Palestinian Play Sparks Concern Jewish Leaders Question Inclusion In New Haven's Arts Festival

May 23, 2002
By FRANK RIZZO, Courant Staff Writer

"Alive From Palestine: Stories Under Occupation" scheduled to be presented next month by a Palestinian theater company at New Haven's International Festival of Arts & Ideas is the subject of growing concern among some Jewish leaders in the community, who feel the piece "demonizes" and "stereotypes" Israelis, "especially at this time."

In the work, seven members of the Al-Kasaba Theatre present a series of monologues depicting stories from everyday life - suggested and developed by the actors - focusing on various areas of frustration, pain, anger and loss. The show will be performed June 25 to 29 at Long Wharf Theatre, one of the festival's venues throughout the city.

The festival booked the Palestinian company after it performed the piece, which is presented in Arabic with English subtitles, in London last summer as part of the London International Theater Festival. According to the New Haven festival promotion, the work depicts an "intimate glimpse into ordinary lives lived in a war zone - the anger, despair, love, loss and frustration." The Times of London said the piece enables audiences "to glimpse something of the day-to-day experience of life in this shattered land." The Guardian, another London paper, called the one-hour play, "necessary theater."

The theater company, led by George Ibrahim, was established in Jerusalem in 1970 and now is based in Ramallah on the West Bank.

"We don't object that the Palestinians are presenting stories from their lives," says David Waren, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League in New Haven. "But under the umbrella of an arts festival which receives $1 million from the state, the show should provoke a productive exchange of ideas. This is not a dialogue-builder in our view. But there's no balance in the play or in the entire festival as a counterweight to this and that really is the rub."

Waren says, pointing to three short excerpts from the script, that the play depicts Israelis in a way "that surely would not be tolerated as part of a community arts festival."

Mary Miller, executive director of the festival, said she felt the piece had artistic integrity. "We are bringing this piece of theater here," she says, "because it is an interesting piece of theater, because it's a fine piece of work, not because it was Palestinian, but that it expressed voices from a country whose voices are not often heard in the theater." She says many of those who have seen a video of the entire play were moved and understood the totality of the work. Miller says it is unfair to base a judgment on excerpts that may be interpreted out of context.

Waren characterized the objections to the production as "informal." "I've seen no organized formal protests," he says. "There's just been an ad hoc outpouring of concern across the community," says Waren, who points out he has received more calls on this issue than any other he has dealt with in his seven-year tenure. He says his organization has a policy opposing organized boycotts."

"We're disturbed that this play was included in the arts festival and there wasn't a better vetting or review process," says Waren. "But we certainly didn't mean to suggest there was any intended malice on the part of the arts festival organizers."

Miller says she has met with Jewish community leaders over the past few months regarding the Palestinian play, "and we are continuing those discussions."

Waren will join Jewish community and festival leaders at a meeting today. "I would like to find cooperative ways to address those concerns we have given that the play is scheduled to take place in June," he says.

Says Miller: "The festival is about giving a platform to artists of all nationalities in order to share their creativity and to share their experiences. The festival has no stand-point or belief other than presenting good art."

The New Haven engagement will mark the Palestinian troupe's only U.S. engagement. The festival will also feature the Inbal Pinto Dance Company, an Israeli group which will present its "darkly mirthful" piece, "Oyster," June 26 to 29 at the University Theater.

courtesy of The Artists Network of Refuse and Resist

What has Hip Hop come down too?
This is what Nas thinks, what about you? what do you think?

For anyone who missed NAS walked out of HOT 97's summer jam after they wouldnt let him di his show which apparently consisted of him pretending to lynch Jay Z. He then went to WBLS and power and
destroyed HOT 97 and funk flex saying they take money to play records. Heres some of the transcript.

Nas: My people know why I'm not at the Summer Jam. I been bamboozled,hoodwinked and the whole nine. I was told and begged to do theSummerjam. I was begged to come to Hot 97 cause I had a hot new
record that nobody wanted to support except for the streets. I wastold to come there and help save Angie Martinez's job. I was told tocome there and help save the ratings at Hot 97 by [Funkmaster] Flex. But I'm here to let my people and my Hip Hop community know that I was dissed this morning by Hot 97 and told what I couldn't do on the show. It's really outrageous and really shows that the wrong people are in
power.

