The manufactured confusion: Were officers reprimanded or not?
The Pavlovian Israeli rejection of the reporting that it has used illegal munitions in Gaza, and specifically White Phosphorous, was obviously standard reaction to facts, ingrained in the Israeli Lie Machinery. So now, the officers responsible for the action that did not take place, instead of those who gave them an order to carry out the action that should not take place, will be reprimanded, which of course they won’t be, as it did not take place, and so on. Work this out, if you will… The Israeli denial of such disciplining is below in Haaretz. It seems that for external consumption, there are officers being disciplined, for internal consumption, there aren’t, and for seasoned readers of this blog, you have to explain no further… This keeps everyone happy.
Israel reprimands top officers over UN compound strike: BBC
Israel has revealed it has reprimanded two top army officers for authorising an artillery attack which hit a UN compound in Gaza last year.
In the attack on 15 January 2009 the compound was set ablaze by white phosphorus shells.
The admission is contained in the Israeli response to the UN’s Goldstone report, which concluded both Israel and Hamas had committed war crimes.
Both officers have retained their ranks, according to reports.
The Israeli army has not specifically said that the rules of engagement were broken over the use of white phosphorus.
During the 22-day conflict last year, media pictures showed incendiary shells raining down on a UN compound.
ANALYSIS
Paul Wood, BBC News, Jerusalem
Buried in paragraph 108 of the Israeli report to the UN is the key fact of the document. Two senior officers were reprimanded for failing to follow their own rules of engagement.
This is an explosive admission, especially as this is about an incident involving white phosphorus and Israel had always maintained that this was not misused in Gaza.
This is the first time that Israel has acknowledged, at least in part, allegations by that civilians were jeopardised by the misuse of artillery at the main UN warehouse in Gaza City.
The officers will not face criminal prosecution. That is something the Israeli political-military establishment is desperate to avoid. They fear it would be disastrous for morale and would damage the ability of Israel’s army to fight the next war.
However, Israel’s problem is that if its own investigations appear to the outside world to be a whitewash, the UN is all the more likely to order a special tribunal at The Hague.
The officers were named in Israeli media reports as Gaza Division Commander Brig Gen Eyal Eisenberg and Givati Brigade Commander Col Ilan Malka.
“Several artillery shells were fired in violation of the rules of engagement prohibiting use of such artillery near populated areas,” the Israeli response to the Goldstone report says.
The officers were charged with “exceeding their authority” in ordering the use of the weapons in the attack.
An Israeli Defence Force spokesman said that the reprimand would be noted on their records and would be considered if they apply for promotion in future.
Brig Gen Eisenberg is still in command of Israel’s Gaza division, and Col Malka has been moved to the West Bank under the same rank, according to the Reuters news agency.
‘Evidence’
Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said the military was investigating about 150 allegations. There was enough evidence in 36 cases to pass those claims to military police for criminal investigations.
“In this particular case, it was not referred to criminal investigation, it wasn’t decided that there was evidence of criminal wrongdoing and a reprimand was warranted,” Mr Regev said, referring to the shells fired on the UN compound.
Criminal proceedings have so far been opened in one case, concerning an alleged theft of a credit card from a Palestinian family by an Israeli soldier.
The soldier used the card to withdraw hundreds of dollars, Israeli media reported.
Mr Regev said there would be “serious consequences” for soldiers found guilty of criminal conduct.
‘Hush money’
A Hamas spokesman said the disciplinary action was “further admission of Israel’s guilt” over alleged war crimes.
But he said he did not expect any further action to be taken against military officers.
He said Israel had paid the United Nations $10.5 million (£6.6 million) in damages to repair their compounds, which he called “hush money”.
A UN representative who was in the compound in Gaza city during the attack told the BBC he “expected full accountability from the Israelis”.
Two UN staff and two Palestinians sheltering in the compound were seriously injured, he said.
A doctor at Gaza city’s main hospital told the BBC he treated hundreds of Palestinians for phosphorus burns during the offensive.
UN Demands
The BBC’s Paul Wood in Jerusalem says it is the first time Israel has revealed it reprimanded any officer for his actions during the offensive, named Operation Cast Lead by the Israeli military.
Our correspondent says the admission was buried in the document handed to the UN on Friday.
The UN General Assembly has demanded that both Israel and Hamas launch independent investigations into their conduct during the Israeli operation which began in December 2008.
An Israeli official said the submission to the UN was not intended to respond in detail to the allegations and incidents outlined in the Goldstone report, but to explain why the Israeli justice system was “reliable” and “independent”.
The Islamist movement Hamas has denied that its forces deliberately targeted civilians with rockets.
Both sides have until 5 February to respond in detail to the UN General Assembly’s request for independent investigations to be launched.
