Today marks a turning-point date in the course of Yemen's 2011 uprising. 'The Friday of Dignity' was a day when peaceful protesters endured one of the first violent crackdowns, while they marched after praying the Friday prayers in Sana'a. At least 45 protesters were killed—most of them university students and three of them children— and 200 protesters were wounded.I used to live one block away from what's got to be known later as Change Square in Sana'a and I've covered and written about the attack during the attack on my twitter and I followed the anniversaries of the date over the coming years. Midst the ravaging war in Yemen, no protest to commemorate the date was reported today. Nonetheless, I list below posts I wrote back to highlight the importance of the date and commemorate the martyrs.
-March 30, 2011:
Interview with a young protester, a survivor from the Friday of Dignity massacre:
Aug 2013 - President Barack Obama and Yemen's president, Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi after speaking to the media in the Oval Office of the White House. Photo courtesy/AP
*As US President-elect Donald J. Trump's win takes over the news, current US President Barack Obama's destructive legacy in Yemen must not go unnoticed.
The Obama administration's foreign policy toward Yemen has been damaging and has largely contributed to the ongoing frenzied blood spill in the country. His policies inflicted devastating chaos on many levels in Yemen, for which the country is paying a heavy price.
In fact, Obama's record in Yemen is so dismal it even trumps his predecessor, Bush.
A failing 'War on Terror'
When Obama took office in 2009, analysts were hopeful that a realist American president would have a better vision for considering Yemen's local context, and fixing Bush's myriad failures in the global "War on Terror" in Yemen.
Bush's doctrine was characterised by his blind idealism in promoting democracy and security, and a dismissal of efforts to address the main drivers of violent extremism in Yemen. His pragmatic alliance with ousted Yemeni president, Ali Abdullah Saleh and his corrupt regime was a major failure in US policy in Yemen.
While Yemen was sliding down the ranks of the UN's Human Development Index, Saleh exploited that alliance to serve his own military interest, in the name of fighting terrorism.
In 2001, Bush's administration presented Saleh with an aid package worth up to $400 million, as part of US counter-terrorism operations, without investigating how Saleh's rule contributed to insurgents in Yemen. Bush's policies failed to comprehend Saleh's deceit in using the anti-terrorism card over advancing the social and economic growth of the country.
Former President Ali Abdullah Saleh and President George W. Bush meet in the Oval Office in 2001.
Obama's foreign policy in Yemen was in many ways an extension of Bush's. Despite his realism, it would have even more devastating consequences. Not only did Obama's approach pursue Bush's anti-terrorism strategy, he also made sure to expand the militarization strategy.
Obama's policy - like Bush's - perceived Yemen as a land of terrorism, neglecting warning calls from the country's civil society and grassroots organisations that Yemen was increasingly becoming a land of poverty, illiteracy and poor governance. This, they warned, represented the perfect conditions for terrorist groups to thrive and recruit.
Nonetheless, Obama too failed to comprehend Saleh's deceit and manipulation through the language of anti-terrorism.
Consequently, under Obama, the US doubled its security support to Yemen, to more than $150 million in 2010, including a proposed $45 million for equipping and training Yemeni special anti-terrorism forces. In spite of that, Obama's approach to Saleh's "War on Terror" was ineffective, with no real gains; it simply allowed Saleh to milk more military aid for no great significant purpose. Recent global terrorist attacks with links to Yemen are just a few examples to demonstrate that.
Worse than Bush
Part of Obama's extension of Bush's policy was the stepped up drone strikes campaign in Yemen. Under Obama, there has been a hike in drone strikes in Yemen and other countries, at nearly nine times more than the level authorised by Bush.
These drone strikes have killed more civilians than combatants - leading to growing anti-American sentiment. While clearly such a military strategy has become counter-productive, Obama's creativity reached its peak with his secret "kill-list" which included names in Yemen. Those in the worst hit areas understand that the real "terrorism" is carried out by US military jets that have been colonising Yemen's skies and terrorising innocent civilians.
The 2011 uprising and Obama
When the 2011 uprising broke out, Obama's US policy in Yemen faced a crisis: How would the US handle losing a close ally in the War on Terror, in Saleh? It was time for Obama's realism to find new priorities in US policy in Yemen.
