Shooting ourselves in the foot
Remarks by 'Ajami' co-director hurt prospects for Arab-Jewish partnership
"Ajami" co-director, Scandar Copti, shot an arrow deep into the heart of Israel’s Arabs. The film he made, along with a Jewish director-partner and actors from both peoples (mostly Arabs) actually did good things for us at first, yet now it’s over.
The audiences, mostly Jewish, who saw the movie found many reasons to feel empathy, sympathy, and solidarity with the harsh life of the Jaffa neighborhood’s residents and to want things to be different. The film created the conditions for greater closeness between Jews and Arabs in Israel, with a desire to boost equality between the two peoples living here.
The fact that we, Israel’s Arabs, appreciate the conditions granted us by the State, and our overwhelming majority do not wish to leave the country under any circumstances, does not justify the injustices we’ve suffered over the years. The State must rectify this injustice, especially after it recognized it and started to work in that direction. "Ajami", the film, could have contributed to this process and helped us.
Yet then came Copti’s harsh words; we now know that matters pertaining to Israel’s Arab population do not really interest him. Had it been otherwise, he should have said: I, personally, am through with the State of Israel. I’m leaving, so don’t see me as a representative of Israel’s Arabs or of Israeli film.
Had this been the case, the film’s audiences and in fact all citizens of this country could have realized that the director made a new decision for himself, and that’s fine. He is rejecting his citizenship and embarking on a new path. Yet this is not what Copti did.
Nationalistic, divisive Arab leadership
After what he said – “The film represents Israel technically, yet I don’t represent Israel. I cannot represent a State that does not represent me” – it’s still unclear in what way the State is supposed to represent him. The State granted him NIS 2 million (roughly $550,000) to make the film, a significant sum, and along with a Jewish director-partner and Israeli actors the movie is clearly Israeli.
Many people feel discriminated against in the State of Israel. Not only Arabs, by the way. Yet very few of these people have been given such a respectable and important opportunity to speak out. “The power of life and death is the tongue,” and in this case the destructive tongue won out.
What happened next was so predictable: Many changed their mind and hoped that the film doesn’t win the Oscar. Many sighed with relief when it did not win. For example, a popular TV personality said: “Do we need to hear anti-Israeli interviews with him everywhere if he wins?”
And so, the shoe is on the other foot now. What could have served as a powerful means for creating a bridge and a sense of Jewish-Arab partnership has turned into a reason to boost the alienation and hostility.
The Arabs living in the State of Israel do not wish to leave it, and rightfully so. Yet they keep on undermining their ability to integrate into the Jewish-majority society.
They showcase a “display window” that is nationalistic and divisive in the form of their leadership at the Knesset; they tend to prefer a nationalistic Palestinian approach over civilian integration, to the point where the Jews find it difficult to tell whether these are Israeli Arabs or Arabs in the territories (and we really don’t want to move there); and after all that, we’re upset that the Jews do not wish to be close to us.
Dubai declared that it will no longer allow Israelis to enter its territory, yet it’s very possible that Copti of all people will be received with great honors there.
The writer, a resident of Kfar Kara, is an elementary school principle and an activist in the field of community service in the Arab sector
