Al-Quds Underground (AQU), a program which claims “to create a secret space for artistic expression,” is funded by Cordaid (Holland, EU), the Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Foundation for the Dialogue between Cultures, and SICA. The Anna Lindh Foundation received €7 million over three years from the EU, earmarked for projects such as Al Quds Underground. AQU’s website states that the group’s vision is “[n]ot conflict and segregation, but contact and curiosity.”
In contrast, on October 30, 2009 the group refused to allow Israelis to attend one of its events. According to a Jerusalem Post report:
“Al-Quds Underground’s artistic director Merlijn Twaalfhoven of Amsterdam then told me, along with some Israeli peace activists who had arrived, that we were not welcome...‘The local people told [Twaalfhoven] months ago that Israelis cannot go. Our team [of 12 Dutch activists and eight artists] had to promise that we would not allow peaceful Israelis to come.’”
In correspondence with NGO Monitor, Cordaid officials attributed the exclusion to disruptions by Israeli participants, claiming that
“a number of Israeli visitors disturbed a performance in one of the private houses in which the festival took place. Out of fear of further incidents and out of respects for the hosts who opened their private homes for the performances, the organizers of the festival felt forced to decide the next day to ask Israeli participants to withdraw from the tour...Both the organizers and Cordaid regret that this course of events took place.”
Cordaid also asserted that “the Jerusalem Post misquoted Merlijn Twaalfhoven unfortunately” regarding the exclusion of Israelis before the first event. However, the author of the Jerusalem Post article stood behind the accuracy of the quote.
In separate correspondence with SICA, deputy director Beate Gerlings stated that its funding was based on the “artistic merits of the proposal,” and these were “achieved.”
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Dear people,
ReplyDeleteI have to inform you that Gil Zohar quoted me wrongly and that the festival did not intend to refuse Israeli guests. After an incident on Fridaynight, where Israeli guests disturbed a performance and did intimidating political statements, we asked six Israeli guests on Saturday not to participate because of the situation of tension and fear that was created.
We regret that this happened and will do everything to avoid such a situation in the future. The quote in the Jerusalem Post: “The local people told me months ago that Israelis cannot go” was not correct. It was based on the explanation that we decided already months ago we would not announce the events publicly or invite Israeli artists to participate, because the situation in the Old City is so tense.
Gil Zohar writes that he himself received an invitation, as many other Israelis did.
It is a project of dialogue between cultures that are part of the society in the Old City such as Christian, Armenian, African and various Muslim communities. To include Jews would be something very good, we hope that this can happen in the future.
Please help us to create more openness and contact among the people that live in fear and frustration in Israel/Palestine.
Merlijn Twaalfhoven
I believe your statement still says it all. "It is a project of dialogue between cultures that are part of the society in the Old City such as Christian, Armenian, African and various Muslim communities. To include Jews would be something very good, we hope that this can happen in the future." BTW, Jews are part of the society in the Old City, and we can see that as of now you do not include them. Gil seems to have been correct after all.
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