In parallel to his cautious endorsement of the protests, he was obsessed with silencing critical reporting of the flaws in his counter-terrorism drone strikes in Yemen. He intervened to keep a Yemeni journalist in jail, who revealed the drone strike crimes against women and children. This has exposed Obama's hypocrisy in supporting press freedom around the globe, but not in Yemen.
As the protests grew, the Obama administration had another setback in Yemen. During the 2011 uprising, Obama's foreign policy in Yemen was ill-made and was key in shaping an ill-formed model for a failing political transition.
He endorsed a power-transfer deal to Saleh, made by the Gulf Cooperation Council that guaranteed impunity to a dictatorship. This was a recipe for disaster, confirmed by the bloodbath we see in Yemen today. Nonetheless, the administration attempted to boast about their success in forging the "Yemen-model" of US counter-terrorism policy.
Obama at war in Yemen
Not long after the myth of the Yemen-model, the war broke out, pointing to the failures of US policy in Yemen. Today, Obama must be held responsible for leading the country to where it is today. He has contributed to the reckless expansion and militarization of Saleh's forces, and the co-enabling of killing through its support for the Saudi-led coalition.
Despite the calls of human rights groups to independently investigate war crimes committed in Yemen, Obama has continued to authorise arms sales to Saudi Arabia. The most outrageous truth, though, is that under Obama US-made and internationally banned cluster bombs were used by US ally, Saudi Arabia, in Yemen against civilian areas.
And yet, Obama has failed to even rhetorically address this. As remnants of bombs dropped above Yemenis' heads read made by the US, Yemenis now more than ever, believe Saudi Arabia's war is an American one, too. The slaughter of Yemeni civilians with cluster bombs might well be Obama's bloodiest legacy in Yemen.
Obama's dismal failure in Yemen reflects the failure of a realist assessment of national interests. Would Trump provide a glimmer of hope in Yemen? That remains to be seen. In the meantime, Yemenis see Obama as worse than any other American president.
Yemeni film director, Khadija al-Salami. Photo courtesy: L'Express.
For the first time in the country's history, Yemen has entered a film into the Academy Awards competition in the category of best foreign language film.
It was announced last week that the dramatic feature film, I Am Nojoom: Age 10 And Divorced, would be among 85 entries vying for the Oscar.
"I was happy to hear the news, even though I have no expectations whatsoever," director Khadija al-Salami told Al Jazeera over the phone from Canada, where she was promoting the film.
"It is a tough competition, but let's hope this news at least gives war-torn Yemen some positivity and encourages young Yemeni filmmakers to dream big."
Shot in 2013, prior to the ongoing war in Yemen, and released in 2014, I Am Nojoom is Salami's debut drama feature film. She has previously made 25 documentaries about Yemen, with a heavy focus on women's issues.
Salami both wrote and directed the film, inspired by her own personal experience of being forced into an arranged marriage at the age of 11 - which led her to attempt suicide, and ended in divorce - and by the story of Yemen's youngest divorcee, Nujood Ali.
'I Am Nojoom' film trailer.
"My belief in the importance of empowering our women and enforcing a law that criminalises this practice is what drove me to do this film," said Salami, whose movie has so far earned 18 international awards.
"But mainly, it was important for me to tell a story based on a mix of my own story, Nujood's story and many other girls' stories suffering from this practice. And as I am touring around the world releasing the movie, my initial understanding of how child marriage is a global problem is increasingly being confirmed."
The latest official statistics suggest that more than 50 percent of Yemeni girls are married before the age of 18. There is no law in the country banning the practice - a problem that reaches far beyond Yemen's borders: "Globally, there are around 15 million female children being married every year," Salami noted. "The film speaks to many girls across the world."
Ironically, I Am Nojoom is making global headlines at a time when Yemen's cinema scene has largely faded.
The country once boasted a vibrant cinematic culture, having gone through many phases since the early 1900s. In 1910, moviegoers in Yemen flocked to mobile cinema shows in Aden, and in the ensuing years, Bollywood filmswere widely exhibited in the city's cinema halls.
During the 1970s, the film scene gained strength, with around 50 cinema halls emerging in Aden, including Radio Cinema, Popular Cinema and Cinema Hurricane. In Sanaa, severalcinema halls showcased both Arab and Western films.
"In the mid '70s, north Yemen's late president, Ibrahim al-Hamdi, had a vision for the art scene to develop - part of his nation-building strategy," Yemeni art critic Ahlam Mohammed told Al Jazeera.