White phosphorus, which is used to lay smokescreens, is legal for use on open ground but its use in built-up areas where civilians are found is banned under international conventions.
This report above was based on the interviews in the clip below:
Israel reprimands top army officers over Gaza war: The Guardian
Disciplinary action taken over UN compound attack in populated area of Gaza City last year.
Use link above to see the official voice of Isral say things that they will immediately deny…
Israeli soldiers ‘disciplined’ over UN compound attack in Gaza: The Guardian
Israeli military report says troops ‘fired artillery shells in violation of rules of engagement in populated areas’ last year
Two senior Israeli army officers have been “disciplined” over the firing of artillery shells towards a United Nations compound in a crowded urban area during the war in Gaza last year.
It is the first acknowledgement by the Israeli military of any of the serious allegations raised by international human rights groups and two UN investigations, which have found grave breaches of international law and evidence of possible war crimes.
The UN compound was hit and its main warehouse burned to the ground, and three people were injured during the attack in Gaza City on 15 January last year. Several other buildings in the area were hit that day, including a Palestinian hospital.
The two officers were named in Israeli press reports today as Gaza Division Commander Brigadier General Eyal Eisenberg and Givati Brigade Commander Colonel Ilan Malka. It is not clear what form of discipline the men faced, but both were accused of “exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardised the lives of others”, according to an Israeli report on the conduct of the war that was submitted to the UN on Friday.
The report found Israeli troops “fired several artillery shells in violation of the rules of engagement prohibiting use of such artillery near populated areas”. However, it also stated that Israel’s military advocate general “found no basis” to order a criminal investigation into the incident in Tel al-Hawa. So far only one Israeli soldier has been prosecuted over the war – for stealing a credit card from a Palestinian house.
Last year, a UN Board of Inquiry report investigated Israeli attacks on UN buildings and staff in Gaza during the war and accused the Israeli military of “negligence or recklessness”. It singled out several incidents, including the attack on the UN compound. The warehouse, run by the UN Relief and Works Agency which supports Palestinian refugees, was the biggest in Gaza and was full of food and aid for the population.
In the past two weeks Israel has paid $10.5m (£6.6m) in compensation to the UN for the damage.
But in its report, the Israeli authorities maintained that their use of white phosphorus munitions “was consistent with Israel’s obligations under international law” and said the military advocate general found no grounds for any disciplinary measures over their use. The disciplining of the two officers was specifically about the firing of “artillery shells”. The two were disciplined by their senior officer, Yoav Galant, the head of the Israeli military’s Southern Command.
A report by the South African judge Richard Goldstone, commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council, described how UN staff that day called Israeli authorities at least seven times asking them to stop the shelling of the compound. Goldstone found that three high-explosive shells and seven white phosphorus artillery shells, probably from a 155mm howitzer, had hit the compound. It concluded that the Israeli military violated customary international law.
False hopes for Palestine: The Guardian CiF
Reports of optimistic developments in the Palestinian Territories are premature – they are still crushed by Israel’s control regime
Over the last six months, there have been numerous reports on the apparent signs of hope in West Bank cities such as Ramallah, Nablus, and Jenin. The Palestinian prime minister, Salam Fayyad, has also enjoyed flattering coverage in the likes of Newsweek and the New York Times, with his unilateral state-building strategy praised by a variety of commentators. The Israeli government, for its part, has trumpeted improvements in Palestinians’ daily lives – from the easing of restrictions on movement, to a boosted economy. Yet as I discovered during a visit at the beginning of this year, these sunny reports bear no relation to Israel’s colonisation of East Jerusalem and West Bank, where the permanently-temporary occupation continues to defy state-building efforts.
The first problem with the West Bank progress story is that even in economic terms the prospect of genuinely sustainable Palestinian growth is compromised by Israel’s regime of control. Back in November, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu claimed that as a result of his government’s actions, there is “unprecedented prosperity in the Palestinian Authority”. This and similar claims have often referred to a report last September by the International Monetary Fund, which predicts in its executive summary that “real GDP in the West Bank is projected to rise by about 7% in 2009”.
Yet, speaking to me by phone, one of the report’s authors, Oussama Kanaan, pointed out that since the economy was “starting from such a low base, even a modest relaxation of [Israeli] restrictions will have a significant impact on growth”. But Kanaan also made clear that “prosperity has to do with per capita GDP – not growth”. In terms of “the wealth of the economy”, he said, “it was much better in 1999”.
Another problem is that the Palestinian economy continues to be kept afloat by external sources, particularly in that the Palestinian Authority – and all the salaries it sustains – is heavily supported by international donations. On a smaller scale, a city such as Jenin has benefited from Palestinian citizens of Israel coming through a checkpoint to shop – but this is not helping self-sufficiency. Driving north out of the city takes you past rows of shuttered-up businesses and workshops, and even the promised “industrial zone” is as yet unrealised.
