The Ghetto Biennale: Haiti Screening & Conversation w/ Port-Au-Prince artist André Eugene & Others

Artwork by André Eugene

What: Haiti Screening & Conversation w/ Port-Au-Prince artist André Eugene & Others
When: Thursday 03.18.10
Where: 16Beaver Street, 4th Floor
When: 7:30 pm
Who: Free and open to all

"This Thursday we will have a very special event with Port-Au-Prince based artist André Eugene, who is in New York for a few days during an exceptional visit. After screening Leah Gordon's ‘Atis-Rezistans: The Sculptors of Grand Rue' (34mins), André Eugene, and our other guests Laura Heyman, and Richard Fleming, will answer questions or comments in a general conversation about art and politics in Port-Au-Prince, the recent Ghetto Biennale that happened there, and the aftermath of the tragic earthquake, and the prospects for the future.

We are keeping to 16 Beaver's tradition of not charging anything for this event (our events are always free), a hat will be circulated for those who want to help with contributions for the Grand Rue community, as André Eugene will be flying back directly to Haiti, and is specifically in New
York to buy tents for people who have no shelter for the coming rain season.

The evening is an opportunity to have a group conversation with everyone in New York who knows and cares about Haiti, or art, politics, and international resistance struggles. Please forward and post to your lists."

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2. About Port-Au-Prince based artist André Eugene, Laura Heyman, and
Richard Fleming

"André Eugene Andre Eugène is the progenitor of the Grand Rue artist movement in downtown Port au Prince. He fuses the fetish effigy with an apocalyptic futuristic vision. Much of his work is figurative using human skulls for heads and imbued with a bold sense of irony, sexuality and
humor. To learn more on him and the Grand Rue artists, see below text and link (3).

British photographer and filmmaker Leah Gordon first visited Haiti in 1991 and has built an extraordinary body of work over nineteen years. Her work does not merely articulate nostalgia for an authentic popular culture but positively celebrates the vivid potential of contemporary communal creativity in Haiti.

Richard Fleming is a writer and journalist with experience in Haiti. He is the author of 'Walking to Guantánamo'. You can learn more about his work at his blog.

Laura Heyman is an educator, photographer, artist and curator. She was a participant in last December's 'Ghetto Biennale' in Port-Au-Prince and will speak of her work and experience there."

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3. About Leah Gordon's film 'Atis Rezistans, The Sculptors of the Grand Rue'

"The Grand Rue Sculptors are a community of artists living in a downtown slum neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. This is the newest art community to have emerged in the last ten years. They have produced art that reflects a heightened, Gibsonesque, Lo-Sci-Fi, dystopian view of
their society, culture and religion, and have dragged Haitian art into the 21st century. Jean Herard Celeur, Andre Eugene and Guyodo are at the core of the movement, which contains seven or eight other younger artists, all producing powerful sculptural works. Their work has opened entirely new vistas into the creative possibilities of the Vodou-inspired arts of
Haiti. Their muscular sculptural collages of engine manifolds, computer entrails, TV sets, medical debris, skulls and discarded lumber transforms the detritus of a failing economy into deranged, post-apocalyptic totems."

To read texts, and see images of works about the Grand Rue, and its artists, visit here.

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4. About the Ghetto Biennale: A Salon des Refusés for the 21st century (November-December 2009)

Please visit the Ghetto Biennale website for full information on participants, history, ideas, etc.

(The following text is just an introduction. The Biennale already happened, but written in present//future tense)

"What happens when first world art rubs up against third world art? Does it bleed?

In 2009 the 'Sculptors of Grand Rue' plan to hold their first 'Ghetto Biennale'. They are inviting fine artists, filmmakers, academics, photographers, musicians, architects and writers, to come to the Grand Rue area of Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, to make or witness work that will be shown
or happen, in their neighbourhood. In the words of the writer John Keiffer it will hopefully be a “'third space'...an event or moment created through a collaboration between artists from radically different backgrounds”. '

'The artists use all the detritus of a post-industrial global economy which uses Haiti as a dumping ground. They return the compliment, creating astounding bricolages and assemblages which express both the despair and the seemingly endless creativity of Haiti and Vodou. I have visited their ateliers on Haiti’s Grand Rue on several occasions over the last four
years. I have had a chance to see their sculptures as they were being wrought from their desperate materials in a scrap yard on this wreck of a street, in this wreck of a city, in this wreck of a country. Saying all that, I would also have to add that, like Haiti, their sculptures seem to
express the boundless creative energy of a people who are simultaneously the economically poorest, and artistically richest culture in the New World.'Professor Donald Cosentino, World Arts and Cultures, University of California-Los Angeles.

