MC Abdul from Palestine - 'Shouting At The Wall'

 

A clip from this song was sent to me via social media.

It's actually been recorded a few years ago, in Gaza. But how relevant!! 

MC Abdul - 'Shouting At The Wall'

Look at this kid... incredible!!

🇵🇸 15 y/o rapper from Palestine 🎤 Spreading peace, love & unity through music.

MC Abdul - 'Palestine' [FREEVERSE]

MC Abdul - 'Let It Rain'

(sampling the Fugees's 'Ready or Not')

A little more about Abdul in this video from 2021: 

WATCH: Brave 13-year-old boy
raps about Palestine war!

11-Year-Old Palestinian Rapper Uses Music to Share Life in Gaza | NowThis (2020)

His name is Abdul-Rahman al-Shantti.

Born on September 14, 2008, he's known professionally as MC Abdul or MCA Abdul.

The Palestinian rapper from Gaza, Palestine "gained popularity when he sang a rap about freedom, in front of his school in Gaza which garnered hundreds of thousands of views on social media." 

Subsequently, as of August 2023, his videos for "Shouting At The Wall" and "Palestine" have received more then 930,000 views and 700,000 views, respectively, on YouTube alone.

He says his idol is Eminem...

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His most recent video:

MC Abdul - 'The Pen & The Sword'

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Thanks Mark for sharing a first clip... 

On our types of online socialisation

 

 Dear friends, readers, newcomers,

I hope this message finds you well.

This year hasn’t been good for much problems, not for the climate, not for peace, not for us, journalists, and not for freedom of expression in general.

One of the issue worsening is the way we're owned by our social media.

You may have seen what happened on Twitter (I won't use the CEO's dark rebranding...).

I certainly have… I mean, for instance, how the CEO criticised the German government for participating in sea rescue operations, posted photos of himself at the Mexican border, and... supported infamous antisemitic French author Alain Soral...

If not, all you need is here on AP, on Bloomberg, and here on Forbes... and on Musk's own unbearable feed!

More recently, Meta started censuring post, and the European Union announced "formal infringement proceedings" against X after identifying suspect posts related to the war between Israel and Hamas: 

https://www.rfi.fr/en/international/20231219-eu-launches-proceedings-against-x-over-israel-hamas-disinformation

It is the first such move against a major online platform under a new EU law designed to combat disinformation and hate speech.

I cannot stand the idea of serving as a tiny pawn in his empire, can you?

*

As a journalist, reporter and writer, I spent an enormous amount of time on Twitter in the past decades, before it was changed, just doing my job: sharing relevant information for free, completed by art, music, films, beauty... created by people I admire and respect for their values.

I can no longer do that without feeling used and reduced to silence, as the algorithm favours the richest man of the world's opinion, while pushing us out. All that by claiming he defends "free speech".

I feel really powerless posting on it, and on social media in general...Serious media have been robbed of all effects. Disinformation, opinions, and hatred have taken all space, thus power. This is the era we live in.

This week now, disinformation and lies about Palestine have inundated all these networks…

All over the world, press freedom is attacked, reduced or threatened. Online networks help to find sources, information, contacts, etc.

But not if we have to sell our souls to the devil for it...

Facebook, Instagram and Thread - as Meta - are not much better, to be honest, I won't start listing all the reasons why, but basically they just encourage self-promotion and competition. While stealing our data! Remember Cambridge Analytica?

Here is an excellent piece on Meta's policy towards politics:

https://theintercept.com/2023/08/30/meta-censorship-policy-dangerous-organizations/

I also tried Mastodon and Post but not much happened there...

If I'm writing to you, it is because I've interacted with you on Twitter at some point or for some of you daily. I now suffer there...

There are alternatives!

Here are a few.

Hope to see you there.

>> BlueSky, and other similar networks

It looks and feels like Twitter at the beginning… 

https://www.zdnet.com/article/best-twitter-alternative/

Twitter, or as it's now known, X, isn't the same as it used to be. Here are the best Twitter alternatives if you're looking to leave the social media site.