This dependency is further compounded by a second, fundamental problem. Kanaan stressed that continued growth in the Palestinian economy would not only require “direct access to the rest of the world and a lifting of the restrictions on exports”, but also a “removal of restrictions on the use of 60% of the West Bank, Area C”. This, he said, is because “you have to have an adequate resource base, ie control of land, for economic activity to occur there”.
Yet Israeli colonisation continues apace in Area C – an area where, as reported by the UN’s OCHA in December, Palestinians are almost entirely prevented from building. This is because the majority of this land “is earmarked for the settlements, the army, nature reserves or a buffer zone around the separation fence”, and in the rest, almost all Palestinian building permits are refused. Last year, close to 200 Palestinian structures in Area C were demolished by the Israeli military.
As the space for state-building is unilaterally delineated by Israel, the latter is also continuing to develop the mechanisms of separation and control that render Palestinian “sovereignty” a joke. Netanyahu may have overseen the removal of some checkpoints but, at the end of last year, there were still 69 staffed checkpoints in the West Bank, and some further 500 obstacles to Palestinian freedom of movement.
Thus the third flaw with the West Bank state-building project is that Israel shows no intention of permitting the emergence of an independent, sovereign, Palestinian state. From Rabin’s desire to help create an “entity” that would be “less than a state”, to Netanyahu’s vision of a “Palestine” forbidden from having a military and surrounded by Israeli-controlled territory, Israel is intent on maintaining its domination of all Israel/Palestine.
This is Bantustan-building, not a state-in-waiting. Even since I first visited in 2003, the occupation has become more entrenched, Israel’s absorption of colonised swaths of Jerusalem and the West Bank further consolidated. From the checkpoint “terminals” and the separation wall, to the expanding settlements and transportation network around East Jerusalem – Israel is putting down the apartheid infrastructure of permanent domination.
A New York Times columnist once wrote that the creation of a Palestinian state was almost certain. “But,” he continued, “it will be a state of a peculiar kind. Its citizens will often have to go through Israeli security checks in travelling from one part of their own country to another. In entering or leaving the new Palestine, they will be subject to rigorous Israeli controls. The state will be utterly dependent on Israel economically.” That was 11 years ago, after almost a decade of “peace process” – and a year before the Palestinian uprising.
This brief analysis does not even take into account the siege of Gaza, the Israeli consensus that Jerusalem is the “undivided Jewish capital”, and Israel’s refusal to recognise the Palestinian refugees’ rights. Yet even purely focusing on the West Bank is enough to show that the latest bout of “state-building” is merely a prelude for the next intifada.
Israel disciplines army officers: Al Jazeera online
The Israeli army has disciplined two high-ranking officers for firing artillery shells at populated areas during the Gaza offensive last year, according to local media.
The Haaretz newspaper website said on Monday that a military inquiry concluded that a division commander and a brigade commander endangered human life by firing highly incendiary weapons towards a compound run by a UN aid agency.
But the Israeli military spokesman’s office said the army had reprimanded Brigadier General Eyal Eisenberg and Brigade Commander Ilan Malka for using artillery in built-up areas – and not for using white phosphorous weapons.
“With respect to exploding munitions containing white phosphorous, the Military Advocate General concluded that the use of this weapon in the operation was consistent with Israel’s obligations under international law”, the military office statement said.
However, the army does not dispute that white phosphorous was used in Gaza and has submitted its report to the UN.
Severe burns
Many human rights organisations had accused the Israeli army of illegally using phosphorous munitions, which caused severe burned injuries among the Palestinian population.
However, the Israeli army justified its actions by saying that similar shells were in use by other Western armies and that the munitions were used in remote locations in the Gaza Strip.
Al Jazeera’s Jacky Rowland reporting from Jerusalem, said: “We must stress that the Israeli army is investigating itself. This is not in anyway an independent inquiry.
“When you bear in mind that a number of human rights groups identified what they described as a systematic, random and wide-ranging use of the chemical, the Israeli report just focuses on this one incident and two individuals being disciplined.
“But we have seen pictures from Gaza that hundreds of people were burned by white phosphorus during that military campaign a year ago. It seems that just this one isolated incident is being focused on in the Israeli investigation.”
The development comes as a deadline looms for Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, to address the General Assembly with his own report on Gaza.
The occupied Palestinian territory has a high population density and limited land access.
Committees formed
With the conclusion of the Gaza offensive, dubbed Operation Cast Lead, Gabi Ashkenazi, the Israeli army chief, ordered the convening of five special investigative committees, Israel’s report to the UN said.
