel, the US and Europe to discuss the political and legal implications of Palestinian statehood. 

Several recent discussions make clear the need to understand Palestinian citizenship now that a state has been recognized. Citizenship deserves analysis in terms of its legal and internationally-recognized status as well as the relation of citizenship to nationality and documentary identity. The issue at hand, then, is the meaning of the Palestinian national vis-à-vis the Palestinian citizen and how each fits into the state of Palestine.

Demands and proposals for an independent Palestinian state that incorporated the Arab nationality of the majority of its inhabitants have been presented by Palestinian Arab leaders to various governments and international organizations since 1918, the year Great Britain started to administer the territory it defined as Palestine. Not since the end of the British Palestine Mandate in 1948 has “Palestine” had a status close to that of a state with recognized borders and citizenship legislation, and thus not since the mandate have the inhabitants themselves been Palestinian citizens (albeit colonial citizens). 
 

The Semantics of Palestinian Nationality and Citizenship, Post-1948

After 1948, the Palestinian citizen ceased to exist and the Palestinian national, both in the diaspora and within the Occupied Territories, took its place as the internationally-recognized identity status of all Palestinians. The existence of only Palestinian nationality, and not citizenship, has implications for the creation of Palestinian citizenship for a second time in history, after the UN recognition of the Palestinian Authority as a state. Indeed, recognition of the PA as a state is not the same as recognition of the nation of Palestine as a state. The state, not simply the PA’s reach within the West Bank, must become the sole grantor of rights and duties to all citizens. It remains the responsibility of the state to enact legislation of citizenship and to regulate nationality through jus sanguinis (by descent), jus soli (by birth in a territory), or naturalization provisions. Currently of course, Israel regulates the documentary identity of Palestinians in the occupied territories. 

In 1947, UN Resolution 181 proposed that Palestinian Arabs and Jews would become citizens of the state of their residence upon a future partition of Palestine. Obviously, the events of 1948 did not happen in accordance with the UN partition resolution. From 1948 until the promulgation of the 1952 Nationality Law of Israel, Palestinian Arabs in Israeli territory were deprived of nationality and citizenship in contravention of the international laws of state succession. 

Following Israel’s occupation of the remainder of historic Palestine, in 1968, Article 4 of the Palestinian National Charter affirmed that Palestinian identity passed by blood, jus sanguinis, and refugee status did not negate this. Article 5 defined the Palestinians as “those Arab nationals who, until 1947, normally resided in Palestine regardless of whether they were evicted from it or have stayed there. Anyone born after that date, of a Palestinian father—whether inside Palestine or outside it—is also a Palestinian.” 

Currently, Israel issues identity cards to Palestinians living under occupation—in the territory meant to be under administration of the state of Palestine. The PA issues passports after Israeli approval, but passports are not equated with citizenship status. Neither documents identify their holders as citizens or nationals; rather they are identified as residents of a certain territory.
 

Practical Questions of Citizenship in the State of Palestine 

Fast-forwarding to 1995, the PA drafted a citizenship law but had no authority to regulate citizenship since it operated under Israeli occupation. Following that, the third Draft Palestine Constitution gave citizenship to any Palestinian resident of Palestine before 1948, by both paternal and maternal descent. The most recent official mention of Palestinian citizenship and nationality is in the PA’s 2003 Basic Law: Article 7 states that “Palestinian citizenship shall be regulated by law” and nationals who are not citizens will be given representation within “Palestine.” 

Statehood, however, presents problems. Guy Goodwin-Gill’s legal opinion on Palestinian statehood highlights questions of citizenship for Palestinian nationals in the diaspora. He notes that refugees and emigrants will lose representation with the coming of statehood as the Palestinian National Council, their official representatives, could be dissolved. This means Palestinian nationals will not have the right to participate in matters of government as citizens. 

The UN vote brings to light elementary issues such as whether statehood for Palestine can bring a Palestinian citizen into being. In the case of an independent Palestinian state, the criteria for citizenship must be delineated in order to give Palestinian nationals clear terms of membership. But what of the territorial fragmentation of Palestine and the fragmentation and dispersal of those who are nationals? Victor Kattan has argued that all Palestinians were denationalized following the end of 1948, and remain without nationality due to the need for a Palestinian state to provide such nationality.

If nationality is the criteria for Palestinian citizenship, it is essential to also recognize that the Palestinian national and the Palestinian citizen are two different statuses. The right of return is the means for extending citizenship to nationals living abroad; under international law, all Palestinian nationals have the right to return, and those who return to the state of Palestine would be deemed citizens. 

Finally, the question remains whether citizenship and the electorate in the Palestinian state must be officially and internationally made clear first, or whether prospective citizens (i.e., nationals abroad) would be provided a means of participating in the formulation of a new basic law. The more likely alternative, given Abbas’s abandonment of the right of return, is that citizenship qualifications will be imposed by the executive or determined by the PA electorate. 

The expiration of the PA’s mandate will play a significant role in decisions on citizenship if the symbolically-recognized state of Palestine is to be transformed into a practical, meaningful state.

The significance of the United Nations General Assembly vote to recognize Palestine as a non-member observer state has been exaggerated by opponents and proponents alike. It has no consequences for the status of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, nor does it undermine the rights of Palestinian refugees living in exile, the occupied territories, or indeed Israel as codified in international law and particularly UNGA Resolution 194 of 1948. By the same token, and as demonstrated by Israel’s subsequent decision to build several thousand new settlement units, it does not make the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip any less occupied or colonized, nor does it confer any additional powers upon either the PLO or Palestinian Authority (PA) that can be exercized within Palestinian territory.

Although it essentially changes nothing, it nevertheless has the capacity to contribute to a strategic transformation in Palestinian fortunes. This will depend primarily on how it is utilized by the Palestinians – all Palestinians – but also the actions of others.

To take the most obvious aspect, the United Nations initiative was strenuously opposed by Israel and the United States. For good reason, because it forms a flagrant violation of the Oslo framework pursuant to which they alone are empowered to answer the Question of Palestine, without heed to either the international community or the corpus of resolutions and laws that collectively represent the will of that community with respect to a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The question for Palestinians is therefore whether the initiative is a first step towards referring the Question of Palestine back to the United Nations – which after all created it and remains responsible for its resolution – or merely a tactical maneouver to resume bilateral negotiations with Israel under American supervision.

To point out that Mahmoud Abbas went to New York in an attempt to shore up his domestic standing and that he has every intention of rushing back to the negotiating table is in this context almost irrelevant. Abbas similarly wanted to host Shaul Mofaz in the center of Ramallah several months ago. Yet popular revulsion at the prospect of a war criminal being feted at the scene of his crime put paid to the planned rendezvous. Similarly, in the wake of Israel’s latest assault on the Gaza Strip, Palestinians across the political and geographic spectrum are with renewed vigour demanding the formulation of a meaningful national strategy and its implementation by a genuinely representative national movement. Ensuring that the UN initiative serves the internationalization of the struggle for Palestinian self-determination, rather than being a prelude to more negotiations that are but a fig leaf for deepening colonization, can hardly be considered an impossible task. It will require serious effort, and won’t succeed overnight, but it can and therefore should be done. To dismiss and miss this opportunity strikes me as a dereliction of duty.

The first step in this direction must be to end the Palestinian schism on the basis of a rejuvenated PLO, particularly since the political programs of Fatah and Hamas are today all but indistinguishable and they are primarily engaged in a power struggle more about factional interest than ideology. Accusing either or both of these parties of having sold out their people is all well and good, but detractors need to get used to the fact that there can be no national movement without both of them, and that the most effective restraint on the excesses of either leadership is not Hamas but rather a rejuvenated Fatah. It may be too late for the latter, but the left and Islamic Jihad presently lack the capacity to play this role, and it will be years before a credible and sufficiently powerful alternative emerges from today’s otherwise inspirational youth movements. Civil society, particularly that large swathe of it dependent on foreign funding, cannot substitute for a national liberation movement.

The UN vote taught us not only that Canada and the Czech Republic today have the most fanatically pro-Israel governments on the planet, and that there are a few more rocks in the Pacific than we thought, but also that Israel’s position in Europe – and Europe’s subservience to Washington on matters Palestinian – are in a state of flux. Here again, things are not going to develop of their own accord, and will be reversed if they are not actively promoted to their logical conclusion. For Palestinians not to capitalize on these opportunities – for at present they are only opportunities – and work to ensure that the EU policies and those of its member governments begin to more faithfully reflect Palestinian rights and European public opinion would be tantamount to criminal negligence.

The time is ripe, for example, to put an end to decades of effort to ensure that settlement products are properly labeled and taxed, and seek to have them defined as contraband and prohibited from the European market altogether. Similarly, there is no reason why European arms sales to Israel are not now prominently on the agenda of every European parliament. In the context of decades of growing Arab disengagement from the conflict with Israel, the regional upheaval that commenced in late 2010 presents an almost unique opportunity to re-mobilize official Arab influence in support of the Palestinian struggle for self-determination, particularly in Europe.

The one concrete achievement resulting from Palestine’s elevated status at the United Nations is the ability to join subsidiary organizations. Given credible US threats of sanctions against such institutions, Palestinians would do well to first join those, such as the World Intellectual Property Organisation, that mean most to Washington and least to the Palestinians. Make those knaves on Capitol Hill publicly proclaim that their loyalty to Avigdor Lieberman precedes the interests of their constituents and corporate sponsors. The same principle applies to the International Criminal Court (ICC). But joining the latter and ending the African monopoly on its interests makes little sense if existing legal instruments, such as the 2004 International Court of Justice  (ICJ) Advisory Opinion on the West Bank Wall, are not activated without further delay.

Indeed, using existing mechanisms to confront the massive settlement scheme Israel proclaimed the day after the UN vote, and which once implemented completes the encirclement of East Jerusalem through its isolation from the rest of the West Bank and effectively bisects the latter, should be considered an urgent priority. Sufficiently urgent to override and invalidate initial Palestinian statements that further recourse to international law is not imminent, and would be assessed in light of Israeli and US conduct in the coming weeks and months. With the Obama administration today enabling an Israeli plan George W. Bush for eight years consistently opposed, the immediate priority for Palestinians is to compel their leaders to show no consideration towards American sensitivities – or threats - when it comes to defending and promoting Palestinian rights.

[A shorter version of this article initially appeared as “UN Vote is Symbolic – Unless the Palestinians Take Advantage” in The National (UAE).]

[نشرت هذه المقابلة مؤخراً في العدد الأول من مجلة "البوابة التاسعة"وكان قد أجراها نات مولر وعمر خليف قبل أشهر لكن نشرها تأخر لحين صدور العدد الأول.  وهنا تعيد جدلية نشرها]

الإطلاق التجريبي الذي جرى في أيلول (سبتمبر) الماضي للمجلة الإلكترونية الإنكليزيّة – العربيّة، "جدليّة"، وهي المبادرة غير الربحيّة التي أطلقها معهد الدراسات العربيّة (ASi) في واشنطن، لم يقدّر له استشراف الموقع الذي تحتلّه المجلّة اليوم. فالانتفاضات العربيّة، البالغة زخمها بعد أشهر قليلة من ذاك الإطلاق، دفعت هذه المجلّة الالكترونيّة بقوّة لتحتلّ مركزًا متقدّمًا في قلب السجالات والتحليلات الدائرة في العالم العربي. منبر الأفكار الذي تمثّله "جدليّة"، التي تُدار على نحو تطوّعي، يمدّها على الدوام بدفق من المقالات والمراجعات والتقارير المصوّرة والمقابلات ورسائل التويتر، حيث غدت على هذا النحو مصدرًا لا غنى عنه بالنسبة لكثيرين من خارج العالم العربي. أعضاء فريق التحرير، خاصة بسّام حدّاد الذي شارك في التأسيس، باتوا أصحاب رأي، يتواتر الاستشهاد بهم في برامج الأخبار في محطّات رئيسة مثل "البي بي سي" و"الجزيرة".

في "جدليّة" يقترن الصوت المتفرّد الذي يتيحه فضاء المدوّنات الراهنة، بالبحث العلمي الرصين والتحليل المعمّق المطلوب في مجلّة تتناول القضايا المعاصرة. فهي تنشر التحقيقات التي توازي ما يُنشر في مجلات سياسيّة مثل "المجلّة"، أو في المجلّات الفنيّة والثقافيّة المنافسة مثل "بدون" و"إبراز"، وهي تعادل كلّ من محطّة "الجزيرة" في سرعة نقل الأخبار وموقع "مشروع الشرق الأوسط للبحث والمعلومات" the Middle East Research and Information Project Online في التنوّع الأكاديمي، فتنسج ذلك كلّه في لوحة افتراضيّة انتقائيّة. يتمّ تنسيق موادها وفق إيديولوجيّة المصادر المفتوحة، الأمر الذي يمدّها بالمواد المستعجلة والسريعة، المتماشية مع المناخ السياسي السائد في المنطقة. "البوابة التاسعة" التقت بسّام حدّاد، أحد مؤسسي "جدليّة" والمحرّر المؤسّس أيضًا في "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة" الصادرة عن "معهد الدراسات العربيّة" ASi، وناقشت معه شؤون هذا المنبر الجديد.

البوابة التاسعة: هل يمكن أن تخبرنا عمّا دعاكم إلى تأسيس "جدليّة" وعن العمليّة التي واكبت ظهورها؟ 

بسّام حدّاد: "جدلية" هي نتاج خمسة عشر محررًا يعملون بكدّ، وفريق من الباحثين المثابرين. أسماء هؤلاء جميعًا تُذكر فيالموقع الإلكتروني. بعد إنهائي دراسة الدكتوراه في العام 2002 أحسست بالفراغ. أصدقائي وزملائي في مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة ASJ – سنان أنطون وشيرين صيقلي وناديا سبيتي – كانوا ما يزالون مشغولين بالعمل على إنجاز أطروحاتهم. وخطرت لنا، أنا وسنان أنطون، فكرة مجلة يفوق انتشارها انتشار مجلّتنا، مجلة الدراسات العربيّة، الجدّيّة لكنّ المتخصّصة. من تجربتنا شعرنا أن المعرفة تتواجد بوفرة في المجلات التي يتعذر وصولها إلى الجمهور العريض. اردنا أن ننتج مجلة فيها الكثير من المعرفة لكن تصل إلى الجمهور العريض. ومع استمرار الحاجة إلى إنتاج أبحاث تستند إلى مصادر أولية، فقد كنا على استعداد للوصول إلى ما يتخطّى الأوساط الأكاديميّة.

جاءت حرب العراق وقررنا تجميد الفكرة، التي ناقشناها أيضًا مع أسعد أبو خليل الذي أطلق مدوّنته. وبين العامين 2008 و2009، حين بدأت أنماط جديدة من الوسائط (الاجتماعيّة) بالتفوّق على الأنماط الأخرى في إنتاج الأخبار والمعرفة والتحليلات، جئت بفكرة الشروع بمجلة إلكترونيّة. فريق منّا يتألّف من ستّة أفراد – يضم سنان وشيرين وناديا، بالإضافة إلى نورا عريقات ومايا مكداشي – قرّر بمبادرة خاصّة إطلاق "جدليّة"، وبدأ بكتابة المقالات ونشرها على مدى ثلاثة أشهر بدءًا من صيف 2010 وذلك قبل إتاحتها للجمهور، فيتسنّى لنا تنظيم إطلاق حافل. واستمر فريقنا بالتوسّع حتّى أواسط 2011. وعَدتُ الجميع بأن "جدليّة" لن تستنزف الكثير من وقتهم. لم أكتشف آنذاك أنني كنت أكذب! لم نتمكّن من مواكبة التصاعد في العمل. ما دعانا إلى الاستمرار كان الطلب المتزايد على التغطية المتواصلة والمستمرّة والذي أظهره جمهورنا بعد أن تلمّس شيئًا نضرًا في "جدليّة".

تشاركنا جميعًا رغبة في إنتاج مجلة إلكترونيّة تملأ الفراغ في مجال التحليلات المتعلّقة بالشرق الأوسط  بين المدوّنات الشخصيّة وبين مقالات المجلّات المتخصّصة والكتب. كما أردنا إنتاج ذلك النوع من التحليلات القادر على تصويب الخلل في السجال الذي يتناول المنطقة. قمنا خلال وقت قصير بتطوير فكرتنا وطريقة عملنا لإنتاج أوّل منشورة يوميّة رصينة، على شكل مجلّة، وباللغتين العربيّة والإنكليزيّة. وهذا في جوهره عمل لا ينتهي، يدمّر علاقاتك الاجتماعيّة ويحيل وقت الراحة إلى شيء من الماضي – حتّى الآن.

ب 9: يثير فضولنا أمر تطوّر العلاقة بين "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة" ASJ و"جدليّة". كيف أثّر المنبر الإلكتروني على المطبوعة؟ وكيف أثّرت المطبوعة على المنبر الإلكتروني؟

ب ح: قررنا من البداية أن يكون هناك فصل جدّي بين "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة" وبين "جدليّة" وذلك، بالدرجة الأولى، للحفاظ على هويّة كلّ منهما ورسالتها. ASJ التي تأسست في أعوام التسعينيات هي مجلّة متخصّصة (يخضع النشر فيها للبروتوكول الأكاديمي) ثنائيّة اللغة، لها أصولها البحثيّة وأساليبها المنهجيّة في العمل، و"جدليّة" هي مجلّة إلكترونيّة تنشر تحليلات يوميّة على إيقاع متطلّبات جنونيّة السرعة، تزداد اندفاعًا كلّما حاولنا الاقتراب من أسلوب العمل المتّبع في المجلّة المتخصّصة.

لكن ثمّة نقاط تقاطع بين المنشورتين. المشروعان تجمعهما أخلاقيات محدّدة. فهما، حتّى تشرين الثاني 2011 حين تلقيّنا الدعم المالي الأول، كانا يستندان إلى المساهمة التطوّعيّة. منذ اللحظة الأولى لوجود "جدليّة" صممنا على خلق نموذج عمل يستند إلى التضامن، ويناقض أسلوب عمل الشركات. وعلى الرغم من عدم افتقارنا إلى القيادة، تنتفي التراتبيّة قدر الإمكان في أجواء عملنا. الانضمام إلى مشروع لن يعود عليك بأيّ أجر يتطلّب في البداية الكثير من التصفيّة! والأسوأ، يستثمر بعضنا من مدخوله ما يساعدنا على الاستمرار. لذا، فإن الشخصيات والخلفيات السياسيّة التي يجذبها هذا الأسلوب تتميّز بالتشابه على نحوٍ ينمّي الفاعليّة، ما يجعل العمل والروابط التي ننشئها شديدة الانسجام وطويلة الأمد وفعّالة.

إلى هذا، ساهمت "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة" بمدّ "جدليّة" بالرصانة. وبدورها ساهمت "جدليّة" في لفت انتباه المزيد من الناس إلى "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة" من خلال إعلان في غاية البساطة عن أعدادها المنشورة. كما وعلى نحو غريب، أضفت "جدليّة" شيئاً من "الخفّة" على "مجلّة الدراسات العربيّة". إنّهما تتعايشان بنجاح.

ب 9: غدت "جدليّة" حديث الساعة لمجموعات عدّة مهتمّة بالعالم العربي – مجموعات من الأشخاص ليسوا من الأوساط الأكاديميّة، كما سبق وذكرت. هل تصوّرت قبلاً أن تغدو "جدليّة" المنبر الذي صارته اليوم؟

ب ح: لم نحلم في أن تتوسّع "جدليّة" إلى هذا الحد وبهذه السرعة، فتبلغ جمهورًا بعشرات الآلاف من الناس وأحيانًا بشكل يومي. تحقّق جزء من هذا بالتأكيد بفضل الشيء الجديد والمنسي الذي جاءت به، لكن أيضًا وبكل صدق، فإن الثورات العربيّة هي التي دفعت بـ"جدليّة" إلى منتديات الكبار. لا أحاول هنا أن أكون متواضعًا، بل هذا ما علمتنا إياه عشرات المدوّنات الجديدة والمجلات التي انطلقت بعد فترة وجيزة من انطلاقتنا واستطاعت بلوغ مستوى معين في انتشارها وفي نسب قرائها.

ب9: أحد أكثر العناصر تألّقًا في جدليّة يكمن في منبريتها وتواصليتها – العنصر الاجتماعي وهويّتها التي تمزج بين كونها منتدى للأفكار ومساحة للكتابة الأكاديميّة. كيف توصّلتم إلى تطوير هذه الهويّة، وما هي تحديات هذه العمليّة ونتائجها؟ وما الذي اعتمدتموه في تصميم هذا المنبر؟

ب ح: حسنًا، في الأمر بعض الإحراج. بما أننا لا نحظى بدعم مالي، كان عليّ الاعتماد على التصميم الذي ارتأتيته شخصيًّا، كما على خبرتي في تنضيد الحروف، الخبرة المستندة إلى وضعي التصميم السابق لمجلّة الدراسات العربيّة. بالنسبة لشبكة التواصل الاجتماعي وغيرها من الوسائط، فإننا أردنا من هذا الموقع أن يكون تفاعليًّا ومتاحًا للمستخدمين وقريبًا منهم. ونحن نسير في هذه الوجهة حيث الحاجة إلى مضمون صلب هي دائمًا في الصدارة.

