Special features of this campaign

Of all the military adventures started by Israel, the current one seems to recieve the nicest treatment from the British media. One is taxed to find an intelligent or searching question from any of the anchors towards Israeli spokesperson; one is taxed even harder to hear a Palestinian speaking, not to mention a Palestinian from Gaza. Why is this wholesale surrender of journalistic practice, and squandering of standards of fair reporting taking place, and what can we do about it?

The Israeli propaganda machine

One of the explanations for this is the launch of an Israeli press and media onslaught, planned for a long time together with the military campaign, and run insynchronism with it. Israel have flooded the air with simple slogans, all of them false, but catchy enough to have the great minds of the British media fall for them. The British media have not given Israelis a hard time: as opposed to other countries’ media:

Quoted from the article below:
Israeli diplomats and spokespeople working with the British media have said that so far “most of the hostility has been in the print media, especially in The Guardian and The Independent. The electronic media, including also the BBC, have made more of an effort to seem even-handed. “The coverage is definitely less hostile to Israel than what we saw during the Second Lebanon War two-and-a-half years ago.”
“Israeli diplomats and spokespeople working with the British media have said that so far “most of the hostility has been in the print media, especially in The Guardian and The Independent. The electronic media, including also the BBC, have made more of an effort to seem even-handed.”

It also seems that the long planning of both the military atrocities as well as the media control has paid dividends:

“The months of preparation and the increased intensity of the media efforts have also shown results in Britain. Senior diplomats in the London Embassy, headed by Ambassador Ron Prosor gave an unprecedented 25 interviews to national television and radio channels, in the first three days of the operation.”

Israel claims success in the PR war; Anshel Pfeffer

December 31, 2008
“Whenever Israel is bombing, it is hard to explain our position to the world,” said Avi Pazner, Israel’s former ambassador to Italy and France, and one of the officials drafted in to present Israel’s case to the world media. “But at least this time everything was ready and in place.” One of the decisions taken following Israel’s failure to explain its case during the Lebanon War was the formation of a National Information Directorate within the Prime Minister’s Office, tasked with coordinating the efforts of the press bureaus in the various government departments.
The Directorate, which has been up and running for eight months, began planning six months ago for a Gaza operation. A forum with representatives of the press offices of the Foreign and Defence ministries, the IDF Spokesman Unit and other agencies held numerous meetings to decide on the message. The forum held two system-wide exercises in the past two months, one aimed at foreign media and, last week, one dedicated to the Israeli press.”

Antisemitism is always useful

But sometimes, with the best preparation in the world, one still meets some hard-headed, unreasonable individuals who would not accept Israel’s claims that in bombing people to smithereens it intends to help them, and to bring peace and calm through explosions and death. For such ocassions exactly, Israel and its allies have a trump card. Any criticism which is too sharp of their actions and brutalities, can always be countered by claiming it is antisemitic. “you are attacking us because we are Jewish. In the case of any other country, you would not attack them in this way.” Most liberal media workers, especially if they are not Jewish themselves, fear this accusation like the plague; after all, how exactly do you prove you are not antisemitic? In Israel, the popular assumption is that ALL Goys are antisemtic, whether they know it or not, whether they admit it or not. The Engage group, operating against the proposals for a boycott of Israeli instiutions, has used this argument for years. It becomes an “antisemites under the beds” hunt, in which the media cannot win. The powerful Jewish establishment, in the UK, France or the USA alike, are able to raise hell on the basis of such false accusations, and to claim that the only reason why Israel “is singled out” for special criticism, as they see it, is because it is a Jewish state. The BBC is especially prone to such attacks, and as a result has adjusted its coverage over the last decade, so as to make criticism from this corner unnecessary. The Zionist lobby is also fond of attacking papers they consider (for whatever strange reason…) leftist or liberal, such as The Guardian or The Independent, which take a more autonomous line on Israel than the papers which are part of the media conglomerates. The BBC has now acknowledged that there is indeed a propaganda war being fought, following reports from Jerusalem:

Propaganda war: trusting what we see?

