By Justin Dorman
Impunity Watch Reporters, Middle East

The latest viral fad that has dominated YouTube in the United States has been the dance videos made to DJ Baauer’s hit, the “Harlem Shake.” The video begins with one person dancing to a combination of hip-hop, house, and crunk music known as trap music, before it cuts to a group of people in costume dancing at the same location. The internet sensation has now taken the Middle East by storm.

While the essence of the videos are entertainment, the viral video has found a niche in the Arab protest movements. Videos have arisen all around the Middle East like Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, but the biggest impacts have been felt in Syria, Tunisia, and Egypt.

In Tunisia, students brawled last week with Salafi extremists outside the Bourguiba Language Institute in Tunis. The Salafi are ultraconservative and tried to stop the shooting of a student made video which they found to be indecent. One of the Salafis held a firebomb, but he was surrounded by students and teachers who kept him from using it. His main concern was that his fellow Muslim brothers were dying in Palestine, and all these students wanted to do was dance.

Shortly after, a younger group of Tunisians from the Père Blanc school filmed their own video without any protest. Upon receiving word of its completion, however, the Tunisian Minister of Education, Abdul Latif Obaid, ordered a criminal investigation of the matter. The Minister who is viewed as more of a moderate leftist pulled this maneuver in order to solidify his cabinet position when the ruling conservative Ennahda Party makes its new choices. This investigation prompted organized protests by students outside the of the Ministry of Education building. These protesters were greeted with tear gas.

In Egypt, approximately seventy demonstrators performed the popular dance just outside the headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood is the ultraconservative Islamist party that boasts Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. Besides for performing the “Harlem Shake,” the group of demonstrators chanted anti-government slogans. The group was specifically reacting to last week’s arrest of four pharmaceutical students who were detained for making their own “Harlem Shake” video. The arrested individuals were dancing in just their underwear, which is in violation of their public decency laws.

While the “Harlem Shake” has caused conflict in the two previously mentioned countries, its greatest unifying effect has taken place in Syria. There, a group of adolescents staged a scene that appears to be a fight between Assad loyalists and the Free Syrian Army. Before long, the fight busts out into a dance party with the “Harlem Shake” playing in the background. Posters can be seen in the video that read, “Stop the Violence” and “Do the Harlem Shake.”

For further information, please see:

France 24 – ‘Harlem Shake’ Rocks Deeply-Divided Arab World – 1 March 2013

New York Times – ‘Harlem Shake’ Protests in Tunisia and Egypt – 28 February 2013

The Times of Israel – ‘Harlem Shake’ Stirs up North Africa – 28 February 2013

New York Times – Arab Spring Blues? – 27 February 2013

By Justin Dorman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

TEHRAN, Iran – A couple of weeks ago, at the 63rd annual Berlin International Film Festival, also known as the Berlinale, Jafar Panahi was awarded the Silver Bear for Best Script for his film, Closed Courtain. Iranian authorities were far from proud of their fellow Iranian’s success, and seized the passports of co-director/actor Kambuzia Partovi and actress Maryam Moghadam. The move was made to ensure that those affiliated with the film could not promote it internationally.

Javad Shamaghdari, the head of Iran’s ministry of culture’s cinema and film department was furious with the Berlinale for screening and awarding the film. “We have protested to the Berlin film festival. Its officials should amend their behavior because in cultural and cinematic exchange, this is not correct,” said Shamaghdari. “Everyone knows that a license is needed to make films in our country and send them abroad.” 

In December 2010, Panahi was sanctioned with a twenty year ban from making films. He was also barred from giving interviews, and was given a six year jail sentence. Nevertheless, in 2011, his work, “This Is Not a Film,” reached Cannes and was well received. Much of that video, filmed largely on his cell phone, tells the day-in-the-life account of Panahi while on house arrest.

His most recent work, Closed Curtain, which is also known as Padré, is a fictional drama that is a not so subtle critique of Iranian authorities’ repression of Iranian artists, which mirrors much of Panahi’s own situation. The tale focuses on individuals who are hiding at a remote beachfront villa, trying to evade the authorities. This is Panahi’s villa by the Caspian Sea where he is under house arrest.