One of the committees examined the use of phosphorus shells.
The members noted in their findings that the two army officers, in approving the firing of phosphorus shells, were guilty of “exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardised the lives of others”.
Gideon Levy, a Haaretz political analyst, told Al Jazeera: “This is the first time that Israel has admitted it did something wrong. This by itself is a progressive step.
“Without international pressure, the [Israeli army] would have not carried out investigations, but I guess the world will not be satisifed with this very minor step.”
Goldstone findings
The Goldstone report, requested by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council, was put together by an expert panel headed by Richard Goldstone, a South African jurist.
Based on its findings in Gaza, the committee accused both Israel and Palestinian fighters of committing war crimes during the Gaza war, which lasted from December 27, 2008, to January 18, 2009.
Initially, Israel refused to co-operate with Goldstone and angrily rejected his findings.
But after the General Assembly urged in November both Israel and the Palestinians to investigate Goldstone’s charges, Israel decided it would provide Ban with information on the Gaza offensive.
Yigal Palmor, the Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, said the country’s response, defends Israel’s investigations of its offensive, but does not address the international body’s main demand – the creation of an independent commission of inquiry.
“The decision to establish a commission of inquiry must be made by Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, he said.
Israel’s report to the UN says that the convening of a sixth committee has been set up to examine additional allegations made against the Israeli army.
So far, Israel’s military says, it has investigated about 150 incidents that took place during the fighting.
At least 29 investigations are ongoing, the military said, and one soldier has been convicted of misconduct.
IDF denies disciplining top officers over white phosphorous use in Gaza war: Haaretz
The Israel Defense Forces on Monday denied that two of its senior officers had been summoned for disciplinary action after headquarters staff found that the men exceeded their authority in approving the use of phosphorus shells during last year’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip, as the Israeli government wrote in a recent report.
In an official response provided to the United Nations over the weekend in response to last September’s Goldstone Commission report, the government said that a brigadier general and another officer with the rank of colonel endangered human life during by firing white phosphorous munitions in the direction of a compound run by UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.
The government finding aknowledges, at least in part, allegations by international organizations.
But the IDF on Monday flatly denied that Division Commander Brig. Gen. Eyal Eisenberg and Givati Brigade Commander Col. Ilan Malka been subject to disciplinary action by GOC Southern Command Maj. Gen. Yoav Gallant. It did not deny that the munitions were in fact used during the war, however.
The incident in question occurred on January 15 of last year, two days before the end of Operation Cast Lead, in the southern Gaza City neighborhood of Tel al-Hawa, at a time when the Givati brigade and other Israeli forces were in the area.
In the course of engagement with a Hamas squad, which according to IDF intelligence possessed advanced anti-tank missiles, it was decided to use phosphorus smoke munitions to create cover that would make it harder for the Hamas fighters to see the IDF soldiers.
According to Israeli intelligence, the Hamas forces were stationed in a commanding location from which they could easily see the soldiers and the UNRWA compound that was located between the Israeli forces and the Hamas position.
The munitions disperse hundreds of pieces of felt impregnated with phosphorus and at least some of the pieces fell into the UNRWA compound, causing injury to an UNRWA employee there as well as to two Palestinian civilians who took cover at the location.
Many human rights organizations said that the IDF had illegally used the phosphorus munitions, which are shot from 155 mm. cannon, and that the material caused many burn injuries among the Palestinian population. The IDF responded that the munitions were permitted under international conventions and that similar shells are in use by other Western armies. The army also contended that the munitions were used in locations remote from heavily -populated areas.
With the conclusion of Operation Cast Lead, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi ordered the convening of five special investigative committees each headed by an officer with the rank of colonel to examine some of the serious allegations leveled against the army. One of the committees examined the use of phosphorus shells.
After three months, at the end of April of last year, then deputy chief of staff Maj. Gen. Dan Harel presented the committees’ findings and with respect to phosphorus munitions said that they had found no instances in which shells were fired in violation of orders and in any event, they were fired in open areas.
Nonetheless, the report that the Israeli government gave to the United Nations last Friday explicitly states that the two senior officers were disciplined after one of the investigating committees noted among its findings that they approved the firing of phosphorus shells at Tel al-Hawa “exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardized the lives of others.”
The report to the UN also says that Ashkenazi recently ordered the convening of a sixth committee to examine additional allegations made against the IDF as well as an incident which one of the previous panels had been unable to thoroughly probe.
The investigative teams have been looking into only the most serious and prominent of the allegations made as a result of Cast Lead. This is in addition to military police probes that were carried out, or are still in progress, into about 150 alleged incidents of improper conduct on the part of soldiers involving civilians and Palestinian property during the Gaza campaign.