By Paul Reynolds
World affairs correspondent, BBC News website
Israel has tried to take the initiative in the propaganda war over Gaza but, in one important instance, its version has been seriously challenged.

The Blond Offensive

“One of our lessons from the Lebanon War was that there were too many uniforms in the coverage,” says Yarden Vatikay, director of the National Information Directorate, “and that doesn’t come over very positively.” The next clip demonstrates this clearly, but the IDF has made it impossible to embed it (sic) withinga webpage, so please use the link to view it:

BARAK CLIP

Anyone who has listened to Ehud Olmert, or the other Ehud – Barak, will not immediately find them either effective, likeable or trustworthy. Hardly any Israeli trusts them, anyway. This can be seen very clearly in the Barak clip I included, where he speaks to InfoLiveTV, an interent news channel working for some two years, placing Israeli propaganda on the net, mainly on YouTube. This was well understood by the planners of this military campaign, and from the start, a new policy of propagating the Israeli agenda, views and terminology has been developed over the last few months, as the military plans were being perfected, and the trigger for the operation prepared. One of the first rules seems to have been to award the task of fronting the Israeli position to a series of peroxide Brunhildas from a galaxy galaxy, speaking in faux sincerity about children in Israel having to face rockets every day. I really hope that none of my readers is denuded enough to criticise this as sexist, which it isn’t. It is a description of a process which affects our attitude to what we hear, and this is exactly the intended effect. The use of women is a sharp move indeed – they cannot be easily connected to those who drop the bombs, and have been well-trained in speaking evenly and without raising their voice, and appealing to our better side. That they never discuss their victims, that they never mention the starvation of 1.5 million people in Gaza, is marginal and unimportant; they only need to repeat the formulations which have been crafted for them, to look unthreatening, and to spend time on camera – enough time, in effect, to allow the killing to go on unhindered. The anchors are unlikely to pair them with a Palestinian woman in Gaza, after all… Speaking a calm voice, they can get away with inanities such as in the next clip, where Livni claims that this operation is planned to “bring calm and peace into the region”. No questiong of her statement follows.

The second important feature of the Brunhildas, is the fact that many of them are of Anglo-Saxon origin, and they speak without the harsh, Israeli accent. This helps the average presenter to feel that here is a woman who speaks sense, after all, she does not sound like someone from the Middle East, and certainly does not sound like an Arab, which is all good news. The Brunhildas are trained in screen-hogging, so can go on speaking for quite a while before the anchor feels the need to cut them off, as cutting them off, while they are in mid-flow of their even delivery, seems almost like an act of violence. The Brunhildas can afford to speak like that – after all, their children are not dead as a result of aerial bombardment, neither are they likely to be – they do not display emotions, but are trying to be the voice of feminine reason. Major Avital Leibowitz, another Brunhilda, is one of the leading spokespersons, always wheeled in on difficult cases.

The language used is extremely important, as is the poise – Tzipi Livni always speak of returning the ‘calm and peace’ to Israel, and to ‘let the Israeli people live peaceful lives’ at the very point that her forces are destroying life on an industrial scale, after having starved them for two years. The other line which ALL Israeli propagators have used is: “No nation on earth would tolerate rocket being hurled at its civilians”, a sentence which Netanyahu, in the clip included here, is able to express with hat mock sincerity and friendliness which is his trademark facade. While he is one of the few Israeli males giving interviews at the moment, he has been so well trained, that he always gets out what he wants:

The relaxed manager in his/her office

As opposed to the many pictures of bloodshed which come from Gaza or Lebanon, in the wake of Israel’s war crimes, the interviews with spokespersons for the Israeli government or the IDF are always are conducted in the privacy and peace and quiet of an office, with both sides in the conversation seated and relaxed, and with the Israeli interviewee doing their best to smile and be pleasant. Sharp as reporters may be, and most of them are far from it, this nice and friendly atmosphere makes it almost impossible to be critical, to ask searching questions (even if they had any) and to question seriously what they are being told. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Netanyahu clip, as it was with Avital leibowitz, IDF’s best propagator of feminine calm and fairness, and well trained at uttering lies most sincerely.

