Swedish "Art" Outrage [With links to video of Israeli Ambassabor destroying "Snow White"]

honestreporting.com (via email) ^ | January 19, 2004

[ml/nj]

Communique: 19 January 2004

SWEDISH 'ART' OUTRAGE

Dear HonestReporting Subscriber,

On January 16, Israel's ambassador to Sweden, Zvi Mazel, attended a Stockholm art show linked to an international conference on preventing genocide. Mazel was shocked to encounter there a large exhibit glorifying the Palestinian terrorist who murdered 21 Israelis at Haifa's Maxim restaurant in October. Dubbed "Snow White and the Madness of Truth," the exhibit showed a tiny sailboat floating on a pool of red water. Attached to the boat was a smiling photo of the female bomber, Hanadi Jaradat. In protest, Mazel pulled the plug on three spotlights illuminating the exhibit, and knocked one light fixture into the red pool.

         The exhibit and 'artists'

Media coverage largely downplayed the exhibit's clear glorification of genocide ― a grave irony, given the theme of the conference. Media reports instead suggested that the exhibit's meaning is open to broad interpretation, or that it merely laments all Mideast bloodshed.

Absent from nearly all reports was the poetic text accompanying the exhibit, submitted by the artists, which juxtaposes the 'beauty' of the red pool of blood upon the moral 'Snow-whiteness' of the terrorist:

For the June 12 deaths of her brother, and her cousin... seemingly innocent with universal non-violent character... Weeping bitterly, she added: 'If our nation cannot realize its dream and the goals of the victims, and live in freedom and dignity, then let the whole world be erased'... Run away, then, you poor child... and the red looked beautiful upon the white.

Here are three examples of the media's selective omission:

1) BBC wrote: "Its Israeli-born creator rejected the charge [of condoning violence], saying the work had a message of openness and conciliation... 'I'm absolutely opposed to suicide bombers', he added."

2) The New York Times News Service reports that one of the artists explained: "I wanted to show how incomprehensible it is that a mother of two ― who is a lawyer no less ― can do such a thing," she said, apparently confusing the Haifa bombing with an attack last week by another Palestinian woman.

3) The (UK) Observer spun the story 180-degrees, presenting Mazel ― not the Palestinian! ― as the killer: Peaceful Swedes were nearly killed when "an ambassador erupted in violent protest... [Mazel] ripped out electrical wires, grabbed a spotlight and hurled it into a fountain, causing it to short circuit and become a potential death trap."

Dutch television has actual film of Mazel, calmly walking around the exhibit, unplugging the spotlights, and pushing one of the (unplugged) lights into the water. Streaming video is available online ―the segment is about 11 minutes into the show (3/4 through). Here are the direct links: (Hat tip: LGF)

Windows Media dialup         Windows Media broadband
Real Player dialup               Real Player broadband

Ambassador Zvi Mazel

BROADER CONTEXT

While one could debate if Mazel's act was appropriate, it is essential to recognize that this story runs far deeper than one art exhibit. Associated Press provides important background context to the story:

There has long been debate over where criticism of Israel ends and anti-Semitism begins. The current round touched a deeper chord, because many Israelis feel outsiders often accept the Palestinians' use of suicide bombings against civilians.

As Ambassador Mazel explained:

This exhibit was the culmination of dozens of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish events in Sweden. When you don't protest it gets worse and worse. It had to be stopped somehow, even by deviating from the behavior of the buttoned-down diplomat.

The Israeli government supports Mazel's protest, and the Jerusalem Post had this to say:

As for "diplomacy," Mazel was communicating his point in the only way possible. A formal protest would merely have been "duly registered," filtered and lost in the back channels of European diplomacy. So he chose to scream. But screaming was the only option Europe now gives Israel.

Did your local paper's coverage of Mazel's act of protest fail to note the artists' accompanying text, which casts a mass murderer as a 'Snow-white' victim? If so, write a letter to the editor, questioning the omission of the artist's literal 'whitewash' of Palestinian terror.

Thank you for your ongoing involvement in the battle against media bias.

HonestReporting.com

[ml/nj]

Note that this is not yet posted at the link I give here. I expect that it will be posted soon.

ML/NJ

[Proud Infidel]

3) The (UK) Observer spun the story 180-degrees, presenting Mazel ― not the Palestinian! ― as the killer: Peaceful Swedes were nearly killed when "an ambassador erupted in violent protest... [Mazel] ripped out electrical wires, grabbed a spotlight and hurled it into a fountain, causing it to short circuit and become a potential death trap."

