al-Sahafiyeen

Op-Ed columnist Ray Hanania on why the U.S. Census is unfair to Arabs

2009-12-21T20:30:00Z

The US Census is pushing to get American Arabs and Muslims to participate and help secure a "complete" count beginning in April. But many Arabs are concerned because the Census wants our help but gives Arabs nothing directly in return, such as recognition. That recognition is given to many other ethnic groups. American Arabs want to be included on the Census Form and be listed as "Arab" or maybe even Middle Eastern. Why not? There are now 28 other racial and ethnic groups listed on the census form. Census officials respond that they have no say over who is or isn't listed on the form, but that is an unacceptable, and even arrogant, excuse. They say we have to lobby Congress. Really? It might be easier to lobby Congress if Congress and the Government were getting feedback from the Census officials saying that many Arabs are concerned and want to be included. Refusing to stand up and convey that concern is what bothers me the most. And here is my YouTube commentary about that controversy. It's under 3 minutes. Click here to view Video

-- Ray Hanania www.RadioChicagoland.com

Programming Note: We've Moved!

2009-09-13T18:17:00Z

The SPJ Blogs Network has moved to the Wordpress platform, making it easier than ever to join the convesation. No registration of any kind is necessary. You can find the new home of the al-Sahafiyeen blog by following this link. RSS subscribers, update your readers by pointing it to this URL.

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Former reporter for The East Carolinian complains of harassment at Israeli checkpoint

2009-08-28T01:30:00Z

Reporters who try to enter the West Bank are routinely stopped and searched by Israeli soldiers at checokpoints. And reporters who happen to be of Arab heritage -- the soldiers always ask -- are harassed even more.

Such was the experience recently of Nadiah Sarsour, a former reporter for the college newspaper The East Carolinian when she decided to visit Palestine last month. Sarsour, a journalism graduate of ECU in broadcasting. Sarsour was trying to visit relatives in the West Bank when she was offered a job with al-Watan, the Palestinian news Agency based in East Jerusalem and Ramallah.

Click to read the story.

The real tragedy is much of what is written about events in the Israeli occupied West Bank in the Israeli press is written "long distance" -- Israeli reporters credentialed by the Israeli government often get their information directly from the Israeli Ministry of Information or the Israel Defense Forces. Oftentimes, they get the information by telephone.

Israeli citizens are prohibited from entering the West Bank. I'm not sure that prohibition applies to journalists, although Palestinians and Israelis have told me they each fear entering the other's area. They both claim that their lives "might" be in danger.

The spokesman for Israel quoted in the story asserted that suicide bombers have used press credentials and vehicles with the letters TV plastered on their roofs to enter Israel and then detonate their bombs.

I never heard of that happening before, but then reality is often based on what officials assert in the Arab-Israeli conflict, rather than being based on hard facts.

-- Ray Hanania
www.RadioChicagoland.com

Release of Libyan in Lockerbie terrorism should put injustice of past behind us

2009-08-20T17:04:00Z

It is understandable that many Americans are upset about the decision by the Scottish court to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi from his 27 year prison sentence after only a few years served. The accused, al-Megrahi, was convicted in the bombing of PAN AM Flight 103 in 1988. The plane was flying over Lockerbie when it exploded, killing all 259 passengers and crew and 11 civilians on the ground. But not understandable is the narrow-vision of Americans who always see terrorism as an act of violence by someone else, but never an act of violence that has resulted from terrorism committed by the United States and the West against civilians in the Arab World. Libyan President Moammar Gaddafi's infant daughter was among the 36 civilians murdered in 1986 when US President Ronald Reagan ordered the bombing of one of Gaddafi's homes. The attack was not against a Libyan military target but rather against innocent civilians. Reagan alleged that Libya was behind the bombing of a disco many weeks earlier that took the lives of two American soldiers and one Turkish woman, and injuring dozens of others in Berlin. But Americans screaming about al-Megrahi's release, seem blind and unconcerned when justice is lost involving non-American murdered by American foreign policies. Thousands of Arabs in the Middle East were killed because of American policies, and those murders often were the motivation between retaliatory violence against Western targets, including the PAN AM Flight and other airline targets. Terrorism is terrorism, but justice is also justice. The fact is that no one has complained when Reagan was never brought to justice for ordering the killing of Libyan civilians. Or, for that matter, no one in America was ever charged with funding and orchestrating and "masterminding" the murder of civilians in Iran during the pro-American and funded terrorist regime of The Shah of Iran Moahmmed Reza Pahlavi. Pahlavi was one of the worst mass murderers in Middle east history and he was protected by Americans. Osama Bin laden is well known today as the terrorst mastermind behind the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the United States, taking some 3,000 lives. But Americans conveniently forget that Bin laden was a member of the Mujahideen trained and funded by the United States in the war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. And, we conveniently forget that Iraq's murdered dictator Saddam Hussein was in fact our ally int he war against the Iranian religious Muslim successors to the terrorist Shah of Iran, the Ayatollahs who held so many Americans hostage during the administration of former President Jimmy Carter. Rather than lament the release of al-Megrahi, Americans should look towards it as an opportunity to close a dark period in our history fromt he 1970s and 1980s when American terrorism was answered with Middle East terrorism. -- Ray Hanania www.RadioChicagoland.com

