The survey — a joint effort between researchers at the Qatar campus of the US-based Northwestern University and the World Internet Project — explored media usage in the Arab world. Participants were drawn from eight Arab nations: Egypt, Tunisia, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates.

The survey questioned participants’ perceptions of the news media, finding that 61 per cent thought the “quality of news reporting in the Arab world has improved over the past two years.” Media credibility declined in countries that experienced revolutions during the Arab Spring. The Saudi Arabian respondents gave their media outlets high marks with 71 [per cent agreeing with the statement, “The media in your country can report the news independently without interference from officials”.

Overall, the survey found high Facebook penetration among respondents who used social media. Ninety-four percent of the social media users had Facebook accounts, 47 per cent used Twitter and 40 per cent used Facebook. Among the Bahrain social media users, 92 per cent had a Facebook account, while just 29 per cent of the Egyptian respondents did.

The survey aimed to assess the use of media — TV, radio, newspapers, books, web — and levels of trust respondents had toward the sources. It also sought to guage how the respondents used the internet to communicate and conduct transactions like banking or purchases.

The results can be accessed at Arab Media Use Study.

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Abdulhadi Al-Khawaja’s letter to the Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs from prison, 8 Feb 2012

His Excellency,
The Minister of Foreign Affairs,
Denmark

Dear Sir,

Subject: My case as a Bahraini Dane detained in Bahrain

Firstly, allow me to thank you and other Danish officials, especially at the Danish embassy, for your concern in my case since I was arrested in Bahrain on 8 April, 2011.  My gratitude is extended to every Danish citizen who heard about my case and sympathised with me, including members of the parliament, media and human rights defenders.

Secondly, I would like to stress the positive influence on me of the 12 years that I had spent in Denmark, along with my beloved wife and brave four daughters, during the period from March 1989 until June 2001 when we returned to Bahrain following a general amnesty.  At the beginning of that period I received my first professional training in human rights by the Danish Centre for Human Rights, which took place at the building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Copenhagen.  This training and other forms of indirect support had an important impact on my voluntary work as the director of the Bahrain Human Rights Organisation (BHRO), based in Copenhagen, which played an important role in the positive developments that took place in Bahrain a decade ago.  More important, living in Denmark and experiencing first hand its social and political system inspired my work for democracy and human rights in Bahrain and the MENA region during the last 10 years, as an activist, researcher and trainer; in Bahrain as the director of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR), from 2002 until 2008, and at the regional level, as the MENA regional field coordinator for Front Line, the international foundation for the protection of human rights defenders, based in Dublin, Ireland, (Aug. 2008 until Feb, 2011).

Thirdly, I have no regrets that I had to pay a price for my work to promote human rights.  It is a serious business to address issues such as corruption, inequality, and discrimination in order to promote the interests of members of the ruling family, and documenting arbitrary detention and torture by the brutal National Security Apparatus.  So, as much as it was unfair, it was no real surprise when I was detained in 2004, severely beaten during peaceful protests in 2005 and 2006, subjected to unfair trials, travel ban and continuous defamation campaigns in official and semi-official media, and eventually, as a part of the crackdown on the wide popular protests since 14 February, 2011, I was severely beaten, arbitrarily detained, held in solitary confinement and subjected to torture for more than two months, brought before a military court on charges faked by the National Security Apparatus, such as “instigating hatred against the regime” and “planning to overthrow it” and eventually being sentenced to life imprisonment, a sentence which I have been serving to date.

Fourthly, it was a great comfort to hear about the mounting support for my case from the people and activists in Bahrain and from the colleagues and friends on the regional and international levels, in addition to statements and campaigns calling for the release of myself and other activists, by the office of the UN High Commission for Human Rights and International organisations including Human Rights Watch, Front Line Defenders, Amnesty International and Human Rights First.  It has also been of great comfort to get visits by Danish diplomats during court sessions and at Jaw Prison, especially by the kind assistant to the ambassador in Saudi-Arabia, who kept me and my family informed about the concern and efforts made by Danish officials regarding my case.

