Mizrahi Jews reach out to the Arab world, By Sherri Muzher

When Gamal Abdel Nasser led the Egyptian Revolution of 1952, it may surprise people that it was the Egyptian singer, Leila Murad, a Mizrahi Jew, who was chosen as the Revolution’s official singer. Murad was chosen over the much-loved Egyptian singer and darling of the Arab world, Umm Kalthoum. The fact is that Mizrahi Jews — Arab Jews — have played important roles throughout Arab history. Recently, I interviewed the Mizrahi Jewish journalist and activist Mati Shemoelof. He and other Mizrahi Jews issued a special letter to the Arab/Muslim world this past summer — not only talking about their shared history but also about President Obama’s positive message in Cairo. Sherri Muzher (SM): Before talking about the letter, “A New Spirit: A Letter from Jewish Descendents of the Countries of Islam,” can you describe what being a Mizrahi Jew has meant to you and how has it shaped your outlook throughout your life? Mati Shemoelof (MS): Being a Mizrahi Jew is a personal family matter and a political issue. It is part of my many identities. To be a Mizrahi Jew is part of my social struggle to change the values in the covenant between the state and society. Because Mizrahis are still oppressed, it is my task to fight against discrimination and look for a multi-cultural consciousness. I look for new and more tolerant ways to deal with the different Middle Eastern identities. SM: What is the difference between Mizrahi Jews and Sephardic Jews? MS: Sephardic Jews originated in the Iberian Peninsula and North Africa. They are mainly the descendants of Jews expelled from Spain in 1492. Sephardic Jews are Mizrahi Jews. The term “Mizrahi” means “East” in Hebrew and is part of a powerful mechanism of classification. Mizrahi Jews are historically Jews of Middle-Eastern descent whose families, in most cases, immigrated to Israel from Arab countries. They form about half of the Israeli Jewish population. The painful reality in Israel is the division within society between Ashkenazi Jews (of European descent) and Mizrahis. This often goes unnoticed by outside observers, who naturally focus on the more violent aspects of Israeli politics and the sharp division between Jew and non-Jew made by the Israeli state. In fact, in mainstream Israeli discourse, there has long been a systematic avoidance/denial of this, maintaining — as is perhaps “demanded” by Zionist ideology and its ongoing nation-building — that Jews are a distinct people and that Israeli Jews have a unified ethnicity and a shared history. Indeed, the mere notion of an Arab Jew, as some Mizrahis identify themselves, is close to unthinkable in the Israeli consciousness. But the divide is not painful simply because it is denied. There is a history of political, economic and cultural oppression of Mizrahis and, as relatively recent scholarship establishes clearly, much of this oppression is present to this day. SM: What problems are unique to Mizrahi Jews? MS: Mizrahi Jews strive to bring about a meaningful change in Israeli society and implement the values of democracy, human rights, social justice, and equality and transform Israel into a multi-cultural society. As a poet, I want the literature of Arab Jews to be part of the curriculum and the Israeli canon. Still, there is much to do in implementing those ideas inside mainstream cultural realms. SM: You are a member of Mimizrach Shemesh, an organization devoted to the Jewish tradition of social responsibility. How difficult is this in a climate of mistrust and anger? MS: Your question shows that you are familiar with the difficulties that any social activist faces in everyday activism. “Mimizrach Shemesh” is trying to bring the theological and religious experiences of Mizrahi Jews into the act of social change. For instance it re-constructs the world of the liturgical music of the Piyut (http://www.piyut.org.il) from the distant past to today’s scene. It isn’t the only place for Mizrahis to re-connect to their heritage — it is a place for every Jew and non-Jew to sit together and learn melodies. After you learn, sing and rejoice together, you can use this social and cultural power for political change. SM: The title of the letter is, “A New Spirit.” Explain the significance of the title. MS: Well, Ezéchiel Rahamim, a close friend, a talented author, scholar and the initiator of the letter thought that we should look for a “New Spirit” in terms of universalizing our identity and re-create it in a different way in the Middle East. For example, for years the West has been trying to mediate between Israel and the Arab states. But European thought is what brought nationalism and Eurocentric as well as Orientalist ideas into the Middle East. Those European constructions couldn’t imagine Arab-Jew identities in which separation isn’t needed. For thousands of years, Jews and Arabs lived, created, and breathed from Arab culture without needing to build a separation wall between Jews and Arabs. We thought that a “New Spirit” was needed as a parallel to Obama’s “A New Beginning” in Cairo. President Obama is the first African-American president; we’d like to see an Israeli prime minister with an Arab heritage, who would take on social responsibility and talk about his/her identity with pride. SM: Would it be fair to say that given the shared history with Arabs, Mizrahi Jews are more likely effective conduits in the pursuit of peace between Arabs and Israelis? MS: This argument can lead to essentialism so I will be careful. We use the Mizrahi term which the country has used to label us to empower ourselves. The Arab Jew’s narrative holds creative ways to handle the problems in the Middle-East. It is sharing knowledge of the Arabic language, culture and diverse viewpoints. The Arab Jew’s narrative holds this in its memory, history and religion. But it is also a shared struggle for social justice and a re-construction of the region with its original inhabitants. So we stand in that tension between awareness and symbolic belonging and identification. And by moving on this scale of possibilities, we can contribute to de-colonizing Israeli culture. SM: Who is your main target audience with this manifesto and why? MS: The main target of this manifesto is first a call to the Arab World to show that the Israeli government and policy makers don’t speak our language. It is really a multi-cultural universal call for social justice without colonization and oppression. ­­— Sherri Muzher is a Palestinian-American activist, lawyer, and freelance journalist.