#BDS: Normalization between Gulf Arab States and #Israel

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"Israel and the GCC discreetly work hand in hand: “I would be surprised if there is no knowledge about the Saudi positions (in Israel) or knowledge in Saudi of the Israeli positions,” said David Menashri, director of the Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University. “I would put it this way: The Gulf states, some of them, would like Israel to be more active against Iran, though they would never say it publicly,” said Meir Litvak, a regional expert at the Dayan Center think tank at Tel Aviv University. All this takes place under the umbrella of regional “defense strategy,” meaning the military exercises which keep Iraq and the Gulf under various kinds of Western political dominance so as to constrict oil supplies and justify ongoing arms purchases by the $700 billion dollar in annual spending US defense complex."


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#BDS: Saudi Artist Ahmed Mater: A Normalizer with #Israel

"The Saudi artist Ahmed Mater has become the subject of an online campaign in Saudi Arabia calling for his immediate censure by the Saudi government, following the inclusion of his work Evolution of Man, 2010, in an exhibition in Israel.

The show, “West End”, opened this summer at Jer­u­salem’s Museum on the Seam, a socio-political contemporary art museum on the edge of the ultra-orthodox Jewish neighbourhood of Mea She’arim. The display garnered extensive media coverage largely thanks to the participation, alongside 21 other artists, of seven non-Israeli artists of Middle Eastern origin. Of these, only two live permanently in the country of their birth: the Egyptian artist Moataz Nasr and Mater."

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#BDS: Palestinian Freedom Riders to Challenge Segregation By Riding 'Settler' Buses to Jerusalem: 11.15.11

"Palestinian activists will reenact the US Civil Rights Movement's Freedom Rides to the American South by boarding segregated Israeli public transportation in the West Bank to travel to occupied East Jerusalem.

Palestinian activists will attempt to board segregated Israeli public transportation headed from inside the West Bank to occupied East Jerusalem in an act of civil disobedience inspired by the Freedom Riders of the U.S. Civil Rights Movement in the 60's.


Fifty years after the U.S. Freedom Riders staged mixed-race bus rides through the roads of the segregated American South, Palestinian Freedom Riders will be asserting their right for liberty and dignity by disrupting the military regime of the Occupation through peaceful civil disobedience.


The Freedom Riders seek to highlight Israel's attempts to illegally sever occupied East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank, and the apartheid system that Israel has imposed on Palestinians in the occupied territories.


Several Israeli companies, among them Egged and Veolia, operate dozens of lines that run through the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, many of them subsidized by the state. They run between different Israeli settlements, connecting them to each other and cities inside Israel. Some lines connecting Jerusalem to other cities inside Israel, such as Eilat and Beit She'an, are also routed to pass through the West Bank.


Israelis suffer almost no limitations on their freedom of movement in the occupied Palestinian territory, and are even allowed to settle in it, contrary to international law. Palestinians, in contrast, are not allowed to enter Israel without procuring a special permit from Israeli authorities. Even Palestinian movement inside the Occupied Territories is heavily restricted, with access to occupied East Jerusalem and some 8% of the West Bank in the border area also forbidden without a similar permit.


While it is not officially forbidden for Palestinians to use Israeli public transportation in the West Bank, these lines are effectively segregated, since many of them pass through Jewish-only settlements, to which Palestinian entry is prohibited by a military decree."

#BDS Violation: Mikhail Baryshnikov dances his way to Tel Aviv

"In anticipation of his visit, for nine performances of a new play 'In Paris', 63-year-old dancer talks about staying young, politics, and why he won't boycott Israel.

September 11, 2011, was a rainy day in Paris. Outside the Theatre National de Chaillot, overlooking the Eiffel Tower, a large crowd huddled under umbrellas and watched the national ceremony marking a decade since the World Trade Center disaster in New York. In the bowels of the theater, in a subterranean dressing room with pink walls, Mikhail Baryshnikov sat cross-legged on a chair encased in blue velvet upholstery. In a little while he would get ready for the matinee performance of "In Paris," a new play he is starring in, which arrives in Tel Aviv for nine performances at the Suzanne Dellal Center beginning on November 15."

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