The play Oh Well Never Mind Bye is set in the busy newsroom of an unnamed London-based newspaper — probably a right-wing tabloid — in the days before and after London police shot dead a Brazilian immigrant on an underground train. But in a genuinely brave piece of playwriting, Steven Lally has drawn on wider themes, including the “churnalism” that has turned much of the journalistic profession into a regurgitation of celebrity press releases, the way in which Palestine and related issues are reported in the mainstream media and the influence of the Zionist lobby on news coverage. Sarah Irving reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about Newsroom politics dramatized in "Oh Well Never Mind Bye"
In his autobiography, Embers and Ashes: Memoirs of an Arab Intellectual, the late Hisham Sharabi transports the reader seamlessly from his early life in Palestine, where he was born in 1927, to his studies at the American University of Beirut, and finally his own American experience and life as a university professor at Georgetown. While it occasionally lacks cohesion, the book is unmistakably personal and insightful. Atef Alshaer reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about "Embers and Ashes:" An intellectual's exile, struggle and success
Of the 27 films featured in the 2009 Chicago Palestine Film Festival held last April, two exceptional shorts demonstrate the breadth of recent Palestinian cinema. Approaching the Israeli occupation from contrasting vantage points, Be Quiet(2006) and The View (2008) press viewers to imagine life under a system that dictates virtually every minute of one’s being. Maymanah Farhat reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about New short films showcase breadth of Palestinian cinema
There is a haunting, nightmarish strand running through the selection of poems by Palestinian author Ibrahim Nasrallah featured in the new volume Rain Inside. This is particularly evident in poems evoking an enigmatic “he,” oscillating undecidably between alter ego and a threatening Other, who may even be the poet’s “killer.” Raymond Deane reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about Humane modernist: Ibrahim Nasrallah's "Rain Inside"
The Maqusi Towers in Gaza City look a bit like US housing projects. The neighborhood consists of several tall apartment buildings grouped together in the northern part of town. It is also ground zero for Gaza’s growing Hip-Hop community. On a recent evening in one small but well-decorated apartment, a dozen rappers and their friends and families relaxed, danced, smoked flavored tobacco, and rapped the lyrics to some of their songs. Jordan Flaherty write for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about Young Palestinians in Gaza find their voice through hip-hop
Mass slaughter perpetrated by the big powers, from Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan, is normalized through labels such as “counterinsurgency,” “pacification” and “war on terror,” while similar acts carried out by states out of favor result in the severest of charges. It is this politics of naming that is the subject of Mahmood Mamdani’s explosive new book, Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics and the War on Terror. Muhammad Idrees Ahmad reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about The Darfur diversion: "Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics and the War on Terror"
For many Palestinians, the month of May is associated with the commemoration of the Nakba. But with the increasing popularity of the arts in Palestine, the second annual Palestine Festival of Literature (PalFest) harmoniously unfolded to the final days of spring, a time also for lavender and lilies. The Electronic Intifada contributor Sousan Hammad reports on PalFest, and how it was shut down by Israeli authorities in Jerusalem. Read more about Despite Israel's efforts, Palestinian festival celebrates literature
Hajo Meyer, author of the book The End of Judaism, was born in Bielefeld, in Germany, in 1924. In 1939, he fled on his own at age 14 to the Netherlands to escape the Nazi regime, and was unable to attend school. Meyer was captured by the Gestapo in March 1944 and deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp a week later. He is one of the last survivors of Auschwitz. Meyer spoke about his book and Palestine with The Electronic Intifada contributor Adri Nieuwhof. Read more about Auschwitz survivor: "I can identify with Palestinian youth"
In addition to a long list of films exploring themes of social injustice and conflict, Swedish filmmaker PeÅ Holmquist has directed several on Palestine. Young Freud in Gaza (2008), his most recent documentary on the subject, enters the recesses of Palestinian society as it copes with life under Israeli occupation. Directed with Holmquist’s longtime partner, Beirut-born Armenian filmmaker and journalist Suzanne Khardalian, the 60-minute film follows Ayed, a 27-year-old psychologist working for the Palestinian Authority’s Clinic for Mental Health in northern Gaza. Maymanah Farhat reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about At a breaking point: "Young Freud in Gaza"
The second Palestine Festival of Literature will take place from 23-28 May 2009. Because of the difficulties Palestinians face under military occupation in traveling around their own country, the festival group of 17 international writers will travel to its audiences in the West Bank. It will tour Ramallah, Jenin, al-Khalil/Hebron and Bethlehem. To mark Jerusalem’s status as Cultural Capital of the Arab World for 2009, the festival will begin and end in Jerusalem. Read more about Second annual Palestine Festival of Literature launches this month