In American politics, your attitudes have a lot to do with your policies

2009-08-05T10:27:00Z

When President Bush was at the helm, he snubbed Helen Thomas, the first female bureau chief for a wire service. She also happens to be Lebanese Arab American and has covered every President since JFK -- Hey, can I wonder if JFK ever hit on Helen? I'll have to ask her the next time we're talking about American Arab journalism history.

It was his last press conference, well, meeting with the press. Bush told the gathered reporters on Jan. 12, 2009 just before finally leaving office:

"Through it all, it's been -- I have respected you. Sometimes didn't like the stories that you wrote or reported on. Sometimes you misunderestimated me. But always the relationship I have felt has been professional. And I appreciate it. I appreciate -- I do appreciate working with you. My friends say, what is it like to deal with the press corps? I said, these are just people trying to do the best they possibly can."

Then, of course, Helen Thomas, the little frail lady of 88 at the time who carried a powerful pen, waved her arms as best she could to get the president's attention. She was sitting right in the front row. It was a "classless" act, not uncharacteristic of most of Bush's mistreatment of American journalists. Actually, Bush treated American journalists better than he treated the English language -- unless I have "misunderestimated" him. Of course, Helen Thomas has her critics -- mainly as she comes out of the closet on the Middle East conflict and the bias against American Arabs by the mainstream news media -- and Bush also snubbed a few other longtime journalists, although Helen Thomas is the "Dean" of the White House Press Corp and she opens and closes press conferences, or should.

Here's a trash slam of HT from Slate Magazine, not always the most accurate or objective online news source on the planet, but what else is new about the decaying and ailing and dying and disabled and ... can I go on? ... American journalism?

This week, though, class returned to the White House sending out a new message that the hatemongering that once found its way from the cable soapboxes into the White House have now been detached.

President Obama, maybe giving a lesson to Bush and his hatemongering pals in the rightwing alleged media, paid Helen Thomas a visit on his own birthday yesterday to celebrate her own birthday. Obama celebrated his 48th birthday August 4 with the hatemongers on the right waving their Op-Eds and commentaries high above their heads demanding that Hawaii and President Obama provide the original copy of his birthcertificate, something I can't even get in Cook County. The "Birthers" really should be aborted.

Helen Thomas was also born on August 4, 1920, sharing the President's honor. Oh that is going to mean that Obama is going to stick it to the Bush tradition every year during his eight year (we hope) reign.

Here's a story (fromt he sometimes not so objective Chicago tribune) on Obama showing that he is a class person in a classless world. Read story?

Happy Birthday Helen Thomas, Dean of the White House Press Corp and Dean of the American Arab journalists. And Happy Birthday Mr. President.

Hey, maybe we can get Helen Thomas to sing Happy Birthday Mr. President and do that intro from the old Bob Hope specials, too?

-- Ray Hanania

www.RadioChicagoland.com

So I guess we're just supposed to trust Baghdad's American-installed government

2009-08-05T00:30:00Z

The Arab News, the leading English language professional newspaper in the Middle East reports this story about the 2006 murder of three reporters working for Al-Arabiya News. The murder of Atwar Bahjat and two of her colleagues, Adnan Abdallah and Khaled Mohsen were grabbed near the Northern Iraqi Town of Samara on Feb. 22, 2006 where they were reporting on the bombing of a Shiite Mosque. Their bodies were found a day later.

What concerns me is the language int he news report which gives us clues as to the process by which these murders were solved.

The killers "confessed." They "told interrogators."

What the story doesn't explain is how the Iraqi government investigated, found clues and then tracked down the killers with evidence. What we do see is that the post-Saddam Hussein government doesn't seem that much more different than the Saddam Hussein government which also issued news releases when alleged "terrorists" were killed that included similar phrases like "confessed" and "told interrogators."

Here's the link to the story. Click here.

-- Ray Hanania

www.NAAJA-US.com

Media focuses on Obama stand against illegal settlements, but closes eyes to it's darker side

2009-08-02T11:55:00Z

While President Obama has courageously put the focus on Israel's illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, arguing they are obstacles to peace and illegal, the news media has turned the story into a debate about political will rather than one about rights.

Meanwhile, no one is looking at the opposite side of the settlement coin: while illegal settlements continue to expand -- Prime Minister Netanyahu insists despite Obama's words, the settlements will continue to expand -- the Israeli government is acting to evict Palestinians from East Jerusalem homes that the Israeli government claims as Palestinians moving into "Jewish" property.