Yemen's cinematic scene peaked after the reunification of northern and southern Yemen in 1990. In the years that followed, several cinema halls opened in major cities, showing foreign and locally made films.
"Despite the early '90s being marked by several conflicts, the unification contributed [to] the film culture of both north and south Yemen in the coming years," Mohammed said, noting that Yemen's culture ministry provided support to local Yemeni filmmakers - particularly to those working on films with an "anti-terrorism" message.
But the growth did not last long. Economic problems bumped the film industry to the bottom of the government's priority list, while the rise of conservative forces further curbed cinematic growth.
"When we, the actors and filmmakers, sought the state's support, government officials used to state clearly that it was not the right time to support films, as they had more important issues to deal with," actor Adnan Alkhadher, a cast member in I Am Nojoom, told Al Jazeera. "We had terrible support in funding cinema, whether in the north or the south."
Amid this backdrop, the outbreak of Yemen's 2011 uprising offered a sign of hope for filmmakers.
Yemeni filmmaker, Sara Ishaq. Photo courtesy: Oscars.
"The uprising represented a moment of courage for many Yemeni filmmakers and a time when their voices were validated, as Yemen received great attention during the Arab Spring," said Yemeni filmmaker Sara Ishaq. "I was and still am impressed by the rise of art and film in Yemen in the wake of the uprising."
Ishaq directed the first Yemeni film to be nominated for an Oscar, the documentary Karama Has No Walls (2012), which was set during the uprising.
Salami, meanwhile, says that she has made efforts to ensure that residents of war-torn Yemen would be able to see her film, arranging screenings in local forums and community centres.
I Am Nojoom has faced somecriticism for portraying stereotypes about Yemen and "exploiting" the issue of child marriages in an effort to please a Western audience - accusations that Salami vehemently rejects.
"This debate is not only another reminder of why, until today, Yemen has no law against child marriage - but it also reflects the status of women's rights in Yemeni society," she said.
As she begins thinking about her next project - a love story that she hopes to shoot inside Yemen once the war comes to an end - Salami says that she is optimistic about the future.
"Nothing is impossible," she said. "If you put your heart into something, the sky is your limit."
*Visualization is an integral part of how we perceive the world, so visual images about Yemen do construct how Yemen is perceived. That’s the case, as well, in how Yemenis perceive each other. Having said that, I tackle Yemen and Image Politics on two levels. One, how western media use images to portray Yemen? Second, how Yemenis use images to narrate stories about each other. Between the misleading political image and misogynic image, images from Yemen are confusing.
Yemen’s Image in Western Media
It is difficult to tell when exactly the relationship between the western media and the Old Sana’a’s beautiful architecture began. That relationship was contagious that it was duplicated in the Arab media. No doubt that the Old Sana’a’s dazzling architecture is difficult to ignore; but as I just mentioned, it’s called the “Old” Sana’a; meaning that there is a new one. To box all Yemen, with all its cities and diversity, in a bunch of images from the Old Sana’a is not only doing injustice to the rest of Yemen’s cities and their beauty, but it also gives a flawed impression that Yemen is just the Old Sana’a. And when western media wants to dig deeper into Yemenis’ lives, it boxes their lives in limited topics about weapons, tribal culture and Qat, and other easy and repeated topics.
The image of an Arab has always been demeaned in Western media; we are told that we, Arabs are barbarians, terrorists and uncivilised. Yemen falls into that stereotyped image which perhaps can be summarised in the “Salmon Fishing in -the- Yemen” movie. The movie demonstrates to be one of the best movies that wrongly portray Yemen. It’s based on the novel with the same title for a novelist that has never been to Yemen. The movie crew, including the actors and the actresses never been to Yemen, as well. The movie was never shot in Yemen. How can we have a movie depicting a country without touching its ground for real is something I don’t understand!
Images’ Use among Yemenis
As movies are discussed, here is a Yemeni movie that’s one of the best movies that genuinely used images to relate to Yemenis. “I am Nojoom, Age 10 and Divorced” by the Yemeni filmmaker, Khadija al-Salami is a movie inspired by the book “I Am Nujood, Aged 10 and Divorced” which was about the real story of the Yemeni child Nujood who is believed to be the first Yemeni child to get divorced in Yemen. The movie was shot in Yemen and following its release has won several international awards. The movie is genuine and honest; its message is to raise awareness about the child marriage tragedy in Yemen. Unfortunately, the movie has not been shown in Yemen, due to the absence of established cinema and, most importantly, the consecutive occurrence of armed conflicts and violence, since the release date of the movie in 2014. This made politics dominate any intellectual and cultural debate in the country.
