Street poems go from bad to verse

Occupied Jerusalem: The people of occupied Jerusalem were surprised to see unusual posters that spoke of Arab-Jewish coexistance on electric poles on the streets.

At first, they thought they were commercial advertisements for one of the big companies, at least that is what 20-year-old Samer Mahmoud, who works in one of the business stores in Salah Al Deen Street, the main street in Eastern Jerusalem, thought.

"What provoked me was that these posters were displayed under the title 'Poetry on Streets'. I didn't understand what that meant; therefore, I began reading and I discovered that I was reading poetry. The strangest thing of all is that it turned out to be Israeli poetry, and to be honest I was angry."

The minute the police on the streets disappeared, some angry guys ripped all those posters.

There were more than 20 posters that had poetry written on them many weeks ago; they were hung on the electric poles, and on the sidewalks of the central streets of occupied Jerusalem, in particular, Salah Al Deen Street and Bab Al Amoud.

Ignored

The poetry is written in Arabic by Israeli poets as well as Arab poets of 1948 areas such as Samih Qasim, Mohammad Ali Taha and Michelle Haddad. The poster initiative, which was deliberately ignored by Israelis and mostly unknown to the Palestinians, was carried out by the Jerusalem Institution funded by international Jewish bodies.

"It was done for the first time in Jerusalem but globally implemented by the Jews in New York," said Nadim Shaban, chairman of the Programme Department in the institution.

"The poems were distributed in five congested areas in the middle of the city; there were 20 Arabic and Hebrew poems translated into Arabic. The poets were chosen by an expert committee," he said.

"The minute the operation entered the stage of implementation, coordination took place with Jerusalem Municipality to provide locations and aiding tools", said Shaban.

Palestinian poet Samih Al Qasim, was surprised to see his poetry published in occupied Jerusalem. "I did not like the idea of my poetry to be published in an occupied city where a soldier holding a rifle stands beside it". This contradiction exists only in occupied Jerusalem.

"Is it possible that the municipality would publish poetry on the streets of occupied Jerusalem when at the same time it exhausts the people of occupied Jerusalem with its arbitrary policies such as taxes, destruction of houses, land confiscation, withdrawal of identity and capitalisation of incorporation files?", said Jamal Gosheh, Chairman of the Palestinian National Theatre.

It is worth mentioning that the idea of "Poetry on Streets" is another idea of the Jewish-Palestinian coexistent group.

In Haifa, the municipality carried out a festival in the Arab "Wadi Al Nisnas" so as to put Jews, Muslims, and Christians on one stage and name it "Jewish-Arab coexistance". Almost a similar event was staged in Akko but was called "the other theatre festival".

All this confusion goes back to the Israeli institutions. Critic and writer Salim Abu Jabal from the Arabs of 1948 areas commented on in a press statement: "What could incomprehensible verses do to the Arabs of occupied Jerusalem? They are only cuttings with poetry written by Israeli poets and translated by Arab poets; poems that talk about everything except occupation, deliberate expulsion and disgraceful racism".

The occupied Jerusalem inhabitants continue to walk every single day under those posters. Sooner or later, the destiny of the poetry posters will be confined to the municipality's garbage bins until another initiative that dreams of Jewish-Arab coexistence emerges in the Holy City.