[fse-esf] Statement by Workers in the Public Cultural Sphere in Lebanon

[Alex Callinicos]

Statement by Workers in the Public Cultural Sphere in Lebanon

We the undersigned declare:

Our conscious support for the Lebanese national resistance as it wages a war
in defense of our sovereignty and independence, a war to release Lebanese
imprisoned in Israel, a war to safeguard the dignity of the Lebanese and
Arab people.

Our unambiguous refutation of the logic that accuses HizbAllah of having
provided the "pretext" for the Israeli invasion. Israel did not invade
Lebanon, destroy its infrastructure, displace and murder its populace
because of the heroic operation carried out by HizbAllah. Israel has never
needed a pretext to breach the sovereignty of Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, or
other nations. Rather, the recent Israeli aggression is the latest in a long
series extending back to the founding of the Zionist state and motivated by
both historical ambitions vis-‡-vis Lebanese territory and waters and by a
racist supremacist ideology that denigrates the indigenous population, their
culture, and their very existence. The most recent aggression is, more
specifically, the realization of a long-standing, openly professed desire of
Israel to avenge for its humiliation at being driving out of most of Lebanon
by the resistance operations that began in September 1982 and had their
fruition in May 2000. Israel's very avowal of intent to implement by its own
powers UN Resolution 1559 is itself proof that its invasion of Lebanon today
surpasses any mere response to the above-mentioned operation and serves an
American policy that aims at annihilating all viable opposition in the world
at large, and at direct control of the Arab world and its resources in
particular. How strange that Israel should wish to be the policeman in
charge of executing UN Resolution 1559 when it has not yet executed any of
the previously issued UN resolutions addressing its own actions, with the
exception of the partial implementation of Resolution 425, which resulted
essentially because of strikes inflicted by the armed Lebanese Resistance.

Our staunch condemnation of official American support for the Israeli
aggression. The war crimes Israel is currently committing, as well as those
it committed in the past and will commit in the probable future, would not
have occurred or occur yet without America's political and military support
for Israel, that which is unmitigated by its allegedly unswerving espousal
of Lebanese freedom, sovereignty, and independence.

Our utter rejection of the Lebanese government's decision to "not adopt" the
Lebanese Resistance operation, thereby stripping the Resistance of political
credibility before the adversarial international powers, when it behooved
that government to deem the said operation as consistent with its
Ministerial Proclamation in support of the liberation of the Lebanese
prisoners in Israel, of Shebaa Farms, and of Kfar Shuba.

We the undersigned, in declaring our intentions, also therefore, call upon:

The Lebanese government to realize its full responsibilities, especially in
terms of embracing the Lebanese Resistance in diverse ways, and particularly
after the clarification of Israel's plan to destroy the infrastructure,
institutions, and political entity of Lebanon.

Arab intellectuals to stand beside the Lebanese Resistance, to expose the
Zionist racist, supremacist impetus, and to document Israel's crimes against
Arabs since its founding. Likewise, we ask our Arab colleagues to confront
the continual calls for capitulation (wrapped in the cloak of "realism"),
and to expose both the American bias towards Israel and the complicity of
the majority of "rational" Arab governments against the Lebanese Resistance.
We, also, ask that you take a stand against all kinds of normalization with
Israel, by closing down the Israeli embassies and government offices located
in Arab countries, and by boycotting products of Israeli and pro-Israeli
companies, whatever their nationality.

Lebanese intellectuals, in particular, not to be swayed by the (il)logic
that accuses HizbAllah of having destroyed the Lebanese economy, but instead
to hold Israel fully responsible for its age-old policy of destruction and
war crimes. The principle of the Lebanese Resistance is to be a deterrent
force against Israel's ability to pursue that policy with impunity.