نحن لا ننظر إلى أنفسنا بجديّة، بمعنى ما، لكننا نأخذ القضايا ببالغ الجديّة. تطوّر منبرنا يعكس هذه المقاربة. نرفض القيام بأمور معيّنة انطلاقًا من أرضيات سياسيّة وفكرية. رفضنا مثلًا التعامل بأسلوب ميكانيكي مع شروط استلام المقالات. يمكنك أن ترى مقالاً من 800 كلمة إلى جانب مقال من 3500 كلمة، أو تحليلاً عقلانياً منتقى بعناية، إلى جانب قصيدة بالعربية لسركون بولص، أو مراجعة كتاب كلاسيكيّ صادر من أربعين عاماً ومترجم أخيراً من لغته الأصلية، إلى جانب أطروحة في الهويّة الجنسيّة باللغة العربية. كل هذه الأشياء مهمّة.

أخيرًا، ينبغي الإشارة إلى أن تقسيمنا للعمل يعكس أيضًا موقفنا من المضمون. وأشارك هذا جميع المنضمين إلينا من مختلف المستويات: نحن نحب العمل مثل فريق كرة القدم الهولندي في السبعينيات، المعروف بابتكاره "الكرة الشاملة"، حيث يعرف اللاعبون اللعب في جميع المراكز، ويتمكنون من هذا، على الرغم من تخصّص كل لاعب منهم رسميّا بمركز معيّن.

ب9: ماذا عن شبكة التواصل الاجتماعي؟ كيف تتعاملون معها، وكيف يسمح لكم الأمر بالتواصل مع قرائكم؟ هل مثّل هذا على الدوام عنصرًا متكاملاً في عملكم؟

ب ح: حتى قبل انطلاقنا، كنّا متواجدين على "الفايس بوك" و"تويتر"، وكان لكلّ واحد منّا بريد إلكتروني يتضمّن jadaliyya.com. ثم عملنا، بجهد كبير في الحقيقة، لتطوير خدمات الآي فون وAndroid التي اتبعت على الفور بـ ريدسبيكر ReadSpeaker، الذي يسمح للقراء بسماع أو تنزيل المادة الصوتيّة لكل مقالة، باللغتين العربية والإنكليزيّة، من خلال الضغط على مفتاح. إن أردت بلوغ جمهور عريض، يضمّ خصوصًا، وعلى نحو متزايد، قراء شبّاناً بات البريد الإلكتروني بالنسبة لهم وسيلة تواصل قديمة، عليك تنويع الوسائل التي تنشر عبرها "المعرفة/المعلومات".

ب9: ما أهميّة المراجعات بالنسبة لهويّة "جدليّة" ولمعناها العام ونظرة محرريها إليها؟ فالعديد من المجلات العربية، مثلًا، يُنتقد في كون مراجعاته ليست نقديّة بما يكفي. هل لك أن تحدّد موقع "جدليّة" في هذا السياق؟

ب ح: خبرتنا في هذا الأمر تكاد تكون معاكسة. تعرّضنا للهجوم مرات عدّة لأن بعض مراجعاتنا لم تكن لطيفة تجاه بعض المؤلفين /الكتاب/المخرجين. لكننا مستمرون في هذا. فكرة النقد عمومًا مركزيّة في ما نفعله، وذلك يتضمّن نقدًا لمقالاتنا نحن. وعلى الرغم من أن هذا ليس من نوع "المراجعات" الذي تطلبه، يكشف قسم التعليقات مدى سعادتنا في نشر المقالات الحادّة في نقديّتها، بما فيها الموجّهة إلينا، ما دامت الشتائم الشخصيّة غير موجودة.

نحن حريصون على تقديم المقاربات المبتكرة في "المراجعات"، خاصّة في القسم الذي نسمّيه "نيوتن" و”كتب”، حيث نستعرض الكتب /المقالات الجديدة من خلال طرح أسئلة على المؤلفين ينتج منها في الحال مراجعة ذاتية/تقييم، تستخدم إذذاك من قبل مشاهدين آخرين. تضمين السياق الشخصي/الثقافي إلى مقالات المؤلفين وكتبهم يساعد على كسر البناء المصطنع في النتاج المعرفي باعتباره نتاجًا "علميّا" خالصًا، أو غير شخصي وموضوعي بالمعنى الخام.

ب9: كيف تصف إقبال المتصفّحين؟

ب ح: العدد بلغ الآن 1.5 مليون قارئ، هذا من دون حساب المقالات المحوّلة والأساليب الأخرى التي تُقرأ فيها "جدليّة". نحن الآن في مرحلة 70 ألف زائر في الأسبوع، قراء من 210 بلدان، والأعداد في ارتفاع. البلدان الأكثر إقبالًا على قراءتنا هي الولايات المتّحدة، بريطانيا ومصر. ولدينا في الوقت الحالي 6500 صديق على "الفايس بوك" و7 آلاف على "تويتر". [ وصل عدد الأصدقاء على الفيسبوك  إلى أكثر من 15 الفاً وعلى تويتر إلى حوالي  14 الفاً حتى نوفمبر 2012.]

ب9: هل لك أن تخبرنا قليلًا عن العمليّة التحريريّة؟ كيف تسير هذه العمليّة؟ هل يقوم محرروكم بتكليف معظم المقالات أم أنّ الأخيرة تُجمع من خلال الدعوة المفتوحة؟

ب ح: مقدار المقالات الواردة بات ثابتًا وكافيًا، فلم نعد نعتمد كثيرًا على التكليفات. يخضع كل مقال مقدّم لعمليّة مراجعة دقيقة على دفعتين في أقل تقدير، قبل أن يذهب إلى المحرر اللغوي. في الحالات الاضطرارية قد ننشر المقال أولًا بعد مراجعة وتحرير سريعين، ثم نقوم بعمليّة تحرير دقيقة فيما بعد. كلما أسرعنا في حركتنا وزاد مقدار نشرنا مع المحافظة على المعايير العليا، كلّما كنّا أفضل.

ب9: ما هي نسبة المقالات المقدّمة باللغة العربيّة من تلك المقدّمة بالإنكليزيّة وطبعاً نسبة المساهمات المنشورة؟ كيف يبدو توزيعها الجغرافي؟ وهل لاحظ المحررون اتجاهًا معيّنًا في ما يتلقونه من مقالات؟

ب ح: نسبة المقالات العربيّة من الإنكليزيّة 1 إلى 5، لكننا في الوقت الراهن نقوم بتوسيع قسمنا العربي تحت إشراف تحريريّ من قبل إبتسام عازم وسنان أنطون. أكثر مقالاتنا ترد من البلدان التي تتصدّر قراءة "جدليّة": الولايات المتّحدة، مصر، بريطانيا ولبنان.

ب9: لا يوجد إعلانات على الموقع. هل تنوون الاستمرار من دون إعلانات؟ لماذا ولماذا لا؟

ب ح: جرى الاتصال بنا عشرات المرّات لنشر إعلانات مدفوعة، لكننا رفضنا ذلك. الأمر لا يتوافق مع الاتجاه الذي أردنا سلوكه، وذلك حتى خلال العام الأوّل بعد أيلول (سبتمبر) 2010 حين كنّا بأمسّ الحاجة إلى المزيد من الدعم المالي. فضّلنا الاستمرار في الابتعاد عن الإعلانات عمومًا. لكن في حال عدّلنا رأينا، ربّما نسمح لبعض الإعلانات المحدّدة، كإعلانات الكتب المنشورة.

ب9: على ضوء هذا هل لك أن تخبرنا عن مموّلكم الرئيس؟

ب ح: لم نتلقّ أي دعم مالي من فرد أو من مؤسسة. لكن تكاليفنا ارتفعت كثيرًا مع توسع عملنا ومشاريعنا خلال العام الفائت. ابتداءً من تشرين الثاني (نوفمبر) 2011 تلقّينا أول قرش دعم من "أوبن سوسايتي أنستيتيوت" Open Society Institute. غير أننا على الدوام نعتبر أن الدعم المالي هو أمر "زائد" قد يتوقّف في أي لحظة. معظم مشاريعنا الكبيرة إلى الآن حُققت عن طريق المقايضة: نحن نقدّم الأفكار، والتنظيم، والعلاقات، فيما يتولّى شركاؤنا الداعمون أمر تمويل المشاريع.

[ عن مجلة "البوابة التاسعة" ترجمة فادي طفيلي] 

When President Mubarak introduced amendments to the 1971 Constitution in the year 2007, the always contested issue of the status of sharia in Egyptian law reemerged in public discourse. Among the most unexpected contributions to the debate that ensued was that made by the Coptic Orthodox Patriarch, the late Pope Shenouda III.

In stark contrast to positions he had adopted in the 1970s, at the height of his struggle with President Anwar Sadat over the ‘Islamization’ of Egyptian society, the position that Shenouda adopted in 2007 was strikingly conciliatory towards Islamists. Indeed, the Pope ventured so far as to repudiate a statement made by one of his bishops, to the effect that Article 2 of the Constitution, which declared sharia the principal source of Egyptian legislation, should be eliminated.

The immediate rationale for Shenouda’s step was his declared fear that such a move to eliminate Article 2 might well provoke sectarian violence. But interestingly in the context of the debates surrounding the current draft constitution, Shenouda likewise insisted that, if the importance of sharia was acknowledged in this way in the constitutional text, Copts should have the primacy of their communal law vis-à-vis the personal status affairs of the Christian community acknowledged in the text. The statements Shenouda made on this subject in 2007 became the basis for this year’s encomium to the Pope by Shaykh Yusuf Qaradawi, who insisted, upon Shenouda’s passing, that the Patriarch had a great respect for the sharia.

Of course, as readers of the draft constitution are now well aware, the concern that Shenouda voiced in 2007 regarding the acknowledgment of Coptic communal law in the Egyptian constitution is addressed explicitly in the document upon which Egyptians will vote on 15 December. Immediately following Article 2, which again acknowledges the principles of Islamic law as the principal source of Egyptian legislation, is an unprecedented Article 3, which reads: “The canon principles of Egyptian Christians and Jews are the main source of legislation for their personal status laws, religious affairs, and the selection of their religious leaders.”

Article 3 is widely touted by members of the Constituent Assembly and supporters of the draft constitution as a “concession” to the sensibilities of the Coptic community. Those who have expressed concern about the provision largely cite the document’s failure to acknowledge members of faith communities apart from Muslims, Christians, and Jews, or those who practice no faith.

However, neglected in this debate about Articles 2 and 3 and their implications for Egyptian society is how these provisions will influence the internal dynamics of the Coptic community. For make no mistake: The Constituent Assembly’s decision to include Article 3 in the draft constitution may well end up having a significant impact on the balance of power within, and political development of, the Coptic community.

To discern just how the provisions might impact Copts, it is instructive to return to the statements made by Pope Shenouda in 2007. Why indeed would Shenouda, who had so vociferously campaigned for the equality of all Egyptians before the law throughout the 1970s, apparently alter his stance and embrace Article 2 in 2007?

To my mind, one can only reckon with this shift in Shenouda’s position by examining the approach to Church governance that he adopted after his return from house arrest in 1985. Having spent forty months between 1981 and 1985 confined to a monastery at the behest of the Egyptian state, Shenouda opted to abandon the activism in which he had engaged through the 1970s in favor of an approach to governance that his predecessor, Pope Kirollos VI, had pioneered. This was an approach that favored cooperation with the Egyptian state, on the assumption that the state would acknowledge the Coptic Patriarch as the sole legitimate representative of the Coptic community in both spiritual and temporal affairs.

This approach had proved a remarkable boon to both Pope Kirollos VI and President Gamal Abdel Nasser, for it had permitted them to dispense with an adversary they held in common – the Coptic lay elite. For his part, the Patriarch would no longer have to deal with the incessant interference of the Coptic laity in Church affairs – a Coptic laity that, for the most part, looked down upon the clergy as purportedly corrupt and wasteful. And for President Nasser, marginalizing the landowners, lawyers, and liberals of the Coptic elite dovetailed ideally with his effort to rid Egypt of the remaining vestiges of the parliamentary era and redistribute the country’s wealth.

For Pope Shenouda in 1985, the attractions of this approach were similarly clear: The Patriarch could continue to build an ever widening network of social, cultural, and educational institutions within the framework of the Coptic Orthodox Church, leaving the Church as the central point of reference in the everyday lives of most Copts. The state would stave off Islamist threats and guarantee Shenouda’s authority within Church and community, as long as Shenouda’s loyalty to the regime remained intact. And as is well known, though now rarely discussed, that loyalty indeed remained intact through the January 25 Revolution, with Shenouda professing his support for Mubarak on state television during the eighteen-day uprising.

Within this political context, Shenouda’s comments from 2007 make sense. To acknowledge the sharia and call for recognition of Coptic personal status law was simply to reinforce the status of the Church as the central institution in Copts’ daily lives, as well as his own status as the sole legitimate representative of the Coptic community. Insofar as the power over personal status afforded the power to define the Coptic community, he was determined to retain that power exclusively on behalf of the Church.

Now that the Constituent Assembly proposes to vest this power over personal status in the Church on a formal, constitutional basis, in a sense codifying the triumph of clerical forces over their rivals in the Coptic laity for control of the Church and community, one cannot help but wonder what roles Coptic laypeople will find for themselves in communal and national politics. In the face of determined Church efforts to marginalize them, as well as the state’s support for these efforts, are Coptic laypeople who want a meaningful say in their community’s and nation’s future, destined to become apostates and insurgents?

[Published in collaboration with Egypt Independent.]

Photographs taken in early 2012 by Andy Spyra. Text essay by Sinan Antoon.

The plight of Christians in the Arab world attracts disproportionate attention in the “West” mostly to score political and “civilizational” points. Nevertheless, it is a serious problem that deserves genuine concern. An understanding of the genealogy and complexity of this plight is best sought beyond Islamophobia and other similarly reductive perspectives. Instead of narratives that imagine and situate the origins of consistent oppression in the distant past, a more careful look at the last few decades is far more productive. Iraq is a prime example. Until a few decades ago, its non-Assyrian Christians had never felt threatened qua Christians, and their rights to worship and practice their religion were never questioned. Larger numbers of Christians started to leave Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War and the genocidal economic embargo imposed by the UN/US, but so did hundreds of thousands of non-Christian Iraqis. The so-called “faith campaign” initiated by the Saddam Hussein regime in the late 1990s affected many Christians who owned alcohol-selling establishments.

The dismantling of the Iraqi state after the 2003 Anglo-American invasion and the institutionalization of a sectarian political system backed by a militia culture rendered minorities with no parties or militias, such as Christians and Sabi’a, severely vulnerable and subject to targeted acts of violence. The deterioration of safety and security and the outbreak of civil war and massive violence that followed compounded that vulnerability. Not unlike mosques, churches too were attacked and priests and nuns, as well as lay people, were kidnapped and murdered. Many Christians fled to neighboring countries or to Iraqi Kurdistan seeking refuge from the violence. Iraq’s third largest city, Mosul, and its environs where significant numbers of Christians live, have witnessed some of the worst sectarian violence. More than twenty thousand of Baghdad’s and Mosul’s Christians have fled to Qaraqosh, a town thirty-two kilometers south west of Mosul, to escape the violence.

  This is a selection of what you might have missed on Jadaliyya during the month of October 2012. It also includes the most recent videos and the most read articles. Progressively, we will be featuring more content on our Monthly Edition series, and we now have a page dedicated to all roundups.

• Timeline: Israel's Latest Escalation in Gaza
• Sexual Harassment Video that Led to Removal of Rula Quawas as Dean at the University of Jordan
• "من المآسي المضاعفة للنزوح:فتيات سوريات للزواج "بثمن بخس
• The Agonies of Susan Rice: Gaza and the Negroponte Doctrine
• We Are Fine in Gaza. How Are You?
• Israeli Aggression in the Gaza Strip: In Pictures
• Tradition and the Anti-Politics Machine: DAM Seduced by the “Honor Crime”
• Dissecting IDF Propaganda: The Numbers Behind the Rocket Attacks
• Facebook Attempts to Shut Down the Voice of “The Uprising of Women in the Arab World”
• Mowing the Lawn in Gaza

• Trial of Israeli Attack on Freedom Flotilla Begins on November 6
• Remi Kanazi: Normalize This!
• DAM: Crime, Honor, and Hip-Hop
• We Are Fine in Gaza. How Are You?
• Noura Erakat and Yousef Munayyer on Gaza Assault: Interview with MSNBC's Chris Hayes
• Qatar: Outrageous Life Sentence for 'Jasmine Poet' (Video)
• Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)
• Democracy Now! Interview with Raji Sourani and Richard Falk on Gaza Assault and International Humanitarian Law
• Russia Today Interview with Co-Editor Mouin Rabbani and Others on Gaza Assault

