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Written by kristel
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Friday, 16 May 2008 |
Saturday 17th May, 8pm
Lecture by Reuven Aberjil about the Israeli Black Panther Movement
Reuven Aberjil is one of the founders of the Israeli Black Panthers.
The Israeli Black Panthers were one of the biggest and most important social protest movements to have been created in Israel. They were a movement of second generation immigrants from Middle Eastern and North African countries, referred to in Israel as Mizrahi Jews.
The movement began early in 1971 in the Musrara neighborhood of Jerusalem, a neighborhood whose inhabitants were mostly North African (Arab) Jews. It was established in reaction to the state’s European (Ashkenazi) elite’s discriminating policies and attitude towards Mizrahi Jews. They named themselves after the African American Black Panthers, who were active at the time in the U.S and with whose struggle they identified with.
The Black Panthers felt that this discrimination could be seen most clearly in the different attitude of the Ashkenazi Establishment favoring the new immigrants who had come from the Soviet Union over the more established Mizrahi immigrants. The movement's founders protested "ignorance from the establishment for the hard social problems", and wanted to fight for a different future. The struggle of the Israeli black panthers was one of the key social struggles in Israel. The issues it raised concerning social inequality and the attitude of the state towards Middle Eastern Jews (and non-Jews) are still very relevant today.
The AICafe is open on Tuesday and Saturday night from 7pm. It is located in the Alternative Information Center in Beit Sahour, close to Suq a Shaab square (follow the sign to Jadal Center) We have a small library with both novels and political books and magazines.
Phone number; 02 2775444
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