Fifthly, as a recommendation from a Danish citizen, I would appreciate it if my case would be legally researched to examine the numerous violations I have been subjected to and the legal basis for keeping me in prison.  Based on such research the Danish authorities could take more actions regarding my case.  Taking in consideration the findings of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI), formed by the King, which documented my case and used it, along with some other cases, as a base for its final observations and recommendations related to the issues; arrests, arbitrary detention, torture and unfair trial.  A summary of my case was published in the final report as case No.8 on page 426.  Find also the relative general observations numbers; (1693) to (1706).

Sixthly, as a human rights defender, regardless of being a Danish citizen, I am entitled for protection by EU member states in accordance with the EU-guidelines on the protection of human rights defenders around the world.  Hence, I would suggest that the Danish authorities kindly put forth more efforts, in coordination with other EU-state members, to take whatever possible actions at the regional level, such as in embassies, in Brussels institutions and at the UN in Geneva to address my case and the cases of other detained activists, and calling for the release, reparations and protection for human rights defenders in Bahrain, and detained activists, including my brother, Salah Al-Khawaja, and a Bahraini-Swedish activist, Mohammed Habib Al-Muqdad.

Finally, I thank you again and send my warm greetings to all Danish citizens.  I hope that the good effort, including yours, would soon secure my release so that  I can join my family and friends and resume my work as the director of the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) based in Beirut, that has recently started its work.

I wish you all the best.

Yours Sincerely,
Abdulhadi Abdulla Alkhawaja
Bahrain. 8 Feb. 2012

Notes:

1. Would you please submit a copy to my family.
2. I consider this as an “open” letter, so you may feel free to use it as you find convenient.

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As Cairo’s Tahrir Square and surrounding area spiraled into chaos,the central square of the same name (Liberation) in Yemen’s capital, Sana’a, was inhabited by pro-Saleh supporters in oversized tents.

Despite two opposing demonstrations taking place in the capital — pro- and anti-government — the feared violence on Yemen’s “day of rage” failed to materialise on Thursday, at least in Sana’a.

To the east of the country, in the coastal city of Mukkalla, the main city of Hadramaut province, at least one person was reportedly shot when government security forces opened fire on demonstrators. Other major protests took place in Taiz, Ibb and the southern city of Aden, where 22 people were arrested, according to local press.

Unfortunately there is no western media coverage of the provincial cities and as far as the world’s press was concerned, Yemen’s “day of rage” rather fizzled out. Tahrir Square in Sana’a couldn’t have offered a scene of greater contrast to that of Cairo’s. In Yemen’s capital, the day turned into a massive chewing session of the mildly narcotic leaf, qat, by pro-government supporters as they settled in to large wedding-style tents.

President Ali Abdullah Saleh has been extremely clever in his management of events here. After 32 years in power, he has become something of an expert at keeping his job.

Since the knock-on effect of Tunisia’s uprising began to be felt and protests in Yemen mounted, the president has announced a string of welfare reforms to appease the people and on the eve of Thursday’s protests, he declared that he would not stand for re-election at the end of his term in 2013. He made the same declaration in 2005 before standing as president in 2006. Saleh also reached out to opposition parties on Wednesday by conceding on a four-member electoral committee, stating that it would now include two opposition members. The coalition of opposition parties, the JMP, has so far boycotted the election process, due in April.

The president’s PR machine has been so slick that his supporters were ready and waiting to cheer him on — and call on him not to stand down in 2013 — before he had even made the announcement in an emergency parliament meeting on Wednesday. The takeover of the capital’s main square meant that planned anti-government demonstrators were forced to switch location at the last minute to Sana’a University.

Despite a distinct build up in security — soldiers occupied every major junction and street corner in the capital on Thursday — the two sets of demonstrations passed off peacefully without ever meeting. In the rest of the country where the international press does not tread, events were less passive.