Media in Yemen is obsessed by a political debate that mainly revolves around today’s political leaders. For instance, topics that dominate media in Yemen are the states of the ousted president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, president, Abdurabou Mansour Hadi, and Houthis’ leader, Abdelmalik al Houthi. Images about this or that political leader represent a mirror in which Yemenis see through each other. Polarisation is extreme and any middle ground is inevitably absent.
In this regard, one of the issues that concerned me the most is the issue of Misogyny and how images are used in Yemen’s political debate. Throughout the past 5 years, since the beginning of Yemen’s 2011 uprising, and along the way with my blogging experience, I found one pattern of a concept being repeated whenever images are used and meant to demean a political leader. That is, whenever any political camp wants to insult another political camp, the easiest thing to do is to portray him as a woman. For example, when ousted president Saleh is meant to be demeaned, he’s being portrayed with full make-up and jewellery so he can supposedly look like a woman. In that way, there is an association being drawn between a demeaned status for men and being a female; an expression of an insult is channelled by describing the other as a female.
I collected the following images over the past five years. As the political phases in Yemen develop, Yemen’s social media users seemed busy designing and posting these images - which sometimes found their way to the streets’ protests as posters.
Speaking of protests, the world was impressed in 2011 by Yemeni women’s participation. Little did they know that those women were to a large extent affiliated to the second largest political party, the Muslim-brotherhood version in Yemen, Al-Islah party. Their participation was only out a decorative move. However, the women who took the streets independently, challenging ousted president Saleh’s regime and Patriarchy -which obliges a gender-based segregation between the two sexes in public space- did not receive the same worldwide attention; even worse, they were doomed to be hit by the walls of Patriarchy. These women’s rebellion provoked Yemeni men. At the beginning of Yemen’s 2011 uprising, a group of men and women tried to hold a gender-mixed protest, but the protest was not only fated to be dispersed but also to be violently attacked. In particular, the women had the biggest share of humiliation and assault.
The perception that women are inferior exists in Yemen; as much as, it exists in the Arab world. Women are believed to be “3awrah“. At the start of the Arab Spring, a group of Arab feminists created a page on Facebook that calls for the uprising of women in the Arab world. People rushed to the page with their posts, protesting against how females are treated in the Arab world; as 2nd class citizens, if not even worse. I was struck by this post from Yemen, which dismays any claim that says women in Yemen are not perceived as inferior.
(I am Shima’a Al-Ahdel with the Uprising of women in the Arab world. My brother is ashamed to say my name and my mother’s name.)
The problem of insulting a male political leader by describing him as a female is something that a Yemeni man won’t understand unless we reverse the meaning. I once had a discussion with a Yemeni male friend who used to like using sexy women images on his facebook to tease and provoke the rival political camp. “I don’t mean to insult women,” he told me, “I just want to tease my enemies.” I said, have you ever seen a woman using images of sexy men to insult her enemies?” My friend stopped to do such moves after he understood my point.
The issue of “Misogyny” and media is a global problem and it doesn’t only exist in Yemen, but it is rarely discussed in the Arab and Yemeni media. We often condemn how western media portray us, Arabs; but we don’t condemn how our media portray our women. And here, Yemeni media concerns me the most.
Since the beginning of Yemen’s 2011 uprising and one conflict after another has been spinning the country around -which made life or death matters prioritised in whatever discussion being brought up about this impoverished country. Amidst all the bloodshed, there is no space for free and refreshing discussion. For instance, I wrote this article while bearing in mind two things: that this topic is refreshing to me from the perspective of media theories and practices, and gender theories. The second thing: I know that there is a so-called “this is not the right time to talk about this” camp awaiting me to undermine the importance of this topic. My desire to navigate an intellectual topic about the stereotyped image about Yemen in media won over my anxiety from the so-called “this is not the right time to talk about this” camp. And that is how I managed to write the article.
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*This article was originally published on Raseef22.com in Arabic, 5th July 2016.
