{"id":8518,"date":"2012-06-19T10:43:24","date_gmt":"2012-06-19T14:43:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/?p=8518"},"modified":"2012-06-19T10:44:24","modified_gmt":"2012-06-19T14:44:24","slug":"alice-walkers-position-on-israeli-boycott","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/alice-walkers-position-on-israeli-boycott\/","title":{"rendered":"Alice Walker’s position on Israeli Boycott"},"content":{"rendered":"

This just in via the Electronic Intifada:<\/p>\n

JTA and Haaretz distort Alice Walker\u2019s position on boycott of Israeli publisher<\/h3>\n
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Submitted by\u00a0Ali Abunimah\u00a0on Tue, 06\/19\/2012 \u2013 11:31<\/div>\n
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\"\"<\/a>Alice Walker speaks in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.<\/span><\/p>\n
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(Lazar Simeonov<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0TEDxRamallah<\/a>)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

A JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency)\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0that was\u00a0carried by\u00a0Haaretz<\/em><\/a>, accuses Pulitzer prize-winning author\u00a0Alice Walker<\/a>\u00a0of refusing to allow her iconic book\u00a0The Color Purple<\/em>to be translated into Hebrew:<\/p>\n

Alice Walker, author of \u201cThe Color Purple,\u201d refused to authorize a Hebrew translation of her prize-winning work, citing what she called Israel\u2019s \u201capartheid state.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a June 9 letter to Yediot Books, Walker said she would not allow the publication of the book into Hebrew because \u201cIsrael is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and also in the Occupied Territories.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

In her letter, posted Sunday by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel on its website, Walker supported the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement and offered her hope that the BDS movement \u201cwill have enough of an impact on Israeli civilian society to change the situation.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But Walker\u2019s 9 June letter to Yediot Books,\u00a0full-text of which is posted on the website of PACBI<\/a>, does not even mention the Hebrew language.<\/p>\n

The JTA\/Haaretz<\/em>\u00a0spin that makes it appear as if Walker were objecting to her book being in Hebrew is a complete distortion.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow is not the time\u201d<\/h2>\n

Nor does the report mention that in making the comparison with apartheid South Africa, Walker said that she would wait until a post-apartheid future before allowing her book to be published by an\u00a0Israeli<\/em>\u00a0publishing house. When it came to having her works published in South Africa, Walker wrote:<\/p>\n

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We decided to wait.\u00a0How happy we all were when the apartheid regime was dismantled and Nelson Mandela became the first president of color of South Africa.<\/p>\n

Only then did we send our beautiful movie!\u00a0And to this day, when I am in South Africa, I can hold my head high and nothing obstructs the love that flows between me and the people of that country.<\/p>\n

Which is to say,\u00a0I would so like knowing my books are read by the people of your country, especially by the young, and by\u00a0the brave Israeli activists (Jewish and Palestinian) for justice and peace I have had the joy of working beside.<\/strong>\u00a0I am hopeful that one day, maybe soon, this may happen.\u00a0But now is not the time.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This just in via the Electronic Intifada: JTA and Haaretz distort Alice Walker\u2019s position on boycott of Israeli publisher Submitted by\u00a0Ali Abunimah\u00a0on Tue, 06\/19\/2012 \u2013 11:31 Alice Walker speaks in the occupied West Bank...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,54,59,79],"tags":[1015],"class_list":["post-8518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-agitprop","category-independent-publishers","category-israel","category-palestine","tag-alice-walker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8518"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8528,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8518\/revisions\/8528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pierrejoris.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}