On Friday in Sana’a there were no spontaneous follow-ups to yesterday’s demonstrations, organised by the opposition. Yemenis are so far reluctant to pick up the baton from the Egyptians. What’s happening in the rest of Yemen is less clear and may be more crucial than events in the capital.

Iona Craig is a freelance journalist and editor at the Yemen Times, Sana’a.

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The Egyptian government has cut mobile telephone and internet services, Index on Censorship’s Egypt regional editor Ashraf Khalil reports on how the information vacuum affected yesterday’s “day of rage”

The cell phones started working this morning again, although I’m not sure they’ll stay that way. The internet (as of 7pm local time) was still blocked. The fact that one but not the other has been restored perhaps indicates that the government views the internet as a larger threat than phone calls and text messages.

Whatever the logic, it’s worth noting that all these government attempts to restrict communications did very little to hinder the protesters yesterday and today.

The #Jan25 Day of Rage that kicked off the current waves of civil unrest rocking President Hosni Mubarak’s government DID employ Facebook, Twitter and text messaging as crucial tools. Last minute notifications on where to gather went out electronically at first. And all through the day on 25 January, protesters used Twitter to coordinate, offer each other encouragement and get news about protests happening elsewhere. When clashes happened in Suez or Alexandria, the protesters in Tahrir instantly knew and took heart from it. If there was thousands fighting to reach the square, they knew that too.

But if protests on 25 January took place in the context of a veritable flood of information, yesterday’s massive demonstrations happened in a literal vacuum. Suddenly dragged back to the landline communications era, the protesters didn’t know about Alexandria or Suez; they didn’t even know what was happening across the river.

It didn’t matter. Protest organisers basically bypassed the idea of coordination altogether and just told people “Protest everywhere.”

In anything, the information vacuum may have ended up sharpening the wills of the demonstrators. With no idea of the situation anywhere else in Egypt, protesters had no choice by to fight like hell for whatever public patch of ground they were standing on—and then fight their way through to the next patch of ground.

All through the day Friday and deep into the night, Cairo seemed to have reverted to a word-of-mouth storyteller society. If you were walking in the street and you saw protesters coming from the other direction, you asked them where they were coming from and what the situation was like there.

The shutdown also didn’t manage to stop the world’s media from effectively conveying the story to the world. Correspondents generally found a way to get online or, in many cases, reverted to the old-school practice of dictating their stories and notes to the newsroom over a landline.

Perhaps the largest impact was that many photographers and videographers have amazing images and footage trapped on their cameras with no way to get them out. I personally know several people in this situation.

When the government does finally lift the country-wide internet blockade, look for an absolute flood of imagery to instantly start flowing.

Read Ashraf Khalil’s “Uncut” blog here

The post Egypt’s Twitter-less revolution appeared first on Index on Censorship.

As demonstrations in Egypt continue into their fifth day Yemen had its moment in the international spotlight on Thursday as around 10,000 people took to the capital’s streets. But the nature of the “protest” in Sana’a was very different to those in Tunis or Cairo.

The Yemeni effort certainly looked impressive, but on the ground it was clear that in reality these so called “protests” were political rallies. Organised by a coalition of opposition parties, members of parliament sat on chairs in neat rows as they listened to political speeches condemning Saleh and his government. There were even suggestions that people had been bussed in by opposition politicians from villages and towns outside the city.

Thursday’s speeches called for renewed national dialogue and denounced constitutional reforms proposed earlier this month — all compromises that Saleh and his ruling General People’s Congress party can afford to concede ground on. Parliamentary elections are due on 27 April, but the opposition is currently boycotting the process. If Saleh responds by giving some concessions to his political opponents he will quiet the call for his resignation, at least for now.

Ultimately the grass roots still remain indifferent to the calls for change. There is no tension on the streets and no fire in the belly of Yemenis at large to create a movement like the one we’re seeing across Egypt. It’s been two days since the large orchestrated crowds gathered in Sana’a, but there have been no spontaneous gatherings since — aside from a small gathering of the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate outside the Egyptian embassy today.

