As a fluent Arabic-speaker, Ksenia Svetlova has been following that Ramadan institution, the TV soap opera. As she explains in the Times of Israel, she is heartened that the Egyptian series Haret al-Yahud marks a change of tone for the better in its portrayal of Egyptian Jews. At the same time the future is bleak. Jewish refugees from Arab countries can take heart that Svetlova, a newly-elected MK, will use her status as head of the lobby to preserve Jewish heritage in Arab countries to defend their rights.
However, this year Egyptian TV presented a new
drama. The Jewish Quarter tells the story of a beautiful young Jewish
girl, Leila Harun, who is in love with a dashing army officer (a Muslim)
fighting for the liberation of Palestine. Israeli aircrafts bomb the
city, and residents of the so-called Jewish district — Jews, Muslims and
Christians — find refuge in the synagogue. Soon Leila finds out that
her brother is on his way to Palestine to fight for the Independence of
Israel against the coalition of Arab armies. Leila condemns her brother
and says to her parents: “You brought up a Jewish Egyptian, not a Jewish
Israeli.”
Meanwhile, activists of the Muslim Brotherhood
and “Young Egypt” (an Islamist organization of which Anwar Sadat was a
member) try to fight the revolutionary “Free Officers” movement, and
attempt to divide Jews, Muslims and Christians and pit them against one
another. There is not a single word in the series on how the Jews were
denied Egyptian citizenship, and were robbed and expelled from the
country — and this is sad, because it heightens the injustice of this
tragedy even more.
But at the same time, the glass is half full.
The series is notable for its marked change of tone in its portrayal of
Jews — albeit not without flaws. For the first time in decades, Jews are
represented without horns and a tail; they do not use blood to cook the
Passover matzah, nor do they kill children or strive for world
domination. They live, love, dream and dance like everyone else. When I
compare the series “Harat al-Yahud” and other films and TV series about
Jews – for example, “48 hours in Tel Aviv”, “Cousins” and “The Embassy
in a Building,” not to mention the anti-Semitic shows mentioned above,
there is a genuine attempt to portray Jews as human beings. Despite
this, the fact is that Magda Haroun, one of the last Jews in Cairo and
head of the Jewish community, made only two comments on the show: that
the Jews were not so rich, and that in her time skirts were longer. The
show was originally supposed to be aired two years ago, but the Islamist
President at the time, Muhammad Morsi, forbid it. Now, with relations
between Israel and Egypt improved, the show got a green light.
In Egypt itself, the reaction is mixed. I
watched the show online, and found many anti-Semitic comments and
insults. Some believe that the show is too sympathetic to the Jews,
while others are offended that the handsome officer has chosen a Jewish
girl. But there are also others who like what they see. They
nostalgically reminisce about old times that will never return — the
blend of the cultures, the coexistence, the freedom of speech, the times
when Jews were involved in the commercial and cultural life of Cairo,
along with other minorities — Greeks, Armenians and Italians.
However, despite The Jewish
Quarter’s refreshingly positive portrayal of Jews, the situation is
bleak. Today almost nothing is left of the Jewish community of Egypt,
and Jewish landmarks are neglected. Synagogues and old Jewish cemeteries
may make for an excellent background in a TV series, but sadly these
historic sites are crumbling and in dire need of protection and
reconstruction. As head of the lobby to preserve the heritage of Jewish
communities from Arab and Islamic countries, I will do everything
possible to preserve the history of the Jews in Egypt and elsewhere, and
to protect the rights of Jewish refugees from these countries. The Jews
of the Arab world have a rich culture and an important history that
must neither be marginalized nor forgotten. I look forward to working on
behalf of these communities.
It seems that as years pass, the country's "elites" sink only deeper in ignorance and dilettantism.
ReplyDeleteArabic as taught today (Arabic characters, standard Arabic language), is useless when it comes to the literary production of the Jews of Arab lands (at least until the 20th century and only in the East). So like her predecessors, she will conclude that they speak "bad arabic" and have produced nothing for at least six centuries. We know from experience that it will never occur to them that "Arab Jews" wrote in languages other than standard Arabic.
She'll need to know a number of Judeo-"arabic" dialects as they differ by country, plus Spanish, French, Hebrew, Aramaic, Italian, haquetia, and Berber. There are also the regionalisms, the differences in dialect within the same country among Jews themseelves.
She would also need to know the dialects spoken by Muslims, since Jews employed the dialects of the Muslims when the audience was not Jewish.
Sorry, MK, Knowing Arabic is very good - but not sufficient to "protect the heritage of the Jews of Arab lands". One also needs to know how to identify it.
I take your point re Judeo-Arabic and its variants but I think Svetlova will be active in trying to do what she can to preserve Jewish physical heritage. I think she has already written about the need to preserve Jewish holy sites in Iraq, for instance.
ReplyDeleteA member of the "Zionist Union" that supports JStreet and advocates for "progressive denominations of Judaism". With people like her and Einat Wilf fighting for Israel the future does seem bleak.
ReplyDeleteA smart woman indeed. It's an easy cause.
ReplyDeleteNo one expects any results, since there isn't anything she can actually do about it, but she will receive laudatory comments and endorsements from everyone just for pretending to fight to preserve a long gone past that everyone sees full of nostalgia these days. And all that while helping to erode the Jewish foundations of the state. Fighting for the Jewish past is always easier -- and more rewarding -- than fighting for its future...
Why is she there in the first place? Because she knows Arabic and for no other reason nor qualification.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the holy sites in Iraqi-controlled areas the task is better done from America than from an Israeli Knesset pulpit.
As far as the areas controlled by Isis in my opinion they will not destroy the shrines of the prophets at best they will appropriate them just like the Makhpela or the Western Wall.
In Egypt scholars have been communicating for years. In Morocco and Tunisia, the holy and religious sites are taken care of by the community and the government.
In Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Libya, Algeria, there is nothing she can do.
So what is that "lobby" really about?
It's bluffing and part of a ping pong game between political parties of which, we, the MENA voters are the ball. Or so they see us.
I said it before, I'll say it again. You should take those documents out of government hands and look for independent funding.
In any case, my position is that what is more urgent than stones is the intellectual corpus whether religious texts, poems, stories, books and newspapers just sitting there and that in just a few years, no one will be able to read or translate, because the emigre generation is dwindling and so the languages are becoming extinct. That's what worries me.