Parvoti, who co-directs the film, also plays a screenwriter who is hiding from the authorities at  the villa. He blacks out the windows and attempts to write when Melika, played by Maryam Moghadam finds him. She claims to be a mere girl also on the run from the police, however, the nature of her prying questions about Parvoti’s hiding and screenwriting indicate that she may represent the spirit of freedom. Shortly after it is revealed that Parvoti and Melika are just on the set of a film which Pahini is shooting, however, characters from the film continually haunt Pahini. The film goes on to artistically suggest that Pahini is Parvoti.

The next appearance the film will make will be at the Hong Kong film festival. None of the major participants in the film will be allowed to leave Iran to promote it.

Panahi is also well known for directing The White Balloon, Crimson Gold, and Offside. Jafar Panahi, along with Nasrin Sotoudeh,  were co-winners of the prestigious 2012 Sakharov Prize, which is the top award given for freedom of thought.

For further information, please see:

Blouin Art Info – Iran Seizes Passports of Jafar Panahi’s “Closed Curtain” Collaborators – 28 February 2013

Film Society Lincoln Center – “Closed Curtain” Filmmakers Banned From Leaving Iran – 28 February 2013

Guardian – Jafar Panahi’s Closed Curtain Collaborators Grounded in Iran – 28 February 2013

Radio Zamaneh – Collaborators of Panahi Film Banned From Travel – 28 February 2013

By Ali Al-Bassam
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

DOHA, Qatar — Last Monday the Qatari Court of Appeals ruled to reduce the life sentence of poet Muhammed Rashid al-Ajami, who goes by the name ibn al-Dheeb in his poetry, to fifteen years.

Originally, al-Ajami was sentenced to life last November for composing and reading out a poem which allegedly incited “the overthrow of the ruling system.”  The poem, written in 2010, allegedly criticized the Emir, Sheikh Hamad al-Thani.

Human rights activists however claim that the actual poem that angered authorities was written in 2011, in which al-Ajami wrote about authoritarian rule in the region.  His poem, titled “Tunisian Jasmine,” which al-Ajami recited and later uploaded to the internet in January 2011, expressed support for the uprising that occurred in Tunisia, saying: “We are all Tunisia in the face of the repressive elite.” In the poem, he also denounced “all Arab governments” as “indiscriminate thieves.”  In a clear reference to Qatar, a home to a major U.S. base, al-Ajami wrote “I hope that change would come in countries whose ignorant leaders believe that glory belies in U.S. Forces.”

Dr. Nejib al-Naimi, al-Ajami’s lawyer, said that the five judges were unanimous in their decision, but he plans to take the case to the Court of Cassation, Qatar’s highest court, where a final hearing will be held on al-Ajami’s sentence.  During the case, al-Naimi asserted that “there was no evidence al-Ajami had recited the poem he is being tried for in public,” which was the central claim that the prosecution raised, and that he only read it “at his apartment in Cairo.”

Al-Ajami was said to have been visibly disappointed with the court’s ruling and looked agitated while he was escorted out of the courtroom.  Reuters reported that al-Ajami shouted out “there is no law for this,” as he was led out.  Al-Naimi said that “the appeals court was apparently politicized and does not differ much from the court of first instance.”

Dr. Ali bin Fetais al-Marri, Qatar’s Attorney General, said that he was also “not happy” with the judgment.  “As a chief prosecutor, I look forward to restoring the sentence to a life term.”

Human rights officials, who attended al-Ajami’s appeal, criticized the conviction, saying that “his trial was marred by irregularities, with court sessions held in secret.”

Qatar, whose human rights record has been criticized in the past, insists that the sentence was not an abuse of freedom of speech but is punishable because it is an “illegal call to overthrow political regimes.”  Under Article 130 of the Qatari Penal Code, the charge for inciting to overthrow ruling systems is punishable by death.  Naimi, a former Qatari Justice Minister who also was a member of Saddam Hussein’s defense team, said that according to the charges, his client should have faced a maximum penalty of five years in prison.

The Court of Cassation will make its final ruling on Al-Ajami in 30 days.

For further information, please see:

Al Arabiya — Qatar Cuts Jail Term for Maverick Poet to 15 Years: Lawyer — 25 February 2013

BBC News — Qatari Poet Life Sentence Reduced to 15 Years — 25 February 2013

Gulf News — Qatar Slashes Life Term Against Poet to 15 Years — 25 February 2013

Al Jazeera — Qatari Poet’s Sentence Reduced to 15 Years — 25 February 2013