If Yemen is going to see anything on the scale of Egypt’s uprising then it is likely to come from the already fractious southern separatists in Aden. In order to progress it would require support from Sana’a, Taizz and elsewhere.

There are further opposition rallies are planned for 3 February, Yemenis may claim that Tunisians inspired them and but only they can show the will to see it through. At the moment, whilst everyone else is looking at Egypt, here in Sana’a people still can’t see or even imagine a Yemen beyond Saleh. The president, who has ruled for 32 years, has his own vision for the future — his son Ahmed, currently head of the Yemen Republican Guard.

Iona Craig is a freelance journalist and an editor at The Yemen Times, Sana’a

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The Shia activists are charged with being part of a “sophisticated terrorist network” aiming to overthrow the government, but the exact charges against Abdulemam are murkier and harder to unravel. He is charged with “spreading false news” through his popular portal, Bahrainonline.org.

A married father of three and an IT consultant by day, Adbulemam has become a fixture over the past decade in forums and conferences dedicated to Arab digital activism and online freedom. He is regarded as one of the region’s web pioneers, and is described by one of his defenders as “driven by his passion for effecting change” in Bahrain and the wider Arab world.

In 2002 Abdulemam made waves by abandoning a pseudonym and publishing under his own name. Three years later he was jailed for charges that included fomenting hatred of the government. He later told the Wall Street Journal, “I believed you could speak and not go to jail.”

His latest trial started last week under heavy security and tight restrictions on local journalists covering the proceedings. A vibrant online campaign has sprung up in his defence.

Abdulemam is a Shia Muslim, described by friends as generally secular. An estimated 70 per cent of Bahrain’s 530,000 citizens are Shias, but the country is completely controlled by its Sunni royal family. The tiny island kingdom remains a close ally of the USA and serves as a host and staging point for the US Navy’s 5th Fleet. As a result, it has been given a largely free hand to roll back democratic freedoms that once set it apart from other Persian Gulf nations.

In parliamentary elections last week, Shias held onto their bloc of 18 seats in the 40-member chamber but are not expected to gain enough allies for a majority. And even if they did, control of the largely powerless assembly would be purely symbolic, and would do little to change the way the country works.

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In recent years, Barenboim has become increasingly vocal on non-musical issues, especially the Arab-Israeli conflict. He holds Israeli citizenship. In 1999, together with his close friend, the late Palestinian academic Edward Said, Barenboim founded the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, an ensemble of more than 120 young musicians who hail from the Middle East — Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan — and other Muslim countries including Egypt, Iran and Turkey. Each summer, the orchestra comes together in Seville, where its members are issued with Spanish diplomatic passports allowing them freedom of movement, before launching an international tour. The orchestra is not able to perform in most of the countries represented by its members, but has enjoyed phenomenal critical acclaim elsewhere in the world. Barenboim was born in Argentina in 1942 to Russian-Jewish parents. He gave his first piano recital in Buenos Aires aged just seven, moved with his family to Israel aged ten, and was being described by conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler as a “phenomenon” by the time he was 11. The former music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Barenboim was named Conductor for Life at the Berlin Staatsoper in 2000 and Maestro Scaligero at La Scala, Milan, in 2006.

The recipient of numerous awards for his conducting, piano recordings and human rights work, he is also the author of three books: A Life In Music, Parallels and Paradoxes (with Edward W Said), and Everything Is Connected, in which he outlines his belief that music offers us a unique model for understanding human relations and the world. Clemency Burton-Hill, the granddaughter of a Jew from Belarus, is a British writer, broadcaster and violinist who has been involved with music projects in the West Bank and occupied Palestinian territories since 2004, including the al Kamandjati refugee camp music schools in Ramallah and Jenin. In January 2009, she was invited by Daniel Barenboim to join the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra as an honorary violinist on their tenth anniversary tour. She has also interviewed Barenboim on a number of occasions in print and on television, including the Proms, the BBC’s Culture Show, and the Berlin Philharmonic’s 2010 Europa Konzert, which will be broadcast on BBC4 later this year.

