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Israeli National Security Advisor Meir Ben-Shabat rubs shoulders with an Emirati official before tackling the …read more
JERUSALEM: The United Arab EmiratesThe move to seek normalization with Israel has sparked a backlash from Arab artists and intellectuals, who are boycotting Emirati-backed cultural awards and events to support the Palestinian cause.
“I announce that I will withdraw from your exhibition,” Palestinian photographer Mohamed Badarne wrote to the Sharjah Art Foundation, based in one of the seven emirates that make up the UAE.
“As a people under occupation, we must take a position against everything to do with reconciliation with the (Israeli) occupier,” Berlin-based Badarne told AFP.
The United Arab Emirates agreed last month to establish full diplomatic ties with Israel in a US-brokered deal, making it the first Gulf state and only the third Arab country to do so.
The agreement was denounced by the Palestinians as “a stab in the back” and sparked widespread protests.
Many Palestinians view the agreement as a betrayal, breaking the consensus that normalization with Israel is permissible only after the Palestinian issue has been resolved.
Palestinian Culture Minister Atef Abu Seif urged Arab intellectuals to oppose a decision that “strengthens the (Israeli) enemy.”
Cultural figures from Algeria, Iraq, Oman and Tunisia, as well as the United Arab Emirates, condemned the agreement.
“A sad and catastrophic day,” wrote Emirati writer Dhabiya Khamis, following the US president. Donald trumpThe surprise announcement of the agreement on August 13.
“No to normalization between Israel and the Emirates and the Arabian Gulf countries!” Khamis added. “Israel is the enemy of the entire Arab nation.”
In recent years, the United Arab Emirates has invested huge sums in culture, including Louvre Abu Dhabi, a branch of the iconic Paris museum, which opened in 2017.
The oil-rich Gulf state also funds a number of literary prizes, including The Sheikh Zayed Book Prize, named after the former Emirati president, which awards gold medals and cash prizes totaling $ 1.9 million. every year.
Moroccan writer Zohra Ramij has announced the withdrawal of her latest novel from the competition, while Moroccan poet Mohamed Bennis resigned from her organizing committee.
“It would be a sin to get an Emirati award,” said Palestinian author Ahmed Abu Salim, who withdrew his entry from the International Prize for Arab Fiction (IPAF).
The competition, which started in 2007 and is run by the Booker Prize Foundation in London, is funded by the Abu Dhabi Department of Culture and Tourism.
Awards $ 50,000 to the winner and $ 10,000 to each of the shortlisted.
“I am an intellectual supporter of the Palestinian cause, whatever the price to pay,” Salim told AFP.
Several former award winners and jury members, including Palestinian intellectual Khaled Hroub, wrote an open letter to IPAF administrators demanding the cessation of funding from the Emirates.
“We call on the current Board of Trustees to assume its historic cultural responsibility in protecting the award by ending funding from the Emirates, in order to preserve the credibility and independence of the award,” the letter read.
IPAF did not respond to a request for comment.
Omar Barghouti, a Palestinian co-founder of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, said such a boycott was “a natural and patriotic response from Arab intellectuals.”
Israel views the movement, which encourages BDS measures as “civil resistance“to the Jewish state, as a strategic threat, accusing defenders of anti-Semitism.
Last week, the United Arab Emirates repealed the 1972 legislation boycotting the Jewish state.
But Barghouti warned what he called “corrupt tycoons” who ended the embargo that they would still feel the impact of the boycott.
Palestinian poet Ali Mawassi said that even if states normalize relations, citizens do not have to do the same.
Decades after Jordan and Egypt made peace with their Israeli neighbor, many Egyptian and Jordanian artists “still refuse to associate with anything related to Israel,” Mawassi said.
But, Mawassi said, other artists will still be courted for cash.
“There are many artists who will remain silent … to take advantage of the opportunities that Emirati money provides,” he said.
