were protesting against the government because they were disadvantaged and they were inconvenienced. They would protest for social reforms, but their country is still an occupying force. I don’t understand how within a month 300,000 people can come out and protest and completely occupy streets, with tents and bring out their families, but they can’t do that against the apartheid wall. So, the intention isn’t to say Israelis are the enemies, the intention is to say that we need more Israelis to stand on the other side of the wall and protest against the occupation. Maybe from my anger in my music it may come off that way, but at the end of the day I live in Haifa, my parents are from Haifa, Palestine. So when I go there I have to pledge allegiance, which I don’t, but I am expected to pledge allegiance to the Israeli government. My parents were born under the British Mandate of Palestine, my parents have Palestinian passports, so how can I ever call Haifa Israel? How can I ever call Haifa Israel? I’d be insulting my parents. I also know Israelis within ‘48 territories; there are a lot who are not standing with the apartheid government, but they’re also not standing against, because they want to stay neutral and keep their house and keep their garden there. There are so many different types of people just like all around the world. It’s not a very big place, it’s very overpopulated, and there are enough Arab Israelis - I don’t like to call them that, Palestinians living under the Israeli government; they dominate the Jewish population in the 1948 territories. Obviously, 64
DOSSIER
K A L I M AT
we’re asking more Israelis to come out and so you’ll see more Arabs out too. The Jews you’re talking about who are standing with us, I know them; there are a lot of Jews that want peace, that’s a natural thing for a human to feel, but over there at the end of the day, there just aren’t enough people standing on the right side of the wall. My music can give that impression because I can get emotional, but I’m part of the Palestinian diaspora; it’s even more frustrating for me to see Israelis in London doing counter-protests on the days when we are trying to commemorate nine murdered Turkish activists who were slaughtered on the flotilla in May 2009. That makes me sick, and I think no, they need to understand, even if it’s in a harsh manner, that we’re coming with facts and statistics, especially artists like Marcel Cartier and Lowkey, and that should be enough to enlighten more Israelis. AM: First of all thank you, this has been really amazing. I’d like to welcome you to the land that the settlers call “Canada”. I’m from Moose Creek First Nation. I’m an indigenous Canadian. This is not my land specifically this area, but I guess what I wanted to ask was - well, first a comment: I started learning about Palestine about three or four years ago, I didn’t really understand what the big deal was. I started reading more and more and I have a lot of friends teaching me on this learning path. Something I came to tell myself was, “oh my god, they gave them fake borders, they gave them Palestinians cards and said that this is the only way you can be Palestinians, they gave us the same kind of fake borders, they gave us cards and said this is the only way that
you can be an Indian”. So, it just makes sense to me; how can you not support Palestinian people as an indigenous person in Canada? How can you not support Palestinian people as someone living in a colonised land? So I guess my actual question is how do you think we can strengthen the bridge from Turtle Island (the original name of North and South America by its indigenous inhabitants before colonisation) to Palestine? SM: When I go to a country I always like to pay my respect to the natives. So, when I went to Montreal in June I went to Kahnawake, I went to visit Mohawk nation, and I met the real Montrealers there. I just want to share my experience with you because it was amazing. The first house belonged to - I don’t know if you guys have heard of Clifton Nicolas, he’s a comrade. I went with a group of people and when I walked into his living room he had a huge Palestinian flag hanging down from his front room ceiling, and he gave me their tribal flag as well. When I arrived in Toronto today, I asked where there is a reservation, but we couldn’t arrange it quick enough because we’re only here for a few hours. So, I think if you ever come to “Israel”, if you come to Palestine as an Indian, I’d advise you to visit the West Bank, ’48 (territories), and Jerusalem, all of Palestine. And that’s really how I see us bridging the gap: it’s getting handson with the situation. It’s not enough to go to protests, put up a banner and shout “Free Free Palestine”. I think we talk about revolution, but really being a revolutionary is something you do, just like hip hop, and we have to exercise it. That’s my advice really - it’s to actually
go and visit and leave a mark, you know, mark your territory, not in a colonising way. The third time I saw Shadia had the most impact: I shyly asked her if she would mind doing a short interview with Kalimat before she had to perform as part of the closing night ceremonies. We huddled into the staircase of the Pilot bar with music sneaking in through the gap under the closed door. There, I turned on my recorder, despite her initial apprehension on being recorded, she seemed to have quickly warmed up to me after I explained what we at Kalimat were all about, and mentioned that I too was originally from Haifa. RR: How was it breaking into the Arabic hip hop scene as a woman and into the international scene as an Arab? Which was harder or what were some of the challenges you faced? SM: I guess breaking into the Arabic hip hop scene as a woman wasn’t really as big of a challenge for me because I had a lot of support from the male MCs - just because it was predominantly male Arabic hip hop artists. I was motivated by them, and that really was my boost into Arabic hip hop. It wasn’t until I started going to Arab countries and performing, confronting more conservative communities, that the challenges began for me. Being a female hip hop artist and trying to be accepted in our own communities I’d say is harder than trying to be accepted in the international community. It’s not so much just being a female, it’s about the type of subjects that you’re presenting as well; politics seems quite a masculine subject to most conservative communities, and breaking that barrier, yes, I’d say it’s
slightly harder than breaking into Western hip hop. RR: How and when did you know that music was your form of expression about Palestinian oppression? SM: It didn’t start with music - I come from a revolutionary family, a humanitarian background - it started at protests, it started in personal family discussions, it started definitely at protests in London and I started singing at these protests, you know, I was a one-woman band. That kind of escalated into spoken word hip hop, and when I was a teenager 9/11 happened and then everyone knew where Palestine was on the map, everyone knew what an Arab was, everyone was familiar with the word. So, I felt like our image was being distorted and I kind of injected my own pride into my music. That’s really the message behind my music: defending our culture, defending our identity. Especially me, someone like me who was brought up in the West, who can easily lose their culture and their identity because we’re forcefully integrated into a Western society. For me, I’m Arab, my name is Arab, I feel Arab, I think Arab, so I choose to express myself in Arabic. On that note, I had the privilege of then witnessing Shadia in her element as she sang and rapped in Arabic, shaking me to my core. In her voice, I heard my own, and felt finally like someone understood me.