Netanyahu insisted recently that no one has the right to prevent people who are Jewish from living in Jerusalem -- a claim no one has made. He even said Christian and Muslims can live in Jerusalem, too.

And the media just smiles and say, "Thanks Bibi for saying the words we need to hear. As long as you say the words we like, we do not need to investigate anything you do."

Fortunately, the Ma'an News Agency, which was founded in Bethlehem a year ago, is asking the questions that the mainstream media refuses to address.

You can click here to read their story, that is, if you don't believe the propaganda that Mohamed al-Dura was not killed in 2000 and think he's still alive living in hiding in some refugee camp in Lebanon.

Who is Mohamed al-Dura" you ask? Well, what I expect from the mainstream news media numb from bias and propaganda when it comes to the Middle East.

ON ANOTHER ISSUE: The National Arab American Journalists Association (NAAJA) has launched a professional social networking site for pprofessional American Arab journalists and American Arabs studying to be journalists.

http://naaja-us.ning.com

-- Ray Hanania
www.RadioChicagoland.com

Number of American Arab publications increases by three in past six months

2009-07-25T11:19:00Z

Although American Arab publications continue to face severe economic challenges, the number of publications (measured by the National Arab American Journalists Association www.NAAJA-US.com) has grown with the addition of three new newspapers.

The Arab American News in Dearborn, Michigan continues to shine as one of the country's leading consistently weekly publications, several other publications coming out twice monthly have really expanded their reach including Aramica in New York/New Jersey, al-Mustaqbal in Chicago, The Independent Monitor in Northern California and InFocus News in LA are among the highest circulated.

I spoke with a dozen editors and publishers and all of them agree that they face several shared challenges and observations:

1-Full embrace from the communities they serve. Arab Americans continue to view their own ethnic newspapers on the basis of political partisanship and Arab national identity or on whether they are secular or Islamic. The community does not support the media as much as they turn to the mainstream media which they complain about loudly and often.

2-Islamic publications, Arab and non-Arab, tend to have more cohesive audiences but are driven by religious interpretation of events. They tend not to appeal to the larger secular Arab community.

3-Palestinian newspapers continue to focus mainly in Arabic and on politics, with an emphasis on activism writing rather than journalism writing.

4-A larger number are expanding their English sections to appeal to a growing population of second and third generation American Arabs who rely mostly on English and may or may not speak Arabic fluently. This segment, they agree, are most likely the future community leadership that will engage and help change American society and the negative stereotypes against the Arab.

5-Advertisers are turned off by too much politics and while the breadth of advertising opportunities are out there, much of it comes from a narrow group that includes: the U.S. Military, cell phone companies, satellite TV companies, Middle East airline companies.

Not, or only infrequently advertising, are major Arab American institutions, suggesting those organizations either do not recognize the importance of the Arab American community or they, too, are experience severe budget challenges.

There is a large pool of advertisers that purchase small advertisements at lower cost including restaurants, travel agencies, insurance companies, charities and entertainment producers. Not advertising at all, it seems, are churches and mosques.

Many of them feel that while President Barack Obama has vowed to reach out and support the Muslim World, he has failed to reach out and engage the Arab World through this local avenue of the American Arab media. Efforts to contact Obama's office, the publishers and editors report, have failed or been rebuffed. Much of the news they get about Obama and the Arab and Muslim World comes from either commentary on the president's policies and actions or from republishing articles in the Arab World media, mainly in Arabic.

An updated list of publications by city and state is now available at www.NAAJA-US.com

-- Ray Hanania

www.RadioChicagoland.com

North Korea - The Mouse that Roared??

2009-07-23T08:03:00Z

Perhaps our carrot and stick approach with North Korea is ineffective because we've tended to use too much stick and not enough carrots. Everyone is cognizance of the fact that the people of North Korea are starving and that the country is in a deplorable economic state, one that has tremendous needs, perhaps second to only Africa for humanitarian relief. On a personal level, I would be much more amenable to working with someone whose provided me sustenance without conditions rather than working with someone that says "Do what I tell you or I'll annihilate you, but, if you're good maybe I'll provide you with a little bit of help as a reward." Before truly wearing the "white hat" in this scenario shouldn't we just help because we know there is a great need? Why do we have to condition our help on their capitulation? We're told to love our fellow man and treat our neighbor as we treat ourselves, as well as apply the golden rule: do unto others and you would have other do unto you. Where are these principles in our diplomatic relationship with North Korea? - NO WHERE TO BE FOUND! Love conquers all - lets be true conquerors and extend out a hand of love and friendship without conditions - it surely couldn't make matters any worse than what they already are! Rather than threatening and bombing North Korea, where then eventually they will surrender, and afterwards the United States funneling in millions of dollars to build an infrastructure... Why don't we just instead lend a helping hand? Jennifer Isso News Anchor/ Reporter

Take your 2010 US Census form and shove it!

