War – Page 34 – James Wagner

we must all be Arna’s Children

Ashraf Abu-elhaje, shown here in the childrens’ theatre of the Jenin refugee camp in 1996, was its most impressive student. At the time he dreamed of a future as the �Palestinian Romeo.� Six years later Ashraf led a large group of fighters in the battle of Jenin. He was killed by a rocket fired from a helicopter.

We went to see “Arna’s Children” at the Tribeca Film Festival yesterday afternoon. It is the only TFF program we expect to see, so it’s clear we had already thought it was important before we knew a great deal about it. We had heard of it through an email sent by the generous Israeli artist, filmmaker and activist Udi Aloni, who had extended an invitation to gather with others for a reception in his studio after the screening.

ARNA’S CHILDREN tells the story of a theatre group that was established by Arna Mer Khamis. Arna comes from a Zionist family and in the 1950s married a Palestinian Arab, Saliba Khamis. On the West Bank, she opened an alternative education system for children whose regular life was disrupted by the Israeli occupation. The theatre group that she started engaged children from Jenin, helping them to express their everyday frustrations, anger, bitterness and fear. Arna’s son Juliano, director of this film, was also one of the directors of Jenin’s theatre. With his camera, he filmed the children during rehearsal periods from 1989 to 1996. Now, he goes back to see what happened to them. Yussef committed a suicide attack in Hadera in 2001, Ashraf was killed in the battle of Jenin, Alla leads a resistance group. Juliano, who today is one of the leading actors in the region, looks back in time in Jenin, trying to understand the choices made by the children he loved and worked with. Eight years ago, the theatre was closed and life became static and paralysed. Shifting back and forth in time, the film reveals the tragedy and horror of lives trapped by the circumstances of the Israeli occupation.

We stayed in the theatre for the generous Q&A which immediately followed the film. Only when the lights went up did we notice that Jeffrey Wright and Glenn Close were also in the audience. We were impressed with their commitment, whether professional or human, but not more than we were with the fact that the festival director was there. Peter Scarlet is responsible for this very large operation showing a number of films simultaneously in widely-spread venues, but he was there to announce the picture and stayed with the filmmakers throughout the discussion after, eventually participating in it.
Even for people who think of themselves as pretty familiar with the issues and the reality of the subject of this magnificent documentary, the film was shattering, and the emotional experience was only made more distressing by a number of things we heard from the director and producers after. One of the revelations was that of all the little boys who had grown up working with Arna in her theatre group, only one survives today.
We were both made physically sick by the emotions tapped that afternoon, and we agreed together that we were unable to imagine going anywhere at that moment, even to be among people who would understand what we were feeling.
There is almost certainly no reason to think that the insanity and horror being visited upon “the other” in the Middle East will end in our time. Films like this may occasionally awaken hope that, were enough people able to see it, the revelation of the humanity and misery of our victims would be sufficient to make us all intelligent peacemakers. This film could change the world, but, except for the incredibly small number already pretty much aware of what’s going on, people will not see it. If we survive our times, “Arna’s Children” may some day be seen in the same way we see the evidence of other monstrosities, like “The Diary of Anne Frank” – after the fact, but with great reverence.
I’m very sorry, but I see no reason to be optimistic about the possibility that the people of this country or of its client Israel will regain consciousness and reason in time to avoid even the destruction of their own societies, to say nothing of the mortal damage being done to those of others.
Ok, maybe I’m just depressed today. Ask me how I feel about it tomorrow.

[image from the Arna site]

subway [in]security

this is as sophisticated as it gets

Ray Sanchez knows what the city won’t tell us: No one is really doing anything about subway security. But then, why should we be surprised? The subway isn’t the politicians and bureaucrats’ thing. They don’t use it.
At the same time it hasn’t escaped the notice of some of us that there’s still talk about entirely shutting down Penn Station and the Main Post Office during the Republican Convention for the safety of hundreds or thousands of treasured Republican plutocrats.

The conductor stood in the cab of the subway car, her door ajar. People have a false sense of security on the subway, she said. “The politicians who never ride the trains are very reassuring, aren’t they?”
The New York Police Department is rushing to train 10,000 officers in counter-terrorism in time for the summer’s Republican National Convention, but there are transit workers without fire and evacuation training.
“I’m one of them,” said the conductor, who has eight years on the job. “You hope common sense is enough to get you through an emergency, but, you know, common sense goes out the window.”

