Blog post by Sarah Lockwood, Cinema & Photography '15, FLEFF Intern, Blairstown, NJ

From talking with Menna Khalil, an activist with the Arab Spring movement, it was impossible not to come away with a thorough understanding of the movement's past, present, and future. For those who are not familiar, I asked Menna to discuss a few topics, which I have condensed into the following explanations:

History of Arab Spring

The pot of Arab Spring has been boiling for decades, each country's actions and movements affecting and inspiring one another. In Egypt, specifically, where Menna specializes, most of the unrest derives from its political background - nearly thirty years of nepotism, the gradual diminishing of the middle class, and the domestication and domination of people's everyday lives as a result.

The straw that "broke the camel's back" for the revolution were the "notorious police brutality" found on the streets of Egypt. In one case, a young engineer living in Alexandria was found brutally beaten to death and mouth stuffed with drugs, in a framing of his murder Why?

This man had recorded, and distributed via the internet, a video of several policemen making a drug deal and keeping the money for themselves. This incident along with countless accounts of "humiliating treatment" and "brutal corruption" of the police forces in Egypt spurned the revolution once again.

Nostalgia of Arab Spring

Menna notes that much of the Arab Spring movement is derived from a sense of "nostalgia" in Egypt. What does she mean by this?

For years, Egypt existed as a nation whose sense of ownership and pride, "being Egyptian", was weak. In order to feel proud of your own society, says Menna, you had to "walk very close to a wall with your head down" and hope not to get caught. 

Smaller revolutions in nearby countries preceded Arab Spring, with the hopes of one day developing into a revolution or movement. As an area of the world who, in decades past, have been exposed to war and revolutions, the current generation was moved by a sense of nostalgia for revolution, as well as a desire for change.

Modern Media and Arab Spring

The incident of the policemen's drug actions distributed through the internet is a prime example of modern media's affect on the current movement, to which Menna responded emphatically.

Menna feels the internet works as a powerful source of circulation - allowing individuals from opposite ends of the world to share their revolutionary experiences and witness them, respectively. The modern age of connection and distribution gives rise to a movement unlike any other in the past. However, there is a level of caution to take.

Facebook invites to protest were often viewed as "jokes" by older revolutionaries in some ages and "a lot of what happens, can happen, is in the streets" and "is never fully captured by Facebook or Twitter."

Temporality of Arab "Spring"

As an Egyptian and activist, Menna hopes that the bittersweet term "Arab Spring" and its movement will not eventually fade. The term "spring" evokes the image of a flower "blooming in the spring", which is a beautiful sign for Egyptians and other persons living in the middle east.

However, it also evokes a temporality - that the spring may eventually fade. The middle east conditions are still unclear, not yet "at its best place" for Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and other nations. 

"As an Egyptian, I want to think that the revolution is not over, has not sprung then phased out into a different season." 

Listen to Menna and her husband, Michael Kennedy, discuss this movement further during their talk tonight, at 7pm in Williams 225, Ithaca College.

Blog post by Sarah Lockwood, Cinema & Photography '15, FLEFF Intern, Blairstown, NJ

I had the utmost pleasure of speaking with Menna Khalil, an activist with the Arab Spring movement the Middle East, specifically Palestine and Egypt. For the duration of our talk we covered her personal background, the current state of the movement, and the influence of modern media on the state of the revolution.

Menna was born and raised in Cairo, Egypt, until the age of 10. At this point her family moved to Chicago, Illinois. Chicago is home to a large, supportive Palestinian culture. She attended DePaul University in Chicago. During this time she joined Students for Justice in Palestine.

As a member of SJP for all four years of her college career, Menna continued the traditions of activism and connection that the predecessors of the club began. During her time as member, Menna helped to coordinate speakers and film festivals for Palestinian rights and activism, concerts from Palestinian groups, as well as an over two-year-long project to bring Palestinian works to the art museum on-campus.

