Can you claim to speak for love and ignore the crimes of occupation and apartheid?

No.

If you sang for Israel, sang in support of its 60+years of occupation and apartheid, and stated  your love for Israel, should you be welcomed in Lebanon (or anywhere else!)?

No.

Lara Fabian is invited to perform in the Casino du Liban this coming February.  Yet, she had announced her support and love for Israel.

Below is the letter written by the Campaign to Boycott Supporters of ‘Israel’ in Lebanon and the statement to the press submitted by the Campaign.

It is a shame that Casino du Liban — owned by the government — did not do adequate research before inviting Fabian, or is indifferent.  It is a shame.  Let’s shame them into withdrawing the invitation!

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نحيطكم علما أن حملة مقاطعة داعمي “إسرائيل” في لبنان المؤلفة من مجموعة كبيرة من الشباب والشابات في لبنان أصدرتْ البيان الآتي: بيروت في 14-01-2012هل بات لبنانُ مسرحاً لمن هبّ ودبّ من داعمي العدوّ الإسرائيليّ؟ فبعد بلاسيبو، ودي جاي تييستو، وآرمين فان بيورين، وغيرهم ممن أحيوْا حفلاتٍ في لبنان بعد إحيائهم حفلاتٍ ف…ي “إسرائيل”، متجاهلين جرائمَ هذه الدولة وعنصريتَها واحتلالَها وانتهاكَها لسيادتنا، يستضيف كازينو لبنان حفلاً للمغنّية لارا فابيان في عيد العشّاق (14 و15 شباط 2012). الجدير ذكرُه أنّ فابيان غنّت في فرنسا، وباللغة العبريّة، في احتفال الذكرى الستين لتأسيس”إسرائيل” (25 أيّار 2008)، أغنيةً من الموروث الاستيطانيّ الصهيونيّ للشاعرة الصهيونيّة نعومي شيمر، معلنة في نهاية العرض الكلماتِ الآتية: “إسرائيل، أنا أحبّكِ!”. كما سبق أن غنّت في تل أبيب (في نهاية آذار 2010)، وشاركتْ في احتفال “سركل بن غوريون” الصهيونيّ في بروكسل. إننا نناشد كازينو لبنان، وهو مؤسّسة تملك الدولةُ اللبنانيّةُ نصيبًا كبيرًا فيها، سحبَ الدعوة من هذه المغنّية الداعمة للصهيونيّة. ونناشد الرعاة سحبَ تمويلهم لزيارتها. كما ننبّه وزارتي السياحة والثقافة إلى هذا الاختراق التطبيعيّ الخطير للبنان. وندعو مواطني شعبنا كافّةً إلى الامتناع عن الذهاب إلى حفل فابيان: فمن يغنّي في الكيان الصهيونيّ يتغاضى عن جرائمه؛ فكيف إذا غنّى في ذكرى اغتصاب “إسرائيل” لفلسطين؟ إنّ غناء فابيان في الذكرى الستين لتأسيس الكيان الغاصب هو تأييدٌ فاضحٌ للممارسات الإسرائيليّة الإجراميّة في فلسطين ولبنان والجولان والبلاد العربيّة طوال هذه العقود. إنّ من يغنّي للاحتلال والعنصرية لا يمكن أن يغنّي لفالانتين، لا يمكن أن يغنّي للعشق والحبّ! للمزيد من المعلومات ولمشاهدة فيديو لارا فابيان في الاحتفال الستين لإسرائيل: http://wp.me/pTpLb-uF