Free-thinking intellectuals the world over, and advocates of justice and
peace, to publicize the history of Israeli aggression and to pressure the
American and European governments to halt their military and material
maintenance of the Zionist killing machine. Similarly, we call upon our
peers the world over to announce a boycott of Israeli products, and of
Israeli academic and scientific institutions that do not condemn the Israeli
aggression against Lebanon. Furthermore, we invite intellectuals of the
world over to visit Lebanon in order to stand by the side of their Lebanese
colleagues and to view first hand the results of Israeli war crimes against
civilians, schools, infrastructure, humane institutions (foremost among them
the Lebanese Red Cross), and media (which, in addition to sustaining hits on
its press convoys and aerial transmitters, most recently lost to Israeli
fire the reporter Layal Najib). The solidarity of world intellectuals with
the Lebanese people, press, and culture-workers, in such direct terms, would
constitute an international declaration of the refusal to permit Israel to
treat Lebanon as a mere "military target" for its airplanes, warships,
tanks, and "smart" bombs.

Resistance is an intellectual act par excellence. That is because the goal
of intellectual activity, like resistance, is to defend the values of
justice and equality of all people. For this reason we, the undersigned,
consider, regardless of our varying intellectual inclinations, cultural and
critical activity an integral part of Lebanese national resistance, indeed
of resistance to injustice anywhere in the world.

Beirut, July 25, 2006

Signed,

Initial Signatories:
Samah Idriss (PhD, Al-Adab Magazine), Joseph Samaha (Al-Akhbar Newspaper),
Talal
Salman (Al-Safir Newspaper), Muhammad 'Ali Shamseddin (Poet), Mai Masri
(Film
director), Kirsten Scheid (Asst. Prof in Anthropology, AUB), Omar Nashabeh
(PhD
in criminology), Rania Masri (Asst. Prof, Fac. of Science, University of
Balamand), Jean Cham'oun (Film director), Wasef 'Awadah (Journalist), Amin
Qammuriyyeh (Journalist), Sa'dallah Mazra'ani (Journalist & Media
Commentator),
Hilmi Mousa (Political Analyst), Adonis Al-'Akra (Phd, philosophy, Lebanese
Univ.), Ibrahim Al-Amin (Journalist), Graziella Kallab (Psychotherapist),
Laila
Al-Khatib (Phd, Literary Criticism), Zaynab Yaghi (Journalist), Jihad Touma
(Phd, AUB), Husayn Ayyoub (Journalist), Najib Nasrallah (Journalist), 'Imad
Marmal (Journalist), Nasri Al-Sayigh (Writer), Pierre Abi Sa'b (Journalist),
Fatima Sharafeddine (Children's Author), Khalil Zahreddin (Geologist &
Cultural
Activist), Hanady Salman (Journalist), Camille Dagher (Writer), Walid
Sharara
(Journalist), Khalil Harb (Journalist), Hala Bajjani (Al-Akhbar Newspaper),
Hanna Al-Hajj (Phd, Sociology), Nabil Haytham (Journalist), Hashim Qasem
(Journalist), Sa'd Mehio (Journalist), Adel 'Ammous (Publisher), George
Haddad
(Writer), Ranwa Yehya (Coordinator of an Arab Youth program), Adnan
Al-Sahili
(Economist & Journalist), Mousa Al-Hindi (Cultural Activist), Imad Haydar
(Journalist), Ahmad Dallal (Prof. of Islamic Studies, Georgetown Univ.),
As'ad
Abu Khalil (Prof. of Political Sciences, Univ. of California at Stanislaus),
Rabi'a Salman (Journalist & Teacher), Nada Al-Qara (Cultural Activist &
Health
Worker), Firas Al-Amin (Writer), Sulayman Bakhti (Literary Critic), Tareq
Ghaddar (Prof. AUB), Pascal Lahhoud (Phd), Jumana B'albaki (Journalist),
Khalid
Saghiyyeh (Asst. Prof., AUB), Sa'da 'Allaw (Journalist), Sahar Mandour
(Journalist), Nader Sabbagh (Journalist), Juhayna Khalidiyyah (Journalist),
Madonna Sam'an (Journalist), Ghada Ali Kalash (Writer & Journalist), Mundhir
Sulayman (Phd, Political Analyst), Husayn Nasrallah (Journalist, Al-Kifah
Al-'Arabi Newspaper), Gabi Abou 'Atmeh (Journalist), Salwa Ba'lbaki
(Journalist), Fatin Qubaysi (Journalist), Rana Nawfal (Publisher), Maysa
'Awwad
(Journalist), Ali Salman (Journalist), Wafiq Qansoh (Journalist), Omar
Al-Ayyubi (Writer & Translator), Sharif Al-Rifa'i (Architect), Saqr Abu
Fakhr
(Journal of Palestine Studies), Jacques Al-Aswad (Art Critic &
Lexicographer),
Michel Riyachi (Cultural Activist), Zeinab Sharafeddine (Journalist), Dr.
Nicolas Abou Mourad (Doctorat en Théologie, Prof. à l'Université de
Balamand),
Ahmad Bazzoun (Journalist), Ghassan Nasser (Architect & Cultural Activist),
Nidaa Abou Mraad (Musician & Composer), Maher Jarrar (Professor
Chairperson, Civilization Sequence Program, AUB),
Hala Sayegh (Collections Librarian,
AUB), Zeina Zaatari (Social Researcher), Omar Zein (Assistant Secretay
General Arab Lawyers Union), Jamil Malak (Researcher & Lecturer), Rosemary
Sayigh (Anthropologist), Mayssoun Sukarieh (Cultural Activist), Stephen
Sheehi
(Asst. Prof, Civilization Sequence Program, AUB), Zeina Maasari (Asst. Prof
of
Graphic Design, AUB), Sami Souaydame (Literary Critic, Prof. Lebanese
University), Salah Dabbagh (Lawyer), Mahmoud Dandashly (Architect &
Activist),





