Alice Walker Kills Hebrew ‘Color Purple’ Deal Citing ‘Apartheid’
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Alice Walker says "the United States and Israel are great terrorist organizations."
Photo Credit: Veesees
Alice Walker, author of “The Color Purple,” refused to authorize a Hebrew translation of her prize-winning work, citing what she called Israel’s “apartheid state.”
In a June 9 letter to Yediot Books, Walker said she would not allow the publication of the book into Hebrew because “Israel is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and also in the Occupied Territories.”
In her letter, posted Sunday by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel on its website, Walker supported the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement and offered her hope that the BDS movement “will have enough of an impact on Israeli civilian society to change the situation.”
Here is the full version of Walker’s letter:
June 9, 2012
Dear Publishers at Yediot Books,
Thank you so much for wishing to publish my novel THE COLOR PURPLE. It isn’t possible for me to permit this at this time for the following reason: As you may know, last Fall in South Africa the Russell Tribunal on Palestine met and determined that Israel is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and also in the Occupied Territories. The testimony we heard, both from Israelis and Palestinians (I was a jurist) was devastating. I grew up under American apartheid and this was far worse. Indeed, many South Africans who attended, including Desmond Tutu, felt the Israeli version of these crimes is worse even than what they suffered under the white supremacist regimes that dominated South Africa for so long.
It is my hope that the non-violent BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement, of which I am part, will have enough of an impact on Israeli civilian society to change the situation.
In that regard, I offer an earlier example of THE COLOR PURPLE’s engagement in the world-wide effort to rid humanity of its self-destructive habit of dehumanizing whole populations. When the film of The Color Purple was finished, and all of us who made it decided we loved it, Steven Spielberg, the director, was faced with the decision of whether it should be permitted to travel to and be offered to the South African public. I lobbied against this idea because, as with Israel today, there was a civil society movement of BDS aimed at changing South Africa’s apartheid policies and, in fact, transforming the government.
It was not a particularly difficult position to hold on my part: I believe deeply in non-violent methods of social change though they sometimes seem to take forever, but I did regret not being able to share our movie, immediately, with (for instance) Winnie and Nelson Mandela and their children, and also with the widow and children of the brutally murdered, while in police custody, Steven Biko, the visionary journalist and defender of African integrity and freedom.
We decided to wait. How happy we all were when the apartheid regime was dismantled and Nelson Mandela became the first president of color of South Africa.
Only then did we send our beautiful movie! And to this day, when I am in South Africa, I can hold my head high and nothing obstructs the love that flows between me and the people of that country.
Which is to say, I would so like knowing my books are read by the people of your country, especially by the young, and by the brave Israeli activists (Jewish and Palestinian) for justice and peace I have had the joy of working beside. I am hopeful that one day, maybe soon, this may happen. But now is not the time.
We must continue to work on the issue, and to wait.
In faith that a just future can be fashioned from small acts,
Alice Walker
In a June, 2011 interview with Foreign Policy, walker said:
“I think Israel is the greatest terrorist in that part of the world. And I think in general, the United States and Israel are great terrorist organizations themselves. If you go to Gaza and see some of the bombs – what’s left of the bombs that were dropped – and the general destruction, you would have to say, yeah, it’s terrorism. When you terrorize people, when you make them so afraid of you that they are just mentally and psychologically wounded for life — that’s terrorism. So these countries are terrorist countries.”
It was not clear when Yediot Books, an imprint of the daily Yediot Achronot newspaper, made the request, or whether Walker could in fact stop translation of the book. At least one version of the book has already appeared in Hebrew, in the 1980s.
“The Color Purple,” which won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, was adapted into a movie in 1985 directed by Jewish filmmaker Steven Spielberg.
The novel and the film, which was nominated for 11 Oscars, treat racism in the American South in the first part of the 20th century and sexism among blacks.
Walker has intensified her anti-Israel activism in recent years, traveling to the Gaza Strip to advocate on behalf of the Palestinians.
JTA content was used in this article.
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3 Responses to “Alice Walker Kills Hebrew ‘Color Purple’ Deal Citing ‘Apartheid’”
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Why would anybody want to read her stuff in Hebrew anyway?
she is an idiot tool of the extremists
Thank you for sharing this! Mz. Walker is very wrong … And VERY MUCH A FOOL!!! God Bless Israel!!! <3
She got no idea what apartheid is! I live in South Africa. Bless u Israel n bless the Hebrew language n bless the Jews.
A quick perusal of her bio reveals someone with not a few personal issues.
Moving along.
It is very disturbing when seemingly respectable and open-minded people espouse such extreme rhetoric. Where is the mention of the terrorist attacks and murder of innocent children? I am becoming increasingly disillusioned by the views of many people on the left.
It is very disturbing when seemingly respectable and open-minded people espouse such extreme rhetoric. Where is the mention of the terrorist attacks and murder of innocent children?
It is amazing to me, that a person who is sensitive to her own history would want to impose such an insulting collective punishment against the Jewish people. Maybe she needs to recognize her own bigotry.
Seems like bigotry is an equal opportunity disease.
Seems like bigotry is an equal opportunity disease.
She wrote in her essay that she grew up under American apartheid..maybe she doesn't know what the word apartheid means.
Jose, you know nothing of me, where I came from nor how I contribute to the underprivileged community. Next time don't be so quick to pre-judge, it is offensive and nonproductive.
She surely has logical thought process issues if she believes her own declaration that "israel is the greatest terrorist" in the Middle East. She is very definitely residing in lala land.
Clearly this woman has an agenda and is making Israel her whipping boy basing her "logical conclusions" on lies fed to her warped mind by the press. Have her go into Rami Levy on any evening of the week and tell me where she sees apartheid "in Israels borders". Tell her to go visit the checkpoints where Palestinians prefer to come with their medical emergencies bc they will be treated by ISRAELI Jewish doctors with the same ethics as any one else. Ask her why psychologically terrorized Sderot's children who for YEARS fell under rocket fire issuing from Azza warrant no opinion or compassion from her? And the list goes on..
Such single minded, uninvestigated "thinking" borders on true evil.
What we have here is ignorance in action.
Günter Hiller, holocaust survivor.
How many Jews live in Gaza? How many Jews are members of the Palestinian Parliament? While how many Arabs are judges in Israel, Knesset members in Israel, policemen in Israel, doctors in Israel? Which one is the real Apartheid state?
It's the sad truth that people won't admit.
I have learned that the situation calls for great compassion on all sides and a willingness to understand that no one represents the truth exclusively. So many come to Israel and the West Bank and even Gaza and view the punishing realities of the Occupation in a vacuum. " Once you've seen it," as Arundhati Roy says, "you can't unsee it," and the daily tragedy of the Palestinian people overwhelms the rockets and all the miniscule measures taken by the Palstinian government. Power corrupts the peace process and increasingly leaves everyone believing that peace is no longer possible. So very much work to do to make peae possible on the ground.
For most of the examples you gave… both sides. But what is your point anyway? We're discussing Apartheid, right? One side has a diverse state that grants equal rights under the law while the other has ethnically cleansed 100% of those unlike themselves from the land they control.
Right of return is not actually a thing. The only people who have that are those who are connected to a state that wants to grant it.
The only side that has policies supporting the killing of their enemy's children are the Palestinians.
She is a bigot and has preconceptions, she does not deserve to have her book translated neither read… Low IQ!
Sorry to say but this is the typical Black anti-semite which has taken hold of the Black elite. The higher the grade completed the more anti semetic they become. The regular black person has a better understanding of life then these famous fools and I include our wonderful President and first lady in that group of fools.