By bringing together the DePaul community, the Chicago community, and the Palestinian arts communities together, Menna's work with SJP influenced a large portion of the activism work she would continue through her current graduate studies and field work in Egypt.

Her work during college combined with her family heritage has "absolutely" connect Menna to her current activism work.

Part Two of our interview will detail the current Arab Spring movement, about which Menna and her husband, Michael Kennedy, will be talking this evening (7pm, Williams 225, Ithaca College).

Blog was written by Evan Johnson, Journalism Major, '13, FLEFF intern, Marlboro, Vermont 

As I’m sure you’re aware, the theme for FLEFF 2011 is “Checkpoints.” In creating a diverse and engaging line-up of events and speakers, the organizers and curators of the festival have examined and almost every possible interpretation of the words “Checkpoint” and “Environment.”  Tonight, I had the opportunity to explore how these words are connected to the expansion of Israeli settlements within Palestinian territories in Michael Kennedy’s presentation “Witnessing Iraq Burin: Stories from a Palestinian Village.”

In the West Bank, checkpoints are a part of everyday life. In the village of Iraq Burin, inhabitants face regular harassment and even armed violence from settlers of the nearby Bracha settlement as well as incursions by Israeli Defense Forces. As the people of Iraq Burin continue to lose farmland due to confiscation by the nearby settlement, the village had been the site of weekly nonviolent demonstrations. At a demonstration on March 20, 2010, two cousins Usaid Abd Qadus (19) and Muhammad Ibrahim Abdel-Qadr Qadus (16) were shot and killed with live ammunition. Usaid was shot in the head; Muhammad was shot in the chest when he ran to help his cousin. Muhammad was announced dead upon arrival at the hospital while Usaid died the next morning, several hours after undergoing surgery in an attempt to save his life.

Neither Usaid nor Muhammad was involved in that day’s demonstration and neither were active in any resistance group. The Israeli Defense Forces described their actions as justified, citing “riot dispersal tactics” and “less-than-lethal munitions” even though the boys were deliberately killed with live ammunition. Three elementary principles of international humanitarian law govern the use of force. These principles are distinction, necessity and proportionality. The willful targeting of unarmed civilians with live fire represents a grave breach the Fourth Geneva Convention and the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

This account heavily illuminates the themes of unnecessary death and remembrance. In cooperation with the intentions of FLEFF, the event also demands the perception and interpretation of a given environment. The presentation tonight demanded the viewers to analyze their own perceptions of the environment surrounding the Israel-Palestine conflict. What is our interpretation of this environment? How should incidents like this change our perception of that environment? Tonight, through his effective and powerful use of photography and journal entries, Mr. Kennedy presented a different environment, one far from our own.

In solidarity,

Evan

*The official UNESCO report on this incident can be viewed here. 

The Middle East continues to represent an intersection between the economic, political, religious and cultural interests of the East and West. The conflict has been changed considerably through developments or changes in policy, leadership and perceptions. However, the issue at its most base form was and continues to be a struggle for multiple groups to call the same land their home.

While most of us find ourselves comfortably halfway across the world and removed from any recent conflict in Libya, Iraq or Israel, we are obligated to bear witness and to observe testimony from a variety of sources with the intention of gaining understanding. For the 2011 festival, the Checkpoints Activism Panel on Tuesday, April 12 will present personal voices from some recent areas of conflict for a variety of perspectives. The purpose of this panel will be to observe and discuss tactics of bearing witness. Additionally, the panel will illustrate one of FLEFF’s many strengths by bringing an impressive variety of perspectives for an engaging and hopefully transformative dialogue.  

Here are the details:

 What: Checkpoints Activism Panel: Documenting Iraq, Burin: Stories from a Palestian Village, and Witness to Uprising:  Voices from Cairo and New York.

Where: Ithaca College, Friends 309  

When: 7 p.m.

Who:  Beth Harris (moderator) Menna Kahlil and Michael Kennedy.

Admission: Free. 

See you there!