Ya know.. this Hip Hop thing comes from the streets. We need our freedom. If y'all aren't gonna go fight for your freedom.Y'all are gonna be like those sucker artists who go up to the radio station and
kiss A-S-S just to get some air time. Or suck Flex's [dick] or DJ Clue's [dick]..trying to get on their best side so they can play your record. Come on man.. take Hip Hop back into your own hands. Throw a party in the streets for free. Make it safe. Hire the Nation of Islam to protect it. It's time that we take it back into our hands because when its being held in bondage and slavery it's really a big slap in the face of Hip Hop and all the people who love it.

How you gonna tell Nas what I cannot do on the Summer jam stage when its been done. The same acts have been done for or five years in a row. And last year the dis was toward me by J [Jay-Z] and he was all high and mighty. I dropped 'Ether' which was a napalm bomb and they whole crew was running like roaches. And now you got that station over there [Hot 97] crying because they lost. It was an unanimous
decision he lost. They played his records like he was dead. It was like a Jay-Z memorial. I'm not saying he was [dead]. Don't get me wrong y'all. I'm not wishing that on any man. That's my brother, but I'm just saying..I'm looking for a fair play and its really outta hand. I'm not going for it. It's not gonna happen. This is the perfect opportunity. You now have the alternative to choose between any radio station you wanna choose and Power 105 plays everything-old school, new school...

Big up to my man Mike [Saunders-Power 105.1 program director] that's standing right here..Big up to my man Donny Iman and everybody at Columbia Records who are totally behind my back..Also David Bell Grave

Deja Vu : We behind you Nas. The streets are behind you.. because you know what after this you're probably ain't gonna hear none of your records over there but you know what that's OK because we [Clear Channel] have over 1200 stations and we gonna hold you down. I know Colb [Colby Colb] is gonna make a few more calls, Mike {Sauders] is gonna make a few more calls. I'm gonna 2way a few cats. We definitely appreciate this because this is what its all about. This as real Hip Hop. This is not synthetic Hip Hop.

Nas: This is not synthetic. I have my freedom of speech and I'm gonnasay what I want. I'm not worried about a record. I turn on thatstation and I hear rappers on there talking about their record sales. That's played out. I hear them [deejays] talking about the rims on a truck. What does that have to do with our community? What does that have to do with anything real? Let the rappers talk about it on their records. Y'all don't wanna hear about rims on a truck. I don't wanna hear the radio disc jockey [Angie Martinez / Funkmaster Flex / Fatman Scoop] making records that sound terrible. I wanna hear true Hip Hop
music.

This is real. You guys gotta realize that I ate it. They had a 'Takeover' show. That was the song ladies and gentleman. that was the wack record that Jay-Z had trying to come at me. They named a whole show on that station called 'The Takeover' and I ate that. They didn't worry about my feelings. They didn't worry about my feelings when he made song dissing my daughter's mother with derogatory things
about women...

Deja Vu: He made two records.

Nas: Yeah.. You have Jay-Z just making records about how much he hates women which really makes me curious. Ya know what I'm saying? And they [Hot 97] just supported that. They support everything that he does. But when Nas-God's son answers him back they team up with the evil. You see its a whole evil empire funded by a bunch of other evil empires with Def Jam being one of them who are giving them money to play all their artists records. Meanwhile the struggling artist have to recreate records that sound like Jay-Z and they're destroying themselves. If you listen to 90% of the rappers they're not even creative. Pick up a 'Stillmatic' album and listen to the song 'Rewind.' Listen to the song 'What Goes Around Comes Around.' Listen to 'One Mic' my people. Let's get real and be creative. I buy all these people's albums and it ain't talking about nothing.

I like Cam [Cam'ron] and everything. He's a good lyricist but the album is wack. Y'all brothers gotta start rapping about something that's real. My man NORE. I love you NORE, but step your rap game up. Nelly-If you trying to battle KRS-One don't follow Nas man. You can follow Nas if you gonna be creative. My next album that's coming out is gonna school a lot of rappers on how to be a man. Because of a lot of these rappers let Flex and them dictate what's supposed to be hot.