2009-07-16T18:16:00Z

Take your US Census form and shove-it!

The first question I always get from “Americans” is, “Why do you keep calling yourself ‘Arab-American?’ You are American!”

It represents the rock and the hard place where American Arabs have been pushed by the lack of education among most Americans.

It’s aggravated by what I also call the U.S. Government’s split personality when it comes to Americans Arabs. On one hand, they want to know us. On the other, they don’t. Here’s what I mean.

The only time the United States Government wants to know about Americans Arabs is when they are “profiling” us at airport and border security to “protect” the country from “the terrorist threat.”

But when it comes to counting people in the U.S. Census (so they can participate and share in government programs like grant funding awards, defining the borders of election districts like for congress, state legislatures or municipal councils) the U.S. Government pretends American Arabs don’t exist.

That is exactly what’s happening now in the massive 2010 U.S. Census drive.

The Government isn’t completely stupid, nor are they naïve. They are dishing out just enough money to American Arab organizations and PR agencies to do the outreach to the American Arab community.

The Government could do it but they don’t have a positive file on who we are. The Government only has “the negative file,” the one were American Arabs have been historically followed, investigated and probed by FBI agents repeatedly over the past 75 years.

The FBI investigated me over a two year period beginning in August 1975, right after I completed my active duty military service for this country during the Vietnam War. They said I must be a terrorist, because I was Arab; but they concluded the 45 page report by saying in small type, I’m just an American who is concerned about advancing his ethnic community.

During the two years, they talked to banks, employers, neighbors friends and anyone who had anything to do with me. It was all in the report, most of it blacked out with marker. When I finally received a copy in 1979, it pretty much explained the dismissal from jobs, why some neighbors and some friends had stopped talking with me or associating with me, and why several prospective employers had refused to hire me.

Hey, when the U.S. Government puts its attention on American Arabs, it’s usually not for a good reason.

That’s why I am upset -- no angry -- that the Government is pretending that they care for us American Arabs by reaching out and asking us to complete our Federal Census form for 2010.

There are these benefits that we will get from participating. Yea? Like what? What benefits do we as American Arabs actually get from supporting anything this government does?

For example, when I go through an airport, I am immediately identified as an “Arab.” I’m pulled aside and my bags and possessions are thoroughly searched. The friends I am with who are not Arab are made to feel like they are traveling with Osama Bin Laden. And strangers who pass through normal levels of security look at me like I’m going to cut their throats or blow myself up when I get on the plane.

It’s humiliating. But no one really cares. Better to be safe than sorry. If we have to make Arabs go through embarrassing and humiliating procedures that single them out solely because of their “look” or their “profile,” so be it.

Meanwhile, Caucasian murderers and killers walk through security thankful that the government is doing at least part of their job to remove the Arab scourge. More than 95 percent of serial killers are Caucasian.

Some of the biggest terrorists in the United States historically have been White supremicists and members of country-folk militias and Neo-Nazi organizations based in the so-called “American Heartland.”

But if you have Olive skin and look Middle Eastern – a profile that fits more than 200 nationalities and ethnicities mainly from Middle East and Asian countries -- you are the person they have to stop.

This is the “Negative Attention” we get from our government.

Then, this same government that spends a fortune screwing us as American Arabs, spends a fortune trying to convince us that if we participate in the 2010 Census this year, we’re going to benefit?

I ask again, what benefit? There is no benefit. And there is no benefit for a reason. Arabs are NOT included on the Census forms anyway.

The census form asks for your Race, listing Hispanic, Latino or Spanish Origin. And they ask if you are Mexican, Mexican American (I didn’t know there were two categories of Mexicans), or Chicano? What kind of race is “Chicano?” What country do “Chicanos” come from? “Chicano-stan?”

They ask the same question again on the long form: Are you White? Black, African American or Negro? Are you American Indian or Alaskan Native and they even give you a place to write in your tribe name.

That’s not all. The form asks are you Asian Indian? Japanese, Native Hawaiian, Chinese, Korean, Guamanian or Chamorro, Filipino, Vietnamese, Samoan or Other Asian where they give you a space so you can print your “race” like Laotian, Thai, Pakistani, Cambodian “and so on.”

Oh, they don’t stop there. They ask are you “Pacific Islander” and ask you to print your race like Fijian, Tongan “and so on.”

Way at the bottom, in case they missed someone, someone not so important, they have the throw away line, to check here if you are “Some Other Race – Print Race.”

That is where I have to hand-write that I am “Arab.” And proud of it too, by the way.

Now, the U.S. Government argues “Arabs” are not a race. So they can’t be counted. They consider us “Caucasian,” although the last time I looked it was the Caucasian hate groups in this country like the former Bush Administration that singled out Arabs for special mistreatment, harassment and discrimination.

