The Arizona Republic · Phoenix, Arizona · 1 November 2002

CP-2002-024

Palestinian artists protest

Say U.S. values are upside down

The Associated Press, Ramallah

Transcribed from the clipping

“RAMALLAH, West Bank — Palestinian artists built a mock Statue of Liberty atop the rubble in Yasser Arafat’s ruined headquarters Thursday to protest U.S. support of Israel. Israeli forces have repeatedly besieged the Palestinian leader’s Ramallah compound, most recently last month in a response to a Palestinian suicide bombing. Israeli tanks and bulldozers destroyed most of the buildings in the city-block-size compound. Sculptors Nabil Anani and Abdel Hadi Yaish created the 6-foot-high, corrugated cardboard model on the wreckage of a building. Anani said the message was that the United States violates its own values of freedom by backing Israel. ‘Therefore we have turned the torch upside down, to say that American values are also upside down,’ Anani said, adding that ‘the destruction around the statue in Arafat’s compound’ is proof of Israel’s misdeeds. Israel charges that Arafat has done nothing to stop militants from attacking Israel, but Palestinians counter that Israel has decimated Palestinian security forces during its many military raids, leaving them powerless to act. The United States in recent months has shunned Arafat and called for his replacement and has been supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself.”

Context added by this archive

Borrowing the most familiar object in American civic iconography and turning it upside down. The Messenger ran the same dispatch as “Palestinians mock Statue of Liberty,” which is a different claim about what they were doing. Photo credit: Nasser Nasser / Associated Press.

Cite this item

"Palestinian artists protest," The Arizona Republic, 1 November 2002. Covering Palestine archive, CP-2002-024. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-2002-024

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