OK, so what their version of 9/11? - "Adherents of the religion of peace were calmly flying tranquilly through the New York skies when suddenly two towers jumped threateningly up at them, smashing their airplanes to bits"?!?!

[visualops]

They've got weird newscasts.
That trash wasn't "art" or "expression".
Good riddance to bad rubbish.

[Paleo Conservative]

And they can't prosecute, because he has diplomatic immunity. Sweet!

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on or off this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

[Alouette]

FRmail me to be added or removed from this pro-Israel ping list.

WARNING: This is a high volume ping list

[Alouette]

Interview with Zvi Mazel and Dror Feiler, Reshet Bet Israël

18/01/04

Full title : INTERVIEW WITH ZVI MAZEL, ISRAEL'S AMBASSADOR IN SWEDEN AND DROR FEILER, THE ARTIST, IBA RESHET BET, JAN. 18, 2004

By courtesy of Prof. Murray Kahl

[Interview orageuse s’il en fût. On remarquera en particulier la hargne rabique de l’Israélien Dror Feiler, accusateur universel et ennemi patent d’Israël, quoi qu’il en dise. Je manque de temps pour traduire ce document. S’il se trouve quelque volontaire pour le faire - sous réserve qu'il/elle aie une bonne maîtrise de la traduction de l’anglais en français -, qu’il/elle soit le/la bien venu(e). Ecrire à cje@pi.be, avec, pour Objet : "Traduction Mazal". Merci par avance. Menahem Macina.]


ANCHOR: Israel's Ambassador Zvi Mazel. Good morning to you.

ZVI MAZEL: Good morning to you.

ANCHOR: So the morning after, how are the Swedish responding to what you did?

ZVI MAZEL: I still do not have all the Swedish media, but as much as I saw on the internet, the headlines in the newspapers are certainly big.

ANCHOR: A harsh criticism of you?

ZVI MAZEL: Not exactly. There is still talk of the fact that there was an attempt to harm the freedom of art, but there is certainly a discussion in the Swedish media on the problem of Israel, with the Palestinian suicide bombers. There are already people for and against. There is a debate on the issue. A debate which did not not exist before.

ANCHOR: Do you regret what you did?

ZVI MAZEL: No. Regret? Certainly not. Certainly not. This is perhaps not traditional classic diplomacy, as people know, but neither is Israel's condition exactly classic. And therefore, it seems that there is room for other options in such situations.

ANCHOR: Was it spontaneous? Describe to me that moment in which you decided to do what you did?

ZVI MAZEL: The moment, in fact was very short. This was after I saw what I saw, and together with my wife, we both trembled a bit and then I turned to the manager of the event and asked him, and explained the issue to him, and requested that he clear out this exhibit. He said - no. And then I answered him calmly - if so, Sir, I will do here something, and I approached and disconnected the electricity.

At that very moment, it angered me a lot, and I asked -- what will I do? And then I turned to the manager, and then I decided that I would do it. At that moment.

ANCHOR: And indeed, as described, you couldn't breath when you saw this picture? Was it a physical reaction per se?

ZVI MAZEL: There was a reaction of trembling. Certainly a reaction of a certain trembling. A person is standing, fever. The appropriate word in Hebrew is fever. My wife looked at me. I looked at her and around us, people from the embassy were standing, and others. We both trembled with fever and froze, and then the brain began to work, and we were stopped.

ANCHOR: And then you told the managers of the museum that this is the second holocaust starting now?

ZVI MAZEL: Perhaps not in those exact words. I just explained what happens in Israel when a male or female suicide bomber arrives, and I said - this is not the place, this is not the time, and this is certainly not connected to the International Conference which will take place -- how to prevent a genocide. For there is an incitement here to a genocide.

Please take it out, and we will end the issue and terminate it. And then he said - no. And at that moment I said, if that the case, I am going to do something. That's it.

ANCHOR: The criticism actually in Sweden and also in Israel, is that in Israel, you have much support - is that there is a sort of a convention, that you do not harm art, you do not harm the freedom of art, the freedom of expression, even if you do not agree with the things.

ZVI MAZEL: Yes, and on this, by the way, I was interviewed a lot yesterday, in the Swedish press, and this is one of the issues handled today. What is art? If so, I claim, and I think that a lot agree with me that art is determined by the viewers, watchers. We determine if this is a work of art.