• Three Poems by Saadi Youssef
• Wadih Saadeh: Because of a Cloud, Most Likely
• Egypt: New Constitution Mixed on Support of Rights
• The Strong Egypt Party, the Constitutional Decree, and Gaza: An Interview with Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh
• Hurricane Sandy Hits Little Syria: Worrying about Buildings and Brothers
• How Syria Turned Off the Internet
• Update: Thousands Converge on Tahrir for Opposition Protests
• Etel Adnan at the Base of the Mountain
• Qatar: Outrageous Life Sentence for 'Jasmine Poet' (Video)
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 29)
• Social Justice and the Draft Constitution
• Palestine at the United Nations: A Vote for Peace and Justice
• UAE: Cybercrimes Decree Attacks Free Speech
• Morsi and his Adversaries
• More Quick Thoughts on Palestine at the United Nations
• Quick Thoughts on the Significance of the November 2012 Palestine UN Bid
• Syria Media Roundup (November 29)
• Call for Papers -- New Media, New Politics? (post-) Revolutions in Theory and Practice? (London, 26 April 2013)
• Beirut Photographer: Interview with George Azar
• الحياة الحزبية في مصر بعد الثورة ... بين الإنطلاق والتعثر
• Rules of Engagement: Documentary Filmmaking According to Tahani Rached
• Egyptian Protesters and Imprisoned Iranian Hunger Striker: Interviews with Mona El Ghobashy, Hesham Sallam and Hadi Ghaemi
• من القاهرة الجميلة - الجزء الأول
• What is Jadaliyya? "Portal 9" Interview with Jadaliyya Co-Founder Bassam Haddad
• New Texts Out Now: Elisabeth Weber, Living Together: Jacques Derrida's Communities of Violence and Peace
• New Texts Out Now: Ann Elizabeth Mayer, Islam and Human Rights
• Egypt: A Year of Abuses Against Detained Children
• Cairo Event -- Why Middle East Studies? A Discussion of the State of the Field (5 December)
• Dispatch from Mohamed Mahmoud Street: Egyptian Revolts
• Afghanistan: The Long, Hard Road to the 2014 Transition
• Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (November 27)
• Egypt Media Roundup (November 26)
• The President and the Fatal Trilateral Logic of US, Egyptian and Israeli Relations
• نزع القداسة عن سلطان عمان
• Last Week on Jadaliyya (Nov 19-25)
• تفكيك أمننة المجتمع
• Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)
• فواز طرابلسي: حرير وحديد
• Democracy, Democracy, But The Courts Can’t Touch Me
• Infographic: Palestinian & Israeli Deaths
• America's Native Prisoners of War
• Joint Statement by Twenty-Two Egyptian Rights Organizations on Morsi Declaration
• تيار استقلال القضاء: من مواجهة مبارك إلى تقاسم كعكة السلطة مع الإخوان
• Reports Roundup (November 24)
• Gaza Solidarity Statement from Individuals and Organizations Based in New York and New Jersey
• Israel and Hamas: Fire and Ceasefire in a New Middle East
• From Opposition to Puppet: Morocco’s Party of Justice and Development
• Revolution Protection Law May Fail To Live Up To Its Name
• Thousands Fill Tahrir on Friday to Protest Morsi's New 'Dictatorial Powers'
• Human Trafficking in the Sinai: Refugees Between Life and Death
• Gaza Reprieve: Jadaliyya Co-Editor Mouin Rabbani On What The Cease-Fire Tells Us About the Balance of Power
• Tradition and the Anti-Politics Machine: DAM Seduced by the “Honor Crime”
• الجبهة القومية ترفض انقلاب مرسي على الثورة وتدعو للنزول إلى التحرير بقوة
• Egypt Political Forces Call for Mass 'Eyes of Freedom' Rally Friday
• The President's New Powers
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 22)
• Going from Pillar to Truce
• Morsy and the "Nationalization" of the Revolution: Some Initial Reflections
• بيروت… غزة
• A Precarious Balancing Act: Lebanon and the Syrian Conflict
• Bibi Bombs
• The BICI Reforms: Promises of Progress, A Worsening Reality
• On Gaza: Interviews with Sherine Tadros and Mouin Rabbani, and A Reading by Sinan Antoon
• Syria Media Roundup (November 22)
• Eyewitness from Gaza: Historic Convoy Breaks the Siege
• الثورة بصفة شخصية
• الجبهة القومية للعدالة والديمقراطية تحمل "مرسي" مسؤولية أحداث "محمد محمود" وتدعوكم للمشاركة في جمعة عيون الحرية
• ملف من الأرشيف: عبدالله الطريقي
• Text of Israel-Hamas Ceasefire Agreement
• Jadaliyya Co-Editor Noura Erakat on China Radio International's Big Debate
• Russia Today Interview with Co-Editor Mouin Rabbani and Others on Gaza Assault
• Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (November 21)
• African Americans for Justice in the Middle East and North Africa Statement Regarding the Aggression Against Gaza
• New Texts Out Now: Mark LeVine and Gershon Shafir, Struggle and Survival in Palestine/Israel
• Call for Applications: Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Modern Arab Culture and Society (Brown University, 2013-2015)
• Democracy Now! Interview with Raji Sourani and Richard Falk on Gaza Assault and International Humanitarian Law
• Egypt Media Roundup (November 19)
• Mohamed Mahmoud Clashes, One Year on: "A Battle for Dignity"
• Out of Sight, but Not out of Mind: Mohamed Mahmoud Remembered
• Assiut, Qursaya, Mohamed Mahmoud: Making the Connections
• عمودُ السّحاب يرتد على نتنياهو وحكومته
• O.I.L. Media Roundup (19 November)
• Noura Erakat and Yousef Munayyer on Gaza Assault: Interview with MSNBC's Chris Hayes
• Last Week on Jadaliyya (Nov 12-18)
• Colonial Experiments in Gaza
• Mowing the Lawn in Gaza
• The Politics of Trains
• “Qaboos can make mistakes like anybody else"-- The Sultan of Oman De-sacralized
• Political Instability Costs Lebanon 5 Percent of Its GDP
• Dissecting IDF Propaganda: The Numbers Behind the Rocket Attacks
• The “End of the Two-State Solution” Spells Apartheid and Ethnic Cleansing, not Binationalism and Peace
• Netanyahu's First War
• When is Something, Something? Jordan’s Arab Uprising
• Reports Roundup (November 17)
• We Are Fine in Gaza. How Are You?
• Lonely Servitude: Child Domestic Labor in Morocco
• Egyptian Doctors' Strike and the Quest for Bread, Freedom, and Social Justice
• خرائط الصبّار
• Israeli Aggression in the Gaza Strip: In Pictures
• في جذور الأسباب البنيوية للانتفاضة السورية
• Quelle justice transitionnelle pour la Tunisie ?
• ثورة . . . أما بعد
• The One-State Solution and Rebuilding the Palestinian National Movement: An Interview with Awad Abdel Fattah (Part Two)
• Plurality, Hybridity, and the Self: A Review of Benjamin Stora's "Voyages en postcolonies"
• The One-State Solution and Rebuilding the Palestinian National Movement: An Interview with Awad Abdel Fattah (Part One)
• Two Steps Back: How HR 35 Fails to Protect California Students
• Some Panels from the Upcoming Meeting of the Middle East Studies Association (Denver 2012)
• نصوص
• الدوحة وأخواتها
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 15)
• The Agonies of Susan Rice: Gaza and the Negroponte Doctrine
• Bodies for Ballots
• The Situation in Gaza: Ali Abunimah on Al-Jazeera
• New Texts Out Now: The Dawn of the Arab Uprisings: End of an Old Order?
• Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (November 15)
• الأطراف والمصالح التي تعوق التغيير الحميد في الخليج
• Getting Past the Brink: Protests and the Possibilities of Change in Jordan
• Syria Media Roundup (November 15)
• Exclusive: Shahin Najafi on the Perils of Being an Artist in Iran
• Timeline: Israel's Latest Escalation in Gaza
• Tadween Publishing Joins The Jadaliyya Community Today
• غزة "القلعة الأخيرة" والأولى
• Why Not Jordan?
• DAM: Crime, Honor, and Hip-Hop
• Letter Concerning US Department of State Decision to Freeze Scholarships for Students from Gaza
• Jadaliyya Launches Photography Page
• "قراءة نقدية في مفهوم ''أوروبا المسيحية
• The Swallows of Syria
• Imagining Tahrir
• “I Have the Picture!” Egypt’s Photographic Heritage between Digital Reproduction and Neoliberalism (Part I)
• Living Under Threat of Expulsion: Palestinian Women Photograph Life in Susiya Village
• Cairo Event: In tribute to the history of studio photographic practice in Egypt: On Photography, at Studio Viennoise (14 November - 16 December 2012)
• Cairo Event: PhotoCairo 5 "more out of curiosity than conviction" (14 Nov - 17 Dec 2012)
• Egypt Media Roundup (November 12)
• Counting Calories and Making Lemonade in Gaza
• بعد ما بعد الحداثة: مقالات في الأدائية وتطبيقات في السرد والسينما والفن
• Five Texts by Zakaria Tamer
• Conditions on Aid and the Politics of Development
• Letter to IMF From Egyptian Parties, NGOs, Syndicates and Political Movements
• Last Week on Jadaliyya (Nov 5-11)
• City, Space, Power: Lahore’s Architecture of In/Security
• Joint Statement on the Revocation of Bahraini Citizenship from 31 People
• The Struggle of Twice-Displaced Refugees: Palestinians Fleeing Syria to Lebanon
• Inhale Reality, Exhale the Truth
• تحديات تنتظر "مدن الملح"
• Reports Roundup (November 10)
• Facebook Attempts to Shut Down the Voice of “The Uprising of Women in the Arab World”
• International Call Out: British CEO’s Actions Threaten Union Rights in Lebanon
• Egypt Monthly Edition on Jadaliyya (October 2012)
• Putting Palestine on the Map
• الأمة المصرية حين تفقد لغتها : لغة الرب أم لغة المستعمر؟
• Draft Resolution Requesting Palestine Upgrade from Observer Mission Status to Observer State Status
• Butheina H. Kazim on BDS and Defining "Powerful Arab Women"
• Open Letter to Egyptian President Morsy from Mahmoud Salem, @SandMonkey
• San Francisco Event -- Teaching the Arab Revolts: Integrating Contemporary Middle East Protests Into Our Syllabi (17 November)
• Syria: When Official Memory is Amnesia
• Palestinian Youth Statement from Lebanon
• The Left in Time of Revolution
• Bidayat: New Beginnings for All Seasons of Change
• الترابي في الثمانين
• ملف من الأرشيف: دلال المغربي
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 8)
• Syria Media Roundup (November 8)
• Amnesty International Calls for End of Bahraini Ban on Protesting
• Open Call for Submissions for the New “Journal of Anthropology of the Contemporary Middle East and Central Eurasia“ (ACME)
• National Students for Justice in Palestine Conference Opposes “Normalizing” Israeli Human Rights Abuses
• Maghreb Monthly Edition on Jadaliyya (October 2012)
• New Texts Out Now: Jens Hanssen, Kafka and Arabs
• New Texts Out Now: Norman Finkelstein, Knowing Too Much
• Gatekeepers and Evictions: Somalia's Displaced Population at Risk
• Ahmad Muhammad Al-Khatib: A Profile from the Archives
• Omar Saad: "I will not be a soldier in your army"
• O.I.L. Media Roundup (5 November)
• O.I.L. Monthly Archive on Jadaliyya (October 2012)
• Beirut Event: The Silver Factory featuring Andy Warhol's 1967 Marilyn Monroe Series (13-17 November)
• Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (November 6)
• Month-by-Month Summary of Developments in Syria (Updated)
• Who Will Win the Presidential Election? Lecture by Michael McDonald
• مواقع الظلال: عمل حديث لجنان العاني
• Last Week on Jadaliyya (Oct 29-Nov 4)
• Egypt Media Roundup (November 5)
• Libya's First Video Art Exhibit (Tripoli, 6-7 November 2012)
• Oxford Event -- Russian Orientalism to Soviet Iranology: The Persian-Speaking World and Its History Through Russian Eyes (30 November 2012)
• Two Iranian Activists Granted EU's Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought
• Du « péril noir » au Maroc
• The Scared Islamists And Their Frightened Majority
• Syria Monthly Edition on Jadaliyya (October 2012)
• From Gebran Bassil To Con Edison: Ten Lessons New Yorkers Can Learn From Beirutis About The Dark
• الحدود والرؤوس المومئة: مرحلة ما بعد الاستعمار والذكرى الخمسون لاستقلال الجزائر
• Jadaliyya Monthly Edition (October 2012)
• Turkish Academics' Statement of Solidarity with Kurdish Detainees on Hunger Strike
• Urgent Call for Kurdish Hunger Strikers in Turkey
• إنفجار غزة و حصار بيروت معاً
• Trial of Israeli Attack on Freedom Flotilla Begins on November 6
• Reports Roundup (November 3)
• Reflections on Egypt's Draft Constitution
• Mehreen Kasana on South Asian Issues and Social Media
• The Balfour Declaration: 95 Years Later
• Conference: Palestine Center Annual Conference (Washington DC, 9 November 2012)
• Remi Kanazi: Normalize This!
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 2)
• Jadaliyya Launches Media Page!
• Ithaca Event: Moving Beyond Sterile Negotiations (Today 1 November 2012)
• Syria Media Roundup (November 1)
• Year of the Ostrich: SCAF's Media Experiment
• New Texts Out Now: Linda Herrera, Youth and Citizenship in the Digital Age: A View from Egypt
• Tunisian Unionists on Strike in Kasserine Province

Most of the Mohawks in America are unincorporated territories, areas that lie outside of any municipality or township. I didn’t even know these places still existed. Apparently, unincorporated territories are either so small, destitute, or isolated that no city, town, or respectably incorporated area has seen reason to claim them; neither have the people who live in these unincorporated territories seen fit to claim themselves. I still can’t figure quite why these places would all be named Mohawk, but maybe it has something to do with a Mohawk being a sort of inherently in between space. There’s Lake Mohawk, New Jersey; Mohawk, Indiana; Mohawk, Oregon; and Mohawk, Tennessee. These are all described as unincorporated areas. I looked it up. This last year I’ve been trying to find out as much as possible about Mohawks. The term Mohawk, of course, comes from a Native American Tribe. The Mohawk Indians originally lived in what is now New York State. The indigenous word for their tribe meant, people of Flint. Mohawk meant eater of flesh. And they only wore their hair in what we now refer to as "the Mohawk" when they were preparing to go to war. 

There are all kinds of Mohawk haircuts today that have nothing to do with unincorporated territories or war. You’ve got the Bi-hawks, Tri-hawks, Cross-hawks, Curly-hawks, Fauxhawks, Nohawks, Shark fins, and my favorite, the Psychobilly Mohawk, which is really just a spiky quiff; a lock of hair running down the center of the head and combed to one side. Quiff also means a promiscuous woman, and I liked the idea of wearing that on my head all the time.

Maybe it was that kind of thinking that started this mess. I never did get a quiff. I don’t have any of those others I named, either. I’m the only person with this particular type of Mohawk I’ve ever met or heard of, and if more people had the kind of hair I have, I promise you, the world would be a very different place. 

It was almost a year ago today. I had a huge crush on this girl, Beth. I’d been trailing her for a couple of weeks since we made out at this anti-valentines day party. But she’s a kind of wholesome do-gooding sort and was making me work for my dinner, so instead of ever inviting me out alone, she invited me to group events. On Sunday morning we cooked breakfast with Food Not Bombs and served homeless people in the park. On Friday I rode a Critical Mass with her. It was nice going out with her those two weeks and seeing lots of people, I admit. I’d been spending too much time at my jobs, or alone sketching and submitting portfolios to galleries, most of whom were turning me down. But to be honest, I was kinda just chasing her tail and getting nothing but community activities in return. 

The third time we went out, she invited me to a political rally. She said we could go to a rock show after, so I thought, why not? I’d done my share of rallying. I cared about things. And this came with the added plus of a pretty girl.

The rally was about Palestine and Israel. It was back when Israel was going hog-wild and just bombing the fuck out of Palestine, in retaliation to rockets being launched into Israel. I’d seen it all over the news for two days, and yeah, it was awful what was happening. But there are awful things happening everywhere all the time. Just not usually here. 

So, I met Beth at the rally in Union Square. We stayed for two hours. It was nothing out of the ordinary. People were really upset and solemn and sincere. Then there were a few fiery speeches, as well as a small group of Zionists pinned in holding counter-protest signs across the street. A band played, and Beth held my hand and skipped around in a circle. One of her sandals came off and she scratched her foot, so we went to sit in the grass. I bought us two soy-dogs. We ate them. Hers had relish and mustard, mine had ketchup. I’m recalling all of these banal details because it seems so outlandish to me now just how ordinary everything was then. Nothing remotely strange happened. I keep playing that whole day and night over in my mind, trying to remember some sign of something, anything exceptional. But there was really nothing. It was an uneventful political rally that I went to because I had a crush on the girl who invited me and nothing exciting happened. 

After finding a band-aid for Beth’s foot and sitting around a little while, we went and got two cups of coffee then headed over to this place called Arlene’s Grocery for the concert. Beth did a lot of dancing. I mostly sat on the couch drinking and listening, thinking how much I missed CBGB. But then I thought maybe it wasn’t CBGB I missed, but being twenty and feeling like I was really doing something drinking with a fake I.D. and being able to drink as much as possible without really feeling it, and most importantly, everything, absolutely everything being new and exciting. 

It just doesn’t feel the same listening to live rock when you’re going to be thirty in a year, and your second drink is already making more tired than drunk and you can’t help but worry you’re going to feel a little sick and depressed the next day. My mind started wandering to sort of existential crisis thoughts, like the fact that I’d been trying to convince art galleries that my charcoal comic strip sketches were gallery worthy since I moved to the city, and I wasn’t getting much farther with that than I was nine years ago, and I can’t blame it all on being a boi instead of a boy, and wondering if I even still really liked live rock; wondering if I even still liked anything really, cause the things that used to seem so exciting now seemed so commonplace. Was it actually those things I liked, or was it just the newness? 

(I don’t worry about that kind of stuff anymore.) 

Beth came and interrupted my quarter life drunk think. She handed me a beer, and smiled, then sat down next to me, her leg crossed in my direction, touching my knee. I remember this very clearly. She took a sip of her beer, tousled my hair and giggled. “You’ve got such a great, thick head of hair, Sheldon. It’s really…..” She paused long like she was wondering whether or not to say it. She’s a few years younger than me and seemed to be getting pleasantly drunk. “Sexy,” she said, and smiled, leaning in. 

I gave her a sort of signature nod I have, and tried my best to look as sexy as she said I was through my increasingly tired version of buzzed. “Yeah,” I said. “You know what I’m gonna do tomorrow? I think I’m gonna do a Mohawk again.”

“No way! That could be really good.” She started twisting my hair around one of her fingers. I don’t think it really was at the time, but I remember it now as a mystical few moments, when she kept touching my hair and talking about it, smiling too big and leaning in, giggling over nothing. The light was dim and the place smelled sweaty. The music was loud. Mediocre and insanely attractive people were dancing and beginning to make out around us. “What kind of Mohawk exactly are you going to do?” She took my brown hair in her fingers like a comb and held it up in the center then tilted her head, trying to picture it. 

“I was thinking about doing a quiff.”

“A quaff?”

“No. Quiff. With an i.”

“Quiff?”

“Yeah.” I described a quiff to her and then told her that quiff also means promiscuous woman, and I said that I like having promiscuous women on my head. She blushed and went, “Mmmmmmm.” Then she crawled on top of me, straddling my lap, and we made-out till the band stopped playing. 

We walked together to the subway. I asked her to come home with me. I really thought she would, but she said it was already two o’clock and she had things to do the next day, “Sorry.” She kissed me on the cheek and went to her side of the subway. That moment really sucked. So I waited thirty minutes for the train, alone, feeling not drunk enough and too tired, frustrated and lonely, my hands shoved in my pockets, watching some junkie not fall repeatedly until the F came. I got into my apartment and just crashed on top of the covers, in my clothes.

I usually would have slept until at least noon. But I woke up really early, like at eight o’clock. I couldn’t figure out was wrong for a second, then I realized my head was itching like crazy. I sat up in bed and started manically scratching it, but that only seemed to make it worse. As I was scratching it, I was shocked to feel tons of little things moving around on my head. “Bed Bugs!” I thought.  I stood up and pulled back the covers. They were all clean. But god, that itching was awful. I ran to the bathroom and looked in the mirror.

I think it was Dr. Phil who said there are out only about five principal events in every person’s life, after which they will never be the same; five events that change you forever. Like you become a markedly different person after those things happened and there’s no going back to who you were before. I only have two, and I doubt I’ll ever have anymore. The first one was my top surgery; when I decided to do the tea and get the surgery and become a real boi, when I was twenty-four. My second “principal event” occurred when I looked in the mirror that morning. 

For a while I just stared at it. Then I started feeling around very gently patting at it with my hands, mumbling to myself, my mouth opening and closing slowly like a dying fish. I watched very closely, mesmerized by what I was seeing; the soldiers standing guard at the check point, the line of cars and people at the base near my neck and the empty deserted area near the front, where, on one side, every few minutes, I thought I could make out some people shifting in the nearby bushes. I fingered the wall that ran like a Mohawk down the center of my head. It was solid, hard stone and did not give under the weight of my touching. Suddenly, I felt something singe my finger tip. I pulled my hand away and jumped back to the tiny sound of three little bombs exploding quickly. I put my hands in the air and pressed my back against the wall. I could make out the microscopic sound of screaming. Something fell from my head to the floor. I got down on my knees and pressed my cheek to the tile to get a good look. It was a little bigger than an ant. Well, I shouldn’t say it. He was a little bigger than an ant, a miniature man wriggling on the floor, blood gurgling out of his mouth in bubbles. By the count of five, he was dead. 

I jumped out of the bathroom, grabbed my keys from the table and bolted out of the apartment, faster than I’d ever run. I didn’t even think to try to get on the subway or grab a bus or even a cab. My body just started going and didn’t seem to want to stop till I got where I needed to be. I think it only took me twenty minutes to get to my doctor’s office. I’d never wanted to see a doctor so badly in my life. It seems silly to me now, that being my first inclination. But in those twenty minutes, I just kept telling myself that all I needed was a doctor.

I slammed open the glass doors and slid along the tile floor, my sneakers squeaking as I landed at the counter, panting beside the line of people waiting to fill out their forms. The man at the front desk started. “Excuse me! Can I help you?” His face went sprintingly from annoyed, to startled, to curious, to horrified as he looked at me. 

“I need to do an emergency walk-in! Okay?” 

He began breathing through his mouth and nodding unconsciously, the way people do when they are mesmerized by something. The people in the line next to me were staring too. A couple of them had stepped away. “Uh hu, sure. Have you…” his eyes scanned my head, “been here before?”

“Yeah. Yes,” I hollered, leaning over the counter and pointing at his computer. “My doctor’s name is Murphy. Is she in today?”

He looked from me to his computer to me again, his eyes wide. “I think so.” He typed something on the screen. “Your name?” 

“Sheldon. Sheldon Peters.”

“Okay, um Mr. Peters. What seems to be…” he paused again, just staring at me. I looked around quickly. One of the women in the line had backed all the way up to the door and was holding it open, watching me warily. “I’m sorry.” He blinked and tried to smile. “What seems to be the nature of your emergency?”

“I… I..”  I coughed and leaned over toward him. I pointed at my head, and I meant to whisper it, but instead I screamed, “I’ve got the Gaza Strip on my head!”

He shot straight up, tipping his chair over behind him, then stiffened. “We’re going to get you a wheelchair,” he told me emphatically. “Nurse!” He looked at me for a couple more seconds, then turned and disappeared through the door behind him, shouting for a nurse.

They were very sensitive to differences in this place. It’s a special sort of clinic geared toward trans and queer people. I’m sure all the staff had been through all types of sensitivity trainings, but I could tell I was pushing their limits. The walls were calmingly purple. I tried to block out the sounds of machine gun fire and shouting, which luckily is only loud enough to hear if you get very close to me. While I was waiting for my wheelchair I read the mural on the wall. It was a quote by Audre Lorde: “Every woman has a militant responsibility to involve herself with her own health. We owe ourselves the protection of all the information we can acquire. And we owe ourselves this information before we may have a reason to use it.” I read it twice. Even though I was no longer a woman, it comforted me. 

