Mitt Romney is now the laughing stock of East Jerusalem. This morning when I bought minutes for my telephone, a clerk inputted them as he was chatting to a fellow customer. Then he looked at me and said, “I know– you think we are not culturally modified to do multitasking.” Another shopkeeper asked me if I had seen “His Excellency on his tour.”
I must point out another aspect of Romney’s insult. In his speech last Sunday here, he went out of his way to acknowledge the Jewish fast on the holiday of Tisha B’av.
But he said not a word about Ramadan.
This month Ramadan and its daily fasts dominate the public life of Palestinian Jerusalem. The rhythms of Ramadan are all around me: The cannon shot that announces the end of the fast each day; the ritual breaking of the fast, visible in every shop and on all the sidewalks as people cluster to eat or hold out bottles of water to one another; the holiday mood that goes on late into the night, with children staying up half the night making noise outside my hotel window in the Via Dolorosa because they don’t want to sleep through the morning meal… I am particularly struck by the degree to which everyone observes the fast, at least in public, even as the shops prepare the Ramadan pancakes and women fill bags with them. I make it a point not to eat in front of these people out of respect for their piety.
No matter what you think of religion, if you are a humanist, you have to admire Ramadan as the expression of a major civilization that organizes people’s lives in humble and at times beautiful ritual. And even if Romney was speaking to Israelis– well, many Israelis are also Muslims. Obama offers a statement about Ramadan every year.
When I pointed Romney’s omission out to the multitasking clerk today, he said with bitterness, “It was a speech made for an exclusively Jewish audience. If he had mentioned Ramadan, it would have hurt him.”
Obviously there is some truth in that statement. The visit was coordinated by the neoconservative propagandist Dan Senor, who was thankfully called out for his racism by NPR yesterday. Senor surely helped craft Romney’s foolish comments, and Senor could care less about Islamic culture.
Compare Romney’s omission with President Obama’s statement on Ramadan two weeks ago. An excerpt that captures some of my feeling here in Jerusalem, and that ties the holiday into human rights and politics:
For Muslims, Ramadan is a time of fasting, prayer, and reflection; a time of joy and celebration. It’s a time to cherish family, friends, and neighbors, and to help those in need.
This year, Ramadan holds special meaning for those citizens in the Middle East and North Africa who are courageously achieving democracy and self-determination and for those who are still struggling to achieve their universal rights. The United States continues to stand with those who seek the chance to decide their own destiny, to live free from fear and violence, and to practice their faith freely. Here in the United States, Ramadan reminds us that Islam is part of the fabric of our Nation…
Romney doesn’t mention Ramadan; the Klan doesn’t celebrate Juneteenth. Haters gotta hate. Bigots gotta bigot.
Yes, good little article, Phil. Keep on giving us this stuff while you are there.
Most of here on your blog know Mitt’s mouth strings were being pulled by Bibi and Sheldon Adelson. Mitt’s way too wooden for this not to show clearly. Of course Mitt likely never heard of Mondoweiss. He has his selected audience, who heard him here from way over there, while most of America doesn’t even know he’s been campaigning for POTUS in a foreign state.
Back here, wouldn’t it be nice if our big three cable TV news-entertainment shows invited Walt on to discuss the election campaign, and posted up his 10 questions for Mitt on the screen: http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/07/25/top_ten_questions_about_romneys_foreign_policy
Obama’s remarks are commendable. But when are they not? His positions are nuanced, but what difference does that make? He’s all avowal but not action. As Bromwich writes this morning:
“Let us recall some of the actions. In response to the onslaught on Gaza in December-January 2008-2009, in which 1,300 Palestinians were killed and 13 Israelis, Obama observed a silence which he has never broken. When, in November 2010, Netanyahu balked at the proposal of a 90-day partial extension of the freeze on West Bank settlement expansion, Obama offered twenty F-35 fighter jets if he would change his mind; Netanyahu refused, and Obama gave him the jets anyway. Only a week ago, the president donated another $70 million, on top of U.S. assistance already given, to build up the Israeli “Iron Dome” defense against rockets. ”
Let us also remember that Obama came into office offering a new policy in the middle east and immediately initiated cyberwar, conspired to murder Iranian scientists, rejected a peace initiative to end the nuclear impasse, and has actively demonized that country in order to stoke the winds of war.
Romney’s rhetoric is offensive and crude, but Obama’s actions do not invite confidence.
Ramadan Kareem- to all who observe Ramadan. (Did I spell that right?)
The combination of fasting and celebration is strange to a Jew whose fast days are pretty somber all told. (True, the meaning of Yom Kippur is supposed to be forgiveness and if your sins are forgiven you should rejoice, but the emphasis is on repentance and it seems pretty somber.)
I received a thrill when I first recognized the word Ramadan in Arabic script. It is not spelled with a dalet (or dal or da, the equivalent of the Hebrew dalet), but with the equivalent of the Hebrew tzadi with a dot on top making it the equivalent of the “d”, although specialists might give it a special twist of the tongue to turn it into something a bit different than a “d”.
I am sure that the fact that Ramadan is celebrated in different seasons is a noteworthy feature. (I imagine a writer: Ramadan that year was in summer or Ramadan that year was in the winter.) The Muslim calendar has 12 months in it of 29 and a half days or 354 days. Thus every year Ramadan is celebrated 11 days earlier on the solar calendar. Thus it takes approximately 33 years to return to approximately the same spot on the solar calendar. On the Jewish calendar we add a leap month, 7 times in a 19 year cycle, so as to keep our holidays in the rhythm of the seasons. The Palestinian Israeli writer, Sayed Kashua, wrote in Haaretz once that Islam should wait until Ramadan reaches the winter months and then change their calendar to reflect the solar calendar with the type of leap months that Judaism has in its calendar. But religions do not change so easily and I’m sure that Kashua was “joking”.
The similarities between Islam and Judaism (monotheism and fast days) would make cooperation easier, one would think, but it doesn’t work that way. The work towards cooperation is difficult. Meanwhile some are dedicated to the next war and fighting the Zionists and the time and spirit for cooperation apparently is supposed to wait until after the next big bloodletting.
(I am mostly passive- communicating my will for cooperation with body language and glances, hardly enough to change the world.)
Oh yes, and while George Romney was brainwashed, Mitt Romney does not seem to have a brain to wash, although maybe it’s his heart (or courage) that is lacking.
Tisha B’Av is not a “holiday”.