I Was Born in Israel Many Years before I Realized Israel Was Palestine Posted by Gilad Atzmon on February 15, 2015 By the age of 30, I l...
I Was Born in Israel Many Years before I Realized Israel Was Palestine
Posted by Gilad Atzmon on February 15, 2015
By the age of 30, I left Israel and never went back.
By 7sabah
I was born in Israel and it was many years before I realized that Israel was Palestine. I was relatively patriotic. I was looking forward to serving in the army and then I grasped that there was little truth in the Jewish historical narrative. I then gathered that I was living on someone else’s land. At the same time I discovered the saxophone. By the age of 30, I left Israel and never went back.
Q: There is some kind of rebellion in your music; how do you explain this?
A: My music can be very soft and reflective. Sometimes it is very funny and occasionally it is furious. There are too many reasons to be angry. I’m far from happy when I see Israel flattening Gaza. I’m furious when I find out 80 percent of British conservative MPs are ‘friends of Israel.’ I’m angry when I find out the Jewish lobby is pushing America into another World War and instead of becoming violent, sometimes I use music as a channel to express my anger.
Q: What type of music is close to your music in the world?
A: It’s very simple. I’m a jazz artist, a Bebop player. But I’m inspired by near east music whether it is Arabic, Turkish or Greek. I find my own way to fuse the Arabic Mawwal with John Coltrane…
Q: What do you think of the social and political state of Turkey?
A: Listen, I’m really against any forms of interventionism, so I’m definitely not the right person to judge the situation here. I can only talk about my impression, and it’s not an academic observation. I’m touring all over the world and I see a lot of sadness. I see impoverished countries, people with no work, with no prospect of production. I see youngsters who are third generation poor and in their deserted main street they don’t eat their own food anymore, they instead eat McDonalds, Burger King, Coca Cola, Starbucks. And I’m here in Turkey and see a lot of people on the streets, and I see fish from your sea, and tomatoes from your fields, and I see a lot of people working in the restaurants that have Turkish names and don’t even offer a menu in English, and it makes me happy for you. You have managed to maintain your authenticity and culture. This is a great victory. You are so lucky that Islamophobic Europeans didn’t accept you in the EU. Your country is now a superpower.
Q: You were born in Israel but you are against Israeli occupation and its politics. You are living in the West, how do you cope?
A: Let me tell you something and it is crucial. In my entire career, I have never been subject to abuse by the British government, never been subject to abuse by the American government. Although the infamous Alan Dershowitz, who is now implicated in a huge sex scandal with minors, labelled me ‘as the number one enemy of the Jewish people,’ I’ve never been subject to direct abuse by the Israeli government. Even the NSA doesn’t harass me. The only people who stalk me continuously are the Jewish left and the Guardian newspaper. I can say that it’s not a problem but I came to the realization that the biggest enemy of our elementary freedoms are the progressives and I’ll explain why.
In the West and maybe in Turkey as well, we have issues with political correctness. What is political correctness? Political correctness is politics that doesn’t allow political opposition. But this is clearly the definition we associate with dictatorship. But political correctness is far worse than dictatorship. Why? Because in the case of dictatorship you experience an opposition to a regime that is distinct from you, but in the case of political correctness it is you who silence yourself. Political Correctness is a form of self-censorship. The Jewish left and the progressives made us into a collective of impotents. Our task is to move on and to erect our resistance against this cancerous ideology.
Q: Can we separate Judaism from Zionism?
Read More - http://www.veteranstoday.com/2015/02/15/i-was-born-in-israel-many-years-before-i-realized-israel-was-palestine/
Posted by Gilad Atzmon on February 15, 2015
By the age of 30, I left Israel and never went back.
By 7sabah
I was born in Israel and it was many years before I realized that Israel was Palestine. I was relatively patriotic. I was looking forward to serving in the army and then I grasped that there was little truth in the Jewish historical narrative. I then gathered that I was living on someone else’s land. At the same time I discovered the saxophone. By the age of 30, I left Israel and never went back.
Q: There is some kind of rebellion in your music; how do you explain this?
A: My music can be very soft and reflective. Sometimes it is very funny and occasionally it is furious. There are too many reasons to be angry. I’m far from happy when I see Israel flattening Gaza. I’m furious when I find out 80 percent of British conservative MPs are ‘friends of Israel.’ I’m angry when I find out the Jewish lobby is pushing America into another World War and instead of becoming violent, sometimes I use music as a channel to express my anger.
Q: What type of music is close to your music in the world?
A: It’s very simple. I’m a jazz artist, a Bebop player. But I’m inspired by near east music whether it is Arabic, Turkish or Greek. I find my own way to fuse the Arabic Mawwal with John Coltrane…
Q: What do you think of the social and political state of Turkey?
A: Listen, I’m really against any forms of interventionism, so I’m definitely not the right person to judge the situation here. I can only talk about my impression, and it’s not an academic observation. I’m touring all over the world and I see a lot of sadness. I see impoverished countries, people with no work, with no prospect of production. I see youngsters who are third generation poor and in their deserted main street they don’t eat their own food anymore, they instead eat McDonalds, Burger King, Coca Cola, Starbucks. And I’m here in Turkey and see a lot of people on the streets, and I see fish from your sea, and tomatoes from your fields, and I see a lot of people working in the restaurants that have Turkish names and don’t even offer a menu in English, and it makes me happy for you. You have managed to maintain your authenticity and culture. This is a great victory. You are so lucky that Islamophobic Europeans didn’t accept you in the EU. Your country is now a superpower.
Q: You were born in Israel but you are against Israeli occupation and its politics. You are living in the West, how do you cope?
A: Let me tell you something and it is crucial. In my entire career, I have never been subject to abuse by the British government, never been subject to abuse by the American government. Although the infamous Alan Dershowitz, who is now implicated in a huge sex scandal with minors, labelled me ‘as the number one enemy of the Jewish people,’ I’ve never been subject to direct abuse by the Israeli government. Even the NSA doesn’t harass me. The only people who stalk me continuously are the Jewish left and the Guardian newspaper. I can say that it’s not a problem but I came to the realization that the biggest enemy of our elementary freedoms are the progressives and I’ll explain why.
In the West and maybe in Turkey as well, we have issues with political correctness. What is political correctness? Political correctness is politics that doesn’t allow political opposition. But this is clearly the definition we associate with dictatorship. But political correctness is far worse than dictatorship. Why? Because in the case of dictatorship you experience an opposition to a regime that is distinct from you, but in the case of political correctness it is you who silence yourself. Political Correctness is a form of self-censorship. The Jewish left and the progressives made us into a collective of impotents. Our task is to move on and to erect our resistance against this cancerous ideology.
Q: Can we separate Judaism from Zionism?
Read More - http://www.veteranstoday.com/2015/02/15/i-was-born-in-israel-many-years-before-i-realized-israel-was-palestine/
