By Stephen Gong, Executive Director
July 26, 2012
On June 27 and 28, 2012 CAAM will be co-presenting four films as part of the
Israel China Cultural Festival in San Francisco. Some members of the
community have contacted us expressing deep concern regarding this
involvement because the Israel China Cultural Festival is sponsored by the
Israeli Consulate. In addition, we recently met with a number of individuals
from the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel who
have asked us to explain our involvement in the festival and have further
asked that we withdraw from this project. Our dialogue was constructive and
helped to clarify for us the reasons why we undertook this project and how
it reflects our mission as an arts and cultural non-profit organization.
CAAM presents many programs with other cultural groups and with the support
of governmental consulates. These are developed and evolve in a variety of
ways. In this case, our colleagues from the San Francisco Jewish Film
Festival asked that we join with them in developing a film program for the
upcoming Israel China Cultural Festival. We met and came up with a list of
films that highlight some of the unique cultural and historic connections
between the Jewish and Chinese communities, such as the remarkable saga of
the Jewish ghetto of Shanghai during WWII (Port of Last Resort) as well as a
CAAM-funded documentary that focuses on a Chinese adoptee and her
Jewish-American adoptive family (Wo Ai Ni Mommy). These films reflect the
missions of both of our organizations: to present little-told stories about
our respective communities, and in this case, the deeper connections and
histories we share. We also share a belief in the power of the film medium
to bridge cultural divides and differences, and welcomed the opportunity to
work together in this way. This is consistent with the many other
collaborations we undertake as a public media and arts organization in a
community as diverse and vibrant as the Bay Area.
We at CAAM do not see the co-presentation of these films as endorsing
policies of the State of Israel, nor was this ever made a condition of our
participation.
We understand the deeply-held conviction of those individuals and
organizations who have undertaken the boycott, and we share an aspiration
for a permanent and peaceful resolution of conflict in the Middle East, and
one that recognizes the right of self-determination for the Palestinian
people. We have supported and presented films like City of Borders, about a
gay bar in Jerusalem that provided a haven for marginalized Palestinians and
Israelis alike. We will continue to support and present such programs in
the future.
One of CAAM’s key organizational goals is to present relevant and engaging
programs that reflect the central and crucial issues of our times. In
pursuing this goal we will at times stimulate challenging conversations. We
will not shy away from these challenges but we also pledge to undertake
these programs with a deep sense of responsibility. We respect the efforts
of those who have decided to mount a boycott as the best and most effective
way to bring about positive political change, but we have a different
approach to our work. CAAM’s very founding was an assertion of the
importance of adding more voices, more images, more histories, and more
stories to the public space, and hopefully, to bring about social change
through cultural change.
Stephen Gong
Executive Director
CAAM
145 Ninth Street, Suite 350
San Francisco, CA 94103-2641
Dear Stephen,
I write to you separately as an individual — a curator, scholar, and member of the API
community.
I thank you for taking the time to meet with us last Wednesday. Three weeks ago, I was
disturbed to learn about CAAM’s collaboration with the Israeli Consulate. I attended the
meeting last week not because I am part of USACBI, but as a supporter of CAAM and a
scholar of Asian American film and culture. I wanted to hear in person what happened,
the context of the partnership, and to hear how CAAM both thinks about, but also
responds to very serious issues that impact not only the API and San Francisco
community, but also the global community at large.
During the meeting, I thought the conversation was productive insofar as it seemed to be
the beginning of a long-term, multi-faceted conversation. Unfortunately, your response
to the request to withdraw sponsorship from the Israel China Cultural Festival and your
public statement to the CAAM community has shut down any kind of serious dialogue on
the issues discussed last week. Furthermore, your decision to not respond to requests by
AROC and other Arab American community members to meet in a timely manner to
continue this conversation is not only regrettable, but exposes the hollowness of your
good will gesture to work with and create alliances with other communities.
