February 15, 2006

THE HUMAN RIGHT TO THUGGERY AND MANIPULATION

By Lucy Owen

The Arab Students Collective at the University of Toronto is currently holding their now annual week-long event “Israeli Apartheid Week”. As independent filmmakers interested in the Arab/Israeli conflict my partner and I, having spent the previous week filming the Jewish Students group Betar Tagar’s event ‘Know Radical Islam Week’ without any problems, decided to document this event too, in order to show the different approaches taken by two groups within the University who have historically, been at odds with each other.

The Arab students assert that Israel is a racist, apartheid state, where the basic human rights of Palestinians are routinely denied. The Arabs allege Palestinians were ethnically cleansed when the state of Israel was established and all of their descendents thereafter have a “right to return”, and that a two-state solution is unacceptable. Their logo, a map of Israel and the Palestinian territories reads “One state, One person, One vote”.

The Arab students’ accusations and goals are important indeed, which is why we thought we would have no problem in offering them a chance to be heard, in their own words, without fear of outside subjective interpretations. We were sorely mistaken. We were told that our presence with a camera would affect the ‘comfort level’ of the ‘public speakers’ hired for the event. Ironically, their ‘comfort level’ was fine if it was being filmed by an accredited news organization where they would be completely exposed nation-wide. So we decided instead to wait in the public hallways of the University building for the event to end so that we could interview those on their way out and get their opinions and reactions to the lectures. We assured the organizers that we would not roll the camera on anyone unless they gave us explicit permission to do so. This however was unacceptable to them. Why? They told us it was because we were being manipulative and ‘playing games.’

Upon arriving, we ran into someone who agreed to let us film their opinions on the conflict. That’s when the trouble began. After interviewing this young man for nearly 30 seconds, Ahmad Shokr from the organizing committee came over, pulled him away and said the young man was needed back inside the room. Shokr could then be seen down the hall interrogating the young man to whom we were speaking about exactly what was said, constantly eyeing us the whole time. Too bad, the young man had just started to explain to us how the western media is controlled by Jews who refuse to tell the truth about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This sounded strange as the very media of which he was speaking was the same mainstream media who the collective were allowing in to shoot Israeli Apartheid Week. Hmmmmm….

We then began to shoot the large displays the students set up – on public property in the hallway of the University building. Big boards with signs and photographs of Israeli soldiers beating and abusing innocent Palestinians. After only a few seconds of filming, another one of the organizers came over and warned us not to shoot. But he didn’t just warn us:

Aggressively and angrily, he moved towards us inches from our faces, clearly intent on threatening to escalate this conflict into a physical one. Let the intimidation commence…. I’m somewhat ashamed to admit it, but to be honest, we were scared and thought it best to turn off our camera. Had security personnel or the police been there, I dare say we would have kept rolling.

Ahmad Shokr approached and told us that while he respected the fact that we were on public property, he requested we “be sensitive” and not walk around with camera in hand, even though it was not rolling. He explained that it was making many people in attendance “uncomfortable”. (At this time, we were only seen by about five people including the ones mentioned.) Unlike his buddy before him, Shokr very astutely decided that making it seem as though we were victimizing audience members would be a better tact in controlling us.

The climax of the evening happened when the lecture was over. As those in attendance began pouring out of the room, we approached some folks in the hopes of getting interviews. Most were unwilling to talk to us, but finally, we found one Arabic man happy to express his views. As we prepared to step outside into the cold to do the interview, Shokr ran up to the Arab gentleman and began to speak to him in Arabic. I suspected he was telling him not to talk to us. When we questioned him about his continual efforts to stop us from getting any footage, he denied he was dissuading his friend from engaging us, however our camera was already rolling to start the interview and we have his words in Arabic on tape. A simple translation will tell us exactly what he said. The soft spoken Arabic gentleman did a lengthy interview in a most polite fashion, despite the fact that members of the collective kept opening the door to see if we were still there. We thanked him and prepared to go back inside to warm up, but alas, we’d been locked out. We went around to the front of the building but they locked those doors too.

This leaves one wondering. What exactly are these people hiding? Why are they so confrontational and angry? Why don’t their views about the media and the filming of ‘public speakers’ coalesce in any rational way? Why don’t they want the greater public to hear their message?

My partner and I are contemplating returning for the rest of the week’s events, however, it’s unlikely we’ll go; personal bodyguards can be awfully expensive.

This doesn’t mean we won’t make our documentary about these students and what they stand for. With or without their cooperation we will expose their agenda, and yes, their tactics and attitudes when dealing with anyone who isn’t clearly a supporter.