This photo is from the first published interview with Yaron Cohen/Dana International, published in the newspaper Tel Aviv, on August 14, 1992. It appears on the amazing website devoted to Dana International, put together by Geir Skogseth. The interview was published in Hebrew, and is translated by Ziv Geri.
The photo is of Dana as a drag queen, from the period when Yaron started out, in early 1992, performing in clubs in Eilat and Tel Aviv, on revues organized by Ofer Nisim. She became famous during this period doing a send-up of the Whitney Houston song, "My Name Is Not Susan." Yaron pretended to be Whitney Houston, performing in Saudi Arabia, and singing verses (from Whitney's song) in English as well as verses made up by Dana, sung in Arabic. The song was called "Sa'ida Sultana" (in it Dana shouts, "My Name Is Not Sa'ida!"). This song was subsequently recorded and became Dana International's first hit. A couple years later, it was a sensation in Egypt, on a bootleg cassette.
Who knows what song(s) she performed while wearing kufiya.
A video of Dana (backed by Ofer Nisim) doing "Sa'ida Sultana" is now available on youtube.
And Geir Skogseth has made the lyrics to the song (complete with a translation of the lyrics) available here. The lyrics on the video vary a bit from the recording, which Geir has transcribed. In the vid, for instance, she sings, "Ana 'ismi Whitney Houston" (My name is Whitney Houston) rather than "Ana 'ismi Solli Sa'dun."
1. Dana is going back to the Eurovision Song Contest. After winning as Israel's representative in 1998, she is returning in 2011 (May 10, 12, 14), to represent Israel with the song "Ding Dong."
Here's her 1998 winning performance of the song "Diva."
And here is "Ding Dong."
I vastly prefer "Diva," but that doesn't mean that "Ding Dong" can't win.
2. Here's a youtube video of Dana's performance of one of her earliest songs, "Sa'ida Sultana." If the date is correct (1993), then Dana has just had or will soon have sex change (MTF) surgery. Note how she simulates bellydancing early on, when Ofer Nissim is playing a kind of 'Oriental' riff on the keyboards.
The song is a "version" of Whitney Houston's 1990 hit "My Name Is Not Susan," sung entirely in Arabic, except for the last verse, sung in English, and drawn from Whitney's original. (Watch the vid here.)
You can and should check out the lyrics, which are quite clever, here (scroll down a bit).
3. Dana was rather inactive from 2002-2006, but returned with a new album in 2007. One of the most interesting of its tracks was "Seret Hodi," a Bollywoodish number, done with Idan Yaniv. Dana's early releases (1993-96) featured a number of tracks in Arabic. Since then it's primarily Hebrew and some English. Does "Seret Hodi" represent a kind of "return" to her Eastern roots, or is it just an attempt to ride the Bollywood wave? Or both? In any case, here's the video:
4. You can read an article I published about Dana in 2000 here.
Check out this video, featuring Israel's entry in the 2009 Eurovision contest. Try to figure out who is the Arab and who is the Jew?
Of course, to engage in such an exercise is to conjure with problematic racial stereotypes. Nonetheless, in this instance it's worthwhile. Noa, the Israeli singer, looks more stereotypically Arab. That's because she is of Yemeni background. Mira Awad, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, is 'whiter' and looks more European. That's because her father is a Palestinian Arab and her mother is Bulgarian.
What does it mean when Israel decides to enter a duo representing Israeli minorities, a Mizrahi and a Palestinian, to represent the Israeli nation in the Eurovision contest? Is it a clever ploy to give Israel a positive image, at a time of growing demands for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, in the wake of the Gaza outrage?
When the announcement of their Eurovision entry was made, Israel's military was deep into its devastating three-week war in Gaza. Suddenly, Nini and Awad found themselves facing a bout of criticism from the left. Several Arab artists – some Israeli, some Palestinian – published an open letter asking the pair to withdraw.
"The Israeli government is sending the two of you to Moscow as part of its propaganda machine that is trying to create the appearance of Jewish-Arab 'coexistence' under which it carries out the daily massacre of Palestinian civilians," the letter said. "Israeli artists, authors and intellectuals that take part in this propaganda machine, instead of working for justice, equality and the upholding of human and civil rights, not to mention international law, are partners to the crime."