In a more recent clip you can see Avital doing her job again, after Israel has killed eigh Gazan workmen in gas truck, a fact exposed by B’Tselem, the human right group. This clip is especially interesting.

How different this looks from the crying mothers, shrieking ambulances, blood spilt on the road, paramedics running with half-dead bodies – we immediately feel a deep sense of calm on cutting to this civilised person in a civilised office. It seems that our reaction may well be one the reporter has experienced before us, after they ran under fire from the Israeli forces, if they were ever near Gaza. Of course, most of the reporters have never been to Gaza, and would run there even if they were allowed to enter. One cannot blame them and hereby lies another mechanism of information control, used by Israel.

Blocking any reporting from Gaza

Of course, the best method of controlling viewer views, is to block their sight, not allowing them to see what is not a good idea for them to be witness to, so they cannot develop an independent view. This is why blocking entry to reporters is the standard tool of control Israel uses in the Occupied Territories of Palestine. Without reporters, who could really say what actually took place? After all, Britain played the same game in the Falklands, and later, the USA and UK invented the ‘embedded reporters’ to avoid independent reporting. It works.
However, not always do the reporters accept this stoically, like they are meant to. Yesterday, the foreign reporters in Israel demanded in an injunction at the High Court, to be let into Gaza. The Court found them justified, but they are still not allowed in, but only according to times and rules the army dictates, so we are back to embedded reporting, almost. But, of course we now live in different times, with the internet allowing just about anybody with a simple camera and computer to upload images into the most public domain. This has typified the conflict in Palestine for some years now. While the material may be fuzzy, lack a structure, and lack the voice of authority, it is probably more real as a result, rather than less so. The fact that such images can be shared and forwarded with ease and great speed, also means that there are chinks in the iron ring Israel has drawn around Gaza.
Of course, on the established media channels, such images will be stopped at the door, and most of the public, here as well as in Israel, are protected from reality by the machinery of media control, which is obviously ideologically oriented and run.

In the next blog I shall be dealing with complaining about media bias, and the terminology to use when speaking/writing to media channels, making a case for Palestine.

Eyewitness report – Monday, December 29th

After the police brutality last night, we were expecting more of the same tonight. Interestingly, it did not quite happen – orders from above, after the politicians must have seen the shocking footage from last night, meant that they have not tried the same tactics, and they were right not to: many more people have come, with hundreds of young children and babies. Any police assault would have ended with deaths and numerous injuries. But it was even more interesting than that. On this evening, the police chose not to block all traffic, like they did yesterday, but to block only on one side on the road, allowing the traffic to separate the demo from Palace Green. In order to limit movement, they have incarcerated some 2500 people into a tiny area surrounded by metal barriers, and one could hardly move at all, creating much consternation and additional anger. After last night, the anger was not just about the brutalities of Israel in Gaza, but also about the supine acquiescence of the UK in the massacre, by joining the US in allowing the Israelis to do what they will, as they did during the destruction of South Lebanon in Summer 2006. The brutality used last night to disperse the demonstrators, was obviously read as an icon of this behaviour.