Arabs are “not” a race, but we are a “people” that must be profiled at airports, security centers, thrown out of buildings in New York City, expelled from seats on Airplanes, and denied jobs and government grants and rejected by voters on election day.

“Not” a race, the Government insists? Really? Wow. Is that why they have taken the other “races” and broken them down into so many miscellaneous categories? It is not enough to know that someone is Asian. They want to know what kind of Asian? What kind of Native American? What kind of Mexican. Is “Chicano” a race? Are “Latino” or “Hispanic” races?

But not “Arabs.”

We’re not a race.

We’re just a bunch of people that ignorant Americans can step all over and use us as punching bags when the times get rough or some nut job we’ve never heard of before decides to declare himself the spokesman for all Arabs and Muslims.

So here’s the bottom line, U.S. Government. You don’t put “Arab” on the form, I don’t fill it out.

Either add the category “Arab” to the form or throw out all of the categories and stop lying to us American Arabs about how much you care.

(Ray Hanania is a Palestinian American Arab columnist, author and Chicago Radio Talk Show host. He can be reached at www.RadioChicagoland.com.)

Suicide Bombers

2009-07-16T05:07:00Z

Embarrassed that the Arab community is looked at through they eyes of Osama bin Laden and suicide bombers? We are judged as a race of people that take their own children, strap on bombs such as the C2, and have them blow themselves up as to become martyrs. As a former educator and a future parent this is something I am not able to comprehend from any given perspective. But my question to you is... Why is this happening? Why are we doing actions on the terms of Al-Qaida and suicide bombers? Why can’t we win a pitched battle?… Because every time we face the so called "enemy”… we LOSE! Why do we lose?… We have what is needed; the Arab men are just as good as any other man from any other race... they are not cowards, and they are not in lack of possession of military equipment.

We lose because of our leadership. Military Leaders have come to the position not based on ability but based on their position in society. Military leaders have obtained their position because they are the kings nephew or he belongs to so and so political party or he is the sheik’s son best friend, (as they resort to in the middle east) Or they are members of the oligarchic system ruling the Arab countries. How are the children’s mothers, fathers, or uncles sleeping at night knowing that their children are blowing themselves up to pieces so small that they can’t even be buried.

We are resorting to subterfuge behavior, terrorism, and suicide bombing because we can’t win the battle due to poor military leadership.

Unless the Arab world wakes up and realizes that they need to start to appoint military leaders based on ability ALONE, we will continue to lose wars and battles and continue to resort to the likes of Al-Qaida, terrorism and strapping huge bombs to our children and having them blow themselves up to little tiny pieces.

Just as General George Patton has once said… “You don’t win a war by dying for your country, you win a war by making the other Son of Bitch die for his."

Jennifer Isso

News Anchor/ Reporter

Why the news blackout over the arrest and detention of former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney?

2009-07-04T15:12:00Z

Cynthia McKinney was a longtime member of the U.S. Congress representing a Georgia District who got into political trouble when she started to turn up the volume on her criticism of Israel. She was finally targeted by AIPAC and thrown out of office.

On June 26, she joined a group on a boat trying to bring food, medicine and clothing to the besieged civilian population of the Gaza Strip which is in a special kind of occupied limbo -- Israel's settlers and military withdrew, but the region of Palestine has been surrounded militarily and the residents remain under an "outsider"-type occupation where nothing gets in or out unless Israel's government approves it.

Not even food, medicine or clothing for civilians.

The ship was boarded on June 26 by the Israeli military and she was among the many American citizens who were arrested and have remained in detention by Israel.

Most of the news reporting on it has been by the Atlanta Journal Constitution, which can't avoid writing about a local politician, even if she is hated more than Sarah Palin.

But here's what the "professional" Washington Post Newspaper, which covers Washington DC and national politics wrote:

Read the story?

The San Francisco View, St. Louis Post Dispatch and BBC have reports on the ongoing controversy. But most major newspapers and media, if they have covered the story, have treated it like the Washington Post as if the story is just a form of entertainment and of little significance. Much of what has been written about Congresswoman McKinney's plight (she retains the title even if a powerful lobbying group doesn't think she should have it) by the new media and "citizen journalists" who are much disparaged by the mainstream journalism elite -- or elitists!

Who decides what is and is not important news in this country? There is no "conspiracy" and no one group "controls" the media as my "peeps" like to insist. (It's their way of using stereotypes to explain what they can't seem to find a good explanation for -- but I disagree with them).

The factors seem to be this:

A - Cynthia McKinney is disliked by the mainstream media establishment which reflects the views of the mainstream political establishment

B - The American media "hates" no loathes writing anything that might be over-critical of Israel. (Who wants to be denounced by the indefensible label of being "anti-Semitic?")