My account on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/melissaontheroad.bsky.social

The one on Threads: https://www.threads.net/@melissaontheroad

>> Substack

Substack is an American online platform that provides publishing, payment, analytics, and design infrastructure to support subscription newsletters. It allows writers to send digital newsletters directly to subscribers. 

But it's also much more than that, and allows space for communication and networking. 

Here's my newsletter:

https://substack.com/@melissaontheroad?utm_source=profile-page 

Melissa Chemam

SUBSTACK.COM/@MELISSAONTHEROAD

Reporter/Writer on African affairs, migrations, culture, Europe/UK/France, interested in rewriting cultural narratives. 

I'm also the author of the book 'Out of the Comfort Zone', about Britain's music, art, multiculturalism & activism, digging into the ghosts of its colonial past.

There are plenty of other newsletters there, of course! And spaces to chat, exchange, discuss, correspond... 

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Palestine: Art centres, artists and messages

These types of articles are multiplying:

'More Than 1,000 Artists Boycott Bristol’s Arnolfini Center Amid Palestine Censorship Controversy'

In an open letter, artists are pledging to withdraw from working with Arnolfini Arts, following their censorship of the Bristol Palestine Film Festival in December. 

Here are some key points from the letter:

"Their actions are a terrible mistake, and a cowardly move toward a British arts ecology that has no genuine space for discussion, debate or dissent. 

We cannot let the arts in this country be censored and limited by fear, pressure or lack of moral leadership. Palestinian freedom of expression must be equal and protected. 

We welcome @icalondon @sitegallery @wysing.arts.centre who have all had the courage and ethical backbone to stand up and platform Palestinian voices and arts and demand a ceasefire."

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This is not the Arnolfini I know. 

We need an explanation...

Just last year I was part of the Bristol Palestine Film Festival there with Ken Loach and many great activists... And the event took place at Arnolfini, the international art centre of Bristol.

The event was titled 'Boycott', how ironic...

'Boycott': film + discussion at the Bristol Palestine Film Festival, Dec. 2022

Something must have turned wrong...

As the article reports, now: 

More than 1,000 artists across the cultural field—including Ben Rivers, Brian Eno, Adham Faramawy, and Tai Shani—have signed a new open letter that accuses Bristol’s Arnolfini International Centre for Contemporary Arts of “censorship of Palestinian culture,” after the institution canceled two events that were part of the city’s Palestine Film Festival. 

The signatories vow to no longer work with the Arnolfini or engage with its events and urge their peers in the field to join the boycott.

In November, the Arnolfini cancelled a screening of Farha (2021), a coming-of-age story set during the Nakba, the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes during and after the 1948 Palestine war, by Jordanian-Palestinian director Darin J. Sallam.

The screening was set to be followed by a Q&A with the Palestinian writer and doctor Ghada Karmi. The center was also scheduled to host a poetry reading headlined by the rapper and activist Lowkey.

The screening of Farha will now be hosted at the cinema & arts charity Watershed, while the poetry event will take place at the department store and arts hub Sparks Bristol.

In Bristol, Portishead’s Geoff Barrow and Adrian Utley, Massive Attack’s Robert del Naja, writers Alice Oswald, Nikesh Shukla, Shon Faye, Travis Alabanza and Rachel Holmes are among many artists who have written a letter accusing the iconic Arnolfini International Centre for Contemporary Arts of “censorship of Palestinian culture”. 

As listed here: https://artistsforpalestine.org.uk/category/all/

The artists vow to take collective action and urge other artists and audiences to join them, saying: 

“We must, reluctantly, refuse cooperation with the arts centre and will not participate in any of its events until Arnolfini publicly commits to consistently uphold freedom of expression, with no exception for Palestine, and genuinely engages with Bristol’s arts community to rectify the harm it has caused”.