After some 30 minutes of spending time in this corralled area, treated by the police as so much cattle, and anger rising from all, some taunts by the police manning the barriers led to an amazing feat – the whole file of the demonstrators at the front started dragging and pushing the barriers towards Palace Green and embassy road gate, pushing the policemen into that enclave. All hell broke loose, and for some long moments it was felt that the events of last night may be repeated, with a Vengeance. It seems that someone high up at the Met was more responsible tonight – after the police have retreated to the safe area behind the iron gates of Palace Green, joining the many hundreds which were already there, presumably to protect the Israeli embassy from some tank divisions, the demonstrators were now in control of the road, and traffic came to a halt, with cars and buses stuck in the middle of the road; there was nowhere for them to go, but to turn back. The police have abandoned the road to the protesters, a rare sight, bearing witness to the strength of emotions of the protesters, and police recognition of it. The demonstration was full of hundreds of parents with young children, none of them less angry than the rest of us; the police had decided to avoid conflict for the time being, but hundreds more of the riot squad arrived and placed themselves at the periphery, ready to pounce of the demonstrators. For the following two and a half hours, the protesters controlled the road and the police were lying back, having experimented with removal of the demo and failed. It was quite a sight – the large forces of the riot police hidden behind the gates of Palace Green, bidding their time, and having to deal with a virtual rain of footwear going their way; many demonstrators have decided on homage to the Iraqi journalist who threww the show at Bush, and directed their shoes at the police as a pointed reminder of what they think of the British position towards this unfolding tragedy. Only by 19:00 has the demo started to disperse, at which point the police moved in like a large commando group, pouncing on youngsters which they have marked for arrest. They have failed twice to make any arrests as the whole crowd was struggling against them, and had to retreat again. Unfortunately, after many of the demo has dispersed, they have manged to arrest eight demosnstrators for what they called ‘public order offences’, as usual. All in all, this was a most successful day of action, in which the whole of Central London was affected by the demo, and there could be no doubt that the message is being transmitted loud and clear. Let us hope that someone tell Gordon and David, the two great supporters of israeli war crimes.

On walking to the station, many demonstrators were stopped and searched, according to what legislation one is not sure – it must be that they were terror suspect… one of them was the Al Jazeera reporter, and this little scene was captured by Mike Cushman of BRICUP. Please watch democracy in action!

Early stages of the demo

Clicking on any picture enables a larger image to be viewed

police ready for trouble	Mike Cushman & Neturei Karta	Mastermind of J-BIG	Nicest Rabbi in London
Law and Disorder	Sending back to base	Cushman raises hell	Abe gets going

Faces in the Crowd

Organisations and groups

London Demo against Gaza carnage Content Eyewitness report – Sunday December 28th