The logic underpinning your decision not to withdraw your support from the festival is
alarming and hypocritical especially in light of the history and mission of CAAM. It is
with much dismay that I see CAAM, a reputable and important organization, play into the
stereotype of Asian Americans as middlemen and apologists. Rather than see Asian
American film as a powerful means of resistance and community-building, you are now
complicit in using film and culture as a manipulative tool to rebrand a rogue nation-state
whose international public image has been degraded due to its decades of oppression and
occupation against the Palestinians.
You say CAAM is not an activist or political organization but rather a cultural
organization whose mission is to “present media that reflects a range of perspectives and
experiences.” But allying yourself with the Israeli Consulate is a political action that
endorses exclusion and implicitly supports Israel’s racialization of the Palestinians. Your
belief that CAAM can exert influence and create social change by “adding more voices,
more histories, and more stories to the public space” is flawed and functions as a selfserving
excuse. Asian American film constantly reminds us through its narratives,
framing and point of view how the public space is not a given, but always involves
selection and exclusion. Your conception of CAAM as a neutral vehicle or blank screen
is also problematic. CAAM’s selections of films, affiliations and sponsorships frame the
way we see your films, festivals, and organization. As a cultural institution dedicated to
presenting “relevant and engaging programs that reflect the central and crucial issues of
our time,” CAAM has the responsibility to make transparent and question thoughtfully
and rigorously the conditions underpinning your programs.
In summary, I can see now that you missed the point at our meeting last Wednesday. I
personally had hoped that you would see the boycott not as a strategic politicized means
to end occupation, but as a principle and response-ability, to listen and respond to the call
from the Palestinian community who are asking us, in this case, the API cultural
community, to mobilize in order to for them to realize and live their basic rights. Instead,
your non-response to this call helps to normalize the subjugation of Palestinians. Instead
of working towards the protracted road to racial, social, and cultural justice and having a
unique opportunity to be visionary by taking the lead in showing how the San Francisco
API community should respond to decades of repressive tactics against people who have
been dispossessed and colonized, CAAM is now institutionally complicit with an entity
that has committed numerous and ongoing human rights violations against the
Palestinians.
Finally, for me the meeting was constructive in exposing CAAM’s blind spots and how
its leadership sees its organization as presenting “accurate, diverse, and expansive”
representations. I thought CAAM’s mission and vision were about so much more.
Sincerely yours,
Susette S. Min
There is good reason for artistic boycott of Israel and perhaps there should have been more research and discussion with those that understand it more completely. Hoping for an end to a brutal occupation by the State of Israel is not enough. There is no peace on the horizon due to Israel not seeing any need to end their illegal occupation and brutality against people. I just recently saw a film called the War Around Us — on the barbaric assault on Gaza by Israel. Perhaps your committee might have seen this film — the “images” are unforgettable.
Israel is trying very hard to “rebrand” itself in light of the global scrutiny of its policies and the incessant breaking of international law and human rights abuses. Your collaboration legitimizes a recognition of a country that at this point in history is practicing in full view of the world, blatant racism, land theft, killing of innocents, and human rights abuses as a means to make life IMPOSSIBLE for Palestinians so that they might leave their own lands. The artistic boycott is part of a much larger boycott where citizens around the world can affect change, as has happened with South Africa historically. It is an important boycott especially as a means for those in the arts to effect change. Your organization will be adding to the ‘hasbara’ that has given Israel so much freedom to act with impunity in the most barbaric ways possible.
CAAM is not adding a voice — but supporting a voice that has dominated media for decades –Israel’s propaganda machine -, the histories are skewed and the stories bent. Social change comes from truth —and it is highly unlikely that this “sharing” will bear much fruit other than again, legitimizing Israel’s propaganda machine.
Would you be willing to work on a project co-sponsored by North Korea, Bahrain or Congo if endorsement of the policies of any of those governments is not a condition? If not, what is the meaning of your principles and why do not the same principles apply to Israel?