On the other hand, does the choice of Noa and Mira Awad represent, in a sense, the success of struggles of Mizrahim and Palestinian citizens of Israel, to change Israel's Eurocentric, Ashkenazi, and exclusively Jewish character?
A cautious yes.
Noa, according to The Guardian, "has taken part in several joint projects with Arab artists, publicly backs a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and refuses to perform in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank."
Noa recorded a cover of John Lennon's "Imagine" together with rai artist Khaled, which was released on the European version of Khaled's 1999 album Kenza. It was not included on the US release of Kenza, from Ark 21.
The Guardian goes on to say that Noa "faces occasional anti-Israel demonstrations during her tours abroad, once in London and most recently during a tour of Spain last month, and has been very critical of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement, in Gaza."
As for Awad, "She works in an Arabic-Hebrew theatre in Jaffa and made a breakthrough appearance in an Israeli television sitcom, Arab Labour. She has sung with Nini for the last eight years and has previously competed to represent Israel at Eurovision, despite objections from the Arab community."
As far as I can determine, the Israeli sitcom, Arab Labor ("Avoda Aravit"), seems to be a sign of Arab inroads into mainstream Israeli culture.
So while I'm sympathetic to the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement, I regard the Noa/Mira Awad collaboration as a complicated matter.
But whatever you think about the politics, there is no way that this song should win the Eurovision contest. It's sappy and dreadful.
(I saw Noa perform at the Fez Festival of Sacred Music in Morocco in summer 1999, and did not care for her music at all. And the duet with Khaled, "Imagine," is awful as well.)
On the other hand, Dana International, Israel's Eurovision entry in 1998, truly deserved to win. Even if she has been shilling for Tzipi Livni of late.
Kadima leader Tzipi Livni campaigned today with Dana International, the transsexual dance diva, AP reported today. According to the report:
Livni held a noisy, colorful women's rally in Jerusalem, dancing to loud music and singing with Dana International, a popular transsexual entertainer. The pink-and-white themed attempt had a rock-concert feel, as throngs of people jostled to get a glimpse of Livni or have a picture taken with her.
Isn't that great, that with all of that Gaza blood on her hands, that she gets treated like a rock star?
Discussions of Dana International usually don't mention the fact that she is of Yemeni origin, and that early in her career, she recorded a number of hits in Arabic. I published an article on Dana International's popularity and notoriety in Egypt during the mid-1990's in Mass Mediations: New Approaches to Popular Culture in the Middle East and Beyond, ed. Walter Armbrust, University of California Press, 2000. You can read it here.
I have no idea whether Dana actually supports Tzipi, or if she was just paid to show up at the event.
What is even more alarming about the AP report on the run-up to the Israeli elections than Tzipi as a rock star is the rise of Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party.
The Haaretz poll showed Lieberman surging to 18 seats, compared with Labor's 14. That sets Lieberman up as a kingmaker, holding the crucial swing votes that the winner will need to form a government. Lieberman clearly leans toward Netanyahu.
A tough-talking immigrant from Moldova who succeeded in turning a party for immigrants from the former Soviet Union into one with broad national appeal, Lieberman has centered his platform on attacking Israel's Arab citizens, demanding that they sign an oath of loyalty or lose their right to vote or be elected.
Perhaps his most polarizing policy is to redraw Israel's borders, pushing areas with heavy concentrations of Arabs outside the country and under Palestinian jurisdiction.
Lieberman appears to be capitalizing on a swell of anti-Arab sentiment among Israelis, fueled partially by the rocket fire from Gaza that sparked Israel's recent offensive there.
The number three party in Israel, the kingmaking party, may well be one that advocates ethnic cleansing. (I should add that Israel launched the offensive against Gaza, starting on November 4. The rocket fire from Gaza came in response to Israel's aggression. This erroneous claim, of course, is repeated endlessly in the US media.)
Professor of Anthropology, University of Arkansas. Author of Memories of Revolt: The 1936-39 Rebellion and the Palestinian National Past. Co-editor of Palestine, Israel and the Politics of Popular Culture and of Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity.