The London Metropolitan Police have managed the impossible – they made hundreds of people ona peaceful demonstration in the heart of London feel a bot like the people they were trying to represent – the Palestinians of Gaza. At the demonstration beside the gates of Palace Green, the leafy avenue of the embassies in Kensington, and the road leading to the Israeli embassy. The Israelis who may have been in the embassy – not many, one assumes, on Sunday evening – had nothing to worry about. The BBC website tells us that there were 2000 demonstrators there – a figure I very much doubt – then there were about two policemen for every demonstrators. The roads between Kensington Church Street and Kensington Gore – just over half-a-mile stretch, where all blocked and coked full of police forces, including the much loved dog unit, which indeed was drafted in to intimidate the protesters, once they really got into the rhythm of brutal policing. Beside me, a young man was trying to argue with the police using logics: “what are you afraid off? Of those people who have come to pray for the Gaza people? Are you not ashamed standing here, protecting the embassy of murderers?” It was to no avail, obviously. I have asked him to move along, telling him I had the feeling they are about to get nasty, and he will make an ideal target. He saw the point, seemingly, and retreated to the back. The demonstrators were made of people of all ages, from babies to very old and frail men and women, including two people in wheel chairs. At about 16:00, immediately after the official start of the protest, many of the protesters have kneeled down for the evening prayer, men and women in different groups, and prayed peacefully. It will be wrong to say that people were not angry – every one of us there was madly angry with the barbaric Israeli murder and destruction – but this did not translate itself into violence against the police, who kept the road to the embassy blocked by lines of sturdy policemen and women. There was something ugly in the air, though. As I was few inches away from the policemen, taking one of the photographs below, at about 16:20, I overheard one of the policemen advising a young man who found he could not get to the other side of the cordon, and just wanted to get there, being a tourist on shopping tour “just go back and scram, I tell you, do it now. There will some action in few minutes and you don’t want to be here”. So, it became clear to me that the violence will be manufactured pretty soon. It did indeed take less than five minutes, and the police cordon was swiftly reinforced by a large number, joining and starting to hit those close to them and push them with enormous force. Democracy in action, I suppose. I tried to take as many photographs as I could of this, until a well aimed hit on camera finished off the flash, so I continued to take photos as best I could, but many of the more brutal ones are, as a result, too dark. In the mad melee which followed, a SKY TV reporter in a beautiful red coat, in mid sentence facing her cameraman, was knocked down and about to be trampled upon by the advance of the forces of law and order, but for the efforts of the protesters which have surrounded her, hammered by the police for so doing, until she could be got up, very badly shocked and quite shaken. Things were happening so fast you could do nothing bur get pushed, and pandemonium was really frightening, with the police behaviour something to be seen to be believed. It well reminded me of the last time I was on demo at one of the checkpoints in Palestine, which seemed apposite. I have tried to pose as a press photographer, with my large professional camera, as I attempted to film the police getting the dogs into the crowd, and snatching individual protesters and hammering them into the road surface, four policemen to one demonstrator. Blood was flowing freely by that point, and as snatched a couple of shaky images, a huge policeman grabbed me with force I can only describe as brutal, and joined by another one rammed me back into the crowd but hitting me on the back for good measure. I could see some ten demonstrators at least led away, or rather dragged away with blood pouring from their wounds, and I moved rather quickly not to become the next prey. This is where I saw the CNN reporter, in mid sentence, on the background of all this violence, speaking of ‘extremists’, of Hamas and Hizbollah flags, as well as the flag of the ‘Palestinian State’. This was too much even for me, and I stopped him in his flow to ask since when did we havea Palestinian state, a comment he dod not really appreciate, but at least it got him packing and reteating before the obviously superior forces of the Met. At this point, there was nothing to do but disperse or be hit and arrested. The road was filled with shocked and shaken people, and one was saying to his friend as they ran past me “this is almost as bad as the Israelis”. He had a point. Haim Bresheeth A link toa BBC report which is not totally useless, but misses the point: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7802078.stm The pictures below were taking by me:

]

Policeman rearranging PEACE into CAPE! on his car

This policeman just noticed that a police car was used to advertise peace, by some of the protesters who passed by it. As I passed, and noticed him rearranging it into CAPE! I asked if the police is against peace on principle, a question which almost cost me an arrest…

People praying

At this point, despite the seriousness of the issues which brought the demonstrators out into the cold London evening, all was well organised and civilised

Large Palestine flag

The large PSC Palestine flag we have seen on so many demonstrations, is unfurled and displayed

Demonstrators

Demonstrators at about 16:10, when the whole thing may have looked as if it will pass without serious incidents

Police line at Palace Green

It was at this point in time, as I took numerous photos of the police line, that I heard one of them referring to ‘some action in few minutes’, and realised it all going to turn nasty. But as you can see, this was reason for jollity

Waiting for action

They never like it when you take their pictures, but what the hell, I am allowed to do what I want in this democracy… but one of them was the policeman who then pushed me brutally so that I could not photograph the ‘special treatment’ on the road surface

Overall view

Everywhere in Palestine, one can see the towering ‘security constructions of Militarized Israel, policing and controlling from above, directing fire, missiles, bombs and helicopters, all carrying out death and destruction in dense civilian population centres

Evening prayer

All around the place about two hundred men and women were praying, in small groups, as the police charged

Anti-Zionist Haredim

about fifteen Haredi Jews were there, stalwarts of such demonstrations, and a reminder that Jews, as devout as themselves, do consider Zionism and its atrocities in the same way that you and me might – their Judaism is what they use against such barbarities, in the same way that devout Muslims may be against Al Aida

In between

Just a couple of minutes before the explosion of violence, This rabbi takes a minute to explain his position on Zionism to a newcomer to the political scene

A demonstrator beaten by the police

This is the demonstrator who was the first one to be taken and beaten up brutally, and then arrested