Some of the incidents were raised in operational IDF debriefings held after Cast Lead, but most came to light following complaints by human rights organizations, individual Palestinian civilians and press reports. Twelve incidents were raised for the first time in the Goldstone Commission report, which was commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council.
In the course of the IDF investigations, about 500 soldiers were questioned and nearly 100 Palestinian civilians were interviewed at the Erez checkpoint on the Israel-Gaza border. As a result of the IDF’s investigations, 36 criminal investigation files have been opened so far, but criminal legal proceedings have so far been opened in only one case, in which two Givati brigade soldiers were convicted of stealing a Palestinian civilian’s credit card.
Dershowitz: Goldstone is a traitor to the Jews
Prominent political commentator and pro-Israel campaigner Professor Alan Dershowitz slammed jurist Richard Goldstone, the architect of a UN report which accuses Israel of Gaza war crimes, calling him a traitor to the Jewish people, Army Radio reported yesterday. Dershowitz and Goldstone were colleagues and close friends for many years before the UN Gaza probe, but once Goldstone published his report the ties between the two were severed. (Haaretz Staff)
To be accused of being a’ traitor’ by Dershowitz, must be a badge of honour more substantial than winning the Nobel Prize! This is like being called a terrorist by Hitler…
Report: UN evidence counters Israel’s account of Gaza war: Haaretz
Remains of aircraft bomb disproves army’s claims that tank shells detroyed flour mill, The Guardian says.
Israel’s account of its conduct during the Gaza war was challenged on Monday after evidence emerged apparently contradicting one of the army’s key findings, The Guardian reported.
Israel last week submitted a 46-page response to a highly critical United Nations inquiry by South African judge Richard Goldstone, which accused both Israel and Hamas of “grave breaches” of the fourth Geneva Convention.
In the report, Israel claimed its forces abided by international law throughout the war last year and denied targeting the al-Badr flour mill in northern Gaza, which was severely damaged during the IDF’s three-week offensive.
But the UN mine action team, which handles ordnance disposal in Gaza, maintains that the remains of a 500-pound Mk82 aircraft-dropped bomb were found in the ruins of the mill last January.
This evidence directly contradicts the Israeli report, which challenged allegations that the building was deliberately targeted and specifically stated there was no evidence of an air strike, The Guardian said.
Goldstone used the account of the air strike as a sign that Israel’s attack on the mill was not mere collateral damage, but precisely targeted and a possible war crime.
Although no one died in the attack on what was the only operational mill in Gaza, the incident received particular criticism from Goldstone, who concluded that the bombing was “intentional and precise” and was “carried out for the purpose of denying sustenance to the civilian population”.
He added that the attacks violated the fourth Geneva Convention and customary international law, and may constitute a war crime.
The Israeli report admitted the building had been hit by tank shells but said it was a “legitimate military target” because there were Hamas fighters “in the vicinity of the flour mill”. It said the mill was “not a pre-planned target” and specifically denied it was hit by an air strike.
“The military advocate general did not find any evidence to support the assertion that the mill was attacked from the air using precise munitions, as alleged in the human rights council fact-finding report,” it said. The military advocate general “found no reason” to order a criminal investigation.
But the Guardian claims to have visited the mill days after the war last year, finding on the first floor of the building what appeared to be the remains of an aircraft-dropped bomb.
The UN mine action team said it identified an aircraft-dropped bomb at the mill on 25 January last year and removed it on 11 February. “Item located was the front half of a Mk82 aircraft bomb with 273M fuse,” the team reported.
“The remains of the bomb were found on an upper floor in a narrow walkway between burnt-out machinery and an outside wall.” The bomb was made safe by a technical field manager and removed.
Attorney Sfard: Israeli Police Investigation of Shooting of Tristan Anderson “Gravely Negligent: IOA
Yesterday’s announcement by the Israeli Ministry of Justice not to indict anyone in the March 2009 shooting and critically injuring of American activist Tristan Anderson at a non-violent demonstration in the West Bank village of Ni’ilin was based on a “gravely negligent” investigation by the Israeli police, says Israeli attorney Michel Sfard, who represents Tristan and his family.
“We were notified two weeks ago that Israel decided to close this case, and our subsequent study of the investigation file led us to call this press conference,” noted Sfard, who met with local and international journalists in Jerusalem at the office of the Alternative Information Center (AIC).
“The investigation of the Judea and Samaria District Police into the shooting of Tristan Anderson was gravely negligent,” stated Sfard. He noted that the police investigation team did not even interview the officers located in the center of Ni’ilin, one of three companies of border police operating in the village that day and the ones almost certain to be directly involved in shooting Anderson, according to the ballistic evidence. “I am embarrassed to say that the investigation team did not even go to Ni’ilin, the scene of the shooting,” added Sfard. “If a Jewish man had been shot and wounded, there is no doubt that the entire village would be under curfew and Israel would do everything possible to investigate.”