C - The media is so economically depressed they have stopped worrying about principle and are instead writing for dollars. (A journalism version of Illinois' "culture of corruption" or better yet "Pay to Play." I'll call this one "Report to Make Happy".)

D - It's not a news story when a former US Congresswoman is arrested by a foreign country and placed in a foreign prison.

Oh, but why belabor the point? The mainstream American news media is biased, unprofessional and can't seem to get their heads out of their asses when it comes to news that is in the special Double Controversy Category.

Which is one reason why I am so happy that the mainstream media is slowly crumbling over their own hypocrisy. Their demise might mean that the media institution or industry will re-invent itself in a free market where the public really does decide what is and isn't worthy news.

So the New Media, which is replacing so-called "trained" and "professional" journalists with untrained "Citizen Journalists" may actually be better off after the mainstream news media finally collapses with its last breath of life in this world.

Maybe what we need more of is the unprofessional "citizen journalists" who may not have the "professional training," but do have a better sense these days of what is news.

-- Ray Hanania <a href="http://www.RadioChicagoland.com >www.RadioChicagoland.com

Israeli sitcom by Arab citizen is breaking the misconceptions by challenging the divisions head-on

2009-06-18T19:37:00Z

The life of an Arab citizen is anything but funny. Just ask my relatives who live in several Israeli cities. Non-Jews in a Jewish world caught on the edge of the wall that separates Palestinians from Israelis.

Yet, that’s exactly the premise of a sitcom that was a hit last year and is in its second season on Israeli TV called “Arab Labor.”

The sitcom is the brainchild of Palestinian writer Sayed Kashua and produced by Israeli Danny Paran. Even in our everyday language, you might note, Arab citizens of Israeli are still spoken of as if they are not a part of the larger Israeli society.

A sizable 20 percent of Israel’s population, the Christian and Muslim Palestinians rarely get any real or substantive airtime on Israeli television, outside of the news reports which, like most Western media, portray them purely in a negative light.

“Arab Labor” is a mild translation of the sitcom’s Hebrew name, Avoda Aravit, which is slang for “sloppy workmanship,” a derisive stereotype of the Arabs of Israel.

Yet under all this, Kashua may have achieved one of the most brilliant portrayals of the challenging life Arabs in Israel face every day. And using humor, he may have presented it in the only way most Israelis are willing to see it, one filled with racism, suspicion, distrust and stereotypes that must be brought out into the open if they are ever to be one-day healed. Because healing is something Arabs and Israelis need very badly.

Kashua’s remarkably captivating series focuses on the life of one Arab, Amjad Aliyan (Norman Issa), a journalist working for a Hebrew language Israeli magazine. Around him are his wife (Bushra played by Clara Khoury), daughter (Maya, played by Fatma Yihye), his parents, the rascal-like Ismael (Salim Dau) and cautious Umm Amjad (Salwa Nakra). Dau happens to be the head of the Arab Theater in Haifa.

What is really impressive is how the insignificant in life becomes the symbol of the very significance of the relationship between Arabs and Jews, Palestinians and Israelis.

Each episode of the sitcom focuses on one underlying challenge set in the broader theater of life. The first episode cuts right to the chase when Amjad is driving through the checkpoints – remember, he is a “citizen” of Israel – and he wonders how is it that the Israeli soldiers know how to single him out and pull him aside for constant inspection. He asks his daughter to please make sure not to speak Arabic and greet the soldiers in English. And of course, the daughter, in her best formal and religious Arabic, warmly and effusively greets the soldiers, who immediately check all their papers.

But his Israeli friend explains the reason for his daily harassment isn’t the way he looks, dresses or “smells,” but rather the car he drives.

Amjad drives a Subaru, his friends notes. And Subarus are only driven by the most extreme Israeli settlers who wear a yarmulke on their heads, or by Arabs.

So Amjad determines to buy a new car, through his father, who negotiates a purchase price and sale price and his double-sided commissions.

But in the process of lampooning something as subtle as the car you drive, other idiosyncrasies of Arab-Israeli life emerge. If you wear a seat belt in an Israeli licensed plated car through an Arab village in Israel, you must be an Israeli undercover agent with the Shin Bet.

Amjad engages in an argument about another subtle but serious topic. Why are there more accidents in the Arab communities in Israel than in the Jewish communities? Because of Arab culture of the fact that Arab villages and cities get so little funding their roads and infrastructure are dilapidated and eroded, causing more accidents.

Only a person who lives this life can see these details and expertly turn them into a humorous debate about everyday life.

In another episode, Amjad hears from his father about an Arab shepherd who has on goat who, when the Israeli soldiers pull him over for inspection, uses his snout to pull out the shepherd’s ID card from the shepherd’s pocket. When they try to recreate the scene for the magazine story and photograph, the goat is shy. So they stage it, of course. And once everyone is gone, the goat does precisely what he was acclaimed to do.