Conference session at the Goethe Institute, November 8th, 2008

organized by Socrates Stratis & Angela Melitopoulos

Any attempt to understand the rapid transformation of territories in the 21st century reveals shifting landscapes and moving boundaries, thus a continuous struggle for their redefinition through conflicts and exclusions. Different conditions of mobility and migration encouraged by the so-called ‘globalised world’ inscribe in material environments social and psychological borders. In this context Cyprus and its inherent division acts as one of the frontiers to the EU. The aim of this workshop is to explore such liminal spaces with a particular reference to Cyprus and the Middle East.

How are liminal spaces constructed and managed and how can one think them from an interdisciplinary perspective?
What dictates the organization and management of these liminal spaces? What facts on the ground challenge the actual negotiation of such “zones under construction”? How do liminal spaces relate to a larger genre of boundaries present in contemporary urban environments? How do continuous fragmentations and reconnections in liminal zones shape contemporary urban societies?

This seminar proposes to engage in several roundtable discussions as productive strategies and tactics encouraging engagement between publics fragmented by the limit. We would like to explore the interdisciplinary roles of visual culture and architecture as porous interfaces within such a territory.

The seminar will take place within the Department of Architecture (University of Cyprus) and the Goethe Institut Nicosia. It will bring together scholars and practitioners from Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, Palestine, Turkey and the UK. “Liminal Zones” proposes the creation of a research platform that will be continued in the future as a model for exchange and production of diverse methodologies.

To see an enlarged picture, click on the thumbnail image. By clicking on the name you can find more details about the speaker and their topic.

Mete Hatay, who has led the tour through the Turkish side of Nicosia, and works for a Norwegian charity.

Conference session on November 6th, at the School of Architecture, Nicosia University

Socrates Stratis, of the School of Architecture, during the tour to the Turkish side of Nicosia

Angela Melitopoulos, one of the two organisers of the conference, delivering her paper on The Blast of the Possible installation

Ines Schaber speaking on the Working Archive, November 6th

Florian Schneider, speaking on November 6th, on Imaginary Property

Anna Grichting speaking on the Boundaryscapes: Recasting the Green Line of Cyprus, November 7th

Eyal Sivan, speaking on November 7th, on the Common Archive

John Palmesino, speaking on the Cyprus and the World Without Borders, November 5th

Eyal Weizman gave the keynote address, on Future Archaeology, on November 5th

Socrates Stratis, speaking on the Public Role of the Architect in Liminal Conditions, November 6th

Maria Loizidou speaking on November 6th, on the “Public Private Synergy Convoy” Project

Celine Condorelli spoke on Common Use/Support Structure, on November 5th

Rebecca Bryant, speaking at conference on The Spoils of History, November 7th

John Nassari speaking on Future Screens, on November 7th, on the right

By definition, political subjects are both excellent and difficult to photograph, as too many images of political action seem to be similar.

	During this left-wing demo in Piazza Navona, Rome, I have noticed the most incredible range of people partaking, from manual workers to intellectuals, all hobnobbing together. This Stalin clone was too good to miss, as he worked so hard on his mustache
	Just as I tried in vain to frame this approaching demo in Rome, Cartier-Bresson’s spirit introduced this couple into the frame.
	In Zurich, this group of Irainian demonstrators had precious little interest from passing commuters in the chill of winter. They looked lost, dejected and hopeless.
	At the time I took the picture, the election in Switzerland were raking up much racism and anti-foreign, xenophobic sentiment. Billboards were covered in racist propaganda, which seemed to be incredible to us, as this could not (yet…) happen in Britain. This was a campaign poster of the left, which incidentally lost ground in the election.
	In a beautiful park in Bilbao, we happened to see this small anti-globalisation demo, in front of one of the many commercial HQ buildings in this affluent Basque city