In addition letters of support from workers in the public cultural sphere
outside Lebanon were received from Dr. Nasr Hamed Abu Zayd & Dr. Ibtihal
Younis
(Egypt), Nasser Rabbat (Agha Khan Professor of Architecture, MIT), Salwa
Bakr
(Egyptian Novelist), Ahdaf Soueif (Egyptian Novelist), Khodor
'Awarika (Novelist & Political Essayist), Virginia Tilley (Prof. of
Political
Science, Human Sciences Research Council Pretoria, South Africa), Mary
christina Wilson (Prof. of History, Univ. of Massachusettes, Amherst), Ziad
Mona (Writer & Publisher, Syria), Suad joseph (Anthropologist, UC-Davis),
Sondra Hale (Anthropologist, UCLA), Kamal Boullata (Visual Artist,
Palestine),
Suleiman Mansour (Visual Artist, Director of Al-Wasiti Cultural Center,
Palestine), Mona Baker (Prof. of Linguistics, University of Manchester),
Fatin
Farhat(Director, Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center), Vera Tamari (Visual
Artist,
Lecturer, Birzeit University), Islah Jad (Researcher, Palestine), Javier
Barreda (Professor of Arab and Islamic Studies, University of Alicante,
Spain),
Luz Garcia Gomez (Senior Lecturer, Universidad de Alicante, Spain),
Jorge Gimeno (Poet, Spain), Samia A. Hlaby (Palestinian Artist, New York),
Nadia Latif (Graduate Student, Pakistan),Ramzi Rihan (Birzeit University),
Bassam Abu Ghazale (Palestinian Writer, Jordan), Simon Samoeil, Curator of
the
Middle East Collection, Yale University Library),Muna Giacaman (Instructor,
Birzeit University), Carlos Varea (Professor of Anthropology, Madrid
Autonoma
University, Spain), In'am El-Obeid (Bir Zeit University, Sami Mahdi (Poet,
Iraq), Muzna Shihabi (Palestine), Salim Vally (School of Education, Wits.
University, South Africa),




Beirut, July 25, 2006

To add your name to this statement, please contact Samah Idriss at
<kidriss at cyberia.net.lb> It would be appreciated if you circulate the
statement
to your contacts. Thank you.


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