The guy came out running with a nurse and a wheelchair. The nurse shoved me down into the chair. The line parted for me and the nurse kept patting my shoulder, telling me everything was going to be okay, all the way up the elevator. 

The nurse who was patting me left as soon as another nurse came into the examination room. This woman was large, rubenesque, and tough-looking with lots of eye make up and a rose tattoo on her arm. “What do we have here?” She put her hand on her hip and tapped her foot. “They tell me you’re a real special case. But I seen everything. I’m from the Bronx, you know. So go ahead and try me.”

I shrugged and directed her gaze to the top of my head. “I think I’ve got the Gaza strip on my head.”

She clicked her tongue, unimpressed. “Mmmmm hmmmm. And what are your symptoms?” She tapped the pen on the clip, appearing slightly bored. 

“Symptoms?”

“Mmmmhhmmm. That’s what I said.”

“Well, uh. It’s the Gaza strip. And it’s on my head. See.”

“Fine. Let me take a look.” She laid the clip board aside and took me by the chin, turning my head side to side slowly, getting a good look at it, then released me.

“I don’t know,” she said, “that looks to me like it might be the great wall of China.”

“I don’t think so.”

She rolled her eyes, annoyed. “Are you a doctor?”

“No.”

“Well see now. Neither am I, and that’s why I got to get your symptoms. We’ll let the doctor do the diagnosing, Okay?”

“Okay.” I nodded and scratched.

“Don’t you start scratching.” She smacked my hand away. “That’s the worst thing you could do. Now what symptoms are you having that makes you think this is the Gaza thing?”

“Well,” I thought hard. It seemed strange to think of them as symptoms. “There’s a check point. I mean, it seems to be a check point.”

“Okay.” She wrote it on the paper. “Check points. Go on.”

“And there have been ongoing bombings mostly landing on the right side of my head.”

“Bombings coming from the east going to the west?”

“I mean, that’s assuming my face is south, and also depends on what area of the wall I’m dealing with here, right?”

“She raised a painted brow. “Hey, we don’t even know that it is a wall yet. Any other symptoms?”

“Yeah well, earlier a miniature man fell out of my head, and…. well, he seemed to have been shot, and he died.”

“Dead men falling.” She wrote it down and placed her pencil behind her ear. “The doctor will be here in a minute. You just hang tight.”

She left the door slightly open. I could hear the news on the television in the waiting room. I walked to the door and listened. They were talking about Israel. I heard the word, escalation, and then fourth day of fighting. The doctor knocked on the wall. I went back to the wheelchair as she entered, my hands folded tensely in my lap. She smiled too big at me. I tried to force one in return.

“Well Sheldon, haven’t seen you for a while. I hear we’re having a bit of a special problem today.”

It wasn’t long before I realized there was nothing any doctor could do for me. First, doctor Murphy had asked me where I got my hair done. I had to explain to her that I didn’t do it on purpose. This whole thing just sprung up over night. She kept me in there for five hours, bringing in almost all of the doctors in the building. They took my blood and urine and my entire life history. Dr. Murphy, at first, was worried it was a side effect of the tea and surgery. But they quickly ruled that out. A few of them thought it was a virus and one of them was dead set on it being a genetic mutation. But no one could come up with any answers. I was in and out of specialists' offices for two weeks. One of them even paid to have me flown to L.A. so he could observeme for three days. I lived in a little room with a double mirrored wall. He wanted to keep samples of the dead people that were falling out of my head, but I wouldn’t let him. It’s my body. Well? It is… I mean, they, are coming from my body. I let him test one then give it back to me. It’s weird, the relationship I have with them, the bodies. 

At first I was keeping them in a glass jar in my room, with the intention of throwing the jar away when it got full. But that didn’t seem right. There are tough looking guys with guns, but there are also old ladies, little kids, old men and frail looking people. I went to the ninety-nine cent store by my house and I found these little glass, kind of jewelry boxes. They look like pill holders, but they have like twenty-four square compartments and each compartment has a tiny little plastic sparkling jewel in it.  It’s just ninety-nine cents each for one of these boxes. I guess the things are like little sequins girls collect to decorate clothes and phones and things. I bought a ton of them. When dead bodies fall, I take out a little plastic jewel and put in a dead body. I hope they don’t mind sometimes when I put the Palestinians and Israelis in the same box. They have different compartments, so, I think it’s probably be alright. It doesn’t happen often and who’s going to know, anyway? I keep the plastic jewels in a scrapbook with a date written by each one. It’s easy to do because the jewels are sticky on one side. Then, when all twenty four little compartments are full, I find somewhere to bury the glass box. That’s not easy to do. I know this all sounds morbid, but I’ve gotten used to having a bit of morbidity as part of my everyday life. I’m not going to say I understand what’s happening there better than anyone, cause I don’t at all, but I think I get it better than anyone who’s never been there.

All the specialists confirmed that the thing on my head is indeed a section of the barrier wall running along the Israel, Palestinian border. The best explanation I found was from the guy in California. He deducted that these weren’t the actual people from Israel and Palestine on my head, but flesh and blood animated replicas. It’s a living scale model. He deducted this, seeing nothing I did, like shampooing or combing seems to affect or hinder their actions. They are not aware of me or my head. I don’t understand at all how this happened, but the specialist said something, which I wrote down, about Chaos Theory, and explained to me that everything only has the slightest probability of existence. He said that we know this is true because, and I wrote this down, ‘It is impossible to simultaneously measure the velocity and position of the divided nuclei in motion.’ So, he deducted, if everything only has a slight possibility of existence, then things that cannot exist have an almost equal possibility of existing. In other words, if everything is barely possible, then the impossible is not far from possible.

I feel like I’ve lived ten lives this last year. I’ve had so many opportunities to go places I never would have and speak in forums I never even imagined I’d be granted access to. After I got back from California, I had to start to try to live my life again. But it was hard. Israel and Palestine have a seven hour time difference from New York, so it is much easier to sleep during their night than mine, because that’s when my head is the quietest. Although it hardly ever seems totally quiet, I’ve also learned to deal with the symptoms pretty well.  

Sometimes there are moments I almost forget it is there, or that it wasn’t there to begin with. It sounds mostly like white noise to me now. A lot of people think I should go there, to Gaza. But that would really freak me out, being in the place, standing on the place that’s standing on me.

When I got back from California, I had a ton of messages from friends and everyone. I hadn’t spoken to anyone for nearly three weeks. I hadn’t wanted anyone to know. I thought I could get it cured and come back like nothing had happened. But like I said, I had to go on with my life. We all do. 

Beth had actually left me three messages, the first one was sweet, and the last two sounded increasingly concerned about my sudden disappearance. I was terrified of calling her, but I figured maybe she could help since she seemed to be up on the situation in the Middle-East. 

When she first saw it, she just sat me down on the chair and circled me, watching my head for like an hour, like it was a documentary or something. She even told me to be quiet a couple of times, bending close and trying to listen. But it’s not possible to pick up any one distinct conversation. There are so many of them, and I’m sure  most of them aren’t speaking English. Groups of people chanting, shouting or screaming is pretty audible to me or if you put your ear close, as are loud machines, gunshots, bombs and things like that.

“This is amazing. This is a blessing in disguise,” Beth told me, clasping her hands, looking excited and solemn. I told her I just wanted it gone. She said that she would help me. That there would have to be someone out there who could do something for me, and we could put ads up on craigslist in lots of countries and cities. She also begged me to go speak at a rally the next day. I told her I didn’t really know much about the situation in Gaza. “What do you mean?” she squealed. “It’s on your head. Just speak about that. Speak from personal experience. That’s the most powerful thing anyone can do.”

I don’t know if she’s right about that, but I agreed. She offered to stay that night, finally. I told her no, though. I definitely didn’t feel like doing anything with her, and I doubted it would be comfortable to sleep next to me. I hadn’t told her about the falling people yet.  

She was getting her bag and about to leave when it happened. She later said she could see little rays of light like glitter bursting above the wall, and there was a sound like tiny firecrackers, then twelve people fell off of my head, onto the kitchen floor. Some of them were already dead when they landed, but a few of them were having seizures. We could see them moving for a moment before they became still. 

“Oh no.” Beth dropped her bag and fell to her knees, carefully inching toward them. I hung my head, ashamed. “Oh god, no,” she whispered. “How is this possible?”

I shrugged, feeling like I wanted to cry, but not in front of her. She looked up at me, her eyes reddening and filling with tears. “Turn on the news.” I walked over to the television and powered it on. Beth stood up and started flipping channels until she found a news station. They were talking about the economy. But it was a split screen, and on the bottom it showed live footage from Gaza. The footage was just dark and then there was a sudden burst like fireworks on the screen. “Oh my god! That’s what just happened on your head!” The strip running below the footage said something about cluster bombs. “Those bastards!” Beth said. “You know what cluster bombs are?” I shook my head no. They just disperse a bunch of tiny little bomblets over a really wide area. It’s completely indiscriminate.” She wasn’t really talking to me, but sort of making and outraged speech, like she was at a rally. “There’s no way to use one without risking killing everyone around. They are the worst for civilian casualties. How can they say they’re targeting Hamas when they’re using cluster bombs, for fuck sake? The United Nations should outlaw them! I can’t believe they haven’t been sanctioned!” She stared down at the floor. “Oh hell, I can’t believe it. You have evidence right here. We can just look and see if they’re civilians.”

“How can you tell?”

“If they have weapons or not.” She pulled me down to the floor to inspect the tiny dead bodies, but once she got down where she could really see them, her face paled. She was completely silent just gazing at them. So was I. After a long time watching them not move, she asked me in a whisper, “What do you do with them?”

I stood up and turned off the television. “That’s personal. I’m sorry, but I just want to be alone now. I’ll see you in the morning at the rally."

Beth stood up and gave me a long hug. She left without saying anything else. 

That first rally I did, I just got on the microphone and spoke for five minutes from my personal experience. I said how awful it was what was happening, and that the fighting had to end. I said that I for one knew this was no way for people to live and that it was costing countless innocent lives. Everybody cheered. I could see a few people were crying. After the speech, a few Palestinian New Yorkers and even a couple of Israelis came up to me and wanted to look at my head to see if they could make out any of their relatives. I let them. They didn’t find who they were looking for. I was nervous the whole time that someone was going to fall out, and that it would be one of their relatives. Luckily, no one did. I got away as quickly as possible, and told Beth that if that I was going to do that anymore, I would need to know that no one was going to come inspect my head afterward.  

That evening, Beth came home with me again. We wrote an ad together that she posted on like every craigslist site in the world. 

The next day I had about two hundred new messages. None of them were from specialists who wanted to help me. They were all from Journalists who wanted to interview me. The first interview I did was with the Daily News. I was on the cover the very next day. They called me “The Gazahawk Man.”

I didn’t even have a chance to see it for myself that morning before my mom called, totally going out of her mind. She insisted I come home right away. I thought it was better for her to see for herself that I was still alive and healthy. I took the train to Jersey and met her at home that afternoon. 

She was waiting by the door when I walked up. She pushed me inside fast, I think before the neighbors had a chance to see me, then she locked the door behind her and peeked out the window like maybe I was being followed. She sat me at the kitchen table and served me a bowl of the chicken soup she had already prepared. I reminded her I was a vegetarian. “Well maybe that’s why this sort of thing keeps happening to you, Chelle,” she said. 

“What do you mean?” She insisted that I eat it. I took a couple sips of the noodles and laid down the spoon. “Nothing like this has ever happened to me.”

“Oh no?” She motioned to my flat chest.  

“Mom! That’s totally different. That was surgery. I chose that.”

“I thought you said it wasn’t a choice.” She buttoned and unbuttoned the top of her shirt, like she does when she’s upset. “Well, which is it? You can’t have it both ways, Chelle.”

I sighed and leaned back. “It’s Sheldon now mom. Sheldon. Is that so really so hard?”

“Oh no, no, no,” She was starting to tear up and her voice was getting squeaky. “It’s not hard. It’s easy! It’s always sooo easy with you, Sheldon.”

“I didn’t come here to fight, Mom.”

“I know. I know. But, this is really a lot, Chelle. You have to understand this is a lot for me.”

“It’s a lot for me too, okay?”

She nodded and pursed her lips, then wiped away a few little tears. “Do you really want to walk around with the Gaza Strip on your head for the rest of your life?” She stood and put more soup in my full bowl. “You really should think about this before you commit to it.”

“Mom. God. I told you, this wasn’t my choice.”

“I know. I know.” She sat the soup bowl down and waved her hands in the air. “I know we’re all different in some ways. But first it was girls. And I said, okay.”

“Ummmmm, NO you didn’t.”

“And then it was a different name and baggy jeans and I accepted that.”

I rolled my eyes and groaned audibly.

“Then it was the surgery. And Chelle, I just don’t know. But now this. What am I supposed to do with this?” A series of pops started going off. I grimaced and sneezed as little flakes of dust rose and fell around my face. “Oh lord have mercy!” My mother jumped back and crossed herself. “Is that what happens when you get upset?”

“No, jeez. I don’t know why I came here.” I let out a long sigh. “Can I have a glass of milk? My throat’s dry.” She nodded and opened the fridge. “It’s not me. It’s Palestine and Israel, okay? I don’t know if you know, but they’re fighting right now.”

She put the milk back in the fridge. “Don’t patronize me, Sheldon. I know about Israel and Palestine. I keep up on current events, too, you know.”

She leaned down and handed me the glass of milk. As she did, her gaze was caught, and she stood, titling her head and watching closely, little sounds coming from her, little ‘ohhh’s’ and ‘oh dears.’ “Mmmmm. Well, would you look at that?” I sipped my milk and hunched my shoulders. Her eyes sparkled, transfixed as she watched. “Have you tried shampooing?” she asked in a whisper.

Two days later, I went on CNN. They actually paid me to be one of those talking heads (I guess that term has a new meaning for me) in the split screen boxes. It’s crazy how they do it. You’re not actually in the room with anyone you’re talking to. They just sit you in front of a screen, mic you and put a little headphone in your ear. Then suddenly you hear a bunch of people who are also on the screen in front of you shouting in your ear. It was really awful for me, because their shouting was competing with the ruckus on my head. 

The interview consisted of me, a Rabbi, and Israeli spokeswoman, a male Palestinian Professor living in the U.S. and a Barbie blonde female moderator. When the sound came on they were all in the middle of shouting at each other. The Palestinian Professor was pounding his fist, saying that Israel fired first and broke the treaty. The Israeli spokeswoman shouted back, very flustered, her sentences breaking. “If Israel hadn’t started firing first in this case… you know, Israel had security reasons. There was no real deal. Israel always reserved the right to go in and attack if they felt that there were real security breaches, and there were.”

The Palestinian shouted, “What are the breaches that merit this level of response?”

The spokeswoman became breathlessly upset. “Hezbollah has been firing rockets for several weeks into Israel! We believe a team of Hamas fighters were digging a tunnel to kidnap Israeli soldiers.”

“AND YOU ASSASSINATED THEM!” The professor hollered back. “You have not even any proof that is what they were doing! It was a tunnel for smuggling food.” 

“Okay, okay.” The moderator interrupted. “We are being joined now by a special guest, Sheldon Peters, also known as the Gazahawk Man. Mr. Peters, maybe you can help us clear some things up. Yours is a very exceptional situation. For those of you who don’t know, what seems to be a life and blood animated replica of a section of the Gaza Strip has grown on your head. Is that correct?”

“Yes. That’s right.”

“Can we get a close up on that, Larry?”

The camera zoomed in, cutting away from the other guests, and I saw, magnified on the screen, the wall, the people, the houses and trees and all the things happening in the little world on my head. The camera pulled back. All the guests were squinting dumfounded into their screens. The Barbie moderator was still smiling, unfazed. “Which section, exactly, of the barrier wall were we just looking at it?”

“Well. I’m not sure exactly, but I’ve been told it’s definitely on the Palestine Israel border, and I think it’s somewhere near the town of Kahna. 

“Why is that?”

“Well, because it’s a stone section, not the wire fence, and also some of the recent events in that area sync up with what has been happening on my head.”

“So the events in this section of the barrier happen in real time on your head?”

“Yes, that seems to be the case.”

“So maybe you can tell us once and for all,” the moderator continued, “Who fired first?”

“This is irrelevant,” The Rabbi shouted, waiving his arms. “This is not a political matter. This is a personal, spiritual phenomenon!”

I held my hand up. “I don’t know anyway. It didn’t happen until two days after the siege started.”

Everyone, except the moderator, nodded and looked relieved. She leaned in and clasped her hands in front of her. She seemed to shine with clean white makeup and polished hair. “Can you speak just from your personal experience, Mr. Peters, and tell us who you feel is at fault here?”

“This is ridiculous,” The Israeli spokeswoman said, leaning back and almost laughing. “One person’s experience of having the Gaza Strip on their head for a couple of weeks can not define centuries of history and struggle.”

“I have to agree with her there,” the Palestinian professor interjected.

“Well I’m glad you can finally agree on something. But this is Mr. Peter’s turn to speak and I think the world is interested in hearing his side.” The moderator nodded, “Go on, Mr. Peters.”

“Well, I don’t know who’s to blame, but I know it’s definitely much more itchy on the Palestinian side of my head.”

“What does that mean, it’s itchy?” the Rabi asked.

“It’s more itchy because there are a lot more people in a very small space. And there are mostly all the gunshots and bombs on that side, you know, going to that side.”

“Is it affecting your health?” The moderator asked. “Do you think you have any symptoms of Traumatic Stress Disorder?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“The fact is, on the twenty-fifth, Israel fired fifty missiles into Palestine.” The professor said, leaning in. “Mr. Peters, can you account for any disparities in casualties?”

“Oh yes. There was a cluster bomb fired into Palestine the other night. I felt that. And there were at least twelve casualties from it.”

“You see.” The professor continued, “And how many casualties from Palestine total have you… experienced?”

“It’s hard to say. More than sixty.”

“Just on this section of the barrier, and just in a mater of weeks!” he went on, “And Mr. Peters, how many Israeli casualties have you experienced?”

“Two. They both appeared to be Soldiers.”

“The fact that there are not casualties in Israel shouldn’t be held against us.” The spokeswoman said emphatically. “There are thousands of Israelis living in bomb shelters all over Israel right now. We are being held hostage in our own homes.”

“Can you corroborate that Mr. Peters? And do you have any knowledge of the tunnel that was allegedly dug from Palestine into Israel?”

“No. It’s only what’s happening above ground… on my head.”

The moderator tapped her pen thoughtfully. “I have a question for him,” The Rabi said. “How can you be sure of the exact number of casualties and if they are soldiers? It appears very small. It would be hard to know for certain. Where are you getting this estimate?”

“That’s a good point. It’s very small. It would be difficult to count the number of dead or wounded without a magnifying glass. Do you check and watch every day?” The professor asked. 

“No Ummmm. No. Not exactly.”

“You see. There’s no way to justify his statements.” The Rabi said, waving his hand as if swatting a fly from the room.

“No… It’s not like that.” I said lowly, my voice cracking.

“I’m sorry Mr. Peters. You’re going to have to speak up,” the moderator told me. “It’s not like what?”

Everybody waited. “It’s … well. I know the number for sure because, when they die, see…” It was hard to say.

“Yes, go on.”

“When they die, they… they fall out. They fall off my head. The bodies, when they’re dead, they fall.”

For the first time, everyone was completely silent. The moderator didn’t look so shiny right then. “Ohhhhhhh,” she whispered. The Palestinian professor swallowed hard and nodded. The other two sat still, stiff. The moderator regained her glistening smile, turned to the camera and segued into a commercial break. 

I did a couple more interviews like that, acting as a commentator. I didn’t really like it, but the money was good. I was also asked to go on these daytime talk shows. The only one I said yes to was Oprah. I was getting kind of tired of the exposure, but who says no to Oprah? I had always thought if I was on Oprah, or doing T.V. interviews, it would be to talk about being trans. In a way, this has helped with that. Now, the last thing on anyone’s mind is my gender. I’m just a man. That’s like one of the least interesting things about me. Even Oprah only brought it up for a second. It was like; “So, Sheldon isn’t your original name, is it? You were born a woman, and you transgendered. Is that the right term? Transitioned. Okay. And one day recently, you woke up with the Gaza Strip on your head? Is that right?” And that’s all she really said about it. 

In the middle of the second month, the whole thing was driving me crazy. I hadn’t yet learned to live with it like I have now. The fighting was still pretty intense. I felt desperate for some peace, so I went on the news one last time and made a statement that I wished to meet with the president in person. He said yes. I guess it was a good P.R. move. I actually got a ten minute meeting with him in private. I thought maybe I could show him the direness of the situation.  

Beth prepped me before the meeting. I was going to ask that he stop funding the Israeli Military. I took a very special gift for him that I kept tucked in my shirt pocket.

