Guest contribution by Muhammad Shareef
I love the RedEye. It usually features a glimpse into what’s going on around Chicago, sometimes expanding on larger national events, but more importantly balancing its informational articles with just enough entertainment pieces to have turned me into a loyal reader each morning for the past three summers.
Yesterday morning was very different. I was shocked by the “Turban Primer” article published barely two days after a gunman shot and killed six worshippers at a Sikh Temple in Milwaukee. I usually refuse to dwell on isolated cases of racism, even those that explicitly target myself, because I recognize that almost all of the people I interact with are amazingly broad-minded human beings. But the “Turban Primer” was too blatant for me to ignore. So I write this with the simple hope of highlighting what I’ve come to notice.
The article shows five cartoon drawings of various men wearing turbans with the following descriptors: Sikh men, Iranian leaders, Taliban members, Indian men, and Muslim religious elders. The descriptors are followed by simplistic captions that are much better suited for Pokémon cards than for a publication of the Chicago Tribune. But looking beyond the ignorance in stereotypically categorizing turban “styles”, an editor at the RedEye saw it fit to educate the Chicago-area community on how to distinguish a Muslim wearing a turban as if to say that a mistake similar to Sunday’s should not happen again. [Read more...]
Why Palestinians won’t lend their voices to OneVoice and liberal Zionism
Guest contribution by Sami J.
The organization OneVoice claims to be a grassroots movement aimed at empowering Israelis and Palestinians to push their leaders toward a two-state solution. In practice, this has translated into a strategy overwhelmingly focused on what’s good for Israel — and specifically Israel’s Jews — while Palestinian suffering and rights are sacrificed on the altar of compromise. This problem was pointed out by PACBI back in 2010. And last week, it was thrown into stark relief when it was discovered that OneVoice had put out a shockingly racist Hebrew-only graphic, warning of the increase in the Palestinian population and what counteractions must be taken to preserve a Jewish majority in historic Palestine (a full translation can be found here).
In what can only be described as naked cynicism, while OneVoice was warning Israeli Jews of the “high” number of Palestinians, it was also seeking to collaborate with Palestinians in exile, specifically the Chicago Movement for Palestinian Rights (CMPR), a youth-led Palestine solidarity organization. CMPR understandably refused, issuing an open letter outlining their valid reasons. This did not sit well with liberal Zionist professor Mira Sucharov, who wrote a very patronizing piece on the need to refrain from (what she thinks are) frivolous accusations of racism and to work together to achieve peace (on Zionist terms, of course) instead.
When I challenged her on this, she responded that while she understands OneVoice’s message “stings”, Jewish yearning for national sovereignty is also important; and that the disagreement with OneVoice is “about feelings and narrative” where “collective emotions and historical memory are key”. [Read more...]