They added:

“We want to make it clear that we stand fully behind workers at Arnolfini who’ve had no say in this. Our message is addressed to those in the management who made this damaging decision; the signatories of this letter expect better integrity, transparency and cultural leadership from Arnolfini.”

The letter continues: “Until the Arnolfini leadership publicly commits to consistently uphold freedom of expression, with no exception for Palestine, and genuinely engages with Bristol’s arts community to rectify the harm it has caused, we must, reluctantly, refuse cooperation with the arts center and will not participate in any of its events.”

Finally, Bristol artist and composer Nik Rawlings, who was in talks with the gallery to undertake a residency at Arnolfini, announced that they are no longer willing to do so. 

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I hope we get to hear what really happened soon for these events to be cancelled.

We need to work with the venue for this to never happen again.

-

Melissa Chemam

Journalist & Art Writer 

@ RFI English, New Arab, ART UK...

Newsletter: https://melissa.substack.com/

Site: https://sites.google.com/view/melissachemam

Nu Barreto's new exhibition

 

Art exhibition: 'Silhouettes Parfaites' - Nu Barreto, artist from Bissau Guinea - Currently at Galerie Obadia, Paris

'Silhouettes Parfaites'

Little clip:

I Am is back

 

'Sans valeurs' - nouveau titre de @IAM

"Le nouvel album du groupe IAM, HHHistory, est disponible en version vinyle afin de clôturer avec ce 11ème et dernier projet l’hommage aux 50 ans du Hip Hop.

'Sans Valeurs' est le 1er single extrait de l’album, disponible sur les plateformes.

La version digitale d’HHHistory sera disponible le 02 février 2024, elle sera suivi de la tournée « HHHistory Tour 2024 » comptant près de 50 dates, presque sold out.

Après Ombre est lumière ou L'École du micro d'argent, IAM continue de marquer et d’écrire l’histoire du Hip Hop après plus de 35 ans de carrière."

Latest post on my Substack Newsletter

 

From mid-December 2023:

UK's deal with Rwanda / Kenya at 60

East African highlights for the month

MELISSA CHEMAM

12 DEC 2023

Read from here:

UK's deal with Rwanda / Kenya at 60

And subscribe, it's free!

News and cultures from my African news journalism, cultural events, African diaspora, activism and more.

Senegal: Sonko's free to run

My latest for RFI English: 

Senegal court clears jailed opposition figure for presidential run

A Senegalese judge on Thursday (14 December) ordered that jailed opposition leader Ousmane Sonko be reinstated on the electoral roll, clearing the way for him to stand in next year's presidential election.

 

The judge thus upheld a regional court ruling from October overturned by Senegal's top court last month, which said the question of whether Ousmane Sonko should be restored to the electoral roll should go back to the lower court in Dakar.

According to RFI's correspondent in Dakar, some supporters of Sonko gathered in the court welcomed this news with jubilation, chanting the opponent's name.

One of his lawyers, Me Ciré Clédor Ly, said that the State could file an appeal before the Supreme Court, but that “this appeal is not suspensive”.

“The electoral code is very clear," he added. "When the judge makes his decision, this decision must be immediately executed.” 

Convoluted justice case 

Sonko has been at the centre of a stand-off with the state for more than two years.

He came third in the last presidential election.

Growing in popularity over the past few years, especially among young voters, he has however been dealing with the justice system on many cases.

Sentenced for "corrupting the youth" in a boiling court case in June, he was also accused by the government of inciting insurrections, after he resisted his trial with popular marches and protests.

In late July, he was arrested on charges including fomenting insurrection, criminally associating with a terrorist body and endangering state security.

His supporters in his PASTEF Party and the opposition coalition believe that the slew of criminal allegations brought against him since 2021 are part of a campaign to derail his political aspirations ahead of a presidential election in February 2024, led by current president Macky Sall.

In mid-October a judge from Sonko's stronghold of Ziguinchor, the city in the region of Casamance where he has been mayor since January 2022, ordered that he be reinstated on electoral lists for the February vote.