Seven Palestinian and international eyewitnesses to Israel’s shooting of Tristan conclusively demonstrated that Tristan was neither masked nor throwing rocks, as the Israeli police claim. Attorney Sfard and Israeli activist Jonathan Pollack, a long-time friend of Tristan, showed photographs from the village, illustrating the impossibility of Israel’s description of the shooting.
Sfard will now file an administrative appeal with the Israeli Attorney General, demanding that the investigation be reopened. “There is little chance that the Attorney General will not accept this appeal, at least in order to interrogate the border police officers from the central command,” believes Sfard.
The Anderson family wants Israel to take responsibility for shooting Tristan, which means both bringing the people involved to justice and helping to take care of Tristan, who will likely require assistance for the remainder of his life. In addition to demanding a thorough criminal investigation and appropriate indictments, the Anderson family is further filing a civil lawsuit in the case.
For background information on the shooting of Tristan Anderson, please see here
“A different kind of occupation”: an interview with Elia Suleiman: The Electronic Intifada
Nazareth-born filmmaker Elia Suleiman is one of the darlings of Cannes and stands out from the pack of contemporary Palestinian filmmakers for his unique style of filmmaking based on sewing together a series vignettes, silence — an emphasis on visual storytelling versus dialogue, and deadpan comedy found in often grim humor in the lives of everyday people living under the tyranny of what he calls a “pathetic occupation.”
Suleiman’s latest film, The Time That Remains (2009), which premiered at the last Cannes Film Festival, marks the end of what has been described as his “Palestinian film trilogy,” beginning with Chronicle of a Disappearance (1996); the much-acclaimed Divine Intervention (2002) which was Palestine’s official submission to the Academy Awards that year (but denied entry because “Palestine is not a country” — although the following year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences reneged and accepted it as a submission from the “Palestinian Authority”); and concluding with The Time That Remains. The Time That Remains broke the French box office’s top ten list last summer and has garnered much acclaim on the festival circuit. The Electronic Intifada contributor Sabah Haider interviewed Elia Suleiman and discussed a broad range of topics from his new film to the human experience and the quest for justice in this world.
Sabah Haider: The title of your new film is The Time That Remains. How would you explain the title; time is running out for what?
Elia Suleiman: I would say that the title is a warning sign. I cannot say that the time is running out — I don’t have authority over time. I can say that it’s a warning sign about a certain feel of the experience that we, whoever we are, might be living. The Time That Remains is a sense of my feeling, I feel it might be the feelings of others — it’s a warning sign regarding a global situation.
SH: What warning are you communicating?
ES: Of things running out. Of time running out. Of the fact that maybe it’s already too late. From the melting ice to the cleansing of any form of justice.
SH: Is the Arab-Israeli conflict is a microcosm of this?
ES: Yes, I used to use exactly that saying. Yes you could, if you want, definitely one keeps on rephrasing. Now I see that we have gone a step further. In my opinion I think that this microcosm is everywhere, so I don’t know if the microcosm of the Arab-Israeli conflict is a reflection of the world, or if the world is a microcosm of Palestine.
There is a microcosm everywhere of every conflict, every centimeter that we are now traveling. I do not believe that there is one microcosm to reflect the world, because every place in the world has become a microcosm of its own conflict.
The Arab-Israeli conflict is the world’s conflict and vice-versa, so I don’t know what is a microcosm of what anymore, because globally, Palestine has multiplied and generated into so many Palestines. Because I feel if you go to Peru, you will find Palestine in a grave state there too.
SH: Are you referring to the fragmented Diaspora?
ES: I’m not talking about Palestinians. I’m talking about all conflicts and all regressions and all pollutions and the [global economic] crash, and globalization. In fact, The Time That Remains is not at all a metaphor of Palestine. Not at all.
SH: Is the Arab-Israeli conflict a symbol of the degeneration of society?
ES: I’m not saying anything about the Arab-Israeli conflict, see what I mean? I do not make a film in order to talk about the Arab-Israeli conflict. In fact, the phrase the Arab-Israeli conflict does not even belong in my dictionary — at all. I only reflect and sponge and experience, and that happens to be as a Palestinian Diasporic — or everyday reality. An occupation of some sorts. A different kind of an occupation. An occupation of the geography of Palestine, and an occupation of the souls of those who live there.