Clemency Burton-Hill: One of my strongest memories of rehearsing with you and the West-Eastern Divan is a moment when you reminded the members of the orchestra that every single one of their governments would stop them from being there if they could, and that what they were doing was therefore very brave. For all the adulation and acclaim that the Divan garners around the world, it strikes me that it is, essentially, a censored orchestra.

Daniel Barenboim: Yes, you’re probably right. The Divan is not acceptable to any of the countries represented by its members. We can’t play in any Arab countries except the Emirates, nor in Israel. The Israelis don’t understand why it is even necessary to make the gesture. And the Arab world mostly sees the Divan as a way of normalisation, in the sense of accepting Israel, and all the problems that involves.

Clemency Burton-Hill: So the fact that those kids come together to make music with each other every year, in the face of governments who would silence them and despite recriminations from their friends and family at home, feels like something of a defiant act.

Daniel Barenboim: It is. And you know, I believe more and more that it is up to individuals — or minorities — to express things which are not acceptable to the majority. Because there is always a special angle that an individual or a minority can have. And maybe the majority will eventually follow, but you cannot start a new idea that is going to change things with the blessing of the majority.

Clemency Burton-Hill: How important is it that the orchestra be allowed to make music freely in the Middle East?

Daniel Barenboim: I think the full dimensions of the Divan will only be achieved when we are able to play in Tel Aviv, Damascus, Beirut, Cairo, because that is really what it is all about. On the other hand, if the conflict was resolved there would hardly be a need for the Divan. And so it is a bit of a contradiction in terms. The Divan came into existence and continues to develop because of the conflict, and it has not yet been fully able to push through its idea of accepting the narrative of the other, the point of view of the other. For that you need a yearning voice for justice and for compassion, from both sides. And the Israelis as a majority I don’t think have a compassion for the rights of the Palestinians, otherwise they wouldn’t be occupying the territories for so many years and they wouldn’t blockade Gaza.

Clemency Burton-Hill: You have said that “Our challenge in the 21st century is to use music not only as an escape from life — in the sense that you come home fed up, put on music, and forget your troubles — but also as a way of making sense of the world. Music is not an alternative to living; it’s a model for living.” So when music is censored, or silenced, is there much more at stake than merely entertainment and pleasure?

Daniel Barenboim: Yes, of course. I think history has shown us that many people are afraid of the effect of music. It can be very exalting, it brings people to expressions of solidarity and of enthusiasm – which is not always the case with the government. That is why music was used and manipulated so unashamedly by dictatorships. By the Nazis, by the Soviets …

Clemency Burton-Hill: And, ironically, those governments that manipulate music for their own purposes are often the states that censor it most cynically.

Daniel Barenboim: Because music is very powerful. It is very difficult to remain unmoved by music, I think probably for the simple fact that it has a physical penetration through the ear, which is much stronger than through the eye. If I don’t like what I am seeing, I can close my eyes. But if I don’t like what I am hearing, I cannot close my ears; I mean, I can, artificially, I can put my fingers in my ears, but basically there is a penetration, a physical penetration, which makes it very powerful indeed.

Clemency Burton-Hill: I have heard you say there is something “subversive” about music.

Daniel Barenboim: Edward Said always used to say that music is subversive. When you have a beautiful melody played by a woodwind instrument, veryoften the accompaniment, say, in the strings, will subvert that. Yet at the same time, the full expression of the line will be totally dependent on it too. There are many, many lessons to be learned from that.

Clemency Burton-Hill: Is it possible to describe why music is so powerful, why it acts on us the way it does?

Daniel Barenboim: Well, I think music is so powerful because it is, first of all, a physical thing, a physical expression of the human soul; something that is not only in the thought. And it attacks, I would say, all the functions of the human being. It attacks the brain, and it attacks the heart, and it attacks the stomach, you know, the temperament. Each one of us reacts perhaps with one more than any other of those three elements, but all three are constantly in action, and that’s what makes it so dangerous. Music is much more powerful than words.

