The first in two posts: today NewFest, tomorrow The Feigele Film Festival at the JCC.
The next 7 days in New York City is a great time to see films about what it means to be queer in Israel today — from the point of view of queer Jews across the religious and political spectrum, from secular Zionists to the orthodox, from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. And the distance between those two cities can seem like the distance between the 21st Century and the Iron Age.
First, there will be an encore screening of City of Borders at NewFest, the annual lgbt film festival, tomorrow night, Wednesday, June 10th at 6pm. It’s an amazing film that chronicles the story of Jerusalem’s only gay bar, through the eyes of its courageous owner (who also became a member of the city council) and its patrons — including a Palestinian man who would have to sneak into Israel to feel safe about being openly queer, and a young man from a settlement community who was one of the people stabbed by a crazed Haredi at the Pride parade in 2006. There is also a cross-national lesbian couple, Israeli and Palestinian, negotiating the rocky shoals of relationship with the added burden of war and oppression. This film asks all the right questions and shows Israeli society with all its beauty and ugliness, with its commitment to equality for all and the discrimination and danger faced by Muslim Israelis by Queer Israelis. This is a fully nuanced view of the multi-faceted reality free of the sloganeering of the knee-jerk crowds on all sides of the issues. And as such, is a film that is important for everyone to see.
It’s all the more interesting to see in the context of the news. The Jerusalem Post reports that international Israel advocacy organization Stand With Us has invited prominent gay opinion-shapers from around the world to Tel Aviv for the Pride celebrations, to show the progressive face of the country and a view that shifts the focus away from the conflict between peoples.
This is clearly a concerted PR effort that has the government behind it, even as the city government in Jerusalem prepares for violence by the Haredi against the upcoming Pride march in that city two weeks from now. Certainly in the face of protests by gay groups in Toronto and elsewhere against Israeli policies towards the Palestinians this is meant to mark the difference between the two societies in treatment of sexual minorities, and to say to these protesters, pardon my French, “what the fuck?”
Of course, you can’t make grey white by comparing it to black. And let’s be clear, while it is certainly true that I’d rather be queer in Israel than in Cairo or Damascus or Ramallah, I sure wouldn’t want to be Palestinian in Tel Aviv.
What’s more I feel used. Not like a politically active gay man wouldn’t feel used in the US today (are you listening Barack? I think not). But last year, when there was a pro-Israel demonstration outside the United Nations against Iran's president Ahmadinejad, I was asked by a Jewish organization called The Council of Presidents to help out by writing a print ad to help draw crowds to the demo by appealing to people concerned about human rights. My copy made it clear that many people were oppressed in today’s Iran, from religious minorities to women to gay men. At first they were happy. But of course, when push came to shove, queer folk got shoved. They didn’t really care about human rights — it was about Israel, pure and simple. And while I support Israel, I am not interested in being used by the Jews in this way.
Yes, my marriage (if I were married) would be recognized in Israel. And I would be killed in Egypt. Makes being an Israel supporter feel like being a Democrat in the US, huh?
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