And in another episode, Amjad and his wife discuss placing their young but clever daughter in kindergarten, rather than leaving them to learn about life from the wily roguish grandfather.

So, they enroll her at an Arab school which happens to be religious. The daughter doesn’t want to go to the school but decides to go to excess in her religious transformation to shock her father into removing her. He then takes her to an Israeli school, called the Peace School.

That sounds innocent enough until they are told they have never had an Arab enroll at the Israeli school. And yes, while the name is “Peace” they never expected it to mean it might attract Arab children to mix with the Jewish children.

Unheard of, and shocking.

Episode after episode draws the viewer through the maze of conflicts that make of the reality of Arab-Jewish life in Israel.

The sitcom is broadcast in Hebrew with English sub-titles that are easy to read and understand. Words are often mistranslated to disguise the more obvious racism that sometimes exists in dialect and speech patterns and habits.

But the biggest tragedy is that most Arabs will not be able to see “Arab Labor,” because there are no cable or TV systems that are of any real reach that can present this sitcom to the public in the United States or the in the Arab World.

The first season features 10 hilarious episodes from start to finish. You can purchase the DVD online at www.AliveMind.net. 300 minutes on 2 disks, the DVD sells for an bargain price of only $34.98. Or, you can purchase it from its American distributor, “Cinema Purgatorio” at www.CinemaPurgatorio.com.

I urge you to get it. Not to laugh at the foibles of human tragedy, but rather to understand through the only medium that permits understanding in the emotion-charged Arab-Israeli conflict, humor.

(An award winning Palestinian American columnist, standup comedian and Chicago radio talk show host, Ray Hanania is the 2009 Winner of the MT Mehdi Courage in Journalism Award. He can be reached at www.RadioChicagoland.com.)

The way we communicate is changing fast

2009-06-08T20:21:00Z

As President Barack Obama prepared to make a major address to the Arab and Muslim Worlds recently, I expanded my access to the Arab World media. For a long time, I would obtain access to Arab media through the internet, either accessing web pages or online live video broadcasting.

One of the only options for most Americans is to purchase a satellite dish and order the "Arab World or Middle East" package of programming. American Arabs already use Satellite TV to access major Arab World media to get news, movies and more in the Arabic language.

One of the most informative resources on news from the Middle East is AlJazeera English TV. It is broadcast on Satellite and it has effectively been banned from broadcast on mainstream cable systems like Comcast, for example. Comcast says the reason is that it could not reach an agreement with Aljazeera but everyone believes the real reason is politics.

Why else is Aljazeera not shown on any mainstream Cable TV systems? You can get every other country on cable TV, including Israel's Shalom TV, which is available on Comcast Cable and other systems. But not Aljazeera English. (Ironically, when I visit Israel, Aljazeera is one of the main options available to viewers on local cable. But then Israel has always had a freer debate on Middle East issues than the poor, oppressed and information deprived United States.)

I should note, I do produce online video reports for Aljazeera English's Listening Post segment and have helped them add journalists to their stable of video bloggers.

I didn't want the Satellite option because it was too expensive and it requires a lot of "parts." I have to put a satellite dish on my house. That's almost like putting a sign on my house that I am Arab. It's bad enough I have a natural sign on my face, in my name and my writing. I don't need another. Still, the hassles of satellite seem overwhelming, especially since I already connect to Comcast Cable in the Chicago suburbs.

Recently, though, I came across a new option that seems to work great. JumpTV and NeuLion Inc have partnered to produce streaming video from foreign countries using the Internet and an iPTV cable box. It's $29 a month. They offer a Middle East option that provides 35 Arabic channels. Most are in Arabic. Aljazeera English is the only 24/7 English language broadcast but there are other programs. I think it would benefit the Arab media to expand their broadcasts from Arabic language to English, but that is another challenge and another column. You can get information at www.Talfazat.com if you are interested.

I got one. It took less than 20 minutes to set up. It plugs in to the HD TV. I connected it to the Internet in my home. And tuned the TV to the Auxillary channel.

And since then, I think I understand the Middle east issues far better than I did when I relied on the New York Times, Chicago Tribune and CNN. I understand a little bit of Arabic (my mother being from Bethlehem and father from Jerusalem) but I am addicted to Aljazeera English TV. Watching on my big screen TV and being able to record programs is far more convenient than trying to watch it on my computer screen. (Ironically, I understood the Conan O'Brien pre-Tonight Show marketing campaign where he introduces the audience to the TV set. It's like an iPod and a computer except that it has better audio and video quality.)

I watched Obama deliver his speech to the Arab World and immediately got reaction from the Arab World. I didn't have to wait until the news was filtered by the political spin in the mainstream American media.

