Coming Together

Jolted to action by the recent wave of hate crimes, American Jews and Muslims are coming together to resist whatever "evil" forces are coming down the pike with the advance of the president elect, Donald Trump. The goal? If Muslims have to register, we will all register. My grandpa, Sol Laskin, taught me that being a good Jew means resisting the forces of hate and opening your heart to "the other." I have always believed this, so much so that there has never been another; we are all one and the same. Vaseem Firdaus, a Muslim, says, "Sitting in an event like this makes you feel it's really not so hopeless. This is food for the soul." May this spirit, as the spirit of my book RONIT AND JAMIL, live on, in the face of the ugly Trumpism, which rears its ugly head daily!

Message From President of City College

Last night, we discovered anti-Semitic graffiti on the CCNY campus. The New York City Police department is investigating this graffiti as a hate crime, and I fully support that approach.

But I also wanted to say how heart sick this kind of thing makes me, and should make us all. There’s not a person on this campus who would not now, or in the recent past, have been vulnerable to something like an attack of this kind. Today it happens that someone wrote something hateful and nasty about Jewish people. Tomorrow it may be African Americans or people who follow the Muslim faith. But on this campus, in this city, nothing should be more obvious than the fact that we are largely and magnificently composed of people who share a history of this kind of vulnerability, and that a huge part of what makes us special, and can make us extraordinary, is the wisdom that comes from understanding and celebrating that history. I know that the vast majority of CCNY students, faculty and staff are as fully committed to this ideal.

Whoever you are, and for whatever reason you decided to write those words: know that you are corroding something precious and irreplaceable. Once this kind of language enters our public spaces or private conversation, it destroys trust, it displaces kindness, and it decimates hope. Everyone belongs on this campus, and in this world—and to suggest otherwise in any way is an act of violence against us all.

At City College, we emphatically condemn hate speech of any kind, directed against any population. In this specific instance, we condemn the anti-Semitic language used in the campus graffiti, and ask each of you to protect and cherish the community we build, each day, on this campus.

Frankenstein

America created a Frankenstein in the name of Donald Trump, and now he is our political leader. Once our country said it is okay to employ hate language; engage in misogyny and LIE--repeatedly, and you can still be out president; it is okay to behave badly and unpresidential, without dignity, grace and not following judicial protocol, we, in essence, created a monster, who will now be our president. Yes, I would have given him a chance, since supposedly democracy brought him to office (he did not win the popular vote, but he lies about that too), but his cabinet choices are appalling. I am sickened that a man like Tom Price can be our Secretary of Health, someone who cares little about the welfare of patients, but cares a lot about money in the hands of doctors (my husband, a doctor, says he and other concerned physicians are saying God help public health); Betsy Vos as Secretary of Education (really--let's do away with public education); Jeff Sessions as attorney general (an outright racist) and Steven Bannon as Chief White House Advisor, a spokesperson for the alt-right, it is evident that a tornado has been let loose on the world, ready to inflict its damage on millions (billions) of people, many of whom are the ones who voted for him.

Do not try to normalize him; he has broken countless rules already, and he is not even president. Just tell me what to do with him? Man created Frankenstein, and then the big question became--now what?

I ask you the same thing. Now what? NOT MY COUNTRY!!!!!!!!!!!

RONIT AND JAMIL Review By Publishers Weekly

Ronit & Jamil
Pamela Laskin. HarperCollins/Tegen, $17.99 (192p) ISBN 978-0-06-245854-4Laskin (Homer the Little Stray Cat) creates a resonant contemporary version of Romeo and Juliet, transporting Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers to modern-day Gaza. Ronit, a Jewish Israeli teen, meets Jamil, a Muslim Palestinian, through their fathers, a pharmacist and doctor. Though both families work together to help the needy in Palestine, they don’t fully trust the other and are particularly wary of their teenage children talking to each other, much less falling in love. Writing in clipped, understated verse, Laskin borrows lines from the original play as she sensitively describes two lovers weaving their way through social, political, and familial hurdles designed to keep them apart (“I hate the parting/ the sorrow of it/ the fear/ tomorrow will never come”). Laskin takes pains to address the similarities between the Palestinian and Israeli households—two back-to-back poems titled “Dinner Chatter” reveal parallel menus (“Ommi’s good food:/ hummus, falafel, baba ghanoush.... Imah’s good food:/ hummus, falafel, baba ghanoush”) and attitudes—starkly juxtaposing them against mutual prejudices. A lyrical message of peace and love radiates from this relevant and hopeful reimagining. Ages 13–up. Agent: Myrsini Stephanides, Carol Mann Agency. (Feb.)
Reviewed on 11/28/2016 | Details & Permalink

RONIT AND JAMIL Review by Booklist

Issue: December 15, 2016

 

Ronit and Jamil.

Laskin, Pamela L. (Author)

Feb 2017. 192 p. HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen, hardcover, $17.99. (9780062458544).

 

Israeli-born Ronit’s abba works as a pharmacist in East Jerusalem; Palestinian Jamil’s abi works as a doctor. But when both fathers decide to drag their willful teens onto the job with them, they impart the same stern words of advice: “Don’t look.” Yet in this modern day Romeo and Juliet revamp, Ronit is quick to admire Jamil’s hazel gaze, and Jamil, too, swiftly swoons for the “girl / with the song in [her] voice.” So begin text message trysts, marketplace meetups, and a love as fierce as it is forbidden. Like its predecessor, Laskin’s tale, a series of mostly page-length poems, unfolds in five acts. Alternating between the perspectives of each teen (and, eventually, their fathers), it illuminates a tense but textured land riddled with rockets, roadblocks, and olive trees. Occasionally saccharine but always accessible, the modern verse—flecked with Arabic, Hebrew, and iconic excerpts from the play itself—will ease romance-hungry teens into both Shakespeare’s original and the challenging context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A welcome nod to hope in the face of the impossible.

— Briana Shemroske

Grief

GRIEF. My country is awash in a terrible storm. My beloved Gulliver, my children's dog, is not feeling well. I saw the movie, "Manchester by the Sea" and all I could do was cry-the whole film. The tears felt good, though. They felt authentic. They were a release during the duration of the film. But then I woke up today and felt sad all over again.

What do you do when the grief just stays there, aside from sit on it? And, I suppose, acknowledge it is a dark period, and the grief just won't quit. What do you do when you are generally an optimistic person, but have lost that sense of hopefulness.

Do you say tomorrow will be better? And what do you do if you really do not feel that?

Myanmar

In the New York Times, Friday December 2, it is reported that Myanmar's leader is faulted for silence in the campaign against the Muslim population.  I completed my book WHY NO BHINE almost a year ago, about this same exact issue. And now, a year later, the same issue rears its ugly head. "Satellite images show villages burned to the ground. Human rights groups relay allegations of rape and the slaughter of children. Thousands of refugees have fled across the border to Bangladesh, while the workers have been prevented from reaching the afflicted."  WHY NO BHINE, the anguish of the Rohingya's, is still a book about a terrible reality. It is an immigrant's story, and--unfortunately--such an ugly reality, to ostracize a population in such a terrible way.

And all I feel is anguish because this is still a reality, and not just in Myanmar, but also in America!