Forging a successful arts career is difficult for a downtown Haitian. Refused US entry visas, the Grand Rue sculptors were excluded from a private view of their work in a major museum in Miami. A lack of government support makes them economically excluded from all major
biennales. The artists have responded by hosting the 'Ghetto Biennale', the first arts festival located in a shantytown in the developing world. The event will explore what happens when artists from radically different backgrounds come together. When first world art objectives encounter third world artistic reality, and when Western artists try to make art in the
poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Haitian artist, Andre Eugene says, 'the Ghetto Biennale represents positive change in my area and gives us the chance to show another face of life in the ghettos of Port-au-Prince. I think we have much to offer and much to learn.'

Malaysian artist, Simryn Gill, has said of her potential involvement in the 'Ghetto Biennale'.'The making of things, in the way that you describe Haitian artists doing, is very energising and attracting for me. Sometime it feels like we have left so behind us the acts of actually making,
forming, transforming materials with passion and courage, and art has become a kind of domain of cleverness, even timidity, in case we somehow show ourselves up in too much eagerness or insufficient wit or skill by making forms.'"

Kathy Acker, Andre Breton, Maya Deren, Katherine Dunham, Graham Greene, Jerzy Grotowski, Langston Hughes, Zora Neal Hurston, & Genesis P.Orridge all visited Haiti and made work inspired by their visit.
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16 Beaver Group
16 Beaver Street, 4th / 5th fl.
New York, NY 10004

for directions/subscriptions/info visit:
http://www.16beavergroup.org

TRAINS:
4,5 Bowling Green
R,W Whitehall
2,3 Wall Street
J,M Broad Street
1,9 South Ferry

Rest in Peace Rachel Corrie (d. March 16, 2003)

Rachel Corrie (1979-2003)

Seven years ago today American peace activist Rachel Corrie was killed by the Israeli Defense Forces in Gaza. She was attempting to block the IDF from knocking down a Palestinian home using nonviolent passive resistance when she was run down by an oncoming IDF bulldozer... which then backed up over her. The incident was witnessed by a group of international activists. Richard Pursell, who was one of Corrie's fellow activists in the International Solidarity Movement, described the incident in a recent article in the Guardian UK. Guardian reporter Rory McCarthy reports from Haifa,

"Purssell, a Briton, now working as a landscape gardener, said he volunteered with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) to witness events in the occupied Palestinian territories for himself. In Rafah he had been hoping to prevent the Israeli military from demolishing Palestinian homes. The organisation was strictly non violent, he said. 'Our role was to support Palestinian non-violent resistance.'

On the day of her death, 16 March 2003, Corrie was with seven other activists, including Purssell, in Rafah, close to the Israeli-guarded border with Egypt. They saw an Israeli military armoured Caterpillar D9 bulldozer approaching the house of a Palestinian doctor.

Purssell described how the bulldozer approached at a fast walking pace, its blade down and gathering a pile of soil in its path. When the bulldozer was 20 metres from the house Corrie, who like the others was wearing an orange fluorescent jacket, climbed on to the soil in front of it and stood 'looking into the cab of the bulldozer'.

'The bulldozer continued to move forward,' Purssell said. 'Rachel turned to come back down the slope. The earth is still moving and as she nears the bottom of the pile something happened which causes her to fall forward. The bulldozer continued to move forward and Rachel disappeared from view under the moving earth.'

The bulldozer continued forward four metres as the activists began to run forward and shout at the driver.

'It passed the point where Rachel fell, it stopped and reversed back along the track it first made. Rachel was lying on the earth,' Purssell said. 'She was still breathing.' Corrie was severely injured and died shortly afterwards.

The Israeli military says it bears no responsibility for Corrie's death. A month after her death the military said an investigation had determined its troops were not to blame; the driver of the bulldozer had not seen her and had not intentionally run her over. It accused Corrie and the ISM of behaviour that was 'illegal, irresponsible and dangerous'."

So, obviously she was asking for it. After all she was standing there is a bright orange safety vest, what did she think would happen?