And, in the event, the riders too, if there’s going to be no direction from “security.”

[image from Rachelle Bowden at rachelleb]

a police state serves only those who control the police

The Patriot Act is obviously a boon for homegrown tyrants. Only slightly less obvious is the fact that it won’t be able to protect us from their bogeymen, even though that’s the only excuse they can publicly offer for its existence.
Bloggy draws the properly scary conclusion from today’s headlines.

future present

(storyboard image for filing cabinet scene not included in the film)

I saw Terry Gilliam’s “Brazil” in a movie theatre when it first came out, almost twenty years ago. I remember thinking it was exciting and pretty funny. B and I saw it again tonight at home. This time I thought it was terrifying. In 2004 it’s no longer “retro future.”
Another big surprise: Jonathan Pryce is really cute as Sam Lowry. I didn’t remember that.

[image at the top from Trond Frittz lower image from MovieGoods]

political trial, political prisoners

5thAve.16.jpg
serious street theatre: Rachel Corrie remembered on 5th Avenue, March 26, 2003

Barry and I slipped into Manhattan Criminal Court on Monday to show support for our friends and their friends, sixteen defendents caught up in the trial from mayhem (maybe the word “hell” should be reserved for even more horrendous judicial outrages likely still to come).
Thirteen months ago the group had been arrested for a totally peaceful street protest against the war in Iraq, against the continuing war on the Palestinians, and against the death of U.S. human rights activist Rachel Corrie. Ok, some traffic was disrupted on 5th Avenue. Now those arrested that day may be subject to restraint of their liberties during years of probation and, in the words of hanging judge Robert M. Stolz on Monday, they are “facing a possible sentence of up to a year in jail.” A year in jail? For blocking cars? For trying to shake their country awake?
Stolz’s mention of the serious stakes involved for the defendents followed immediately a thinly-veiled warning to their friends and familiy in the benches: “[This trial] is not for the benefit of Spectators.” No, it certainly isn’t, but can we know for whose benefit it is being staged?
This trial is an appalling abuse of the courts. We used to think that Giuliani’s regime* was outrageous, but to experience an even more serious assault New Yorkers really had to wait until after the reactionary ascendancy which followed the 2000 election, after the misreading of September 11, after the terrorists won the war on terror the day it was announced, and after the totally political decision that New York City would be the site of the Republican Convention celebrating the arrival of the fundamentalists’ brave new world.
Normally political protest which involves a police determination that the protestor
is somehow out of order results in a simple violation and the dismissal of all charges, assuming the person arrested does not run into the police again within a designated relatively short period of time, usually a few months.
I can’t begin to go into the particulars here of how this judge and this district attorney (Morgenthau’s lieutenant, Barry Glasser) have been mishandling the case of the “5th Avenue 16,” but let me say that neither party is disinterested, and that the people’s justice appears to be just about the last concern of both. Not incidently, aside from carrying an axe which will apparently never be ground enough, Judge Stolz has to be faulted for incredibly slovenly, unprofessional conduct. But then, these are also times which somehow accomodate a George W. Bush presiding over 300 million [or actually 6 billion] of his fellows.
Yesterday morning, for what was expected to be only the pronouncement of sentences, there were at all times a minimum of eight police officers in the courtroom on Monday (one for every ten people in the public seating area) and four of them wore bulletproof vests. I have been a defendent in civil rights cases, I have sat in courtrooms while others were tried for similar “offenses” and I have sat on the jury in one capital case. Never before have I have seen more than two officers in a courtroom, and none were ever wearing vests.
Clearly the City authorities and their directors in Washington are trying very hard to frighten us all into submission and to minimize the potential for the demonstrations and protest which are the only refuge for a people given no effective electoral choices. We can’t let our self-appointed governors get away with this. The stakes are just too high. If we fail to stop these police state tactics now, we all will be paying for it for years, if not forever.
Clyde Haberman has written one of the very few media stories on this trial. He doesn’t tell us enough, he provides no real context, and he may be trying to be too entertaining, but you’ll at least learn that sentencing has been delayed contemplating the impact of new evidence. True justice’s hope is that the defendents’ lawyer will be successful in his motion for an appeal, but with this judge it must be a distant hope at best.
For more press and other information, including pictures, go to M26.org

*
Surprise! A former federal prosecutor, Stolz was originally appointed Judge by Giuliani, to the Civil Court in 1995. He was appointed to the Criminal Court by Bloomberg in 2003.