I couldn’t get through the metal detector without beeping, obviously, so they patted me down and metal detected me all over with a hand-held device. Four secret service officers led me into the Oval Office. The president stood and shook my hand. He directed me to sit in the chair across from his desk. The presidential seal is really intimidating, and whether you want to be or not, you can’t help but be intimidated by the president. Beth had warned me, “Don’t let him intimidate you,” so I tried to push through it. Luckily, he was obviously intimidated by me too. That day, there was a lot of machine gun fire on my head, and even though he’s always really cool, I could make out his right eyebrow twitching each time the sound of little pops emanated from my neckline. “That’s near the checkpoint,” I told him. “There are some activists there today hammering at the wall.”

“I see. Yours is a very exceptional situation,” he told me. He’s a very earnest man, not only on the television, but even in person. His calm, earnest manner seems very sincere, but there is something infuriatingly impenetrable about it as well. “I just want to start by expressing my deep sorrow that a civilian has had to experience these types of… upheavals.”

“You mean an American civilian.”  I was proud of myself for starting strong, like Beth said to do.

“Look, let me be clear.” He knocked on his desk. “I do not support the level of the recent retaliation of the Israeli government. I condemn the killing of innocent civilians. I am doing everything in my power to ensure that peace has a chance to re-emerge.”

“Then are you going to de-fund the Israeli Military, at least momentarily? Can you make sure that U.S. money isn’t going toward weapons like cluster bombs?” Sure, Beth had coached me a little, but I meant it. This was my only chance to talk to someone who might be able to give me some peace, finally. 

I don’t remember what exactly he said then, because he talked for several minutes. He said something about Gandhi being a good man, and that he was trying to continue to foster a nation where people like Gandhi could exist, and he loved Gandhi, but he’s not Gandhi, He’s the president of the United States and the issues are complex.

I was very frustrated by the whole thing. I told him that I wasn’t going to pay my taxes until the U.S. stopped providing the weapons that were being fired on my head. He told me again that mine was obviously an exceptional situation and that he wasn’t quite sure what the legal implications were, but that I would most likely still face an audit if I chose to do that. 

I stood up and bent down, shaking my head and pointing to it. “You would find a way to stop this if you were me,” I shouted. “This should have happened to you, not me. This is on your head more than mine.” He leaned back, clasping his hands in front of him. 

A secret service officer steeped up and took hold of my shoulder. “Sir, you’re going to have to calm down or I will remove you.”

The president lifted his hand. “It’s okay,” he said. “I can understand why you are so upset. “ We stared at each other for a second, not saying anything. 

I turned to the secret service officer. “I have something to give him, okay? I’m going to get it out of my shirt pocket now.” I didn’t want them to think I was pulling out a weapon. “Mr. president, I have something for you.” My mouth went dry as I reached into my front pocket. The secret service guy was watching very carefully, standing shoulder to shoulder with me. I held out my cupped hand. “I hope you’ll take her, and keep her as a reminder.” The president looked from the officers to me, wonder crossing his face. I waited. He held out his open palm below mine. I dropped her in. It wasn’t a bomb, but it almost might as well have been. Amazing how something so tiny can have such an effect. But I guess a corpse is a corpse, no matter how small. 

His hand trembled as he cradled her. Hi mouth fell open and his face paled. He limpened. The secret service officers did not react, but I saw one them looking. “Who is she?” 

“I don’t know. She’s just a kid who fell out of my head a few days ago. I don’t know her name.”

“Thank you Mr. Peters for illuminating the full weight of your situation. I appreciate it.” He nodded at the officer. “Would you please show Mr. Peters to the lawn.”

I was escorted out. Twenty minutes later I met the president on the lawn. The press took pictures of us shaking hands. The headlines read “GAZAHAWK MAN AND PREZ TALK PEACE.”

That’s it. It’s been more than a year now. Nothing has really changed. I got some gallery offers. Maybe I’ll do a show. Only, I haven’t produced any new work for a while. Somehow I have a feeling that won’t matter. It’s not about the work anyway. Now I’m known, I have a name, a public identity. 

My mom sends me new shampoos every week. Beth still comes around. But we’re just friends. I think she’s more intrigued by my head than she is by me. Mostly, I keep to myself. I spend a lot of time looking in the mirror. Maybe I’ll start sketching some self-portraits. I always thought that kind of thing was indulgent, but now I’m more than myself. Maybe I always was. I can do sketches close up and far away. It wouldn’t just be me I was sketching. It’s all there, on me, part of me, falling from me. 

A few weeks ago, President François Hollande finally decided to recognize the infamous episode of 17 October 1961, when the French police brutally repressed peaceful and unarmed Algerian protesters, resulting in nearly two hundred deaths. In a short and abrupt press release, Hollande paid homage to the victims of one of the most violent manifestations of colonialism in France's metropolitan territory. This recognition was a symbolic one; the crimes and cultural abuses that occurred during the 132 years of French occupation in Algeria remain unaddressed. The current political leadership is too timid to admit to the brutality and racism that fuels colonial rule. Nevertheless, this timorous sign of repentance (i.e. apologizing for colonial crimes) inspired a remarkable reaction from the French far right.

This reaction is born of an insecurity rooted in a peculiar vision of history. For the far right, France has to defend its pride to remain relevant in a globalized world. In this vision, any recognition of colonial violence is a weakness, a renunciation of power, and a harbinger of a decline that they refuse to accept. This persistent non-repentance is also squarely located in a gender-normative vision of power relations. For them, a “real” (read white) man does not apologize, for an apology implies submission and a loss of virility. This masculinity informs the ways in which French commentators on the far right view repentance, homosexuality, and radical Islam as three inherently related phenomena. Each threatens the dominance of these aging men, who seek to protect their whiteness and virility. 

Neither Regrets Nor Remorse

For many reasons, the "loss" of Algeria is still a sensitive subject in France. There is no denying that many pied-noirs born in Algeria experienced their repatriation after independence as a painful exile. But, politically speaking, these experiences should not impact the question of repentance, which is at the center of a recurrent polemic between the two countries. The Algerian government, after all, is asking for the French state to recognize the racist and violent policies that were inflicted on it as an occupied country. This is a diplomatic issue between two sovereign states and a matter of international justice. It is in this context that the former Minister of Defense Gérard Longuet’s elegant “up yours” to the current Algerian Minister of War Veterans,Cherrif Abbas was an astounding gesture.

Many in France condemned Longuet's insulting behavior, while the far right enthusiastically expressed their support. Some even imitated the gesture in an apparent show of solidarity. Marine Le Pen, the leader of the nationalist and xenophobic Front National (FN) said that the act was a pleasure to witness. Longuet himself claimed that he made this gesture cheerfully (“de bon coeur"). How should we understand these statements?

Le Pen's reaction illustrates the resilient feeling of a stolen victory among old colonial circles in the Army and supporters of French Algeria. For them, the loss of Algeria – at the time, an integral part of France – was the consequence of De Gaulle’s political treason. Marine Le Pen's father and former President of the FN, Jean-Marie, was, after all, a parachutist under General Massu during the Battle of Algiers. He personally participated in torture sessions, as revealed by the newspaper Le Monde. The far right refuses to admit the possibility of a defeat in Algeria and insists that the army won the war. As Hannah Arendt has shown, the "bourgeois" mind believes that failure must necessarily involve a sense of shame, as success logically generates pride.[1] Thus the Le Pen family, which embodies the combination of bourgeoisie narrow-mindedness with French imperial nostalgia, exhibits this rejection of French defeat in Algeria. 

During one of his many media appearances, Eric Zemmour, a far right polemicist of pied-noir origins, expressed this nostalgic and vindictive view of the Evian Accords, the agreements which began formal preparations for Algerian independence.  He claimed that the accords were: "A peace that was only a ceasefire. A political defeat for France that was, yet, a military victory. A craven relief which will be followed by murders, the kidnap of hundreds of pieds-noirs and the slaughter of thousands of harkis."

Zemmour's statement expresses both the feeling of a stolen victory and an indignation at this perceived insult to France’s national strength.  This notion that the war was never lost (i.e. it "was only a ceasefire") is why Marine Le Pen was pleased by Longuet's "up yours” gesture. Inversely, an apology would amount to recognition of defeat, and therefore offer a proof of weakness in the face of an “inferior” Algerian population. From the perspective of the far right the only way to deal with the history of colonization and to maintain France’s honor is to show neither regret nor remorse ("ni regrets ni remords").

The Resistance of an Endangered Species

The question of French repentance for the crimes committed in Algeria also reveals a deeper fear that transcends the question of colonialism. Indeed, these historical claims are often linked to anxieties around sex, gender, and race. For these individuals, defending France's strength and honor by insulting an Algerian minister is part of a broader struggle to save a normative racial and heterosexual political order.[2]  For example, a media figure like Eric Zemmour, whose racist statements have provoked many a debate, has been particularly worried about the extinction of manhood. For him, French society is facing a dangerous process of feminization.[3] This intersection between gender anxiety and racism is present not only in the writings of Zemmour, but also in the non-repentance for the aforementioned French crimes committed in Algeria.

Central to the anxieties around gender normativity and colonial repentance is the claim that it is necessary to defend the country against decadence. Recently, influential members of the UMP have presented the legalization of same-sex marriage (mariage pour tous) as an imminent threat to France's demography. Even though the measure is expected to be announced within the next six months, the far right has gone so far as to claim that it would potentially signify the end of the nation.  In short, the right reject both the expression of regret for the slaughter of Algerians and the legalization of same-sex marriage because they challenge historical forms of domination based on a widely shared conception of a white and patriarchal political order. Therefore, one should not be surprised that Gérard Longuet was expressing his fierce opposition to same-sex marriage a few moments before his controversial gesture against colonial repentance. Except for Marine Le Pen, all these commentators belong to an endangered species of men who are over fifty and white. For them, changes in the structure of national and global power amount to a direct threat of castration.

Another example of this dynamic is the self-proclaimed "neo-reactionary" thinker (and longstanding defender of non-repentance), Ivan Rioufol, who writes in Le Figaro - the newspaper of reference for French conservatives. In his "praise to the up yours" (éloge au bras d'honneur), he congratulated Longuet for expressing the growing feeling of discontent among a large part of the population. For Rioufol, this dissatisfaction is reflected in the allegedly “popular” opposition to gay marriage; it is also demonstrated in the struggle against radical Islam, which for him is not based in Islamophobia, but rather stems from a drive to protect Republican values[4].  He calls for an uprising against what he views as a discourse that is merely cloned and repeated (“discours cloné"), in order to defeat homosexual communitarianism and radical Islam. In fact, Rioufol, like many French reactionary thinkers, dreams of a grassroots mobilization similar to that of the Tea Party in the United States - the people rising up in order to restore a golden age of national conservatism.

A Complex Nexus of Fears and Fantasies

Far right commentators often link colonial repentance, homosexual marriage, and “radical Islam” due to a complex nexus of fear and fantasies.  These older white men feel “surrounded” and outnumbered by a new demographic reality composed of women, homosexuals, youth, foreigners, liberals etc., all of whom are believed to undermine moral and societal cohesion. The right understands the changing political landscape as a sign of the collapse of traditional structures and evidence that the old order has been corrupted. For example, same-sex marriage is linked to terrorism while repentance is supposed to turn children of immigrants against France.

Clearly, I do not mean to imply that all of these individuals are paranoid lunatics, which would be an outrageous (but nevertheless satisfying) attack. Some of them, like Zemmour or Le Pen, also have family backgrounds that explain their position toward non-repentance. Instead, my goal here is to show that we cannot understand the behaviors of individuals like Longuet as mere expressions of longstanding racism or the trauma of repatriation. The imbrication of gender and race, past and present, guilt and pride, leads them to fight against what they perceive as a distortion of a pure and untarnished political order, i.e. white men's rule. When a reactionary singer like Michel Sardou expresses this nostalgia by glorifying the “blessed time of colonies,” it is tempting to dismiss what could pass for a grotesque farce with little political consequence. However, when a former Minister of Defense, known to have established fascist youth militias during the 1960s, is showered with praise for insulting another country, it is time for some serious national reckoning.

It is especially telling that these figures on the far right often insult those who threaten their conception of French national identity. Lionnel Luca, a member of the former presidential party, is well known for his racist provocations. In 2009, he defended the expulsion of three Afghan immigrants, arguing that, "If they were men, they would fight for their freedom in their own territory." According to him, it does not suffice to assert that French soldiers are manly because they “save” (i.e. occupy) a foreign country. It is also important to question the virility of others (namely, “brown” people), in order to ensure France’s strength and pride.

Fantasies of an imperial golden age also encourage a delusional militarism that is inspired by the heroic figures of colonial wars (for example the General Bigeard, also known as the "last french hero"). The French state itself actively participates in the maintenance of an anachronistic global military power, even while teetering dangerously close to bankruptcy. From this perspective, apologizing to Algeria would be an insult to French soldiers, "who are brave enough to defend our country's pride." As a result, Longuet's gesture is not merely an illogical provocation. It is, rather, a childish but nonetheless aggressive way of asserting power. Thus, Le Pen is gleeful about Longuet's provocation not only because of the insult itself, but because this gesture shows that, unlike President Hollande, there are still some politicians who are not "crawling" in submission to the demands of Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika.

In 2012, France is no longer an empire, and its position as a global power is also seriously under question. Given the fact that France is a geographically small country with a population of sixty million people, it should renounce its aspirations to be a global power; this era is over. Yet, the reactions generated by the question of colonial repentance express a rejection of any change to the old social and political order.  The insistence on non-repentance also demonstrates the resilience of certain anachronistic imperial behaviors, which should be understood as a form of colonial nostalgia.  Undoubtedly, it is time to work though this nexus of fears and fantasies.  Fifty years after Algerian independence, it is high time to accept the passing of empire and accept the inevitable changes in the social and political fabric of France.

This is a selection of what you might have missed on Jadaliyya last week. It also includes a list of the most read articles and videos.  Progressively, we will be featuring more content on our "Last Week on Jadaliyya" series.
 

• Quick Thoughts on the Significance of the November 2012 Palestine UN Bid
• More Quick Thoughts on Palestine at the United Nations
• Morsi and his Adversaries
• Tradition and the Anti-Politics Machine: DAM Seduced by the “Honor Crime”
• نزع القداسة عن سلطان عمان
• The Strong Egypt Party, the Constitutional Decree, and Gaza: An Interview with Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh
• "من المآسي المضاعفة للنزوح:فتيات سوريات للزواج "بثمن بخس
• What is Jadaliyya? "Portal 9" Interview with Jadaliyya Co-Founder Bassam Haddad
• A Constitution That Divides?
• Dispatch from Mohamed Mahmoud Street: Egyptian Revolts

• Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)
• Qatar: Outrageous Life Sentence for 'Jasmine Poet' (Video)

• Citizenship and the New “State of Palestine”
• حول العرب وصحوة الفن: تحذيرات من الشعوب المخدَّرة
• A Constitution That Divides?
• Israeli Supreme Court Hearing on Petition Against Anti-Boycott Law Set for 5 December
• The Draft Constitution: Some Controversial Stipulations
• November Culture
• Reports Roundup (December 1)
• Qatar and the Palestinians
• Three Poems by Saadi Youssef
• Wadih Saadeh: Because of a Cloud, Most Likely
• Egypt: New Constitution Mixed on Support of Rights
• The Strong Egypt Party, the Constitutional Decree, and Gaza: An Interview with Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh
• Hurricane Sandy Hits Little Syria: Worrying about Buildings and Brothers
• How Syria Turned Off the Internet
• Update: Thousands Converge on Tahrir for Opposition Protests
• Etel Adnan at the Base of the Mountain
• Qatar: Outrageous Life Sentence for 'Jasmine Poet' (Video)
• Maghreb Media Roundup (November 29)
• Social Justice and the Draft Constitution
• Palestine at the United Nations: A Vote for Peace and Justice
• UAE: Cybercrimes Decree Attacks Free Speech
• Morsi and his Adversaries
• More Quick Thoughts on Palestine at the United Nations
• Quick Thoughts on the Significance of the November 2012 Palestine UN Bid
• Syria Media Roundup (November 29)
• Call for Papers -- New Media, New Politics? (post-) Revolutions in Theory and Practice? (London, 26 April 2013)
• Beirut Photographer: Interview with George Azar
• الحياة الحزبية في مصر بعد الثورة ... بين الإنطلاق والتعثر
• Rules of Engagement: Documentary Filmmaking According to Tahani Rached
• Egyptian Protesters and Imprisoned Iranian Hunger Striker: Interviews with Mona El Ghobashy, Hesham Sallam and Hadi Ghaemi
• من القاهرة الجميلة - الجزء الأول
• What is Jadaliyya? "Portal 9" Interview with Jadaliyya Co-Founder Bassam Haddad
• New Texts Out Now: Elisabeth Weber, Living Together: Jacques Derrida's Communities of Violence and Peace
• New Texts Out Now: Ann Elizabeth Mayer, Islam and Human Rights
• Egypt: A Year of Abuses Against Detained Children
• Cairo Event -- Why Middle East Studies? A Discussion of the State of the Field (5 December)
• Dispatch from Mohamed Mahmoud Street: Egyptian Revolts
• Afghanistan: The Long, Hard Road to the 2014 Transition
• Arabian Peninsula Media Roundup (November 27)
• Egypt Media Roundup (November 26)
• The President and the Fatal Trilateral Logic of US, Egyptian and Israeli Relations
• نزع القداسة عن سلطان عمان
• Last Week on Jadaliyya (Nov 19-25)
• تفكيك أمننة المجتمع
• Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)

[”ملف من الأرشيف“ هي سلسة تقوم ”جدلية“ بنشرها بالعربية والإنجليزية بالتعاون مع جريدة ”السفير“ اللبنانية. الملفات ستكون لشخصيات أيقونية تركت أثراً عميقاً في الحقل السياسي والثقافي في العالم العربي.]

الإسم: غادة
الشهرة: السمان
إسم الأب:  احمد
إسم الأم: سلمى رويحة
تاريخ الولادة: 1942
الجنسية: سوريا/لبنان
مكان الولادة: دمشق
الفئة: مؤلفة
المهنة: كاتبة 

 

غادة السمان

• سورية حائزة على الجنسية اللبنانية.
• واحدة من أشهر الأديبات العربيات وأكثرهن جرأة. تركت أثراً ملحوظاً في الأدب العربي الحديث.
• ولدت سنة 1942 في قرية الشامية القريبة من مدينة دمشق.
• والدها: أحمد السمان، كان أستاذاً جامعياً وعميداً لكلية الحقوق، فوزيراً للتربية.
• والدتها: سلمى رويحة من اللاذقية.
• شقيقها: بشر.
• شقيقتها: زلفى.
• درست في الليسيه الفرنسية بدمشق، ثم انتقلت إلى مدرسة التجهيز، ونالت فيها شهادة الثانوية العامة - الفرع العلمي، وكان والدها يرغب في أن تصبح طبيبة. لكنها تمردت على هذه الرغبة والتحقت بكلية الآداب - قسم اللغة الإنكليزية في جامعة دمشق.
• عملت في أثناء دراستها الجامعية في إحدى المكتبات، ومعلمة اللغة الإنكليزية في إحدى ثانويات دمشق.
• عملت محاضرة في جامعة دمشق وصحافية ومعدة برامج في الإذاعة.
• ذهبت إلى بيروت فور تخرجها في جامعة دمشق سنة 1964، والتحقت بالجامعة الأميركية، ونالت الماجستير سنة 1966، وكانت أطروحتها عن "أدب اللامعقول".
• عاشت بين 1966 و1969 متنقلة بين لبنان والدول الأوروبية، واختلفت مع عائلتها لإصرارها على استقلاليتها الفردية والمادية.
• حكمت بالسجن ثلاثة أشهر لأنها، بحسب القانون السوري، غادرت سورية وهي موظفة من غير إذن. وجرى إبلاغها غيابياً بينما كانت في لندن. وفي الأثر طردت من عملها كمراسلة لإحدى المجلات اللبنانية.
• بدأت تنشر القصص سنة 1960، فنشرت قصتها الأولى في جريدة "الأخبار" السورية. ثم راحت تنشر قصصها في الصحف العربية، ولاسيما في مجلة "الأسبوع العربي" اللبنانية، حتى صارت صاحبة الاسم الأشهر في العالم العربي.
• تزوجت سنة 1970 الدكتور بشير الداعوق صاحب "دار الطليعة للطباعة والنشر"، ولهما ولد واحد يدعى حازم.
• عاشت في بيروت في ذروة ازدهارها الثقافي والعمراني، وساهمت بقوة في النشاط الثقافي، وباتت واحدة من أبرز الروائيات العربيات.
• مع اندلاع الحرب الأهلية في لبنان سنة 1975 وتدهور الأوضاع الأمنية في العاصمة غادرت بيروت سنة 1976 إلى باريس، وظلت تتردد على لبنان إلى أن استقرت نهائياً في باريس ابتداء من سنة 1984. وراحت تكتب الصفحة الأخيرة أسبوعياً في مجلة "الحوادث".
• في العام 1993 أحدثت ضجة كبرى في الأوساط الأدبية والسياسية عندما نشرت مجموعة رسائل عاطفية كتبها لها غسان كنفاني في الستينيات من القرن العشرين، حيث جمعتهما علاقة عاطفية لم تكن سراً آنذاك.
• أسست داراً للنشر باسم "منشورات غادة السمان".
• جمعت مقالاتها الصحافية في سلسة أطلقت عليها "الأعمال غير الكاملة" وصدرت في خمسة عشر كتاباً ولديها تسعة كتب في النصوص الشعرية.
• يضم أرشيفها غير المنشور والذي أودعته في أحد المصارف السويسرية مجاميع كثيرة من الرسائل.
• ترجمت أعمالها إلى الإنكليزية والفرنسية والبولونية والإسبانية والروسية والرومانية والإيطالية والألمانية والفارسية واليوغوسلافية وغيرها.
• بعد وفاة زوجها في سنة 2007 وتوقف مجلة "الحوادث" عن الصدور. في سنة 2011، اعتكفت في منزلها في باريس، وتوقفت عن النشر.