McCarthy reports that Corrie's parents have initiated a civil case against Israel. The Corrie family lawyer, Hussein Abu Hussein, (dum, dum, dum!) said he would argue that Corrie's death was due either to gross negligence by the Israeli military or that it was intended. If the Israeli state is found responsible, the family will press for damages.

I would like to end with something positive. I don't want to be cynical because Rachel wasn't cynical... but I just can't. Not today.

Summer 2010: Art and Resistance

Jesusa Rodriguez. photo by Julio Pantoja

The Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics

Presents:

Summer 2010: Art and Resistance

San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico

July 19–August 6, 2010

Taught by Diana Taylor, Jesusa Rodríguez (Resistencia Creativa, Mexico), and Lorie Novak

This course explores the many ways in which artists and activists use art (performance, mural paintings, graffiti, writing, music) to make a social intervention in the Americas. We begin the course by examining several theories about art and activism (from Plato and Aristotle to Brecht, Boal, Buenaventura, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, and Foucault, among others) and then focus on issues of agency, space, event, and audience in relation to major political movements (revolution, dictatorship, democracy, globalization, and human rights) as seen in the work of major practitioners. Jesusa Rodriguez will lead an intensive one-week performance workshop as part of the course. Lorie Novak will discuss the use of the Internet as a site for activism, doumentation, and research, and will assist students in conceptualizing and realizing web-based projects. Performances, video screenings, guest lectures, and visits to FOMMA, Chiapas Media Project, a Zapatista community and other activist projects will provide an additional dimension to the questions raised by the theoretical readings and discussions. Students are encouraged to explore possibilities for practice-based research, develop their own sites of investigation, and share their work in a final presentation.

Students from all member institutions of the Hemispheric Institute are encouraged to apply. NYU students can take the course for 4 pts of graduate credit through the Department of Performance Studies, and students from other institutions can take the course for credit as independent study in their home universities. Students from non-member institutions will be considered for admission, though priority will be given to graduate students from member institutions.

Although bilinguality (English-Spanish) is a plus, it is not required. Students are encouraged to bring laptops and digital cameras to use for their projects.

Lab fee $1000

A lab fee will apply to all—$1000 for students in the U.S. Canada, and Europe, and $250 for those in Latin America. While housing and travel costs are separate, the Hemispheric Institute is negotiating very reasonable costs for room and board. All local expenses (performances, lectures, travel to local sites, etc., will be covered by the lab fee).

Download Application

English
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The deadline for applications is May 1, 2010.

Download the announcement (PDF)

English
Español

Analysis: "Welcome to Israel, Joe!" by Yousef Munayyer

Reuters/ Ronen Zvulen

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden arrive at Ben Gurion International airport near Tel Aviv, March 8, 2010.

Credit: Reuters/Ronen Zvulun

Analysis: "Welcome to Israel, Joe!"

by Yousef Munayyer

Originally posted at the Palestine Center

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Palestine Center Brief No. 193 (11 March 2010)

By Yousef Munayyer

When he visited the Middle East, then Senator Barack Obama had a rude awakening. He was on the ritual visit for American presidential candidates to Israel, which usually consist of touring sites of significance to Jews and declaring support for the state of Israel. This is important for American politicians who pay homage to an influential pro-Israel lobby, and it was even more important for President Obama. His background, his middle name, his father’s religion and his associations with Arabs and Muslims made him a target of critics who claimed he would be soft on security.

So, with a yarmulke upon his head, Barack Hussein Obama recited prayers at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. But before his prayers could transcend the clouds and make it up to heaven, Obama was reminded just what he was getting into. In the crowd of onlookers and media that had formed around him, a heckler yelled out, “Jerusalem is ours, Obama. Jerusalem is not for sale, Obama.”

Though it is doubtful that the unidentified heckler was Binyamin Netanyahu, the current Israeli prime minister, the same message was sent to the Obama administration this week from the Israeli government. After months of disagreement with the Israelis over their settlement policy, Vice President Joe Biden became the highest ranking Obama administration official to visit Israel and he was greeted by the announcement of 1,600 new settlement homes in occupied East Jerusalem.

Welcome to Israel, Joe.