An artist never establishes that this is a piece of art, if he did something, or if it has been placed in museum. The fact that something is placed in the museum does not turn it into a work of art.

A work of art, in German and in Swedish, end in the word 'kuntz', meaning something beyond the acceptable. All in all, there was red water here, which represented blood, and a small ship that sailed, and on it the picture of the female terrorist which turned into a white Snow White.

There was clear political support of terror here.

ANCHOR: But in the eyes of Dror Feiler, good morning to you, by the way Dror Feiler, you with us on the line, true?

DROR FEILER: I am with you on the line.

ANCHOR: Yes. In his eyes --

DROR FEILER: -- that the Ambassador is a liar!

ANCHOR: No. no. no.

DROR FEILER: He is a liar since he himself says completely different things to the Swedish media. He says that he decided against the display before he came to the museum. With an ad he saw in the newspaper, which he did not try to check, which is not an ad, and not a picture from our display. It is someone else's display, by the name of Michael Pon Hauswood, who received consent of the person in charge of the entire exhibition. He did not check the things. He hides the fact -

ANCHOR: What didn't he check? He saw a female terrorist --

DROR FEILER: -- hold on a moment, let me talk. Hold on, hold on a moment --

ANCHOR: -- you allow a terrorist, no no just a moment. Just a moment, I am also allowed to intervene. You display a female terrorist as Snow White with the smile of an angel.

DROR FEILER: -- no, I am not --

ANCHOR: -- which sails in a white ship, and you call it art!

DROR FEILER: -- Excuse me! I am not displaying a female terrorist, named Snow White. I am displaying white hatred which floats on rivers of blood, the same way that the terrorist floated on rivers of blood. In the display there is a plaque that says that the terrorist killed 19 innocent people in Haifa. The names of the terrorist's victims are also in the display. For those who come to the display, there is music by Johan Sebastian Bach that is called 'My heart flies and drowns in blood'.

ANCHOR: But to take the blood of 21 dead and make an artistic display out of it?

DROR FEILER: I want to show the cycle of blood that needs to be broken. Only by breaking the cycle of blood can the two nations live without both of them being victims.

ANCHOR: Can you understand what the ambassador did?

DROR FEILER: I can understand that the ambassador misunderstood the message, even though I think that a diplomat should act better. He is acting like the owner of a stand in some market in the Third World, but I can understand that people don't like and don't understand this. Not everyone can have a big enough ability to understand.

But to start to break things and to try and ruin others things - if this is the kind of democracy that he wants to show from Israel, if he wants to be part of the tradition of burning flesh and of banning artwork, then by all means. If this is what he wants to show Israel is like, then it is a shame. I, personally, am not against Israel. I am for the State of Israel.

ANCHOR: Dror Feiler, I hear that you attend a lot of anti-Israel events and give lectures on Israel's character.

DROR FEILER: This is not true. I attend a lot of events that criticize the policy of the Israeli government. I have nothing against the State of Israel. The Israeli government's current policy is the greatest enemy of the Israeli people. It will result in the idea of a Jewish State not being able to exist. This is because of Israel's policy. I am not inciting to murder and I am not inciting suicide bombers. I am against this 100 percent.

(Crosstalk)

This can ruin people and bring them to a situation that they are so desperate and crazy that they blow themselves up, blow up Israelis and cause irreversible harm to their nation.

ANCHOR: Dror Feiler, I would also like to tell you that the artists here in Israel - Yigal Tumarkin, you know him - he is one of the great artists - say that an artist who presents this type of work should be put in a hospital.

DROR FEILER: I say that when diplomats define what art is, and when artists make medical diagnoses - we are in trouble.

ANCHOR: Mr. Ambassador, are you with us?

Would you like to respond to these things that Dror Feiler said?

ZVI MAZEL: I would like to respond to two things. First of all Dror Feiler is the main anti-Israel activist in Sweden. In the past few years before I got here, he was known as someone who stands outside the embassy and passes out flyers against Israel. He appears in lectures here and he writes articles and it is all against Israel.

Every second word of his about Israel are the words 'apartheid' and 'racism'. He is Israel's number one enemy and everything that he does is Anti-Israel. His work comes from an Anti-Israeli soul and heart. This is one thing.