مؤلفاتها: 
القصص

• رحيل المرافي القديمة (1960)
• عيناك قدري (1962)
• ليل الغرباء (1966)
• زمن الحب الآخر (1978)
• الجسد حقيبة سفر (1979)
• الأعماق المحتلة (1987)
• القمر المربع (1994)

الروايات
• بيروت 1975 (1975)
• كوابيس بيروت (1976)
• لا بحر في بيروت (1962)
• غربة تحت الصفر (1986)
• ليلة المليار (1986)
• تسكع داخل جرح (1988)
• الرواية المستحيلة: فسيفساء دمشقية ( 1997)
• سهرة تنكرية للموتى (2003)
• استجواب متمردة (2011)

مقالات وكتابات أخرى وشعر: 

• حب (1973)
• أعلنت عليك الحب - مقالات (1976)
• اعتقال لحظة هاربة - شعر (1978)
• ختم الذاكرة بالشمع الأحمر (1979)
• مواطنة متلبسة بالقراءة (1979)
• السباحة في بحيرة الشيطان (1979)
• الأعمال غير الكاملة (1979)
• كتابات غير ملتزمة (1980)
• صفارة انذار داخل رأسي (1980)
• الرغيف ينبض كالقلب (1980)
• ع.غ. تتفرس (1980)
• القبيلة تستجوب القتيلة (1981)
• أشهد عكس الريح - شعر (1987)
• الترياق - شعر (1991)
• البحر يحاكم سمكة - محاورات (1986)
• الحب من الوريد إلى الوريد - شعر (1980)
• غربة تحت الصفر (1986)
• شهوة الأجنحة - أدب رحلة (1995)
• عاشقة في محبرة - شعر (1995)
• رسائل الحنين إلى الياسمين - شعر (1996)



الكتب التي تحدثت عنها:

• غادة السمان بلا أجنحة، غالي شكري (1977)
• غادة السمان الحب والحرب، إلهام غالي (1980)
• قضايا عربية في أدب غادة السمان ، حنان عودة (1980)
• الفن الروائي عند غادة السمان ، عبد العزيز سبيل (1987)
• تحرر المرأة عبر أعمال غادة وسيمون دي بوفوار ، نجلاء الاختيار (باللغة الفرنسية 1990)
• التمرد والالتزام عند غادة السمان ، باولا دي كابوا ، (باللغة الإيطالية 1991)
• غادة السمان في أعمالها غير الكاملة ، عبد اللطيف الأرناؤوط (1993)
• الجنس في أدب غادة السمان، وفيق غريزي (2011)

مواقفها:

• ”أكتب عن وطن كان سيد الدار فصار أحفاده يتسولون على أبواب الحضارات“. 
الشرق الأوسط، 14تشرين الأول (1995).
• ”الرواية لا تصير مستحيلة إلا بعد كتابتها“. النهار، 25 أيلول (1997).
• ”أنا امرأة بلا أقنعة والحرية هي مفتاح حياتي“. الوطن العربي، 27 شباط (1998).
• ”متأججة حائرة معذبة جارحة مجروحة كي أظل اكتب“. 
النهار ، 19 تشرين الأول (1999).
• ”أنا مدام بوفاري أكتب ما يحلو لي حين يحلو لي وأتلذذ بمتعة اقتراف أخطائي“. 
ملحق النهار، 20 تشرين الثاني (1999).
• ”أريد تحرير المراة لا قهر الرجل“. الشراع، 13 آذار (2000).
• ”الحب مذهل دائماً وأجمل ما في الرجل نزواته لأنها تؤكد أنه ما زال حياً“. السياسة، 9 كانون الأول (2001).
• ”والدي حمى أجنحتي وبنيت مستقبلي بحجارة الماضي“. الأنوار، 3 آذار (2002).
• ”كل رواية عندي مغامرة مستقلة لأنني كاتبة هاوية وتجريبية لا محترفة "تفرغ" الروايات في ماكينة "تفقيس" البضاعة“. المستقبل، 18 شباط (2003).
• ”وطني ليس الذي تحط فيه طائرتي بل الغيمة التي يسكنها قلبي“. القبس، 19 تموز (2005).
• ”لماذا حين نتعلم كيف نكتب يصير علينا ان نتعلم كيف نموت“. مجلة لها، 25 حزيران (2008).
• ”الأدب ليس ثرثرة بل كلمة مكتوبة قد تبقى أو قد تضيع على "رمل الطريق". 
الشراع، 5 كانون الأول (2011).

[This is a roundup of news articles and other materials circulating on Egypt and reflects a wide variety of opinions. It does not reflect the views of the Egypt Page Editors or of Jadaliyya. You may send your own recommendations for inclusion in each week's roundup to egypt@jadaliyya.com by Sunday night of every week.]  

“Amr Darrag on Egypt's 'perfect' constitution”
The secretary-general of the Constituent Assembly and member of the Freedom and Justice Party defends the draft constitutions.

“Egypt Constitutional Court postpones all sessions indefinitely”
High Constitutional Court declares open-ended strike after judges are blocked from attending a session that was to rule on the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly.

“Egypt President Morsi: I Refuse to Describe Christians as Minority”
The president responds to allegations that the current situation in Egypt is leading to a mass exodus of Christians from Egypt.

“Anti-Morsy protests bring hundreds of thousands together”
Friday’s protests at Tahrir Square denounce the president’s special privileges and the new draft constitution.

“Update: Morsy supporters take to streets, one killed by falling tree”
Friday’s protests at Cairo University show support for the president’s decisions and the new constitution.

“Abuse of power allegations levelled at government”
The opposition accuses the government of using state funds and property to support pro-Morsi protests.

“A referendum with judges, or no judges?”
As constitutional referendum is announced, judges, who have to observe the voting process, start a general strike.

“Comparison of Egypt's suspended and draft constitutions”
BBC provides an overview of the main differences between the 1971 constitution and the new draft constitution.

“Judgment day for constitution set”
Referendum date set for December 15, as experts warn against the referendum being held in crisis time.

“Egyptian labor between Morsi and Mubarak”
Controversial amendments to the trade union law passed by the president threaten the independence of trade unions.

“Transcript: TIME’s Interview with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi”
Presdient Mohamed Morsi talks about the Muslim Brotherhood, the Gaza ceasefire and the constitutional declaration.

““Final warning” marches to presidential palace”
Eighteen opposition groups plan a march on the presidential palace to protest the draft constitution and the president’s constitutional declaration.

“Update: Protesters storm Alexandria Brotherhood office, set Mansoura FJP office on fire”
Anti-Brotherhood protesters attack offices of the organization and its party across three governorates.

“50 injured in attack on FJP headquarters in Tanta”
Hundreds of protesters try to break into the party’s headquarters, after earlier clashes between Muslim Brothers and leftists.

“Egypt police fire intense teargas at anti-Morsi protesters in Tahrir Wednesday”
Police tries to disperse anti-Morsi protesters, as demonstrations continue for close to 10 days.

“New Alignment Forms To Oppose Morsi Decree” 
Sara Khorshid says anti-Morsi protests draw together revolutionary forces and former regime supporters.

“ElBaradei under fire for Constituent Assembly comments”
Islamists attack Mohamed ElBaradei after his comments suggesting that Islamist members of the Constituent Assembly deny the Holocaust.

“Thoughts on the current crisis”
Ursula Lindsey says the Muslim Brotherhood have misread their own popularity.

“Around 300 injured in Mahalla clashes”
Clashes erupt between Muslim Brotherhood youth and Ultras in the industrial town of Mahalla.

“Review: Morsy’s supporters and detractors”
The Daily News’ does an overview of what Egypt’s prominent columnists say about the current clash between opposition and regime-supporters.

“Update: Mother of Damanhour teen killed in clashes speaks out on son's death”
Islam Fathy’s mother says her son went voluntarily to the headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood, not at request of the organization.

“Islamists launch initiatives to defend Morsy”
Seif Abd El-Fatah, adviser to the president, says the first and fourth points of the constitutional declaration are negotiable.

“Head of Shura Council denies criticising Morsi's decree”
Ahmed Fahmy claims the media misquoted him and says he supports the constitutional declaration.

“Morsi's declaration to go to Administrative Court”
Administrative Court schedules 12 lawsuits filed against the constitutional declaration for December 4.

In Arabic:

“نائب الرئيس في حوار مع التلفزيون: الإعلان الدستوري يبعد القضاة عن السياسة”
Vice-President Mahmoud Mekki says that as a judge he is tempted to feel anxious because of the constitutional declaration, but he approves of it because it is designed to keep the judiciary away from politics.

“"خالد سعيد" جديد بالأسكندرية.. أسرة "عبد الله" تتهم الشرطة بضربه حتى الموت”
A young man dies in the notorious Sidi Gaber police station, as the Ministry of Interior claims that police torture is no longer happening.

“«التأسيسية» توافق على محاكمة المدنيين «عسكريًا» في الجرائم التي تضر بالجيش”
The Constituent Assembly agrees to include an article in the constitution allowing military trials of civilians for crimes that “damage” the army.

“هشام البسطويسي: نظام «المرشد» يحاول استنساخ «الديمقراطية الإيرانية» في مصر”
Reformist judge and former presidential candidate, Hisham Bastawisi says the president is trying to implement “Iranian democracy” in Egypt.

“لأننا يجب أن نلقي عليهم المولوتوف”
Ahmed Samir writes about why young men continue to get into dangerous clashes with interior ministry forces.

“عاجل.. نادي القضاة وقضاة الأقاليم يرفضون بالإجماع الإشراف علي استفتاء الدستور”
The Judges’ Club refuse to oversee the upcoming constitutional referendum.

“شركات الأتوبيس بالغربية ترفض تأجير سياراتها لنقل «الإخوان» إلى القاهرة”
Bus companies in Gharbia Governorate refuse to rent buses to transport Muslim Brothers to Cairo for the protests.

“بيان غاضب لقضاة مجلس الدولة يستنكر الإعلان الدستوري.. ويذكر مرسي بعمر بن الخطاب”
A statement by the judges of the State Council denounces the constitutional declaration.

“بالفيديو .. والد جيكا يحمل مرسي مسئولية استشهاد جابر.. ويهاجم ا«لإعلان الدستوري »”
The father of Gaber Salah, who died during clashes at Mohamed Mahmoud, accuses the president for his son’s death.

“هجوم بقذائف صاروخية علي مصنع للاسمنت بوسط سيناء”
Armed men attack a cement factory in Sinai with RPGs.

Recent Jadaliyya articles on Egypt:

The Draft Constitution: Some Controversial Stipulations
Lina Attalah outlines the main debates over the draft constitution including articles that infringe on civil rights, union rights and military and interior ministry prerogatives.

November Culture
Jadaliyya’s November Culture bulletin.

Egypt: New Constitution Mixed on Support of Rights
Human Rights Watch expresses concern about articles in the constitutions that might harm basic and civilian rights.

The Strong Egypt Party, the Constitutional Decree, and Gaza: An Interview with Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh
Former presidential candidate Abd El-Moneim Abou El-Fotouh criticizes the opposition’s approach to dealing with the recent political developments in the country.

Update: Thousands Converge on Tahrir for Opposition Protests
Marches from different parts of Cairo merge in at Tahrir Square to denounce the constitutional declaration.

Social Justice and the Draft Constitution
Nader Fergany argues that the only way to establish social justice is to overturn Egypt’s political and economic system.

Morsi and his Adversaries
Ellis Goldberg says that while through his recent decisions the Egyptian president is denying the fundamental right to the Egyptians to seek justice for harm done by the state.

Call for Papers -- New Media, New Politics? (post-) Revolutions in Theory and Practice? (London, 26 April 2013)
University of Westminster announces a call for papers on the influence of media in recent uprisings and protest movements.

الحياة الحزبية في مصر بعد الثورة ... بين الإنطلاق والتعثر
Ahmed Taha talks about the new partisan life in Egypt.

Rules of Engagement: Documentary Filmmaking According to Tahani Rached
Mai Serhan writes about Tahani Rached’s life, filmmaking and her latest project.

Egyptian Protesters and Imprisoned Iranian Hunger Striker: Interviews with Mona El Ghobashy, Hesham Sallam and Hadi Ghaemi
Mona El Ghobashy and Jadaliyya’s Hesham Sallam discuss the Egyptian president’s recent decisions and Hadi Ghaemi talks about the fate of Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh.

من القاهرة الجميلة - الجزء الأول
Amro Eletrebi writes about his experience in the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud.

Egypt: A Year of Abuses Against Detained Children
A Human Rights Watch says more than 300 children have been tortured in Egypt over the past one year.

Cairo Event -- Why Middle East Studies? A Discussion of the State of the Field (5 December)
Announcement of an event at AUC Downtown Campus on Middle East Studies.

Dispatch from Mohamed Mahmoud Street: Egyptian Revolts
Mayssoun Sukarieh tells the story of some of the young boys involved in the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud St.

The President and the Fatal Trilateral Logic of US, Egyptian and Israeli Relations
Amro Ali argues that the nature of trilateral relations between the US, Egypt and Israel influences the Egyptian president’s illiberal decisions in domestic politics.                 

تفكيك أمننة المجتمع
Aly Al Raggal discusses the presence of the security discourse across public fields and social layers.

Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)
Bassem Youssef’s episode of “The Show” dedicated to the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud from last year.

Democracy, Democracy, But The Courts Can’t Touch Me
Seif Fawzy says the hope for the revolution lies with the judiciary.

One of the more remarkable yet less remarked upon moments of the recent Israeli massacre in Gaza came when the Qassam Brigades gave a press conference on 17 November. They had a message for the Israeli public: “It was your leadership,” they said, “that dragged you into this and into the shelters to score cheap political points.”

The causes for the latest Israeli massacre in Gaza are more complex than the Qassam Brigades statement made them out to be. The main driver is the restoration of Israeli “deterrence,” carried out through the evisceration of the resistance capacities of the Palestinian people and an attempt to obliterate the national will and resilience of Palestinian society. This rejuvenation requires an occasional blitz of the coastal strip, at least from the blinkered perspective of Israeli generals who speak only the language of force and Israeli politicians who speak only the language of fear. 

But placing the balky analysis to the side, what’s more important and truly stunning is that the Qassam Brigades were making an open anti-government appeal to the people of Israel. 

It was well-placed. 

Any hard look at the numbers makes it clear that Israel undertakes bombardments of the Gaza Strip in the full expectation that they will lead to a short-term uptick in Palestinian rocketry. Of the twenty-six people killed due to rockets from Gaza over the last eight-and-a-half years, seven died after the inception of the Cast Lead and Pillar of Cloud massacres, operations supposedly engineered to stop rocket attacks. 

Before the latter operation, a year had elapsed since the previous fatality due to munitions from Gaza. Twenty-five percent of the deaths from Palestinian weapons occurred in the one-month periods of the 2008-2009 and 2012 Israeli assaults – just one percent of the total time-span during which Palestinians have been launching rockets from there. 

So stopping Palestinian rockets is not a plausible explanation for Israeli attacks. Indeed, the Israeli leadership – at best – does not care much about such deaths, posturing to the contrary. There’s a reason for that. The Zionist political and intellectual elite makes a lot of cantankerous noises about the rockets falling on southern Israel, usually accompanied by the question, how would you respond if rockets were falling on your head? But less frequently noted is whose heads those rockets are falling upon. Sderot and other southern cities are not merely populated by Jewish Israelis. They are also populated by mostly Mizrahi, usually lower-class, Jewish Israelis, the outcome of a planning regime which puts some populations of Jews in some places and kept other populations of Jews in others. 

Sderot, summoned up so sedulously as the very symbol of Israeli terror and fear due to Hamas’s – mostly ineffectual – rockets was initially a transit camp for Kurdish and Persian Jews. Later, it was populated by Moroccans. And still later, Ethiopians and the darker Jews of the ex-Soviet Caucasus. That was where they were dumped, with the European elites concerned, according to a 1950 Jewish Agency brochure, that the darker Jews might create “quarters of poverty, filth, unemployment, and crime.” Accordingly, there needed to be “a greater effort to settle the immigrants in the countryside.” And so they were.

The Ashkenazi founders and the “new classes” did not, for the most part, choose to live so close to the Gaza Strip, whence Palestinians still came in those times to try to harvest crops or return to their land, and later from which came the Fedayeen, before the Israeli “border wars” had hardened the armistice lines of Israel into impermeable steel.

And so Tel Aviv, the cosmopolitan, Ashkenazi, cultural core of Israel could remain distant from the front lines of the conflict created by the policies pursued by its economic and political elites, while the cannon fodder on the Israeli periphery would bear their brunt.

A glance at the names of the dead from the rocket attacks on Sderot and elsewhere reveal much of the truth of Israel’s “security” policies. Of the twenty-six dead, four are likely Ashkenazi, or of European extraction. Two are Bukharian. Four are Moroccan. One is Ethiopian. One is Persian. One is Russian. And five are Mizrahi. Most of the rest seem a mixture of Thai and Palestinian, either workers or soldiers. Given that many Israeli Jews of all backgrounds have “Hebraicized” names, not all are clearly identifiable. But given mappings of ethnicity and class within the Israeli Jewish population, the pattern is clear: defensive Palestinian rockets do not tend to kill the rich within Israel, but the poor.

Some in Sderot have been aware of what their government has done to them. In January 2008, at a demonstration at the Erez Crossing against the blockade, a 17 year old from Sderot, Shir Shudzik, said: “Every time I go to a train station or to a supermarket, and I hear the PA system switching on, I jump, because it sounds like the beginning of the rocket alarm. But I know I'm not alone in this situation, that people are suffering even worse on the other side.” Shudzik knew what the rulers of Israel do not want known: that they are responsible for nearly every death on both sides of the conflict. But as she also knew very well, any comparison between the plight of Israelis hiding from Qassams and Palestinians in Gaza hiding from F-16s and Apaches cannot be exact. There’s no equivalence between the mechanized and profitable violence of the Israeli army and the guerrilla defense of the Palestinian militias.

Of course, Shudzik was isolated, and the dominant response within Israeli society is not one of solidarity. Instead, it is one of fear, support for “retaliatory” violence, as well as a hankering for the feeling of security provided by the “Iron Dome” missile batteries. 

That is placing to the side whether “Iron Dome” even works. It probably does not, except in the traditional sense in which policies work in Israeli society: they work to funnel American and Israeli tax dollars to the American and Israeli military contractors which manufacture the weapons off which the American and Israeli elites get fat, while at the same time doing good ideological work in positioning the state as the guarantor of the “security” from threats which it itself provokes – a social role which Charles Tilly famously likened to that of organized crime.

Indeed, despite the government’s hyper-ventilations about the threat posed by rocket fire, it has no problem putting poorer Israelis directly in harm’s way. That threat is exactly what creates and reinforces the atmosphere of fear and jingoism that underlays the “security” discourse which justifies every act of state aggression and state terror. When the government complains about the threat posed by the rockets to the people of southern Israel, there is zero reason to take it at its word, as it is a threat the government “cares” about only after its own policies have magnified it – a dynamic which will, however, shift as the operational capacities of the missile brigades in Gaza extend to the larger metropolitan areas within which affluent Israelis are ensconced.

Once one sees Israeli “security” policies as simultaneously a ruling-class strategy of social control and a framework for capitalist accumulation, one can assess where they are most vulnerable.

Gramsci, in theorizing revolutionary strategy, differentiated between a “war of position” and a “war of movement.” The former comprised a series of maneuvers operating on multiple levels simultaneously, but oriented to breaking down the barriers in civil society which protected the iron core of class power. The latter referred to an open, frontal assault on state power – the model of the Russian Revolution, or most classic anti-colonial struggles.