Deja Vu: Thank You Nas. Thank you for saying that.

Nas: That's why I'm here to let y'all know why I'm not at Summer Jam.
I ain't no sucker. I'm right here. I was raised in Queensbridge.

Deja Vu: Let's give Nas a round of applause from the Hip Hop
community.

Nas: This is for all my peoples. This is for the Hip Hop community. I don't want nobody to get it twisted. Word Is Born. This is all about people knowing that I did not dis my fans there at Hot 97. I was told this morning what I could not do and that's why I am not going to close the show. They begged me to be the headliner because Jay-Z is mad at them. He had a fit with them. He had a little emotional attitude.

Deja Vu: That's why you came over here and made the Power switch.

He had a fit with them. They begged me not to go to Wendy Williams station [WBLS] because Wendy was slaughtering Angie Martinez. They were like; 'Please don't go there because Angie is about to not have a
job.' I told them don't confuse me with an Angie Martinez/Wendy Williams beef. I make rap records. They got me in the middle of that so they can boost up their ratings and then they go treat me like a crab today. Which is not surprising which is why part of me feels good for not showing up when they told me what I could not do and that I could take it or leave it and walk. They treated me with total disrespect. So that's why I'm here letting my people know its time to be real. Make your own outlets. Listen to Power 105. Make mixtapes. Listen to Kay Slay. Go get Hip Hop without dealing with that station. Or get some balls. Rappers get some balls. Rappers are slaves.

When you know better you do better

Slave Owners and Their Insurers Are Named
By DAN MORAIN, Times Staff Writer

SACRAMENTO -- The California Department of Insurance on Wednesday identified half a dozen insurance companies that issued slavery-era policies and posted the names of hundreds of slave owners and the slaves they insured on the agency's Web site.

For advocates of paying reparations to the descendants of slaves, the report provides a compendium of material that could advance their efforts by identifying companies that profited from slavery. At a minimum, the records unearth long-forgotten names of those who trafficked in slaves and detail the crass financial arrangements that undergirded the nation's long embrace of trade in humans.

"These types of exercises give us a history lesson, and what the reparations movement is trying to do is concretely link the present and past by showing the lingering economic effects," said Darnell Hunt, director of African American Studies at UCLA.

The report, posted at http://www.insurance.ca.gov, attracted more than 8,000 hits in the first three hours after it was released.

None of the firms named Wednesday are based in California. But a state law pushed by then-Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) and signed into law by Gov. Gray Davis in 2000 requires all insurance companies doing business in California to publicly release information about policies they or their predecessor firms wrote insuring slave owners for losses if slaves died or ran away.

No other state has required insurance companies to compile and release such information.

The report includes 60 pages of charts listing more than 600 slaves by name and more than 400 slave owners. The listings are sketchy--slaves often are listed only by first name--but tantalizing, offering clues into the lives of slaves and their owners.

In one case, a man named Stephen Chenoweth of Louisville, Ky., took out insurance policies on five slaves named Tillman, George, Jack, Bob and John Owen. The policies, written by the predecessor of New York Life Insurance Co., say the slaves were to be employed as firemen, cooks or cabin boys on riverboats between Louisville and New Orleans.

According to the Kentucky Historical Society, the Chenoweths, originally from Virginia, were among the first settlers in Louisville. They established a fort called Chenoweth Station, and become targets of the last major raid on white settlers by Indians in 1789.

The Chenoweth clan became well-established and well-connected, said Ron Bryant of the historical society, which has a 600-page tome on the family. Bryant said records show that a Stephen Ross Chenoweth was listed in the 1850 Census as having a net worth of $20,000, a considerable sum at the time, and an 1848 Louisville directory listed his occupation as "jailer."

"It means 'slave jailer;' he bought and sold slaves," Bryant said.

William Werfelman, spokesman for New York Life, said the California law prompted the company to search its archives, finding that its predecessor company, Nautilus Insurance, wrote policies for slave owners for two years, in 1846-47, then discontinued the practice when the firm trustees voted to end the practice.