Clemency Burton-Hill: Which is why censorship of music has always existed, and still exists?

Daniel Barenboim: Yes. By the way, there is a wonderful book called Beethoven in German Politics [by David B. Dennis]. It documents how Bismarck, Hitler, and then in the East German Republic, how Beethoven was used for their purposes, and how Hitler managed to convince the world that Beethoven’s Ninth was the perfect example of German spirituality with a text that says ‘all men are brothers – except a few’, namely the Jews.

Clemency Burton-Hill: That brings us to an important point about the de facto censorship of Wagner in Israel. You have always been adamant that Wagner was originally banned after Kristallnacht in 1938 not because of his own anti-Semitism — which had been well known since the 19th century — but because of the anti-Semitism of the Nazi party, i.e. the monstrous and appalling uses to which Hitler put the music. That distinction seems still not to be being made in Israel today, where the ban is very much still in place.

Daniel Barenboim: I’m afraid Israeli public opinion has manipulated all that. I’m sure there are many people in Israel who “don’t want to hear Wagner” who think that Wagner was around in 1940 — that Wagner was a Nazi. But you know, none other than [Arturo] Toscanini — who besides being a great musician was a great fighter for liberty — in 1936, when he was conducting the opening concerts for the new symphony orchestra in Tel Aviv, ironically then called the Palestine Philharmonic, played Wagner and there was no problem. The decision to stop playing Wagner was taken by members of the orchestra after Kristallnacht and that was perfectly understandable and just, from my point of view, in 1938. But to continue with that now is arguably as bad as it would have been to continue to play Wagner from that day.

Clemency Burton-Hill: It seems ironic that you were accused of being a fascist for playing Wagner’s music, when it could be argued that censorship of any music in a democratic country is verging on the fascist.

Daniel Barenboim: As I have said before, the idea this was a scandal was started the following day by people with a political agenda, not those in the concert hall, which greatly saddened me. I have always said that I respect anybody’s right not to listen to Wagner and that is why his work should be offered to a non-subscription audience. Israel is a democratic society, there should be no place for such taboos.

Clemency Burton-Hill: Have you ever had any problems from members of the West-Eastern Divan who perhaps did not want to play Wagner?

Daniel Barenboim: No, in fact it was the Israeli members who asked me to play Wagner in the first place, in 2004 or 2005. It was the brass players, who came and asked me to programme some Wagner because they couldn’t play it in Israel, they could not hear it in Israel, but they felt that musically it was very important to them, and they had no problem with it.

Clemency Burton-Hill: How depressing is it, to you, that it is now almost a decade since you played that Wagner encore in Jerusalem, and yet the debate about whether his music should still be banned from live performance seems not to have moved forward at all — rather backwards?

Daniel Barenboim: Yes, but the whole of Israeli society, from my point of view, has humanly moved backwards over those ten years.

Clemency Burton-Hill: You have made an explicit connection between this issue and Israel’s relationship with the Palestinians and the conflict today, suggesting that the Wagner ban means Israelis have not yet made the transition into being Israeli Jews and are still identifying themselves with the Judaism of the 30s and 40s. You have said: “Until we are able to do that, we will not be able to establish a fruitful dialogue with non-Jews”, and pointed out that while a sense of history is imperative, Israel must also look forward.

Daniel Barenboim: Yes, well, it is the same instinct that would allow so many Israelis to deny the Palestinians who live in Israel, the so-called Israeli Arabs, their human rights; to not allow civil marriages; the same instinct that means there is no separation of the synagogue and government, which is something that is accepted in most of the world. The other place where it is not accepted is Iran!

Clemency Burton-Hill: Talking about Iran, the authorities there have banned all teaching of all musical instruments in all schools because “the use of musical instruments is against the principles of our value system”, according to Education Minister Ali Bagherzadeh. Any school in Iran that teaches music may now be permanently closed and its director barred. What do you think of that?