I also watched the elections take place in Lebanon and better understand the dynamics of that country's problems. While we in the United States focus almost exclusively on Iran and Hezbollah, the militia they helped found during the Israeli occupation of Lebanon years ago, news reports in Lebanon are nore sophisticated. Many Lebanese said their votes were inspired by Obama's speech the week before at Cairo University. Others said that Hezbollah is not that major force that it is made out to be in the Western media. Of the 128 seats vyed for in the elections, Hezbollah only fielded 11 candidates -- who all won by the way.

I don't know. I think when we Americans have ALL the facts and ALL the information from ALL the available sources, our decisions become more sound. More reasoned. And our conclusions become more accurate. Our actions become more effective.

I know it is a new way to do things. But maybe, just maybe, we should set aside the hatred that has built a wall to separate us from news and information from the Middle East and start listening, learning and using what we learn to make our nation even better. Well, it may or may not become better, but we sure will be smarter people.

I'm addicted to Talfazat programming and to Aljazeera English. I think you should be too.

This is not a paid Ad at all. Just an attempt to increase your knowledge about a region of the world that has so much influence on our daily lives that we have so little access to understand.

-- Ray Hanania
www.RadioChicagoland.com

What Arabs hope for in Obama speech in Cairo

2009-06-03T20:36:00Z

By just going to Cairo University to give a "speech to the Muslim World," Barack Obama is doing something that his predecessors never really understood.

The Arab World and the Muslim World do not hate Americans nor do they hate the West. They are angry about some policies. Some fanatics use that anger and exploit it to finance and empower their extremist goals.

But by speaking to the Arab and the Muslim World, Obama is sending a signal to the silent majority of Arabs and Muslims that he cares and that Americans care. And that by itself will help to undermine the extremists in the Arab and Muslim World who are behind much of the violence. Obama "gets it." But what he actually says will help the Arab and Muslim World decide if Obama "understands" the Arab and Muslim World.

Most Arabs and Muslims do not hate Jews and they don't hate Israel. But they ARE angry with Israeli policy. That Obama is trying hard to stand up not only to Israel and to its 395 supporters in the U.S. Congress - a daunting challenge for even a president -- is a signal that Obama does understand. He understands that peace is not just abotu stopping the violence. It is about achieving the justice. Peace is about BOTH SIDES in the Arab-Israeli conflict actually doing something significant to compromise. That means the Arabs compromise and that means Israel compromises too. And the compromise that Arabs and Muslims want from Israel is simple: Stop building settlements. Stop annexing Arab owned lands. Share Jerusalem.

Despite being rebuffed not only by Israel's rightwing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu but also by "moderate leader" Ehud Barak, Obama plans to push ahead with "tough love." The fact is you can support Israel and Israel's interests and still demand that Israel stop building settlements and be ready to compromise.

That is exactly the message the Arabs World and the Muslim World want to hear from Obama. And he has spoken that tune already. not as forcefully and maybe too diplomatically in the face of Netanyahu's flexing of his muscle in Washington D.C. -- Netanyahu is behind the letter fromt he 395 Congressmen telling him to go soft on Israel.

Arabs and Muslims expect Obama to tell them that they must act to recognize Israel, work with israel and normalize relations with Israel. Control the fanatics and the extremists and crack down ont he violence and the violent prone fanatics who are behind the terrorism.

In exchange, Arabs and Muslims are expecting to also hear that he will pressure Israel to do what it has promised to do. Return Arab land confiscated in 1967. Share Jerusalem. Stop making excuses on the issue of illegal settlements and stop expanding them. Stop them and eventually remove them or trade them land for land, inch for inch.

Maybe it is a bit of Obama's upbringing that is making him more sensitive to the concerns of the Arab and Muslim World. But it is also the right thing to do. Showing concern for the Arab and Muslim World which has been victimized by the policies of the West for a century, mainly because of Oil will be more than enough for Arabs and Muslims to "stand down" in their anger, in their suspicions and their emotions or passion. Chill and give Obama a chance to do good.

Barack Obama is NOT George W. Bush, a president who lacked the ability to comprehend the depth of the Arab Israeli conflict. Although Obama has Rahm Emanuel at his side -- Emanuel is the son of one of Israel's toughest fighters and a member of the former terrorist organization the Irgun who also did some service in the Israel Defense Force -- Emanuel is not Dick Cheney pushing an agenda of vengeance against Iraq.

Obama is unique. Maybe because of his African American heritage. Maybe because of his family understanding of the Islamic World. Or maybe, more importantly, because he is a genuine person who speaks from his heart and truly believes that America is the champion of justice, the leader of the free world and that principle and morality mean more than shortterm political hegemony.

I trust Barack Obama. I think that given the chance, he more than anyone can bring peace to the Middle East. And, maybe even use that regional peace to bring peace to the rest of the world.

-- Ray Hanania
www.RadioChicagoland.com