A “war of position” corresponds to a mode of elite control characterized by a mix of domination and consent – hegemony – whereas a “war of movement” corresponds to a mode of elite control premised essentially on brute force – domination. 

In the Qassam Brigades’ clear appeal to the people of Israel to assign culpability to the government whose policies of occupation and aggression make retaliatory rocket fire inevitable, they were making a carefully calibrated pitch, intended to fracture the hegemony of the “security” discourse – a war of position in the Gramscian sense.

Of course, most of the Hamas propaganda is not nearly so sophisticated, mostly consisting of threats to the Israeli population, thereby bolstering the security discourse which some fragments of their messaging is intended to erode. The end result is a muddle, with most Israelis still marinated in fear. But the move by the Qassam Brigades, even if utterly contradicted by other rhetoric, is still interesting, for the latent strategy is one that is oriented towards drawing attention to the fissures within an Israeli society that is already among the most unequal in the industrialized world, and clarifying to the Israeli people that although they are without question members of the colonizing class, they too are victims of the Israeli elites, and that if they wish to stop living in fear, they ought stop foisting the blame for their fear upon the rockets of the resistance and start looking to their own venal and cynical rulers and the larger system of power within which those rulers nest.

Thanks to Matan Kaminer for help with names, and other corrections.

 [This is a roundup of news articles and other materials circulating on Occupation, Intervention, and Law and reflects a wide variety of opinions. It does not reflect the views of the O.I.L. Page Editors or of Jadaliyya. You may send your own recommendations for inclusion in each biweekly roundup to OIL@jadaliyya.com by Monday night of every other week]

Commentary

"Obama’s pick for CIA could affect drone program", Greg Miller
President Obama’s choice of successor to CIA director David Petraeus, a proponent of the agency’s drone fleet, may signal the administration’s desire to continue or back off from the agency’s “pronounced shift toward paramilitary operations”, Miller writes. 

"Palestine as a UN Observer State: Does this Make Palestine a State?", Dapo Akande
Akande argues in a post on EJIL Talk! that while the recent vote to upgrade Palestine’s status at the UN to that of nonmember observer does not grant Palestine statehood, or even membership in the UN, it is an act of “collective recognition” that, depending on the reaction of the ICC, ICJ, and United Nations itself, may lead to in all but name, statehood.

“Rules for Targeted Killing”, The New York Times
The Times responds to a recent report that, following Mitt Romney’s defeat in the Presidential election, the Obama Administration has chosen to develop a “legal architecture” for targeted killing “at a more leisurely pace”, finding the decision to set up rules admirable but the cynical political circumstances of their development reprehensible. The Time also argues the rules should be, rather than kept confidential, “shown to a world skeptical of countries that use deadly force without explanation.”

"Reining in Obama and His Drones", Ralph Nader
Writing for Counterpunch, Nader writes that in the absence of a “legal architecture” for targeted killing, the Obama Administration’s drone program is unconstitutional and warns that other countries will remember the administration’s “green-light on illegal unilaterialism” should they acquire similar capabilities to use drones.

"Is the US Really Ending the War in Afghanistan?", Dave Lindorff
Lindorff criticizes the Pentagon’s decision to keep at least 10,000 US troops stationed in Afghanistan indefinitely after the 2014 deadline for withdrawal despite assertions from the President during his re-election campaign that the US would be “totally” out of Iraq by this time; whether the administration is ending the war, Lindorff writes, depends on one’s definition of ‘war’. 

"Exile and the Prophetic: Benjamin Netanyahu’s self-constructed hologram", Marc H. Ellis
Ellis, for his “Exile and the Prophetic” column on Mondoweiss, is reminded of Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu by recent criticisms of David Petraeus as a “hollow” military hero who failed to achieve real strategic success in Iraq or Afghanistan. With Netanyahu’s upcoming re-election imminent, Ellis alarmingly asserts that while few in the international community see Netanyahu as a “serious political strategist who might bring Israel…to safety, security and stability”, Netanyahu’s “hollow’ image is backed by enormous military and political power.

"AP’s Dangerous Iran Hoax demands an accounting and explanation", Glenn Greenwald
Writing for The Guardian’s “Comment is Free”, Greenwald reports a recent Associated Press report of a graph showing evidence of Iran’s nuclear weapons program—a graph that appears to have been “either slipshod analysis or [an] amateurish hoax”, writing that AP’s publishing the graph under an inflammatory headline is indicative of “AP allowing itself, eagerly and gratefully, to be used to put its stamp of credibility on a ridiculous though destructive hoax”. 
 

News

"UN general assembly recognises Palestinian state – as it happened", Matthew Weaver and Tom McCarthy
A liveblog of the UN vote and subsequent approval of the plan to upgrade Palestine to a ‘nonmember observer state’ of the assembly, including a short analysis of what the large majority in favor of the plan means for future peace negotiations.  

"White House opposed new Iran sanctions", Josh Rogin
Writing for Foreign Policy Magazine’s “The Cable” blog, Rogin summarizes a recent Senate plan to amend current economic sanctions on Iran so as to make the sanctions far more aggressive, as well as the White House’s response that more sanctions aren’t necessary or prudent at the moment.

"US drones kill 3 'militants' in 1st strike in Pakistan in more than a month", Bill Roggio
The Long War Journal reports that in the first drone strike recorded in Pakistan in more than a month, three militants have been killed.  The thirty-six day long hiatus is the second longest hiatus in the program since its apparent launch in the summer of 2008, a length the Obama administration refused to comment on.

"Facebook ‘Likes’ Considered Key Evidence In ‘Terrorist’ Plot", Mike Masnick
TechDirt reports on a recent FBI indictment of three men terrorism-related charges, noting that the suspects’ past ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ on Facebook were listed as evidence of their material support for terrorism.

"In pretrial hearing, Army private Bradley Manning tells court of harsh prison conditions", Julie Tate
Tate, writing for the Washington Post, describes Pfc. Manning’s pretrial hearing, in which he testified of poor conditions of his confinement at a Marine Corps brig at Quantico, Virginia.  Manning’s lawyer has argued that such conditions are unlawful and amount to punishment enough, filing a motion asking the judge to dismiss the charges or reduce any sentence. 

"Report: Hamas leader Meshal to visit Gaza for first time", Associated Press
Khaled Meshal, leader of Hamas’ political bureau, plans to visit the Gaza Strip for the first time on Hamas’ 25th anniversary, both to commemorate the anniversary and congratulate Hamas’ leaders on its actions during Operation Pillar of Cloud.

"Israel confiscates Palestinian funds", Al-Akhbar English
As “punishment” for refusing to halt its United Nations bid, Israel intends to withhold $120 million in Palestinian funds, a move likely to affect PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ ability to pay the salaries of civil servants in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, Israeli finance minister Yuval Steinitz has told Israeli radio.  Also reported is Israel’s recent move to expand settlements in the territories, a move Steinitz also characterizes as a reaction to the UN bid.
 

Blogs

"For the First Time, Obama Official Sketches Out End to War on Terror", Spencer Ackerman
Pentagon General Counsel Jeh Johnson gave a speech recently articulating what an end to the War on Terrorism might look like, asserting that the war ends when al-Qaeda’s ability to launch a strategic attack does, a moment he calls a “tipping point” from war to mere “counterterrorism effort”.  Ackerman writes that the speech raises more questions than it answer, namely about the precise nature of such a tipping point, and the fate of Guantanamo detainees upon the achievement of such a point.  Jack Goldsmith makes a similar argument on Lawfare, writing the speech is full of too many generalities to tell us much about the end of the war, while Deborah Pearlstein is more optimistic of the speech’s significance on Opinio Juris.  

"Yes, Palestine Could Accept the ICC’s Jurisdiction Retroactively", Kevin Jon Heller
Heller asserts that the Rome Statute’s text holds that a state may file a declaration with the ICC accepting the court’s jurisdiction retroactively, and that Palestine may ergo accept the Court’s jurisdiction retroactive to 1 July 2002 (the date the Rome Statute entered force); he warns, though, that the ambiguity of much of Israel’s crimes in Gaza leave Palestine with a difficult road towards prosecuting Israeli impunity there.  Jennifer Trahan responds on IntLawGrrls that Heller’s reading of the Rome Statute is difficult to justify and takes advantage of a “lack of clarity” in the text.

"Will the siege on Gaza finally be lifted?", Jillian Kestler-D’Amours
Kestler-D’Amours addresses and agrees with UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Head Ramesh Rajasingham’s assertion that lifting the Israeli blockade of Gaza is the only way to address “chronic humanitarian need” in the area following Operation Pillar of Cloud.

"Why The Brits Abstained", Hannah Weisfeld
Weisfeld writes for the Daily Beast’s “Open Zion” blog that the United Kingdom’s abstention from the recent vote to upgrade Palestine’s UN status was motivated out of a concern that that the talks would anger Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu to a degree so as to derail future talks—a position Weisfeld equates with being “scared of Bibi”.

 
Reports

"Egypt’s Draft Constitution Translated", Nariman Youssef
Egypt Independent provides an English translation of Egypt’s recent controversial draft constitution.

"The Conflict Against Al Qaeda and its Affiliates: How Will It End?", Jeh C. Johnson
Contains the full text of a recent speech given by the Pentagon General Counsel on what a “tipping point” towards an end to the war on terror might look like. 

Conferences

"Military Justice? Palestinians in Israeli Courts"; 3 December 2012; Heyman Center, Columbia University; RSVP on Facebook here.

"Conference: Critical Approaches to International Criminal Law"; 6-7 December 2012;  University of Liverpool School of Law and Social Justice; Respond to call for papers here. 

"Conference: Conduct of Hostilities and Law Enforcement: A Contradiction in Terms?"; 3-4 December 2012; Respond to call for papers here.

On Jadaliyya

[This is a roundup of news articles and other materials circulating on the Arabian Peninsula and reflects a wide variety of opinions. It does not reflect the views of the Arabian Peninsula Page Editors or of Jadaliyya. You may send your own recommendations for inclusion in each week's roundup to ap@jadaliyya.com by Monday night of every week.]

Reports and opinions

Saudis detain families at rights protests A news report on the arrest of dozens of Saudi civilians who were demanding the release of their jailed relatives, on Gulf News.

Qatari poet Mohammad Al-Ajami sentenced to life in prison A news report on Al-Ajami’s sentence for “insulting the Emir” and “inciting to overthrow the regime,” on Doha News.

Qatari poet jailed for life to appeal A news report on Al-Ajami’s lawyer’s assertion that the poet will appeal the life sentence, on Al-Jazeera English.

Discounted Saudi Crude Shape Refiners’ Political Contributions, Paper Finds Justin Lahart reports on Jennifer Peck’s paper, which states that Saudi Aramco sold crude to U.S. refiners at a considerable discount from 1991 to 2003, in Wall Street Journal.

Kuwaiti lawyer appeals sentence for religious insults A news report on Khaled Al-Shatti’s appeal against a one-year jail sentence for “insulting Sunni Islam,” on Your Middle East.

Can Qatar’s food security plan ripen? A featured report on Qatar’s experiment with solar power to desalinate water in its efforts to produce most of its food within the next decade, on Al-Jazeera English.

Living poor in Saudi Arabia A photo gallery of the conditions of poor Saudis, in The Washington Post.

In Saudi Arabia, unemployment and booming population drive growing poverty, Kevin Sullivan writes on poverty in the kingdom, in The Washington Post.

Bahraini MP burns Israeli flag in parliament, escapes punitive action A news report on Osama Al-Tamimi who burned the Israel flag to protest the bombing of Gaza, on Al Arabiya News.

Missing ‘Saudigate’ Documents in Sweden Spur Call for Inquiry A news report on the uproar over the removal of the “Saudigate affair” on arms deals from public files. 

Gentrification and Xenophobia in the Gulf Mona Kareem writes on the plights of migrant workers in the Gulf state, on Al-Akhbar English.

Repression in Bahrain

Bahrain police deploy teargas at anti-Kim Kardashian protest A news report on clashes between the police and hardline Islamic protesters in Bahrain.

An intolerable status quo in Bahrain Elisa Massimino describes the hearings for twenty-eight medics, which she attended in Doha, in The Washington Post.

US Mass Media ignore Bahrain until Kim Kardashian gives them Tow Reasons not To Juan Cole examines the coverage of Bahrain’s news in American news channels, on his blog Informed Comment.

Parliamentary Elections in Kuwait 

Voting ends in Kuwait amidst call for boycott A news report on the parliamentary elections in Kuwait last Saturday, on Al-Jazeera English. 

Kuwait election turnout shrinks after opposition boycott Ian Black reports on the parliamentary elections, in The Guardian.

Shia minority makes gains in Kuwait election A news report on the electoral results, on Al-Jazeera English.

Crisis in Yemen

Saudi diplomat killed in Yemeni capital A news report on the assassination of a Saudi military official and his guard in Sanaa, on Al-Jazeera English.

U.S. Buys Yemen a Fleet of Spy Planes for Growing Shadow War Spencer Ackerman analyzes the Pentagon’s decision to buy piloted spy planes for Yemen, on Wired.

Human Rights Watch

UAE No Model of Progress Joe Stork argues against the claim by the Italian ambassador to the United Arab Emirates that the Gulf state is “a model of intolerance.”

UAE: Cybercrimes Decree Attacks Free Speech A statement by the organization condemning the new federal decree on cybercrimes for the threat it poses for liberty and peaceful protests.

The State of Kuwait Mariwan Hama examines the impact of the new electoral law confirmed by the Kuwait emir on the political crisis in the country.

Climate Talks

Gulf states quiet on climate change pledges Sam Bollier writes on the failure to cut emissions, and on the growing of green energy projects in the Gulf states, on Al-Jazeera English.

Protest in Qatar calls for climate action A news report on protests during the eighteenth United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Doha, on Al-Jazeera English.

Doha: a strange place to host a climate-change conference Fiona Harvey reflects on the paradox of holding the eighteenth United Nations Climate Change Conference in Doha, in The Guardian.

Urban Landscape in Mecca

The Bin Laden conglomerate “wants to turn Mecca into Las Vegas” A France 24 article on the destruction of historical sites in Mecca.
 

Arabic

In recent months, more and more quarters of respectable opinion have sounded the alarm that at some undefined point in the future, partition of Israel/Palestine along the 1967 lines will no longer be “feasible.” Yet any ensuing fights over the accuracy – or even the public acceptability – of such announcements miss how far ahead the Zionist right is on these questions. Unwedded to any pieties about “moderation” or the “two-state solution,” some Zionists have floated the idea of formally annexing the West Bank and extending citizenship to Palestinians – but with the massive asterisk of excluding the 1.7 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in order to forestall a clear indigenous demographic majority.

While one can ridicule this proposal as a non-starter, it is a helpful reminder of the dangers lurking ahead for the Palestinian national movement in the wake of Israel’s onslaught against the Gaza Strip last month. The cease-fire agreement that ended the latest conflagration has been seen by both supporters and critics as a political victory for Hamas. Yet historically, greater autonomy for Palestinians in Gaza – be it under Fatah after the first Intifada or Hamas after the second – has come at the expense of broader solidarity. There is again a danger that Israel will exploit short-term Palestinian gains on the ground in order to further deepen the political disconnect between the Gaza Strip and the rest of the Palestinian people. If such trends continue, then the proposal above of an open apartheid regime with a Jewish majority made possible by removing Gaza from the demographic equation may not be such a remote possibility after all.
 

Demanding Subjects

Since 2005, Israel has developed an unusual, and perhaps unprecedented, experiment in colonial management in the Gaza Strip: it has sought to isolate Palestinians there from the outside world, render them utterly dependent on external benevolence, and absolve Israel of responsibility toward them, all at the same time. The problem with all experiments – especially when the subjects are not chemical compounds or animals but human beings with claims to freedom and dignity, which is to say that they are demanding subjects in all senses of the phrase – is that they can sometimes blow up in your face, quite literally. In order to better understand the dynamics at work, let us turn to the South African example by way of contrast.

When Ariel Sharon first floated the disengagement plan in 2004, the Israeli political columnist Akiva Eldar noted that it was “amazingly similar” to the Bantustan scheme, in which apartheid South Africa concentrated much of the native population in a series of disconnected, landlocked enclaves. The hope was that the illusion of independence or autonomy for black South Africans living in these “homelands” would placate international criticism of the apartheid regime.

Israel strived to succeed where South Africa failed, and two factors weighed in its favor. First, the Bantustans were designed to warehouse natives commuting to work in the rest of the country. In contrast, Israel’s unilateral disengagement spelled the end of Israel’s reliance on labor from Gaza, largely curtailing the possibility for meaningful civil disobedience.  It is much harder to have a “Palestinian Gandhi,” after all, among a population who you do not ask to work or pay taxes. Second, South Africa tried and failed to convince the international community to recognize the Bantustans as independent states, which would have entailed depriving of millions of people of South African citizenship. In contrast, the international community has long considered the West Bank and Gaza as occupied territories, meaning Israel cannot legally claim them as its own but by the same token need not grant the inhabitants citizenship in the first place.

Despite these undeniable advantages over its South African counterpart (to say nothing of a less lopsided demographic distribution vis-à-vis natives and a Very Special relationship with the United States), Israel’s control over the Gaza Strip faces the same basic problem that plagued the Bantustan project: a shift to indirect control does not end resistance, it merely reshapes its opportunities and constraints. The “native” chiefs who ruled the Bantustans in collaboration with the apartheid regime faced considerable opposition from their own populations. As long as the Bantustans were a vehicle for the immiseration and exploitation of natives, it was inevitable that chiefs would be branded as collaborators and forced either to switch sides or to go down with their patrons. In the late 1980s, a group of chiefs in South African Bantustans, sensing the shift in prevailing winds, broke from the apartheid regime and aligned with the African National Congress. In 1988, South African troops had to invade Bophuthatswana–the second-largest of the four “independent” homelands—in order to reverse a coup against Pretoria’s local surrogate.
 

Reckless Abandon

As in South Africa, Israel has allowed some natives to manage some of their own affairs as a way to maintain the illusion that Palestinians have been making progress toward independence and sovereignty. In the Gaza Strip, however, this process of controlled abandonment has been no less messy than the Bantustan experiment. The near-total isolation imposed on the Gaza Strip entailed a significant gamble for Israel: it could retain overwhelming power in dictating the conditions of everyday life – including how much electricity and food Palestinians could consume – but it gave up significant leverage in influencing political developments on the ground. Although this latest stage of colonial rule left the structure of native administration – the “Palestinian National Authority” (PNA) – largely intact, Israel could no longer control the selection of its native chiefs. Using ground forces to prop up Fatah against its rival Hamas was no longer an option.

Nevertheless, the Hamas takeover of PNA institutions – electorally in 2006, practically in 2007 – seemed to Israel a price worth paying. Hamas faces many of the same constraints on its rule as its predecessors did, including dependence on Israel for electricity, fuel, even cash for the economy (armored trucks continue to deliver shekels to Gaza for use in banks that Israel can then bomb in turn). Meanwhile Hamas’s armed capabilities remain far less lethal than the ambushes and infiltrations that afflicted Israeli military bases and colonies within the Gaza Strip prior to disengagement. And most importantly, Hamas served as a convenient “radical” bogeyman to justify the lack of any movement on the diplomatic track. This reconfigured space paved the way for displays of overt violence unprecedented in the history of the occupation. Declaring Gaza a “hostile entity” with an illusion of parity, Israel could accordingly employ airpower with even greater abandon than before, hoping that spectacular and indiscriminate bombardment (infamously shrugged off as “mowing the lawn”) would cow the civilian population.

Yet the latest aggression, Operation Pillar of Cloud, demonstrated the limits of Israel’s experiment in indirect control and isolation. First, Palestinians now managed to make some use of the post-2005 contours for resistance. By moving from street patrols and fortifications to aerial bombing over the past two decades, Israel had deprived Palestinians of any readily accessible targets. This had rendered both civil disobedience and traditional guerrilla warfare unavailing, hence a shift to manufacturing projectiles. If Gaza was the first place for Israel to test out a strategy of long-distance control, then it should not be a surprise that Gaza was the first native reserve in Palestine to develop some form of long-distance military capability, however limited. As mentioned above, this shift seemed to have worked to Israel’s overall benefit until recently, since the rockets were largely ineffective in imposing tactical losses or political costs. But now that Hamas has demonstrated its ability to threaten Tel Aviv and Jerusalem despite sustained bombardment, the calculus for military action has been altered. Startled, Israel now needs time to reconsider options in light of its own domestic elections and the shifting regional environment. Hence Netanyahu’s precipitous acceptance of a cease-fire.