[image from Fred Askew]

of mythical homelands and homelands blessed by god

For their replacement homeland it now looks like the Palestinians will just have to be content with a small rock somewhere south of the mythical Blessed Isles.
I don’t know how to deal with such idiocy as this. [the original headline was more to the point: “Bush recognises Israel West Bank claims”]
I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised to see this agreement between two governments which routinely defy international law, each recklessly asserting its absolute right to do whatever it pleases regardless of the impact on others. But actually there is something far more frightening about this agreement between two rogue states – its scary biblical element.
There is absolutely no way to defend the Sharon settlement policy, but hearing that the White House legitimized it today is very frightening news. Not only is this strange Washington crew’s domestic policy about their god cult, but so also is its foreign policy where it’s really fundamentally about crusading [see Bushie’s fake news event last night]. The armageddon it’s already inciting seems to be its real purpose, since there is obviously no logic to it.
Look around. These people have removed all joy from lives all over the planet since they seized power little over three years ago, but since there was obviously no pleasure in their dried-up Republican hearts anyway, they are oblivious to the cloud now hanging over the planet. In fact, for those little superstitious minds the next life just can’t come soon enough; they’re apparently willing to help their god-thing hurry it along.

NOTE: For a proper précis of the Bush thing last night see criticalviewer’s “A Busy Person’s Guide to the Bush Press Conference”

stupidity and iniquity

The Bushites and their handlers: Although somehow they hijacked command of the most powerful country on earth, they clearly don’t know what they’re doing and they’re doing it for the wrong reasons.
I used to think that their stupidity is what would save the planet, but that was before the “war on terror,” the war on Afghanistan, the war on Iraq and now the wars which will be visited upon the entire world in response to their stupidity and iniquity.

places in history

We also note that, even if he is remembered for Vietnam, LBJ at least managed to deliver on civil rights, a voting-rights bill, a Medicare program for the aged, and measures to improve education and conservation. What will Bushie be remembered for?
Reuters on Monday, via Atrios:

Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy on Monday accused President Bush of having created at home and abroad “the largest credibility gap” since the Watergate scandal forced Richard Nixon from the White House 30 years ago.
Kennedy, a key backer of fellow Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry’s campaign for the party’s presidential nomination, also charged Iraq has become “George Bush’s Vietnam,” the war that divided the United States and helped drive Lyndon Johnson from the presidency.
In addition, Kennedy said, Iraq has “diverted attention from the administration’s deceptions here at home — especially on the economy, health care and education.”

armageddon, finally, again

It may finally have come down to our millennialists against their millennialists.
Over the weekend a new war may have begun began in earnest in Iraq, a very visible, coordinated, religion-based uprising against the occupation. The Christian soldiers running the U.S. and Iraq these days are driven by visions of the second coming of Jesus. The Iraqi streets and basements are propelled by the appearance of the Mahdi. Unfortunately the two armies are talking about roughly the same thing – the end of the world – but they aren’t going to make it easy for anyone.
The Mahdi Army is the name given to the militia responsible for the current outbreaks of violence. People who study British, african, middle-east and asian history know the enormous significance the name Mahdi assumed at the end of the 19th century when it was both bogeyman and a real terrorist threat for the last bible-thumping, English-speaking empire. At least the reportedly quite observant Blair should remember Gordon and Kitchener, especially this week.

[image originally from Wired]

mercenary brouhaha hysterics, and reason

Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator in Iraq, shown on Thursday protected by a security guard employed by Blackwater USA, even while in a heavily guarded military complex in the city of Mosul

Tom Moody writes about the Daily Kos teapot-tempest mercenary brouhaha.

Those deaths were terrible but I hate that saying “screw the mercenaries” is being framed as an issue of patriotism or “supporting the troops.” These high-paid soldiers of fortune are essentially a private army dedicated to securing Middle East oil assets and protecting corporate interests abroad. And just a reminder: they’re shooting Iraqis today; tomorrow they could be over here in the States breaking strikes and busting protester’s heads. This isn’t as farfetched as it sounds: the Bush campaign recently hired Vance International, notorious anti-labor thugs, for “private security.” This privatization of military functions is a sick trend, and I actually think it’s more patriotic to oppose it. Unfortunately the Kerry campaign seems to think we should “support the mercs.” [Moody points out at the top of his post that the “unctious Kerry campaign de-linked Kos from its website” when the controversy began]

[image from the NYTimes, pool photo by Ceerwan Aziz]