Secondly, this is not a work of art. The viewers determine what art is. I decide what art is. This is not art. This is perverse art at the most and in my opinion, it is not art at all. It is a political cry to glorify the concept of the suicide bomber.

ANCHOR: All right. Maybe one last sentence, Dror Feiler, before we say good-bye.

DROR FEILER: I am saying it again. Everyone who wants to read the things that I say can easily do so. I am saying this again. Since I came to Sweden, I always said that the Israeli people have a right to self-definition and they have a right to a Jewish state next to a Palestinian state. I have nothing against the State of Israel. I have a lot of things against the State of Israel's policy exactly the same way that I have a lot of things against the Swedish government's policy or the way I might have things against the policies of the German government or the American government or the Russian government. It is legitimate to criticize the State of Israel.

ANCHOR: Thank you.

DROR FEILER: It is a fact that the ambassadors are trying to incite in such a way that will increase Anti-Semitism. They cause simple people in Europe and in the world to say - how can people act in this way?

ANCHOR: Thank you Dror Feiler. Mr. Ambassador, maybe one more sentence.

Do you see what is happening…?

ZVI MAZEL: Maybe Dror Feiler gave me an answer now.

ANCHOR: Do you see in what is happening, a peak in the Anti-Semitism that is washing over Sweden?

ZVI MAZEL: At this stage it is not final. There is an Anti-Semitic movement here which comes mainly from Muslim sources. A few weeks ago, a very harsh report was published on this by the Swedish committee against Anti-Semitism, where it said that Sweden is one of the most severe Anti-Semitic places and 131 complaints were filed to the police by Jews in the past year. Teachers stopped teaching about the Holocaust because Palestinian-Arab Muslim students would stand up and react violently to teaching about the Holocaust. The situation is definitely serious and not good.

ANCHOR: Israeli ambassador in Sweden thanks.

Mis en ligne le 19 janvier 2004 sur le site http://www.upjf.org

[veronica]

"Snow White?" I don't think so. More like....

[Cultural Jihad]

Thanks for the post. I watched the video, and the ambassador unplugged the lights before throwing one into the pool of red water. Whoever the man was with the saxophone, he looked pathetic to be attacking the Israeli ambassador.

[Piranha]

I'm a little disappointed in the Ambassador's response in the interview.

He played into the interviewer's hands a bit, and even though the interviewer seems sympathetic I think that he is mis-casting the issue into a dispute between the Israeli ambassador and Dror Feiler; in fact, it is a dispute over the insentivity of Swedish government and museum officials to the merciless palestinian arab terror attacks against innocent victims.

The bigger questions for me are: (a) given the type of person that Dror Feiler is, and his outspoken opposition to Israel, who commissioned him to prepare this work of "art": (b)why is a museum of antiquities the appropriate venue for a piece like this?; (c) did the museum people know that the Israeli ambassador was invited when they agreed to show this piece? and (d) was there any communication among the museum officials about the Swiss government's agreement not to tie the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into the meeting?

Inquiring minds want to know.

[MHGinTN]

The Eurotrash continue to encourage the violence, to encourage the suicide/homicide murdering, by continuing to allow any publicity at all for the maniacal bastards! I'm with the ambassador, this 'exhibit' exemplifies the trashiness of the Eurotrash elite.

[Alouette]

FReep this poll!

(Poll is on the right side of the page, about halfway below the scroll)

Bör den omtalade installationen på Historiska museet tas bort? (Should the "installation" exhibit at the Historical Museum be removed?)

Ja (yes)
Nej (no)

[Alouette]

(c) did the museum people know that the Israeli ambassador was invited when they agreed to show this piece?

Yes. He was set up.

(d) was there any communication among the museum officials about the Swiss Swedish government's agreement not to tie the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into the meeting?

Was there such an agreement? The museum rejected one artwork which showed a pro-Israeli point of view, because the Syrians demanded that it be excluded.

[Bobby777]

I never ceased to be amazed ...

[LayoutGuru2]

Done. Freeped the poll. Looking for the video now.

[LayoutGuru2]

Only streaming links? Sad, this one is a keeper.

[Piranha]

Wow! The poll is nearly 50/50. Who is this newspaper?

[Piranha]

Swiss, Swedish...

I still have trouble with Iowa, Ohio and Idaho.

[Bullish]

Liberals are such lying sacks of $hit!

At the heart of the pali - Isreal conflict is the utter hatred the palis have for the Jews. They'll never get anything but misery if they can't get rid of the hate.