I assume from this that, during the cultural boycott against Apartheid in South Africa, you would welcome sponsoring a “Joint South Africa China Cultural Festival with the South African Consulate.
This was the letter presented to CAAM by a coalition of individuals–scholars and activists–not all of whom belong to USACBI, but all of whom support its principles:
The US Campaign
for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI), and the undersigned
groups and individuals [removed from public posting], are deeply dismayed and disappointed that CAAM is
sponsoring the Israel China film festival on June 26-28 at the San Francisco
Public Library, as part of the Israel-China Festival this year.
CAAM’s official partnership
in this program with the Israeli consulate, and thus with the Israeli
government, is extremely troubling. It implies CAAM’s endorsement of the Israeli
state’s illegal military occupation, annexation of land, home demolitions, and collective
punishment and displacement of Palestinians, all of which have been condemned
globally and in hundreds of UN resolutions. Israel has inflicted military
assaults on Palestinians using brutal and disproportionate violence and illegal
chemical weapons, such as during the massacre in Gaza in 2008-09 that killed 1400
Palestinians. Israel has constructed a Wall that not only restricts Palestinian
life and livelihood and divides families but has also annexed Palestinian lands;
the Wall has been deemed illegal by the International Court of Justice. Israel
has enacted systemic and often legally sanctioned discrimination against its Palestinian
citizens because they are non-Jews,
leading Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and many other international
human rights activists to liken Israeli policies to those of apartheid; for
some, they are even worse than those of apartheid South Africa. Israel continues to deny hundreds
of thousands of Palestinian refugees their right of return as enshrined in
international law. Israel’s violations of human rights are simply too many to recount in a brief summary. However,
they are by now well documented and increasingly challenged by the growing boycott,
divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement around the world and in the U.S., one that
is supported by leading artists and intellectuals of diverse backgrounds.
If you are not aware of the BDS movement,
it is not too late for CAAM to join this global struggle for human rights.
Palestinian civil society has called on the international community to engage
in an academic and cultural boycott of Israel:
“Given that hundreds of UN
resolutions have condemned Israel’s colonial and discriminatory policies as
illegal and called for immediate, adequate and effective remedies, and Given
that all forms of international intervention and peace-making have until now
failed to convince or force Israel to comply with humanitarian law, to respect
fundamental human rights and to end its occupation and oppression of the people
of Palestine, and In view of the fact that people of conscience in the
international community have historically shouldered the moral responsibility
to fight injustice, as exemplified in the struggle to abolish apartheid in
South Africa through diverse forms of boycott, divestment and sanctions” [RA1] (www.pacbi.org).
The US Academic
and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI) was founded in response to this call from
Palestinian civil society and was inspired by the spirit of international
solidarity, moral consistency, and resistance to injustice and oppression. While
those who attempt to silence critics of Israel often hurl gratuitous accusation of anti-Semitism
at any one who dares to challenge the Israeli state, the boycott is an effective,
antiracist campaign and will continue until Israel ceases its violations of
human rights. USACBI opposes cultural programs that are sponsored by the Israeli
state and are increasingly used to whitewash Israel’s violations of
international human rights and war crimes and to legitimize its illegal
occupation and apartheid practices. [RA2]
In its attempt
to undermine the rapidly expanding BDS movement, Israel has resorted to the “Brand
Israel” campaign and has spent millions of dollars to improve its public image
through cultural programming and outreach to diverse communities. The CAAM
festival seems to be another example of this discredited propaganda campaign. [RA3] None of the featured
films address the Israeli occupation nor racially discriminatory and
segregation policies that target Palestinians, nor indeed Palestinian
experiences in any form. There are by now many films that powerfully document
the situation on the ground in Israel, made by Palestinian and Israeli
filmmakers. None of these films are being shown at this festival. In fact, the
festival seems to be an attempt to evade an honest and open discussion of the
reality of Israel and to forge an alliance with the Chinese and Asian American
community on the backs of silenced Palestinians.