"New York Life abhors the practice of slavery, historically and currently, and we profoundly regret that our predecessor company, Nautilus, was associated in any way with it, for even a brief period of time," Werfelman said. "The fact that slavery was legal in certain parts of the United States at the time doesn't make it any less repugnant." New York Life provided a list of 484 names of slaves and 233 slaveholders. The company reported that the policies generally were written for less than $500 and were for one-year terms. New York Life turned its records over to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, a part of the New York Public Library.

At the Schomburg Center, director Howard Dodson characterized the report as "a piece of evidence." It is limited to insurance companies doing business in California currently, and does not include other industries that profited from slavery.

"I anticipated there would be a larger number of policies," Dodson said.

"I knew that New York Life was in the business Some of the others were in much longer period of time."

Other firms named include Aetna, AIG, Royal & Sun Alliance, Manhattan Life and Ace USA. Two other firms, Penn Mutual and Providence Washington, provided documents but nothing showing they had issued policies on slaves.

AIG produced a magazine article describing a $550 policy on a slave named Charles.

Among the policy's exclusions: "death to said slave by means of any invasion, insurrection, riot, civil commotion, or of any military or usurped power, or in case the slave shall die by his own hand or in consequence of a duel or by the hands of justice."

Another firm, Ace USA, found only a single policy on a slave identified only as a laborer named Peter in Mississippi. Ace reported that as part of its research to comply with the law, it obtained a database of 27,233 transatlantic slave ship voyages from 1595 to 1866.

For the most part, companies that issued policies for transatlantic shipping firms are not represented in the report, perhaps because they are out of business, or have no business in California, insurance department spokeswoman Nanci Kramer said.

One exception involved a marine insurance policy issued by Manhattan Life, and that policy did not cover shipping in the African-American trade.

Rather, Manhattan Life insured 720 Chinese slaves, called "coolies," aboard the vessel Sea Witch, bound for Panama. The company covered one-fourth of the $84,000 insured value of the human cargo.

When three of the workers jumped ship and 11 others died on the voyage, Manhattan Life paid the owners $408, leaving the insurance company with a profit of $432.

Hunt said the material released Wednesday represented an incremental but important step in recasting the national discussion of race and slavery.

Targeting insurance companies helps reveal the "naked calculation," Hunt added. It paints a picture of slaves as chattel insured like valuable jewelry, cars or homes.

The ultimate value of the information will only be known over time, said Douglas H. Daniels, professor of black studies and history at UC Santa Barbara.

The report, Slavery Era Insurance Policies Registry, makes no comment on the politically controversial issue of reparations. Indeed, it never uses the word. Neither Davis nor his appointee, Insurance Commissioner Harry Low, commented on the report's contents.

Davis, who signed the Hayden bill into law in 2000, had planned to hold a news conference Wednesday in Los Angeles but canceled it.

Davis press secretary Steve Maviglio said the governor "hasn't taken a position on reparations."

But in a comment that last week became fodder for Northern California talk shows, Davis, appearing with the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson Sr., said: "Clearly, we want to right any wrongs, and do justice to people who were taken advantage of if that is the case. And I believe that will be the case."

Jackson on Wednesday hailed California's posting of the report as a "breakthrough" and praised Hayden for pushing the legislation, which he said would urge other states to follow.

"This is the key that opens the door to insurance companies and banks involved in the slave trade," Jackson said.

But Bill Simon Jr., Davis' Republican challenger in the race for governor, issued a statement criticizing the Democratic governor's "divisive and politically motivated support for reparations."

"Bringing up the wounds of our country's past in a politically motivated attempt to shore up his political standing today is typical of Gov. Davis, who offers only politics, and no solutions," Simon's statement said.

"Americans feel pain for what happened over 150 years ago, but we cannot right the wrongs of history by handing out money generations later."

"When things go wrong, don't go with them"

"..whatever is true, whatever is worthy of reverence and is honorable and seemly, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely and lovable, whatever is kind and winsome and gracious, if there is any virtue and excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on and weigh and take account of these things." Philippians 4:8