This is a reality that is being experienced everywhere in the world, and not necessarily just Palestinians. I’m saying it’s an experience that can be identified with everywhere in the world. We live in a place called “the globe” today that has a multiplicity of experiences in it. My films do not talk about Palestine necessarily. They are Palestine because I am from that place — I reflect my experience, but in identification with all the Palestines that exist. The word “Arab-Israeli conflict” is alien to me in terms of the poetics of the word. I don’t think my film is about that altogether.
SH: Can you explain your view that Palestine represents all of the conflicts of the world?
ES: I think there is an identification. Look, when you are an artist, you should have faith that first of all your experience is not local; it is a universal experience. That’s one. When you compose an image you should never think about the boundaries of that image. But should this image exist in one locale, it should transgress the boundaries of that locale. So that means that if an Uruguayan is watching my film, and has an identification with the story of Fouad in the film, then this is where I believe I have traveled an experience, a universality of some sort, which I think cinema is up for. So this is not about molding or summing up an experience located in Palestine. This is about all the experiences that can be conceptually, Palestinian-ally, called so.
When I make a film, I do not have any impulse, when I’m composing an image, of raising the consciousness of the world about Palestine. If, by de facto, the spectator feels an identification to the story of Palestine, that is when I’ll be achieving something. And if they go home and change a certain something to the better of the world, in their own locale, then they have been in my opinion, I would say, very pro-Palestinian.
If they took pleasure when watching the film, and went home and had a kind of positivity or an intuition or desire to aestheticize their dinner table, they have, as far as I’m concerned, went a step further to becoming pro-Palestinian. I will not even believe that if they went and started to demonstrate, that this would be an achievement for me. I think each individual, when they watch a film of mine, that when it will be flattering me is when they have certain impulses of a positive construction, of a better life of their own. As individuals, and as communities, and that is for me then, a pro-Palestinian experience.
The term “Palestinian cinema” is not just used to describe the films made by Palestinian filmmakers, but it’s now used describe films that represent a Palestinian perspective. I don’t know what that is. What is a Palestinian perspective?
SH: Contemporary films that tell of Palestinian experiences — would you say these films construct a national identity for the fragmented Diaspora?
ES: Certainly not mine. Personally, I do not adhere to Palestinian national identity. I may adhere to an identification, but not an identity. The experience of my films do not construct or adhere to what an identity can be defined as. Expulsion? Expulsion is shared by so many histories. A kuffiyeh? A kuffiyeh became a political symbol in intifada times. Some cynics might have been right in defining a counter-effect to an occupation.
Look at who actually constructs national identities in the world — not necessarily those who are under occupation, but those who are into occupation. Take for example, Israel, who even goes to steal the falafel to make that part of their national identity. What is the force behind that sort of pathetic, obsessive search for any form of a national identity in Israel? More occupation? Definitely. More expansion. Definitely. First it was the falafel, then it became the hummus. I think they’re absolutely pathetic.
Why do we have to run after what is by de facto part of our culture — food or embroidery or kuffiyehs — and why do we have to overemphasize dancing dabke as if this symbolizes that the land is ours, but simply beating it? I do not believe in those things. If there was to be any such thing as a national identity with an identification of that, I think then I would say it has to be so elastic it would never have to be within any static borders.
Because if we start to say that “this is us, until here, and the rest is them or other” that means we have put ourselves into our own ghetto and nailed ourselves to the ground, while if our national identity is expansive in terms of the seduction and pleasure of being others, then our national identity can enhance so much of the world’s experience.
I said it a long time ago — if, for the sake of strategy, and only if, I would be fighting today in sympathy of the Palestinian people to have an independent state, what does that mean? Am I such a lover of any kind of statehood? Do I so much admire any kind of police force, government and institutionalized powers? It is only so that the Israeli tank leaves the doorsteps of the school where the children are entering. Why a state, then? Why raise a flag? Only because it’s a symbol of the freedom that the Palestinians are trying to attain.
Lets say that the Palestinian state raised the flag, it built the borders, and we had a certain amount of freedom, a certain amount of less oppression — what if this state is not necessarily the kind of state we’d adhere to, in terms of justice and democracy, even though it achieved a liberation of some sort? Will I still be supporting a Palestinian state? No I will not. If it becomes another oppressive authority, I will be fighting it nonetheless. I will be fighting to lower the flag. In fact I said once, if this is one strategy, I will be fighting until the flag has risen. But then I will be fighting to lower that flag again, because I do not believe — nor in flags, nor in linear identities. I believe in multiplicities of and diversities of cultures. So I am not for a two state solution. I never had compassion for this sort of idea. Not only that, but the fact that politically, socially, humanly, morally, it’s not just.
SH: Your films focus on a loss of hope and of melancholy resignation. Do they represent a loss of hope that exists within the Palestinian community, both under occupation and in the Diaspora?