In addition, we
are troubled by the self-professed attempt of the Israel China Festival to co-opt
Chinese and Asian American communities into celebrating the “continued
vitality” of two “global leaders” and the “remarkable
economic nexus which has formed between Israel, China and Silicon Valley,”
erasing any discussion of human rights abuses, labor exploitation, and
occupation. While we do not oppose the exploration of cultural traditions or
common histories, we strongly object to an alliance between Israel and China that
is built on the censorship of histories of settler colonialism or of
occupation.
We strongly believe
that Asian American community organizations and individuals should stand in
solidarity with those challenging occupation, apartheid, warfare, and
colonialism, and not engage in the normalizing of oppression. In addition, we are deeply concerned about the
partnership of Chinese American and Asian American cultural organizations with
an anti-Palestinian program, rather than with antiracist and anticolonial projects
that stand for social justice and human rights for ALL.
We ask CAAM:
will you take a principled stand against occupation, colonization, and
apartheid?
Signed,
Organizations
US Campaign for
the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI)
Al Awda: The Palestine
Right to Return Coalition
The Arab Film Festival
National Coalition of
Arab Americans
Arab Resource
and Organizing Center (AROC), San Francisco
Arab and Muslim Ethnicities
and Diasporas Initiative, College of Ethnic Studies, San Francisco State
University
Bay Area Labor
Committee for Peace & Justice
Davis Committee for
Palestinian Rights
Friends of
Palestine-Wisconsin
Wisconsin Middle
East Lobby Group
Berkeley Women in
Black
San Francisco Women
In Black
Students Allied for
Freedom & Equality (SAFE), University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
US Palestinian
Community Network (USPCN)
Queers Undermining
Israeli Terrorism (QUIT!)
14 Friends of
Palestine, Marin
Free Palestine
Movement
International
Solidarity Movement – Northern California
Global March to
Jerusalem – North America
South Bay
Mobilization for Peace and Justice
American Muslims
for Palestine
Middle East Study Group,
Contra Costa
Hilton Head for
Peace, Hilton Head, SC
St. Louis Palestine
Solidarity Committee
National Lawyers
Guild-Free Palestine Subcommittee
Peace in the Precincts
– Sacramento
United Methodists’
Holy Land Task Force
Bay Area Women in
Black
InterDenominational
Advocates for Peace, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Interfaith
Community for Palestinian Rights, Austin, Texas
Sacramento BDS
[RA1]You
may want to indent this quote.
[RA2]Not
sure if this is necessary
[RA3]Sounds
cheesy; maybe another more appropriate term.
Many from the API community called for CAAM to respect the cultural boycott of Israel and remove themselves from their partnership in the Israel China Film Festival. A number of letters objecting to the participation were presented to CAAM, including the one below signed by activists, cultural workers and academics from the API community:
Dear Mr. Stephen Gong,
On behalf of the Asian American organizations and individuals listed below [removed from public posting], we are writing to express our deep concern regarding the Center for Asian American Media’s (CAAM) participation as a co-sponsor of the Israel China Film Festival, as part of the
Israel China Cultural Festival, in San Francisco.
We ask CAAM to respect the call for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel
(www.usacbi.org), a growing movement of international civil society modeled after the
struggle to abolish apartheid in South Africa through boycott, divestment, and sanctions
(BDS), in the face of Israel’s countless violations of human rights. As Asian Americans,
we have a long history of struggles against racism and injustice—from mobilization
against the anti-Chinese exclusion act and Japanese American internment camps to
exploitation of Filipino American laborers and hate crimes and violence against South
Asian and other Asian Americans—not to mention histories of struggles against
colonialism and wars in our homelands. Thus we are in solidarity with the Palestinian
people who have faced many injustices caused by Israel, including the colonization and
theft of Palestinian land, displacement and dispossession, military occupation,
massacres of civilians, home demolitions, racial segregation, restrictions on freedom of
movement, and countless war crimes that have been condemned by the United
Nations.