And Senegal’s National Electoral Commission said early in November that Sonko “must enjoy his status as a registered voter with all the rights attached thereto."

But Senegal’s Interior Ministry has since refused the request.

Back in the campaign

A few weeks later, Senegal's Supreme Court ruled on his ineligibility, and his party had to choose another candidate, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, to defy President Sall in the upcoming presidential election.

Pastef insisted that not all legal options had been exhausted to clear Sonko's name, encouraging the opposition to work with Diomaye Faye in the meantime.

His spokesperson, El Malick Ndiaye confirmed Sonko want to carry on running.

Sonko now has only a few days to rejoin the presidential race: he need to present formally his candidacy and obtain the necessary sponsorships before 26 December.

 

Burkina Faso's filmmaker Apolline Traoré on her film 'Sira'

 

'SIRA': My interview with Burkina Faso's filmmaker Apolline Traoré, for Afrika Eye - Bristol

Burkinabé filmmaker Apolline Traoré's feature "Sira" tells the story of a young woman abducted by jihadists who draws on her wits and courage to survive.

Offering a rare insight into the lives of thousands living with Islamist violence in the Sahel, the film has already won prizes at home and abroad – and is now in the running for the 2024 Academy Awards.

I spoke to Apolline in November, via Zoom, to discuss the making of such a great film, her own journey, and her vision of the Sahel region, as my contribution to the Bristol-based film festival Afrika Eye, created by Annie Menter.

Gaza: Destruction "Worse Than In WWII Germany"

Gaza Destruction Worse Than In WWII Germany: EU's Borrell

By AFP - Agence France Presse

December 11, 2023 

The situation in Gaza is "catastrophic, apocalyptic", with destruction proportionally "even greater" than that which Germany experienced in World War II, the EU's top diplomat Josep Borrell said Monday.

Israel's military response to Hamas's 7 October attacks has resulted in "an incredible number of civilian casualties", Borrell said after chairing a meeting of EU foreign ministers.

He said the EU was also "alarmed by the violence in the West Bank by extremist settlers" and condemned the Israeli government's decision to approve 1,700 more housing units in Jerusalem, in what Brussels considers a violation of international law.

Hamas triggered the conflict with the deadliest-ever attack on Israel on October 7, in which it killed some 1,200 people, according to Israeli figures, and took around 240 hostages.

Israel has responded with a relentless military offensive that has reduced much of Gaza to rubble and killed at least 17,997 people, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

While noting that Hamas's bloody attacks had cemented its place on the EU's list of terrorist organisations, Borrell made clear he saw Israel's military operation as disproportionate in terms of civilian deaths and damage to civilian property and infrastructure.

"The human suffering constitutes an unprecedented challenge to the international community," Borrell said.

"Civilian casualties are between 60 and 70 percent of the overall deaths," based on Gaza health ministry figures, and "85 percent of the population is internally displaced".

"The destruction of buildings in Gaza... is more or less or even greater than the destruction suffered by the German cities during the Second World War," taken proportionally, Borrell said.

He said he had presented a discussion paper to the EU foreign ministers looking at "imposing sanctions against extremist settlers in West Bank" who have stepped up attacks against Palestinian residents.

Borrell said he would soon make that a formal proposal, based on an initiative taken by the United States, which last week said it would refuse visas to extremist Israeli settlers.

He acknowledged, however, that there was as yet no unanimity among the 27 EU governments on the issue.

  © Agence France-Presse

SUDAN UPDATE

 

#SUDAN UPDATE - East African bloc IGAD says it has secured a commitment from warring parties to implement a ceasefire and hold a political dialogue to try to end the war.

On the ground, the International Committee of the Red Cross - ICRC decried a deliberate attack on one of its humanitarian convoys in Khartoum on Sunday. 

The UN says it is now lacking fund, and the victims of the war are on the verge of a catastrophe.