Whether from hecklers or through government declarations the message from Israel to Washington is clear: we’ll take what we want and you cannot stop us. The problem is the message from Washington to Israel has been far too ambiguous. The Israeli government, addicted to gobbling up Palestinian land, is taking every opportunity to exploit this ambiguity and embarrass American and Palestinian officials while they are at it. Some argue that the Obama administration made a strategic mistake by raising expectations before guaranteeing full Israeli compliance with a settlement freeze. They are only partially right. The Obama administration was, in fact, right to raise expectations and capitalize on a wave of good faith resulting from a historic election welcomed around the world and in the Middle East in particular. The strategic mistake, and a big one at that, was the failure to apply the necessary pressure on Israel to force compliance with a full settlement freeze.

It has been said that to do the same thing over and over again and expect different results is insanity. Why then should the United States expect anything other than continued Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank and in Jerusalem without applying the necessary sanctions to modify Israeli behavior? It is very clear, given the insulting announcement that the Israelis greeted Vice President Biden with, that asking them politely is simply not working.
For two decades of “peace process” the United States has failed to pressure Israel and, low and behold during this time period, settlements have only grown in size and population. In the last 20 years, the number of settlers on occupied Palestinian land has doubled and walls have been built around these Israeli colonies creating a near inextricable reality. If this doesn’t change, nothing will stop Israel from completing its colonial project and the world will continue to live with an apartheid state in its midst.

The tools for change have always been in Washington but domestic politics have always made selecting to use these tools unpopular choices. The U.S. Congress is staunchly pro-Israel and looks at the Middle East blindly following the whims of influential pro-Israel lobbies. Therefore, the Executive Branch will have to take unilateral steps to change the tone. The president has multiple tools at his disposal through the State Department, like the American vote in the Security Council, for example, which has been the single veto on nearly 40 occasions to save Israel from condemnation.

Binyamin Netanyahu is scheduled to be visiting DC at the end of this month; interestingly President Obama is conveniently scheduled to be traveling at the same time. Wouldn’t it be fitting for the White House to take a page from Israel’s book and announce a halt to U.S. support while the Israeli prime minister is in Washington?

Maybe, just maybe, if we communicated with the Israelis through a method they are familiar with they will finally get the message.

Yousef Munayyer is Executive Director of the Palestine Center. This policy brief may be used without permission but with proper attribution to the Center.

This is Worldtown Magazine Feature on Me

Garrotte (Sex Doll) Joseph Shahadi,
Digital C-Print 24" x 30" from the series TV Eros

Speaking of shameless self-promotion...

The web magazine This is Worldtown has done a feature on me and my artwork illustrated with images from my series TV Eros. TIWT founders Sana Malik and Ausma Malik write,

"Representations of youth from immigrant and ethnic minority backgrounds are usually created in the context of crisis, as so-called failures of integration, or as ethnicized trends in fashion and music. This is Worldtown aims to challenge this notion and the inauthentic representations of this generation which are often lumped together merely on the basis of race, religion or background.

As a webzine, This is Worldtown offers an edgy take on our collective yet varied experiences by providing features on politics, popular culture and individual perspectives."

And in the feature on my work I write,

"I have always been fascinated with in-between states. I think that is partly my personality and partly because I’m Arab American: in the culture but not of it. My grandparents immigrated to the US from Lebanon at the beginning of the 20th century and I grew up watching cartoons, reading comic books and drawing in my sketchpad, dreaming. When I was a kid my father called me into his workshop in the garage and showed me an old National Geographic pictorial of Beirut from before it was broken into a million pieces. We stood there flipping through it and he said, “This is what it looked like…it was beautiful” A few years later my dad was dead and like Beirut he was only alive for me in pictures. In the world of pictures, nothing ever goes all the way away. But it does. And we are between the two, staying and going, always. We are lousy with ghosts.

I grew up to be an artist to try and make sense of this."

... Go and check out the magazine and leave a comment.

Link Round Up: Israeli Apartheid Week Edition

Israeli Apartheid Week gets a lot of coverage elsewhere so I didn't focus on it this year but I thought I'd do a link round up that covered some of the themes and events around the occupation in the last year. This is by no means comprehensive, and some of these links are a few months old, but I thought taken together they paint a picture of the current arguments against the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

1) Pushing the boundaries of identity: an interview with Jennifer Jajeh

Electronic Intfifada (ei) has published a great interview with actress, playwright and performer Jennifer Jajeh about her one-woman show I Heart Hamas and Other Things I am Afraid to Tell You, which premiered at the New York Fringe Festival in 2008. Jajeh has subsequently performed her show all over the United States and ei contributor Uda Olabarria Walker interviewed her before a Minneapolis performance. The interview is really interesting but I was particularly taken with the eloquent way Jajeh addresses the -- internal and external-- pressures on how she identifies and represents herself.