It is therefore very disturbing for us to learn that CAAM is partnering with the Israeli
consulate to sponsor an Israel film festival as part of the Israel China Cultural Festival.
This festival uses cultural exchange as a means of whitewashing the reality of
occupation and apartheid—a reality in which Palestinians have lived under an illegal
military occupation and siege for 45 years, the “Apartheid Wall” restricts the daily lives
of Palestinians, thousands of Palestinians are detained as political prisoners,
Palestinians in Israel face systemic discrimination in multiple realms simply because
they are not Jewish, Palestinian families have been refused the right to return to their
homes for generations and many continue to live in refugee camps in Palestine and
elsewhere. Yet not one of the films featured in this festival seems to address these
realities, which we find shocking.
As a community media organization, it is important for CAAM to recognize the political
significance of this “cultural” partnership with the Israeli consulate, which is essentially a
partnership with a government body. By participating in this festival, Asian Americans
are being used as cultural ambassadors to sanitize the public image of Israel, while
hiding its human rights violations. By excluding the voices of those who have been
affected by Israeli occupation, war crimes, and apartheid, this cultural festival is an
insult to Palestinian and Arab American communities and a disgrace to Asian American
communities and people of conscience who strive to stand in solidarity with oppressed
communities, locally and globally.
We are also troubled by this partnership because as a community that is generally
stereotyped as the “model minority,” Asian Americans are often pitted against other
marginalized communities and used to erase the historical exclusion and oppression of
other minority groups. It is critical for our community to show solidarity with other
communities of color, including the Palestinian and Arab American community, as
Japanese Americans and other groups have done since 2001 in forming coalitions
against the racial profiling of Arab and Muslim Americans. CAAM’s partnership will be a
huge blow to these coalitions and a violation of these principles of solidarity against
racial injustice and colonial oppression. Participating in the festival allows Asian
American communities to be used in the normalization of Israel’s human rights abuses.
Many important CAAM productions and SF International Asian American Film Festival
films have documented how Asian Americans have taken an active stance in the civil
rights movement, labor movement, immigrant rights struggles, and protests against
warfare and imperialism. CAAM has consistently tried to be an outlet for the stories of
Asian American and underrepresented communities and we hope that it would try to do
the same for West Asian/ Arab American communities as well, or at the least, not erase
their experiences. It is our hope that CAAM will maintain its commitment to supporting
Asian American voices against injustice and stand in solidarity with Palestinian and
Arab American communities by not participating in the Israel China Cultural Festival.
We call on CAAM to join the global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS)
movement in opposition to Israeli human rights violations and to join the hundreds of
groups across the US and around the world that stand on the side of human rights for
all. BDS is an expression of principled opposition to the notion that certain groups can
be excluded from human rights and the right to freedom and self-determination, due to
their race or religion. The cultural boycott campaign is an institutional, not individual,
boycott and so it does not oppose screenings of Israeli films that are not part of a
whitewashing campaign nor censor collaboration with Israeli artists. The cultural boycott
does not preclude cultural exchange or freedom of expression; on the contrary, it
champions honest and fully open dialogue in which the stories of those who suffer from
racism and colonialism are not silenced.
Signed,
Organizations:
Anakbayan – East Bay
ASATA (Alliance of South Asians Taking Action)
Asian Americans for Peace and Justice (AAPJ)
Asian Prisoner Support Committee
BAYAN – USA
BAYAN USA-Northern California
Hella Organized Bay Area Koreans (HOBAK)
League of Filipino Students – BAYAN USA
Malcolm X Grassroots Movement
South Asians for Justice – Los Angeles
Xicana Moratorium Coalition
[Individuals removed from public posting.]