Letter to Lara Fabian

Beirut, January 15, 2012
Dear Ms Lara Fabian,
Greetings from Beirut.
You have declared your full support of Israel. You have sung on its 60th “anniversary,” which means 60 (by now 64) years of ethnic cleansing, house demolitions, apartheid, colonial settlements, and denial of the rights of millions of Palestinian refugees (including about 400,000 thousand in Lebanon alone) to go home. You have sung a Zionist song in Hebrew, and declared your “love” for Israel when you finished singing it (in Paris, Trocadero, May 25, 2008)
While you were celebrating Israel’s “anniversary,” leading international artists and cultural figures of the caliber of Augusto Boal, Mahmoud Darwish, Judith Butler, Andre Brink, Nigel Kennedy, among many others, signed a statement titled “No reason to celebrate!” It appeared in the International Herlad Tribune on 8 May 2008 and stated:
“There is no reason to celebrate! Israel at 60 is a state that is still denying Palestinian refugee their UN-sanctioned rights, simply because they are “non-Jews.” It is still illegally occupying Palestinian and other Arab lands, in violation of numerous UN resolutions. It is still persistently and grossly breaching international law and infringing fundamental human rights with impunity afforded to it through munificent US and European economic, diplomatic and political support. It is still treating its own Palestinian citizens with institutionalized discrimination. In short, celebrating “Israel at 60” is tantamount to dancing on Palestinian graves to the haunting tune of lingering dispossession and multi-faceted injustice.”
More recently, heeding the virtually consensus-supported Palestinian call for a cultural boycott of Israel, tens of artists and musicians have declared their unwillingness to play in Israel just as they had done with apartheid South Africa. Tel Aviv is increasingly being viewed today as Sun City was in the 1980s. Roger Waters, Carlos Santana, Elvis Costello, Natasha Atlas, Gil-Scott Heron, The Pixies, Gorillaz, Klaxons, Vanessa Paradis, Snoop Dogg, are some of many who took a moral stand and refused to allow their art and names to be used to whitewash Israel’s violations of human rights. You, on the contrary, chose, time and again, to entertain apartheid, crime, and occupation in Israel and to further vow your “love” for it.
For that, and in line with our right to freedom of expression in Lebanon, we pledge to boycott your event in Casino du Liban on Feb 14-15. We will call on all the Lebanese and Palestinians in Lebanon to boycott your shows; we will also urge our Algerian and Moroccan brothers and sisters to do the same.
Singing for love and peace on Valentine’s Day contradicts your unequivocal support for apartheid and colonization. Our country, Lebanon, is, to this very day, subject to daily Israeli infringement on its sovereignty. Tens of thousands of Lebanese have been murdered thanks to Israeli bombardment and shelling since its inception (“independence”!) in 1948. Furthermore, millions of cluster bomblets are still implanted in the south of Lebanon, causing the daily death and injury of peasants and children.
Lara Fabian, the message of love should not be smeared with blood. Boycott Israel; be on the right side of history!
Campaign to Boycott Supporters of “Israel” in Lebanon

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For this new, year set aside the negativity about 2011 (the ongoing occupations,detentions, uncertainties, economic and environmental injustices, etc)

For this new year, spend some time imagining, envisioning what you would like to see, to do, to feel.  What does it look like? What does it feel like?  Relish in it, the imagining, relish in it

A free Palestine… What does it look like?

A Lebanon with citizens (watan aw muwaten)

Economic justice built on environmental laws of finite growth, and satisfaction replacing consumerism

Wolves free, not hunted

Love embraced without fear

…

What else?

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 29,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 11 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

All three are quite interesting…

Both are focused more on the negotiation itself  — as a direct objective to divert attention from the the goal of the negotiation itself.

In other words: both are focused on talk, talk, talk — while allowing the destructive actions that are the cause of the problem to continue unabated, undeferred.

And both are being led by the strong and the guilty against the vulnerable and the impacted.

For an excellent discussion on the Durban Climate Change Negotiations, refer to this interview on Democracy Now

Recent Government approval to go ahead with the Awali project to supply Beirut with drinking water ignores repeated warnings about a high bill, environmental damage, and mounting risks to already dwindling water sources [English Al-Akhbar]

Check out that excellent article

And, I must confess.  I had forgotten how good TV reporters push their questions, and how much stronger I should be to push for my answers. Russia Today news anchors are stronger than those I had gotten accustomed to in Lebanon, and more reminscent of the anchors in the US.  Thus, after my second interview on RT (as with my first interview), I reprimand myself on not enunciating clearer what I had planned to say.  I answered his question on armed intervention, yes, I oppose it, but I didn’t follow through with my prepared notes: the Syrian government is facilitating the plans of certain Western countries for armed intervention by continuing with its repression. And the Syrian government *is* making it easier. 

A UN report today claims that 5,000 people have been killed in Syria.  Let’s go so far as to say that half of those were killed by the government — that figure is still horrific.

As I said on RT yesterday, the reports issues by the Syrian Human Rights Observatory lack credibility — but nevertheless we still know that crimes are being committed by the Government. We may disagree over the numbers of victims, but the crimes and the acts of repression are still being committed. That much is clear.