Daniel Barenboim: Well, one has to say that music has not played the role in the Muslim world that it has played in Europe for centuries, so in a way they are sadly more ignorant about the nature of what music is. For them, music is something to celebrate with at weddings and mourn with at funerals, but they don’t view it as an expression of the human quality of life. They don’t understand that when you play a piece of music, whether it is a Chopin Nocturne or a huge Bruckner Symphony, that this is the story of human life, it tells us something of the quality of humanity. This is what makes us moved when we listen to music.

Clemency Burton-Hill: The West-Eastern Divan contains some young Iranian musicians within its ranks. How do you find their attitudes?

Daniel Barenboim: Those youngsters obviously do not share the opinions of their government about the nature of music. As you know, they are wonderful musicians, they have a huge capacity of giving, of generosity.

Clemency Burton-Hill: And I don’t think it’s too idealistic to suggest that their experiences making music, especially in the West-Eastern Divan, have probably nourished and developed that capacity. The orchestra is what brings them together with Israelis and Arabs, but music leads these youngsters to all sorts of other connections — they talk about politics, football, pop music, films; they fall in and out of love with each other; they begin to understand and accept the narrative of the other and take what they have learned back home. Isn’t it a tragedy that young Iranians will henceforth be denied the right to even learn a musical instrument? To my mind that’s a particularly pernicious form of music censorship; silencing it before it even exists!

Daniel Barenboim: In the end, though, when people forbid things, it is because they are afraid of them. It is not a sign of strength, it is a sign of weakness.

Clemency Burton-Hill: Yes — I have been struck by that often, travelling through the occupied territories with musicians. I have watched Israeli soldiers turn away young Palestinian musicians and singers at checkpoints as if somehow playing Bach or singing Puccini were a genuine threat to the state of Israel. And it always smacks of such monumental cowardice, even if the soldier is wielding a gun. Especially when the soldier is wielding a gun.

Daniel Barenboim: Exactly.

Clemency Burton-Hill: And whoever it was who burned down the al Kamandjati music centre in Jenin, or destroyed the Gaza music school; such acts feel like a despicable yet rather pathetic attempt to silence the Palestinian’s fledgling right to express themselves, through music, as a people. As Ramzi Aburedwan [founder of the al Kamandjati music school and viola player in the West-Eastern Divan] always says: “Bring music, and you bring life.”

Daniel Barenboim: Of course. You know, earlier this year, in May, I had organised an orchestra only of European musicians — no Israelis, no Arabs — to play a concert in Gaza. Simply to give people a little bit of relief from the harshness of their lives. And in the end the Israeli government did not allow it to happen, because they would have had to open the border to me and 35 musicians, once in the morning to let us in, once in the afternoon to let us out. We would have been there simply to make music; there was no question of anything else. But they forbade it. I found it absolutely devastating, I have to say.

Clemency Burton-Hill: What would you have played?

Daniel Barenboim: We would have played Mozart.

Clemency Burton-Hill: And if an Israeli politician had the vision to think about this differently, to say: we are a democracy, we support human rights, the inalienable human right to self-expression, we must let international musicians come here and make music freely …

Daniel Barenboim: A politician like that would not be elected in Israel.

Clemency Burton-Hill: But these are the moments, as you say, when Israel can define itself as a democracy. How can it get away with silencing something as innocuous and humane as a simple concert of Mozart in Gaza?

Daniel Barenboim: I have no idea. I have no idea. It defies every logic. Every logic. From our Jewish history we should be the first ones to know the importance of compassion and not to do unto others what was done unto us for so many centuries.

Clemency Burton-Hill: Where does it all end?

Daniel Barenboim: I don’t know. I don’t know. I really cannot answer that.

To read other articles in Smashed Hits 2.0 or to subscribe to Index go to www.indexoncensorship.org/subscribe

To listen to contributors’ playlists go to www.indexoncensorship.org/music

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