A Guest Post by Dr. Harold Goldmeier

Israel’s enemies have a new venue to isolate the Jewish State from the civilized world. 37 actors, playwrights, directors, and producers, signed a letter to The Guardian calling on the producers of the Globe-to-Globe World Shakespeare Festival to disinvite Habima, Israel’s National Theatre. Habima is scheduled to perform The Merchant of Venice this May in Hebrew.

Nearly 60 theatre partners will perform Shakespeare’s 37 plays in 37 languages to celebrate the beauty and universal appeal of the Bard’s works. An educational component of the April-November festival is to reach the teachers of the more than 60 million children who become acquainted with Shakespeare’s works in schools around the world. One of my sons teaches English literature, including The Tragedy of Macbeth, to high school students in Israel.

Habima’s crime is that she performs in settlement “halls of culture”; a sarcastic characterization by those who don’t want Habima. These theatres are located on occupied Palestinian lands. Second, the apartheid State excludes Palestinians from these performances; and, Habima’s participation in the festival gives tacit acceptance to Israel’s flouting of international law. The Globe’s response to-date is to keep Habima scheduled, because the producers believe cultural inclusiveness builds bridges between people who politically disagree. Habima is defiantly planning to perform at the festival, but expects interruptions and demonstrations. Denying free speech to the Jews is a common tactic of Israel’s detractors.

Here is an opportunity for these champions of human rights to draw attention to artistic repression and suppression of freedom of speech in countries with abominable human rights records.

• Afghanistan is sending a company, and we know the plight of women in that country. How appropriately, the Roy-e-Sab company will be performing The Comedy of Errors.
• Russia’s Vaktangor Theatre will be performing despite the decades long war against Chechen’s who want an independent state. Russian commandos slaughtered 129 hostages (audience members) and 39 Chechen freedom fighters in a Moscow theatre to call attention to Russia’s bloody and vicious campaign in Chechnya. Journalists in Russia and beyond her borders have been murdered with strong suspicion of government involvement.
• The Ramallah theatre company will be at the festival despite the murder of one of their own by, Israeli-Arab actor and director Juliano Mer-Khamis. He was shot five times outside his playhouse in Jenin one year ago. Mer-Khamis was an activist, but was killed by Palestinians because he committed the crime of co-ed productions. Modern cultural events, journalistic freedom of speech, and women’s rights, are suppressed in Gaza and the PA lands.
• Turkey is sending a company, but no one is protesting on behalf of the Kurds. Turkey attacks them with planes and tanks inside Turkey and across sovereign borders. Cypriots suffer under military occupation, since Turkey invaded and occupies their country.
• Without Richard Gere performing at the festival, no one will ask for a boycott of China on behalf of the physical and cultural annihilation of Tibet. Even Secretary Clinton occasionally reminds China about their horrendous record in Tibet, and their attempts to assassinate the Dali Lama.

The twisted rational for disinviting Israel reflects the fetid moral indignation of people who hate the Jewish State and all it has accomplished. These accomplishments includes staging a world-class, internationally renowned arts and culture phenomenon. Habima was founded in 1905. She suffered through the Russian revolution, a move to another continent, and a World War. Habima’s players and support staff grew through wars and intifadas, yet she maintains her dignity and dedication to artistic freedom and experimentation.

How easy to boycott the Jews. It’s apodictic that the underlying anti-Semitic sentiment of Christian and European society among the chic, gives gravitas to their cultural and religious prejudices. It is no small leap to focus on the settlements, as if before settlement activity there was peace with the Arabs and Palestinians. The actors and others who signed the boycott letter want to make all Israelis suffer not just the settlers. Habima is a national theatre. At least the producers of the festival have bravely stood by their decision.
Israel is not without its character flaws, but like Othello and Shylock, Israel is the object of single-minded discrimination by people of malice with fetid moral righteousness.


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