	For most Palestinians, this is what they see from their windows – a 100 foot surveiilance tower – you are never far enough from the watchful eye of the foucauldian state… this, together with unmanned drones, satellites, airplanes and army patrol, complete the picture of the occupying power and control.
	The anti-War demos have been getting smaller every year, after that amazing demo with 2 millions in London, which as we know made no difference. Still, millions everywhere continue to oppose this mad war, destructive for Iraq, the region and the world.
	During the 2004 demo, I noticed the huge number of surveillance cameras everywhere, photographing our very move.
	It was a windy day, and bitterly cold, but still hundreds of thousands came out in protest against this disastrous government and its US partners.
	Many of us have been toi this same sqaure in central London hundreds of times on demonstrations, and on the whole, we have little to show for it… Palestine? Iraq? Well, there is also South Africa, and now Ireland. Keep marching!

Objects are evidence; evidence of time, evidence of use, evidence of life and of the elements. They remain here when we are long gone, changing with time. Most images here were shot on film – either on 35mm or 60mm by 60mm, and all are connected to the sea. The sea always ages objects in the most unique way. Click ONCE to see the full image.

	Another picture taken by Benny Bronstein and me on film years ago. This is the Jebalia beach, near Jaffa.
	Norfolk beaches are teaming with objects which were licked by the waves and dried by the merciless north wind – wood especially benefits from this treatment.
	On the sandy Norfolk beach, this mysterious object was irresistible.
	On the Norfolk broads, mornings and evening are magical. The gentle fog kills the faraway sounds, and gives a special depth to images, muting their colour palette.
	A Hammam doorway in Marrakech, with the ever-present weapon of mass-destruction, the scooter.
[	A Swiss barn-door in the Valais, showing all the signs of life and labour, and little different from the doors I photographed in the Third World.
	Another doorway in Marrakech, in the Mellah, the Jewish quarter. The reds of walls and doorways are of the same family of hues which is used to paint walls in Rome, and yet, so different. The colour is gentle, yet persistent and pervasive.
	In an antiquarian shop in the Medina, an old Hanukah lamp, genuine and no doubt looted from the Jewish population of the Mellah. There is an amazing range and variety of Judaica here, which makes you realise how integrated and large this Jewish community was.
	Mysterious bundles of coloured twine abound all around Morrocan cities,especially in Marrakech. to begin with, one is lost when inquiring about. People would rather not tell you, but all around town, young men are weaving their balls of twine. It is a form of practical magic called Schur, designed to dispel the evil spirits or Jinns.
	In the main street of Bern, Large colourful flag-bearing posts are dividing the street into sectors, diverting your gaze. Each is adorned with a different, striking face.
	Certainly one of the largest and most intriguing objects anywhere, Louise Bourgeois’s metal spider towers over the visitors to the riverside Guggenheim Gallery in Bilbao.
	The underside of the spider at Bilbao.

	Could those long poles in a Marrakech street really be holding up the wall?
	A scooter in Marrakech, attracting the voracious and capable denizens of the streets.
	The colossal bust of Rameses, now in the British Museum, has been there over 150 years, ever since it was ‘prospected’ by the great adventurer, Giovanni Battista Belzoni, who has used hundreds of Egyptian peasants in 1815, and recorded this feat of archaeological engineering in a famous coloured drawing.
	One of the largest and most majestic objects of Ancient Egypt, the Sun Barque of the Pharaoh Khufu, was found disassembled, in a special covered trench by his pyramid and took 30 years to put together.
	Walking slowly through the Marrakech Medina, one comes upon mysterious and magnificent views, as if turning in a dream towards a sight known from another life.

Places mean more than their image gives away – they hide but also reveal – so one can see how people lived in them, loved them, or were frightened of them. Click ONCE to see the full image.