Second, Israel’s resort to indiscriminate bombing as a way to intimidate the population paradoxically drove the people and Hamas to stand together in a way that even the more punishing, numbing structural violence of the siege did not. After all, the main effect of the siege was to create conditions under which Hamas could extract rents by taxing the tunnel smuggling trade, which was hardly conducive to building solidarity. But Israel’s bombs struck Hamas and non-Hamas alike. In South Africa, native administration became the target of anti-colonial resentment; in a curious contrast, Israel’s unusual combination of indirect rule and spectacular violence has forced Hamas to simultaneously play the roles of both partner and adversary.

To understand Hamas as being in partnership with Israel is not to accuse it of “collaboration,” nor to dismiss the enormous sacrifices made by the people of Gaza. It is merely to recognize a hard fact: As long as Israel wants to maintain a veto over vital aspects of ruling Gaza, and Palestinians do not want Gaza to be permanently severed from the rest of the country, then Israel and Hamas are stuck with one another and must deal with one another, be it through words or bombs. Whether the PNA is run by Fatah or Hamas, it remains de jure and de facto an entity that administers Palestinian life on behalf of Israel and is ultimately dependent on the colonial power. Last month witnessed a violent renegotiation of the terms of this partnership in Hamas’ favor; whether this yields any benefits for Palestinians in Gaza is a separate matter.

Marginal Gains

If one accepts that Hamas emerged victorious in the latest round by demonstrating a limited ability to deter an Israeli ground assault, it is unclear how this could help impede, let alone reverse, colonization elsewhere in Israel/Palestine. Popular resistance to land seizures and “Judaization” persists on both sides of the Green Line, but remains scattered and disconnected from broader political formations. And in the West Bank specifically, Israel has made more progress in learning from the Bantustans: it subjects Palestinians there to less isolation and privation than their brethren in Gaza and also maintains a more direct military presence, thereby ensuring that the PNA remains in the hands of Fatah, its more pliable partner.

Yet despite all of Israel’s problems with managing the Gaza Strip, the territory continues to maintain an important function: to help the Zionist project re-balance its demographic books. Between the river and the sea is a regime that calls itself the state of the Jewish people, but half of those living under its writ are not Jews. The Gaza Strip includes one out of every four members of this “troublesome” population, packed into a tiny corner of the whole country. Israel’s marginalization of Gaza is in many ways an attempt to ignore the question of how to build a common political community with the indigenous population, an effort to postpone Zionism’s reckoning with equality.

Commentators who frame their critiques in terms of Israel acting against its own best interests have once again trotted out the empty cliché that Israel has empowered “radicals” over “moderates.” The real paradox of Hamas’ “victory,” however, lies elsewhere: that if Israel decides against all odds to actually honor the cease-fire and improve conditions in the Gaza Strip, that Hamas will be tempted to opt for unmolested and undisputed rule in its tiny corner of the land over the more arduous and risky path of working to reconstitute a broader liberation movement encompassing Palestinians everywhere.  Until struggles in Gaza can be strategically connected to Palestinian and allied mobilizations elsewhere, however, Israel will face setbacks but not defeat.

[Infographic illustrating geographical, socioeconomic, humanitarian, political and civilian divisions that dictate Palestinian existence.  image by Michal Wexler.  Download high-res version here.]

One of the most wrenching images from the November 2012 conflict between Israel and Hamas was that of BBC journalist Jihad Masharawi holding the shrouded body of his eleven-month-old son. His face is gripped with agony, his eyes closed as he looks upward. We can imagine that he feels utterly alone in his grief, but he must also be aware of the men around him in this hospital room. Some or all of the men are likely fathers, uncles, or older brothers to young children. They reach out to touch Masharawi on his shoulder. In their downcast glances, I feel I recognize the strange shame of people who wish they could do more. Behind the camera, taking the picture, is a colleague, Majed Hamdan, a photographer for the Associated Press. Behind the photographer are all of us.

The photograph was on the front page of the TheWashington Post on 15 November, and apparently it caused a hassle for the paper. According to ombudsman Patrick Pexton, many accused its placement of being biased. Many asked why this image was not “balanced” with one of Israeli suffering. Pexton replied that no such image existed, since, as of the day of Masharawi’s son’s death, no Israeli civilians had been killed by Gaza rocket fire for over a year. Pexton also described the fundamental imbalance in arms between Israel and Hamas, and concluded, “Let’s be clear: The overwhelming majority of rockets fired from Gaza are like bee stings on the Israeli bear’s behind.”

He is suggesting, but does not say outright, that an expectation of balance is unreasonable not only because an equivalent image from the “other side” may not be available but for another reason as well. Expecting balance obfuscates our understanding of conflicts that are not in reality balanced. Israel has some of the most advanced military technology in the world. Hamas has rockets with limited range and accuracy. Even more fundamentally, Israel remains the occupying power over Gaza, and thus has ultimate responsibility for civilian welfare—as well as a legal responsibility to end the occupation. (The metaphor of balance and the seesaw image it evokes has other problems, too. The myth of “two sides” to the conflict obscures differences of opinion and hierarchies of power within Israeli and Palestinian societies.)

If balance is not a good guiding value when producing news about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, then how else can we evaluate the newsworthiness of this image? For Paxton, the strength of the photograph is in its universality. He writes, “That the man is Palestinian—not a terrorist but a journalist—and that the bomb was dropped by Israelis, to my mind is almost beside the point. This photo depicted loss and pain, the horrific cost to innocents on both sides of the violence in the Middle East.”

This universalizing quality is an important value, but the strength of an image also lies in the way in which it can speak to multiple audiences at once. Many Americans will look at this picture in the universal way that Paxton does and see a father, any father. Perhaps they will experience a moment of surprise when they realize that this man is Palestinian—and a BBC journalist at that. Some audiences need no schooling on Palestinians’ flesh-and-blood, heart-and-soul humanity, but for a broader public photographs such as this one are an important reminder of the insecurity faced by most Palestinians as they try to care for loved ones. But for those who follow the Israeli-Palestinian conflict closely, this image carries a slightly different meaning since it falls into a whole series that shows Palestinian parents’ inability to protect their children in the face of large-scale Israeli violence. There is the image of Muhammad Al-Durrah, killed by Israeli gunfire, being cradled by his father. There is also Huda Ghalia weeping on the beach in Gaza near the body of her father and five of her siblings. There are others. And now we have this image.

Whether one sees it as an image of universal suffering as a result of war or as a particularly Palestinian image, photographs like this summon honest introspection and difficult feelings, perhaps even more than the bloody images of conflict that often cause viewers to avert their eyes. Given news standards that lead journalists all too often to focus on leaders’ statements and casualty statistics, it is a small moral breakthrough that this image should take up space on the front page of a major paper. It is an invitation to feel something about a Palestinian family far removed from Washington, DC.

Yet, photographs like this one have provoked the argument that dead children are part of Hamas’ media strategy. According to this argument, Hamas baits Israel into killing Palestinian children in order to make Israel look bad. On 18 November, 2012, a post on HonestReporting concluded, “The media must acknowledge that dead babies and children play an essential role in Hamas’ propaganda war.” A few days later, in a blog entry entitled “The Media Bear Some Responsibility for Civilian Deaths in Gaza,” law professor Alan Dershowitz took the argument a step further by asserting that the media are complicit in the deaths of Palestinian children: “If the international community and the media want the conflict between Hamas and Israel to end, they (OR: we) must stop encouraging this gruesome Hamas tactic.”

On 28 November, 2012 in TheWashington Post’s op-ed pages, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, picked up the argument. Oren asserted that Hamas has a strategy of making it seem as though Israel is perpetrating war crimes, and that the US media “help advance its strategy.” “Hamas knows,” he writes, “that it cannot destroy us militarily but believes that it might do so through the media.” In other words, while Israeli missiles killed an estimated 103 civilians—including three journalists and 33 children—and Hamas rockets killed four Israeli civilians during the November fighting, and even though Israel has been carrying out a crippling economicblockade against Gaza for five years, it is Hamas that poses the existential threat to the state of Israel via its media strategy.

Because I have been researching this topic, I know that this is not the first time such an argument has been made. It is, of course, impossible for a photograph of a dead child, or even many photographs of many dead children, to destroy the state of Israel. Israel’s public image certainly influences its economy, military strategies, and negotiating position, but a direct cause and effect argument is extremely weak. This is not the only problem with the argument. The claim that Hamas intends to have Palestinian children killed for the sake of international media is unsubstantiated, to say the very least. The contention that the media are complicit with Hamas or even with a broader Palestinian perspective is also, of course, rathertendentious. But what bothers me the most right now is that given the amount of blood being shed, it is disingenuous of the Israeli ambassador to equate potential damage to Israel’s image with the loss of lives and homes that the phrase “existential threat” evokes. Given that Israeli missiles endangered and killed journalists last month, it is especially distasteful for him to blame journalists.

It is hard enough to learn about the world and care about people we have never met without having to read op-eds by officials that try the limits of logic. So I must return from that cliff of disdain to the concrete losses: that of Jihad Masharawi, and all of the other Palestinian and Israeli mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and friends who have lost loved ones in this conflict, lost to missiles and bullets and rockets and bombs and jail cells, as the Israeli government continues to perpetuate its control over another people.

This is a monthly archive of pieces written by Jadaliyya contributors and editors on Egypt. It also includes material published on other platforms that editors deemed pertinent to post as they provide diverse depictions of Egypt-related topics. The pieces reflect the level of critical analysis and diversity that Jadaliyya strives for, but the views are solely the ones of their authors. If you are interested in contributing to Jadaliyya, send us your post with your bio and a release form to post@jadaliyya.com [click “Submissions” on the main page for more information].

Egypt: New Constitution Mixed on Support of Rights
Human Rights Watch expresses concern about articles in the constitutions that might harm basic and civilian rights.

The Strong Egypt Party, the Constitutional Decree, and Gaza: An Interview with Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh
Former presidential candidate Abd El-Moneim Abou El-Fotouh criticizes the opposition’s approach to dealing with the recent political developments in the country.

Update: Thousands Converge on Tahrir for Opposition Protests
Marches from different parts of Cairo merge in at Tahrir Square to denounce the constitutional declaration.

Social Justice and the Draft Constitution
Nader Fergany argues that the only way to establish social justice is to overturn Egypt’s political and economic system.

Morsi and his Adversaries
Ellis Goldberg says that while through his recent decisions the Egyptian president is denying the fundamental right to the Egyptians to seek justice for harm done by the state.

Call for Papers -- New Media, New Politics? (post-) Revolutions in Theory and Practice? (London, 26 April 2013)
University of Westminster announces a call for papers on the influence of media in recent uprisings and protest movements.

الحياة الحزبية في مصر بعد الثورة ... بين الإنطلاق والتعثر
Ahmed Taha talks about the new partisan life in Egypt.

Rules of Engagement: Documentary Filmmaking According to Tahani Rached
Mai Serhan writes about Tahani Rached’s life, filmmaking and her latest project.

Egyptian Protesters and Imprisoned Iranian Hunger Striker: Interviews with Mona El Ghobashy, Hesham Sallam and Hadi Ghaemi
Mona El Ghobashy and Jadaliyya’s Hesham Sallam discuss the Egyptian president’s recent decisions and Hadi Ghaemi talks about the fate of Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh.

من القاهرة الجميلة - الجزء الأول
Amro Eletrebi writes about his experience in the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud.

Egypt: A Year of Abuses Against Detained Children
A Human Rights Watch says more than 300 children have been tortured in Egypt over the past one year.

Cairo Event -- Why Middle East Studies? A Discussion of the State of the Field (5 December)
Announcement of an event at AUC Downtown Campus on Middle East Studies.

Dispatch from Mohamed Mahmoud Street: Egyptian Revolts
Mayssoun Sukarieh tells the story of some of the young boys involved in the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud St.

The President and the Fatal Trilateral Logic of US, Egyptian and Israeli Relations
Amro Ali argues that the nature of trilateral relations between the US, Egypt and Israel influences the Egyptian president’s illiberal decisions in domestic politics.                 

تفكيك أمننة المجتمع
Aly Al Raggal discusses the presence of the security discourse across public fields and social layers.

Bassem Youssef's The Show: Mohamed Mahmoud Street (Video with English Subtitles)
Bassem Youssef’s episode of “The Show” dedicated to the clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud from last year.

Democracy, Democracy, But The Courts Can’t Touch Me
Seif Fawzy says the hope for the revolution lies with the judiciary.

Joint Statement by Twenty-Two Egyptian Rights Organizations on Morsi Declaration
Various organizations condemn the presidents constitutional declaration saying that it is impeding delivering justice.

تيار استقلال القضاء: من مواجهة مبارك إلى تقاسم كعكة السلطة مع الإخوان
Ayat Alhabal looks into the relationship between the Movement for Independent Judiciary and the new Egyptian regime.

Revolution Protection Law May Fail To Live Up To Its Name
Mai Shams El-Din says the Revolution Protection Law is thwarted by the president’s declaration giving him unchallengeable decision-making powers and making the Constituent Assembly immune to dissolution.

Thousands Fill Tahrir on Friday to Protest Morsi's New 'Dictatorial Powers'
Zeinab El Gundy, Mostafa Ali, and Osman El Sharnoubi document the Friday protests in Tahrir against the presidential constitutional declaration.

Human Trafficking in the Sinai: Refugees Between Life and Death
A summary of a recent report on human trafficking in Sinai documenting the suffering of thousands of African migrants who fall victim of Egyptian traffickers.

الجبهة القومية ترفض انقلاب مرسي على الثورة وتدعو للنزول إلى التحرير بقوة
A statement by the National Front for Justice and Democracy calling on Egyptians to protest the presidential constitutional declaration.

Egypt Political Forces Call for Mass 'Eyes of Freedom' Rally Friday
Over thirty political groups call for an 'Eyes of Freedom' Friday protest calling on Mohamed Morsi’s government to quit and interior ministry to be purged.

The President's New Powers
Heba Afify, Amira Ahmed, and Lina Attalah look into the consequences of the president’s new legislative and executive powers granted to him by his own declaration.

Morsy and the "Nationalization" of the Revolution: Some Initial Reflections
Jadaliyya’s Hesham Sallam reacts to Mohamed Morsi’s constitutional declaration.

Eyewitness from Gaza: Historic Convoy Breaks the Siege
Hundreds of activists from leftist, secular and moderate forces reach the Gaza strip amid continuing Israeli bombardment.

الثورة بصفة شخصية
Amro Eletrebi recalls past protests and reflects on the current condition of the revolution.

الجبهة القومية للعدالة والديمقراطية تحمل "مرسي" مسؤولية أحداث "محمد محمود" وتدعوكم للمشاركة في جمعة عيون الحرية
A statement by the National Front for Justice and Democracy accusing Mohamed Morsi of being responsible for the violence during the Mohamed Mahmoud protests.

Egyptian Doctors' Strike and the Quest for Bread, Freedom, and Social Justice
Gillian Kennedy says the doctors strike started as a protest for budget increase but transformed into an anti-Muslim Brotherhood movement.

Imagining Tahrir
Yasser Alwan talks about photographic production during the revolution at Tahrir Square.

“I Have the Picture!” Egypt’s Photographic Heritage between Digital Reproduction and Neoliberalism (Part I)
Lucie Ryzova writes about the attempts to preserve Egypt’s photographic heritage.

Letter to IMF From Egyptian Parties, NGOs, Syndicates and Political Movements
Twenty parties, civil society organizations, and movements sign a statement against the IMF loan the current government is negotiating.

الأمة المصرية حين تفقد لغتها : لغة الرب أم لغة المستعمر؟
A book review of the translation of Niloofar Haeri’s book Sacred Language, Ordinary People: Dilemmas of Culture and Politics in Egypt.

The Scared Islamists And Their Frightened Majority
Mohamed Waked says the word “civil” has acquired a variety of meanings in Egyptian political vernacular which do not necessarily reflect political realities of the forces which are branded with it.

Reflections on Egypt's Draft Constitution
Ellis Goldberg criticizes the new draft constitution, looking into specific articles.

Year of the Ostrich: SCAF's Media Experiment
Adel Iskander traces the military’s use of media since taking over the Egyptian revolution in early February.

New Texts Out Now: Linda Herrera, Youth and Citizenship in the Digital Age: A View from Egypt
An interview with Linda Herrera about her new book on Egypt.

Egyptian opposition parties and revolutionary groups will organise a march to the presidential palace in Heliopolis on Tuesday afternoon to protest the draft constitution, which will be put to national referendum on 15 December.

The call was initiated by the National Salvation Front, a recently-formed umbrella group led by former presidential candidates Hamdeen Sabbahi and Amr Moussa, as well as reform campaigner Mohamed ElBaradei, after President Morsi announced the date of the upcoming referendum on Saturday.

"The Constituent Assembly is illegitimate, and it produced a disfigured constitution without the participation of women, Christians, workers or intellectuals. We will seek all nonviolent means to prevent this assault on the rule of law from happening," Hussein Abdel-Ghani, a spokesman for the group, told Ahram Online.

Marches from Rabaa Al-Adaweya Mosque in Nasr City and El-Nour Mosque in Abbasiyya will converge on the presidential palace in the district of Heliopolis in Cairo at 5pm, while adjacent protests in Tahrir Square will begin by 3pm.

Tuesday's protests come after over a hundred thousand protesters held a demonstration in Tahrir on Friday to oppose Morsi's controversial constitutional declaration from 22 November, which renders his decrees immune to judicial challenge and also makes the Islamist-dominated Shura Council and Constituent Assembly immune from dissolution by court order.

Morsi's constitutional declaration prompted a wave of rival protests in Cairo and across the country, as both opponents and supporters of the president showcased their ability to mobilise.

In response to the mass protests on Tuesday and Friday, hundreds of thousands of Islamist supporters demonstrated in Nahdet Masr Square in Giza in support of Morsi's declaration and the Constituent Assembly. The demonstration concluded after the head of the Constituent Assembly delivered the draft constitution to Morsi in a ceremony Saturday evening, where Morsi announced the date of the referendum, to cheers in Nahdet Masr and anger in Tahrir.

"Morsi had no other choice but to issue the constitutional declaration and no time to explain it beforehand, in the face of a manipulative court order by the [Mubarak appointed] Constitutional Court on 2 December to revoke his presidency which would reinstate the military in power," historian Mohamed El-Gawadi told Ahram Online.

"If Morsi succumbs to the demands of the opposition and the judges to cancel the declaration and bring back the sacked prosecutor-general, he will immediately be struck from power by the judiciary."

With Morsi's ostensible refusal to back down and the opposition promising escalation, it is unclear how the deadlock will be resolved ahead of the referendum.
"The only way out of the this situation to cancel the call for referendum and form a committee of independent figures and international experts to reformat the controversial articles, and at the same time he should reformulate the membership of the Constituent Assembly in a more representative structure and then put the constitution before them. But I do not think the president will do that now," political researcher Nabil Abdel-Fattah told Ahram Online.

Conflicts Within the Judiciary

On Monday, Egypt's Supreme Judicial Council officially announced that it will assign judges to monitor the referendum, stirring further conflicts as earlier in the day, head of the Judges Club Ahmed El-Zend announced that club members have agreed not to monitor the referendum.

Conflicts within the judiciary have been ongoing since the constitutional declaration was issued, where a number of courts across the country had suspended their activities in protest over the constitutional declaration on grounds that it is an infringement on the judiciary.

Last Monday, in an attempt to ease the deepening crisis over the constitutional declaration, Morsi met with senior members of Egypt's Supreme Judicial Council, and following the meeting the presidential office announced that the judges had unanimously agreed to the declaration. The following day, reports circulated that the judges did not express unanimous agreement as was announced by the presidency.

Opposition forces have sided with protesting judges since the declaration was issued, and they renewed their support for judges who boycotted the referendum.
"If the constitution passes without the monitoring of the judges it will be an illegitimate constitution," Hussein Abdel-Ghani told Ahram Online.

Morsi's declaration was explained by the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood and its Freedom and Justice Party as a necessary measure to protect the elected president and the elected Shura Council, as well as the Constituent Assembly, which was formed by the elected people's assembly, from possible dissolution by court verdicts from the High Constitutional Court, whose verdict against the constitutionality of the elected people's assembly led to its dissolution by the military council in June.

"Morsi's declaration has led to internecine conflicts within the judiciary. Also, the inclusion of bodies such as the administrative prosecution and the state commissioners, which are not under the direct mandate of the judiciary, in the process of monitoring the referendum will lead to shallow supervision," political researcher Nabil Abdel-Fattah told Ahram Online.

Hundreds of supporters of the president had gathered outside the court building since Sunday morning, where the court was supposed to issue a verdict on the constitutionality of the Constituent Assembly and the Shura Council, which are both immune to dissolution according to Morsi's decree. In response, the High Constitutional Court (HCC) declared on Sunday it will freeze all its sessions indefinitely in protest of "pressure" exerted upon it by Morsi's supporters. 

[Developed in partnership with Ahram Online.]