Jennifer Jajeh says, "I grew up with a split life, half Palestinian and half American --where the two identities were very separate -- to becoming an adult and combining the two. It wasn't until I went to Palestine that I really figured out what it meant for me to be Palestinian on a personal level and what part of that identity felt vital for me. As far as becoming radicalized, it first had to do with pure anger at what I experienced on the ground in Palestine, but now it's about challenging the status quo both externally and within the Palestinian community about what it means to be Palestinian and raising the difficult questions. It was also really important for me to claim my space as a Palestinian woman and look into what it means to be a woman in my community and what the role of women is in the struggle inside and outside that space. So, part of becoming radicalized was also about being a Palestinian woman who openly challenges my own community's ideas about women's roles, sexual mores and religious affiliations and divides. This has been really liberating... The second half of the show is about me coming to terms with the political part of my identity when I go back to Ramallah at the beginning of the second [Palestinian] intifada. But still, the politics are not the only thing that defines me as a Palestinian. There are a variety of Palestinian experiences and if I can get people to sit down and listen to just one of them for an hour and a half, I see it as a major accomplishment. If I have been able to create the space for people to explore the complexity of identity, I have also done well. This is what I'm trying to do with the show; explore identity and raise questions, not push a political agenda."

Of course, I'd argue that raising questions about identity, especially in an Arab/American context-- and extra-especially in relation to the Intifada, is a political agenda in the best sense. But I understand and agree with Jajeh's larger point: it is exhausting to have to always deal with the reduction of your entire identity to an image defined by other people's political notions.

For more information about Jennifer Jajeh and I Heart Hamas check out her website.

2) It's Not about Islam & Judaism, It's About Anti-Colonialism, Territory, Liberation, and Lives

Washington Note has published a guest note by journalist and Middle East expert Nir Rosen, responding to the "outrageous oped by Efraim Karsh" in the February 28th Sunday New York Times. It is incredibly frustrating to read the usual fear mongering in the overwhelming majority of the mainstream press about Palestine/Israel... and the Karsh Op Ed rehearses most of the usual Zionist "lies, distortions and mistakes" on the topic. Which is why Rosen's response is so minty fresh in its perfect directness.

Rosen writes, "Karsh mentions some sort of '100-year war between Arabs and Jews.' There is no 100 year war between Arabs and Jews. There is a 100 year colonial struggle between Zionist Jews and the Palestinian people (and briefly the Lebanese as well).

He hopes that the 'Islamic nation can make peace with the idea of Jewish statehood in the House of Islam.' Its not about Jewish statehood in the house of Islam.

Its about Zionist Jewish settlers dispossessing the Palestinians and occupying Palestinian land. And killing Palestinians. Its not a religious conflict. Its a territorial one, an anti-colonial one, a national liberation struggle, even if the discourse used these days to describe it is often religious.

'Muslim states threaten Israel's existence not so much out of concern for the Palestinians, but rather as part of a holy war to prevent the loss of a part of the House of Islam,' he says. He is lying. Who is he talking about? Iran?

Even if that was a real threat and not merely grandstanding, who else is there? the Saudis, the Turks, the Egyptians, the Jordanians and others all collaborate with Israel. Syria?

Hardly a threat and eager for peace as long as it can regain the occupied Golan heights. And the Israeli police force could conquer Syria in a few hours. Hizballah? Not a state and not trying to destroy Israel but merely protect Lebanese territory.

Hizballah threatens a bloody revenge if Israel attacks Lebanon, but that's it. And he is also lying when he says that Muslim states believe in some kind of holy war to prevent the loss of a part of the house of Islam. Which Muslim state? Nobody talks like this or says these things... Karsh is a third rate academic who clearly has not visited much of the "Muslim World" about which he writes with generalizations, clichés, racism, Orientalism and a right wing pro Israeli agenda."

Um, word.