	This hill in Tuscany has taken my fancy and I have spent some days on editing the picture into this hybrid.
	The beach of my childhood, and one of my very first pictures, taken on an ancient Kodak Retina II, which always leaked light at a certain angle to the sun…
	Jerusalem at sunset, some days after the beginning of the Al Aqsa Intifada, as if the landscape knew. There again, Jerusalem looks like this quite often. It must be all the blood in its history. I did not have to use filters here.
	A photograph of my mother, My uncle and a dear friend of the family, Dr. Braver, as well as three-year old me. This is on the beach, some 50 yards from our flat in Jebaliia (Jaffa), and in full view of one of the Palestinian boats which were left by the many who have fled away from the Israeli army as it entered Jaffa in 1948, during what is termed the Nakba (the great catastrophe). Many of them died at sea, trying to reach Gaza or Lebanon. The boats stayed on the beach for years after 1948, until destroyed by the winter storms.
	A bridge in Norfolk. This is the kind of green you never see in the Mediterranean, and I did not even know it existed before coming to England.

	A night in Rome, as one turns the corner, one is always surprised there.
	The pastels of the house fronts in Salcombe are musical to the eye.
	The Post Office of Salcombe, one of many pictures I took of Post Offices all around Britain.
	Those trees on the Pacific coast in California bear witness to the power of the wind which shaped them.
	One of the few surviving cinema buildings, though not active, in Marrakech. This is actually in the French part of the city, Gueliz, but seems to have closed some decades ago.

	This cinema in the Medina in Marrakech was working, and showing many Bollywood films, of course.
	This hotel balcony in Basle has a historical resonance. The hotel, the Three Kings, is the one Theodor Herzl stayed in during the first Zionist congress in 1896, and on the same balcony was taken his famous portrait. The congress took part across the road, in the municipal casino…

People are the most difficult, but also the most rewarding subject to photograph. The few examples here show thus clearly, I hope. Click ONCE to see the full image.

I saw this baby on his own, seemingly abandoned, sleeping very peacefully, the kind of sleep which only babies seem capable of.

	On the beach in Dubrovnik, early evening is the time of the chess players. Every move is discussed and dissected by all present.
	In a piazza in San Diego, we saw this father and his daughter asleep, on a very hot day, totally oblivious to all and sundry.
	On a summer’s day, in a Queens Wood cafe, I saw this young boy, Harry Potter-like and photographed him before I looked around. It was amazing to find out, immediately afterwards, that he is the son of an academic colleague, Prof. Rosie Thomas.
	In a small town in Montenegro, this man crosses our path, carrying his large radio, playing to himself in the empty street. What is he listening to? Where is he going like this? Does he always carry his radio with him, like Radio Rahim in Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing?
	In an East Jerusalem busy road, while the soldiers drive people to clear the road, for some unknown reason, this man is not giving up on finding a bargain.

	In a park cafe in mid-summer, this man sat and looked miserable, totally alone in the middle of the hubbub, and after some time he could stand it no more, and started crying.
	This picture was taken many years ago, by me and Benny Bronstein in Tel Aviv. The man looked at me while I pressed the shutter with a gaze which was empty of life.
	A woman walking past me in East Jerusalem, when both Israelis and Palestinians had a reason to hope for some future together.
	A street scene in Marrakech – two women, two donkeys, and a lot of affection.

	Night in the Medina in Marrakech, and the stall holders, all women, are still there, waiting in vain for one last customer… while waiting, they never rest, knitting more of their wooly hats
	In a cafe near the Saadian tombs, East meets West
	Mysterious bundles of coloured twine abound all around Morrocan cities,especially in Marrakech. to begin with, one is lost when inquiring about. People would rather not tell you.
	This is one of the mysterious weavers of coloured twine balls, in action in small but perfect garden in the Medina. He refused to tell me what he was doing – a form of practical magic called Schur, which is designed to dispel the evil spirits or Jinns. All around town, young men are weaving their balls of twine.

The Gallery is still being constructed

A selection of photographs by Haim Bresheeth can be seen in the different pages of the Gallery.

In Progress – A Civilised Clash, 18 min. – a 16 screen drama-dance production, with Prof. Lizbeth Goodman and Bobby Byrne as the Dancers. Music by arrangement with Kila, Dublin. More on A Civilised Clash »