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We struggle every day against our obstacles (November 11 2012) We struggle every day against our obstacles (November 11 2012)

Mohammed Matter ‘Abu Yazan’ the Palestinian political activist, writer and a member of Gaza Youth Breaks out movement, writes “My story is marked by violence, persecution, arrests, abuse and resistance.” Matter has published an article on Aljazeera stating “It has been almost two years now since we wrote our manifesto. We called it a manifesto, but in reality, I’m not sure what it was. Was it a manifesto, or was it a cry for help? Perhaps, an accusation, or even perhaps a demand to the world and to ourselves; a demand for change from the outside and from within. It was before the uprisings began around us, and they have been roaring the last two years in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria and Bahrain. But we had felt like shouting in the dark, and while this raging had brought light into the darkness of the dictatorships around us, the night around us has not thinned even a bit. No, if anything, it has only become darker. … We struggle every day against our obstacles and for our dreams, and you can see that in all the amazing creativity coming out of Gaza, in our art, poems, writing, videos and songs, you can hear it and meet us in the talks we give all over the world. Yes, we wrote a manifesto, and maybe that was just the bright and loud outcry of the beginning of a journey, whose path is hard and tiring, thorny and also often very quiet and dark. But it is always there. So two years later, we say: We will be free. We will live. We will have peace. And we are always out there, fighting our daily struggle, full of the resistance we inherited from a long struggle for Palestine. We live and write and say and sing silent or loud manifestos every day. Just listen to us.”

 

Inspired by Aljazeera ow.ly/eUhfO image source Facebook ow.ly/eUhc9

Syria artists in a time of revolt (October 30 2012) Syria artists in a time of revolt (October 30 2012)

Jane Ferguson the British Freelance Journalist currently with Aljazeera has published an article titled ‘Portrait of Syria artists in a time of revolt’ discussing how artists who fled the country had experienced “torture” by security forces but are still intent on continuing their work. Ferguson states “Many of them [Artists] have been detained, beaten and disappeared by the government for focusing their talents on the ugliest of truths around them. In times of war, writers, painters, filmmakers and photographers often mirror its horror. We now look upon great works such as Pablo Picasso’s Guernica and Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls, with nostalgia – neatly cleansed of the terror that inspired them. Fast forward a generation and works born from the Syrian revolution will likely be part of our contemporary art world. But first Syrian artists must survive, and to do that many have fled the country. Filmmaker Firas Fayyad tried to board a flight from Damascus Airport last November. … they put a bag over his head, threw him into a car, and drove him to the first of a series of underground detention centres where he said he was beaten and interrogated repeatedly for four months. …After his release in March, Fayyad knew he was being watched, and could be arrested again at any time. He left the country on foot. …He is now working to challenge the Assad government as an exiled activist, even though the once peaceful rebellion has transformed into an increasingly violent civil war.”

 

Inspired by Aljazeera ow.ly/eIYPC image source Linkedin ow.ly/eIYiU

Václav Havel the 75 year old Czech playwright, poet, dissident and former President of the Czech Republic who recently died, has been honored in an article published by Mark LeVine. Levine recalls Havel’s role in the Velvet Revolution and connection to the Arab Spring, “as a model for understanding, or engaging in, the present revolutions across the Middle East and North Africa … While it looks increasingly dark in Egypt, Syria and other Arab countries today, if the protesters in the streets can solidify their co-ordination with civil society and, as was so crucial in Poland, involve religious leaders in fighting truly to take down the system rather than merely get a large piece of it for themselves, there is little doubt that in a very short period of time the world’s newest generation of revolutionaries will manage to secure the freedom for which they are fighting…”

 

Inspired by Mark LeVine http://ow.ly/8eWzq image source Ondřej Sláma http://ow.ly/8eWxy

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