3) Palestine-- The View from South Africa

The Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign has reprinted an essay by Alain Gresh from Le Monde Diplomatique, which is unfortunately only available to subscribers. On the occasion of the 2009 Israeli assault on Gaza Gresh explores the historical connections between Apartheid South Africa and Israel. He writes, " The bedrock of the relationship between the two countries was in the first instance economic, under the aegis of the Histadrut (the 'socialist' trade union congress), which controlled a significant part of the Israeli economy during the 1970s and 1980s. Through the Hevrat Haovdim company, it enjoyed a quasi-monopoly over trade with South Africa. The kibbutzim played a part too: the Lohamei Hagetot ('fighters of the ghetto') kibbutz, founded by Jews from eastern Europe who had fought the Nazis, ran the Kama chemical plant in the Kwazulu Bantustan.

When it came to the military and security, the alliance between the two countries took on a strategic dimension. Israel helped South Africa become a nuclear power.

The Israeli military attaché in Pretoria was a high-ranking officer who was a member of the General Staff Forum (the only other Israeli military attaché to hold such high rank was based in Washington). Israeli arms were manufactured under license in South Africa... (And) Brigadier 'Rooi Rus' Swanepoel, the main interrogator in the Rivonia trial of 1964 at which Nelson Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment, was a regular guest of the Israelis in the 1970s. Swanepoel, who set up the counter-insurrection squads in Namibia, was known as the 'beast of Soweto' for the way in which he crushed the revolt in the township leading to the loss of hundreds of lives. Uri Dan, meanwhile, a journalist and adviser to Ariel Sharon, proclaimed his admiration for the South African army."

4) Tutu to Haaretz: Arabs Paying the Price of the Holocaust

Haaretz correspondent Akiva Eldar reported on Tutu's response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's statement in Germany last August that "the lesson of the Holocaust is that Israel should always defend itself." Tutu responded to this assertion, which justifies the occupation of Palestine (among other things ::cough::) saying, "in South Africa, they tried to get security from the barrel of a gun. They never got it. They got security when the human rights of all were recognized and respected."

Eldar writes, quoting the Nobel Prize laureate, " He said the West was consumed with guilt and regret toward Israel because of the Holocaust, 'as it should be... But who pays the penance? The penance is being paid by the Arabs, by the Palestinians. I once met a German ambassador who said Germany is guilty of two wrongs. One was what they did to the Jews. And now the suffering of the Palestinians.'

He also slammed Jewish organizations in the United States, saying they intimidate anyone who criticizes the occupation and rush to accuse these critics of anti-Semitism. Tutu recalled how such organizations pressured U.S. universities to cancel his appearances on their campuses. (Tutu said) 'That is unfortunate, because my own positions are actually derived from the Torah. You know God created you in God's image. And we have a God who is always biased in favor of the oppressed... (Under Apartheid black South Africans) used to take our children in Swaziland and had to go through border checkpoints in South Africa and face almost the same conduct, where you're at the mercy of a police officer. They can decide when they're going to process you and they can turn you back for something inconsequential. But on the other hand, we didn't have collective punishment. We didn't have the demolition of homes because of the suspicion that one of the members of the household might or might not be a terrorist...

(Tutu concluded) I hope your society will evolve."

5) Taher Herzallah: Heckling Israeli ambassador at UCI was right

The Orange County Register published this op ed by Taher Herzallah, the University of California at Riverside student who was among the protesters who booed the Israeli Ambassador when he spoke at UCI. Herzallah, who grew up in Gaza, writes, "I know the pain of Israel's brutal military tactics firsthand. Three members of my immediate family were killed in Gaza last year during 'Operation Cast Lead,' in which more than 1,400 Palestinians were killed and more than 5,300 wounded. Since then, Israel has launched a massive propaganda campaign to transform its image from a war machine to a victimized democracy. Israel's ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren, represents the face of this campaign.

During his recent appearance at UC Irvine, I took a stand against Oren and the brutal state he represents. I spoke out well within the bounds of my right to free speech and in the peaceful, nonviolent manner adopted by the likes of Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Since that day, I, along with the other protestors, have been dubbed by the media as the 'Irvine 11'... Time and again, hecklers and protestors have been afforded their full First Amendment right of freedom of speech, including at UCI. I cherish this American tradition and am consequently troubled that I am not afforded the same protections as students elsewhere voicing their dissent. Today, I face criminal and university disciplinary action. I suspect that I am being punished because of strict limits on pro-Palestinian speech."

James Westcott, When Marina Abromovic Dies