ES: I think by de facto, that the very act of the making of a film, is an act emerging from hope. So questions that surround hopelessness are in contradiction to the actual fact that there is a film. If I was hopeless, I would not have made a film entitled The Time That Remains, so I don’t think that this question applies to my being, because I think that there is hope. There is only hope. Otherwise I wouldn’t be making films. I’m not in a post-apocalypse ambience. We’re not sitting with … gas masks.
The Time That Remains is a kind of warning about the regression of the status quo, or the regression of the state of things. You warn because there is hope. And when you compose an aesthetic image, the pleasure is not morbid. I’m not living in a ghostly ambience. It is based in only hope. I can tell you at the same time that the space of this form of reflexivity, of meditation of pleasure, of the positivity to destabilize the authorities that are aggressing [against] us; those who want any form of a better life is shrinking. We are not necessarily winning. We are only trying to arrest the regression, unfortunately. And the powers that are trying to shrink our aspiration for democracy are greater than our imagination.
SH: Of the films being made today that propel a counter Israeli perspective, do you feel they construct an efficient form of resistance?
ES: Are there works of art that form this form of resistance? Like my films? I think Palestinians are included, at the forefront, having to face the everyday reality of occupation and oppression. And still be able to, actually, with so little space and so little possibility, to express themselves aesthetically, they are definitely at the forefront. I don’t think they’re so particularly special in the aesthetic department. I think the total sum of aesthetic attempts everywhere, participate in the liberation of Palestine as well as the liberation of all occupations.
SH: So do you believe Palestinian cinema is a form of resistance?
ES: Not necessarily just Palestinian, but I think that cinema, a certain cinema, is a form of resistance. Especially when it is the habitat of a certain moral questioning; of a certain place and pleasure and inspiration of a certain democratic framing, it becomes a form of resistance evidently. The fact that we are trying, we are crossing the boundaries and transgressing these boundaries, we are also trying to communicate to others a form of resistance to stop the regression by itself — by de facto. Palestinian cinema, the term must be used precisely — because it can be used by our adversaries in order to lock us in. What’s the use? We know we are Palestinians.
SH: What is your opinion on cultural boycott? Do you support the academic and cultural boycott of Israel?
ES: I really started to have a process of self-evaluation and of defining and redefining this word … I see a lot of justice in the academic boycott in the historic moment that it is happening vis-a-vis what Israel has been doing lately. I think this is definitely an interesting move and an interesting [course of] action … It has destabilized the institution of Zionist practice somewhere, because really they are so obnoxious, the Israelis — the Israeli institution and the government. … I [do] have a problem with boycotts of anything, any time, when it starts to kill the good, the bad and the ugly. And this is the problem that I have been facing with some of these boycotts — not the academic one, by the way, because for some reason I have felt there is a lot more thought and strategy [in it] — and I have been in dialogue with some of the pioneers of this boycott, and I have discussed with them, what I would consider my reservations about it.
Sabah Haider is a Canadian journalist and filmmaker based in Beirut. She can be reached at sabafhaider A T gmail D O T com.
OPEN LETTER TO ELTON JOHN
Dear Elton John:
Like much of the world, we think you’re a good bloke. You came out when it was
difficult; you admitted your addictions were stronger than you were; you’ve
poured money into AIDS research. Oh, and then there’s the music – not bad at
all.
But we’re struggling to understand why you’re playing in Israel on June 17. You
may say you’re not a political person, but does an army dropping white
phosphorus on a school building full of children demand a political response?
Does walling a million and a half people up in a ghetto and then pounding that
ghetto to rubble require a political response from us, or a human one?
We think it needs a human response, and we think that by choosing to play in Tel
Aviv you’re denying this. You’re behaving as if playing in Israel is morally
neutral – but how can it be? How can the cruelties Israel practises against the
Palestinians – fundamentally because the Palestinians are there, on Palestinian
land, and Israel wants them to go – be morally neutral?
Okay, you turn up in Ramat Gan, and it gets to that ‘Candle in the Wind’ moment,
and thousands of lighters flicker – but there won’t be any Palestinians from the
Occupied Territories swaying along with the Israelis – the army won’t let them
leave their ghettoes. Please read what Judge Goldstone said about the onslaught
on Gaza; what Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have been saying
for decades about the crimes committed against the Palestinians. Of course the
Israeli state denies it has a case to answer, though it’s knee-deep in ethnic
cleansing and land-theft and the endless daily suffocating of Palestinian lives and
hopes.
Political or not political, when you stand up on that stage in Tel Aviv, you line
yourself up with a racist state. Do you want to give them the satisfaction?
Please don’t go.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Haim Bresheeth
Mike Cushman
Professor Steven Rose
Professor Jonathan Rosenhead