Emile Habibi
Emil Habibi (Arabic إميل حبيبي, Hebrew אמיל חביבי ), ( born August 29, 1921 in Haifa, Nazareth † 2 May 1996 ) was a Palestinian writer, journalist and politician of the Communist Party of Israel ( Maki ).
Politician
Habibi grew up in a Protestant family in Haifa, but lived from 1956 until his death in Nazareth. In 1940 he joined the Communist Party in Palestine founded in 1923, but left it with another in 1943 because of disagreements on the national question with the majority of the party to Shmuel Mikunis and founded the National Liberation League in Palestine. As the Arab League, the Arab High Committee founded back in 1946, the Liberation League did not join because they demanded democratic elections. The Liberation League aspired to national unity is the only way she held a victory over the British colonial power possible.
In 1947, the Liberation League agreed to the partition plan, as the USSR suddenly began it. The Liberation League declared its stance so that the two alternatives, a Jewish state on the one hand or a connection to Jordan, were worse. She was thus the only Arab party in Palestine, which supported the partition plan. The Liberation League accused the Arab League and the Arab High Committee of involvement in anti- Jewish provocations such as the Kfar Etzion massacre. In September 1948 Emil Habibi wrote in a leaflet, the Palestinians had the invasion of the Arab armies not desired. The Liberation League blamed the Arab League and the Arab High Committee for the loss of Palestine. After the war, the Palestine Liberation League united with the parts of the Palestine Communist Party, which formed after the founding of the Communist Party in Israel ( Maki ). This led, among other things, that Habibi family members who had fled to Lebanon, was able to get to Haifa after Jewish party members had applied to David Ben- Gurion pressure. From 1953 to 1965 he was a member of the Knesset. It is not clear whether Habibi really recognized the state. A rumor says he has asked the comrades in Moscow to recognize the Soviet support of the partition plan as " Stalinist error ". Anyway, he had his own opinions and was therefore hated by many. 1965 split the maki, and Habibi joined the predominantly Arab Israelis supported the Communist Party, the " Rakach " called. He was back to the Knesset in 1972. Subsequently he was chief editor of the party newspaper " Al -Ittihad " until 1989. This year, he was relieved of all his offices and expelled from the party because he supported reforms in the party. Later practiced Habibi sharp criticism of Saddam Hussein and the PLO.
Work
His first literary steps made Habibi in the party newspaper " Al- Itichad ". There he wrote under the pseudonym " Juhaina ", the name of his daughter. After leaving the Knesset, appeared in 1974, his first and most famous novel, " The Peptimist " ( in German: 1995). Main character of the book is the Hapless Said, from the family Peptimist. Peptimist, a neologism of the author, the opposition connects optimist and pessimist together. Said reveals his life in the form of a letter to the reader and talks about his life and his attitude to political life. Unlike many of his Arab compatriots, Said is not displaced from Israel, but serves the Israeli intelligence service, always on the search for his identity and the identity of its people. The service as a spy in the Israeli intelligence has inherited his father, yet the protagonist of the book between the two societies and cultures torn feels. In 1985, " The valley of the jinn ", which begins with a gigantic traffic jam in Haifa. 1991 appeared " Saraya, the daughter of the witch " ( in German: 1998). The folk tradition over Saraya, which is being held by a child-eaters, given a modern interpretation in Habibi.
Israel Prize
In 1992, Emil Habibi was awarded the Israel Prize for Arabic literature. Since it politically at this time was in sharp cross-fire and was accused by his former comrades of betrayal, this recognition was them by the Israeli establishment an eyesore. Also on the Zionist side, there was rejection. In protest against the award ceremony at Habibi Juval Ne'eman gave his prize he had received in 1969, back.