Read here:

https://rfi.my/AAhi.X

Sudan's military rivals agree to meet to discuss possible ceasefire

East African bloc IGAD has been involved in efforts to mediate over the war in Sudan for months, and says it has secured a commitment from warring parties to implement a ceasefire and to hold a political dialogue aimed at resolving the conflict. On the ground the UN is now lacking fund, and the victims of the war are on the verge of a catastrophe.

At talks on Saturday in Djibouti with the members of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), Sudan's army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan agreed to a one-on-one meeting with RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, an IGAD statement said.

In a phone call, Dagalo, widely known as Hemedti, also agreed to the ceasefire proposal and a meeting with Burhan, the statement added.

Both Hemedti and Burhan "accepted the principle of meeting within 15 days in order to pave the way for a series of confidence-building measures between the two parties that could lead to the launch of a political process," said Alexis Mohammed, adviser to Djibouti's president.

Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have been locked since mid-April in a conflict that has devastated the capital Khartoum and triggered waves of ethnic killings in Darfur despite several diplomatic efforts to halt the fighting.

• UN warns that Sudan faces 'full-scale civil war'

Their power struggle has killed more than 12,190 people, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED).

The United States said last week that Sudan's rival forces have both committed war crimes in their brutal conflict, accusing the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity, following the European Union.

• EU 'appalled' by reports of 1,000 killed in Darfur, fearing ethnic cleansing

Meanwhile, on the ground, eyewitnesses reported blasts at the major Al-Jaili oil refinery on the outskirts of Khartoum on Sunday.

Both sides said there had been casualties when a Red Cross convoy came under fire in the capital.

Humanitarian disaster in a "forgotten war"

At the same time, the United Nations said war-torn Sudan faces 'catastrophe' as their funds run short.

The UN has only been able to reach a fraction of the nearly 25 million people needing aid, the head of the UN's humanitarian response in the country says.

But assistance to even those four million could soon stop if the chronic lack of funding continues, Clementine Nkweta-Salami said on Sunday.

The UN's humanitarian coordinator for Sudan said the situation is "catastrophic" and aid workers have called it the "forgotten war".

There are also "seven million people displaced in Sudan, which is the highest displacement situation globally," said Nkweta-Salami.

Yet despite the scale of the crisis, the humanitarian response remains woefully underfunded.

"We've received only 38.6 percent" of the total $2.6 billion needed for 2023, Nkweta-Salami said.

"There will come a time when even if we have (physical) access, we will not have the resources to enable us to channel the relevant assistance that we need to do," she warned.

Call for peace

Sudan's tragedy has been overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza from October, and then saw nearly all aid groups disappear. 

One of a handful of organisations still providing vital aid across Sudan is the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).

"I have never, in all my years, seen such a horrific mega-catastrophe with so little attention or resources to reach people in their hour of greatest need," said NRC's secretary general, Jan Egeland.   

"Millions are trapped in the crossfire, in ethnic violence, in bombardments, and we are simply not there."

The gaps, Egeland and Nkweta-Salami agree, are huge.

According to the UN representative, "we are facing a population that is about 24.7 million people in need of humanitarian assistance," or more than one in two Sudanese.

Only recently was the UN able to regain limited access through Chad into areas of Darfur, Sudan's vast western region where the UN has warned of a repeat of violence that occurred there in the early 2000s.

• UN says 'horrible suffering' in Sudan growing as more people displaced

In recent weeks, pro-army demonstrators and high-ranking officials loyal to Burhan have accused the United Arab Emirates of supporting the RSF, which controls much of the country's lucrative gold mines.

On Sunday the official news agency SUNA reported that Sudan's foreign ministry declared 15 UAE diplomats persona non grata, demanding they leave Sudan "within 48 hours."

"We need the two parties to arrive at a ceasefire," Nkweta-Salami said. "We need eventually a cessation of hostilities. The people of Sudan need peace."

 (with newswires and RFI)