And it is wrong. criminal. tragic.

I hope that message came out during the interview.

From the discussion that ensued between Mary Rizzo and myself on Facebook, it is clear that my position on Syria has not been clear enough and that misperceptions and false assumptions have been made.  The recent interview I had on Russia Today seems to have aggravated that misperception.  I should have spoken clearer on RT. So, let me clarify.

(1)  There is never an excuse for any government to torture anyone. Period. There is never an excuse for any government to set aside a fair justice system (or not to instill one).  This is an absolute. It does not matter if the detainee is a citizen of that country per se, a foreigner, or even an “enemy of the state.”

(2) All peoples, everywhere, deserve the right to be heard, to be represented, to be respected. All peoples, everywhere, deserve the right to influence decisions that impact their lives. Again, this is an absolute.

(3)  Freedom of speech is a human right.  We cheapen this right when we only respect it for those whose opinions are like ours.  The same applies with respect to human rights.  If a government violates human rights, regardless of its political position, it is still in the wrong.

. I oppose the Arab League position on Syria. It lacks any credibility and is but an avenue for foreign armed intervention and foreign influence.  That foreign influence, by the way, is not interested in democratic reform or human rights but in transforming the position of the Syrian government on certain key foreign issues.

I made that position clear in my RT interview.  I should have also clearly stated that the Syrian government is, and has been for decades, guilty of human rights violations, and it is the right of the Syrian people to demand their rights.

My opposition to Syria becoming ‘a Libya’ does not imply support of the Syrian regime.  My opposition to the use of arms by a small group of protestors does not imply my support of the government’s use of institutionalized violence. (nor does it imply that I oppose armed resistance)

I hope I have clarified my position.  If I am to be interviewed on the topic again, I will be sure to emphasis the rejection of this binary approach.

Thank you, Mary, for alerting me to the (mis)perception made of my position.

On a more personal note, I find that words fail me in thinking of Razan in Syrian detention.  Her release, safe!, and the release of all those who spoke their mind and their heart, is vital.

“From Cairo to the Cape, the impact of man-made climate change is already being felt. Farmers, people in cities, local scientists and governments all tell a remarkably similar story – that there is evidence of more extreme and unseasonal weather taking place outside the natural variability and cycles of African climate, and that the poorest communities are the least able to adapt.

In Egypt’s Nile delta, where 40% of the population lives, most of the land is liable to be inundated by a one-metre increase in sea levels, anticipated over the next century. Guy Jobbins, a Cairo-based British water scientist who heads Canada’s International Development Research Centre climate change adaptation programme for Africa, says understanding of the issue has rocketed in the past few years.

“Go to any farm, talk to any fisherman, and climate change fits their experience. The last few years have seen temperature spikes to world-record highs. We don’t absolutely know it’s climate change but we do know that the summers are hotter now, and the impact of evaporation is greater in the south of Egypt. We see crops dying in the fields, temperatures of 63C [145F] have been recorded, and the winters are not cold enough to grow olives. There are some advantages, like the fact that vegetables grow earlier, but smallholders have no way of taking advantage.

“We know sea level rise is happening but it’s slow and steady. But the effect is being aggravated by the increasing intensity of storms. Last year saw the worst [storms] in decades. The last few years have seen temperature spikes, with nights becoming unbearably hot and then switching to freezing cold. But the real issues are groundwater and soil salination. Coastal aquifers become depleted, which leads to groundwater becoming salinated. As sea levels rise the water becomes more stagnant and salty. It’s affecting hundreds of square kilometres, up to 10km from the coast in places. … Climate change is a massive problem for developing countries because people are less resistant to shocks and cannot adapt.”

A thousand miles south in Khartoum, Dr Sumaya Zakieldeen, a researcher at Khartoum University’s institute of environmental studies, says the harsh climate that Sudan already experiences will become more extreme. She and her team have compared historical data going back to 1940 and found drought and extreme flooding more frequent, temperatures rising in winter, extreme – good and bad – years now more common and rainfall patterns changing.”

In this Transparency International Corruption Index, Lebanon ranks 134th out of 182 countries in corruption. [182 = most corrupt.]

Source: Corruption Index 2011, The Guardian