JustASC

Aaargh! The Canadian Jewish News blew the opportunity to clear up one of the main contested points surrounding the anti-Tel Aviv protest at the Toronto International Film Festival. One of the key justifications by the actors and writers who objected to including a film series on Israel was that they didn’t want to see the film festival “hijacked” in service of Israeli government propaganda. They pointed to Brand Israel, a government-backed effort to focus on aspects of Israeli society beyond the conflict, and claimed the festival served its propaganda purposes, “knowingly or not,” as protest signer Jane Fonda put it.

The programmer at the festival denied that he worked with Brand Israel, saying the “City to City series was conceived and curated entirely independently. There was no pressure from any outside source.”

But here’s Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai, paraphrased during an interview in the Canadian Jewish News:

He said that while the City to City program was initiated by the festival, the Israeli ministry of foreign affairs was involved as part of its Brand Israel media and advertising campaign, which was launched last year.

“Was involved.” What the hell does that mean? How involved? Involved how? Nailing this down was essential, because it is so central to the complaints about the City-to-City series. There should have been a follow-up question demanding specifics: Was there funding involved? Meetings between Brand Israel representatives and anyone associated with the festival? Did a third party act as a go-between? Or perhaps Huldai is taking credit for something he didn’t do, as politicians are wont to do?

John Greyson, who got the protest ball rolling by pulling his film out of the festival, cites the CJN in defense of his action:

TIFF said that Brand Israel wasn’t involved, but in this week’s Canadian Jewish News, Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai confirmed Brand Israel’s participation….

For TIFF in 2009 to bestow the honour of their inaugural City-to-City Spotlight on Tel Aviv, out of all possible ‘city’ candidates, and to seemingly collaborate with an Israeli PR re-branding campaign, so soon after Gaza — this touched a raw nerve.

The protest letter, like Greyson’s defense, is full of maddening one-sidedness, historical distortions, icky double standards, and the demand that the entire artistic community view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through their one-dimensional lens. But because I agree that it would be unfortunate for any international arts festival to be in cahoots with any government’s offical p.r. campaign, I’d like to see the question of Brand Israel’s involvement cleared up.

UPDATE: Ben Harris at JTA also has a longish piece on the Toronto brouhaha, but it also misses an opportunity to detail the direct ways, if any, that Brand Israel did or didn’t impact the programming at TIFF. From the article:

In an interview last year with the Canadian Jews [sic] News, [Amir] Gissin, [consul general of Israel for Toronto], boasted that his new marketing idea, known as Brand Israel, would help reshape public perceptions of the Jewish state and culminate in a major presence at the 2009 festival.

The presence turned out to be the focus on Tel Aviv as part of the festival’s new City to City program, which included an appearance by the city’s mayor and VIP receptions in addition to the screening of 10 Israeli films.

“Turned out to be.” Again, a meaningless sentence. Who talked to whom? What was Brand Israel’s specific role? Was it a face-to-face or concrete role? Can Gissin detail a specific series of events that led TIFF decision-makers to include Tel Aviv? Without that knowledge, I tend to focus on words like “boasted,” and wonder if Gissin is perhaps claiming credit to justify the expense of Brand Israel.