Jessica Alba, kufiya'd, circa 2008

here's the source. more research necessary...

Marilyn Monroe & James Dean in kufiya

It makes sense that this t-shirt, of Marilyn in a kufiya, would be from a clothing line produced by Iranian designers living in New York City. Check out Nimany's other stuff, it's fantastic. Most of it with terrific calligraphy. (The back of this shirt says Marilyn, written in Arabic script.)

And now that we have learned that Marilyn was a Commie symp, this is all the more appropriate. Even if she was sympathetic to Zionism.

I've seen nothing to suggest that James Dean had any "Communist" sympathies, but it nonetheless makes some sort of sense that an icon of disaffected youth would be posthumously kufiya-clad.

Mother Jones blames hipsters for decline of Palestine kufiya industry. Plus, Colin Farrell & Isabel Marant

The Mother Jones blog published an article about kufiyas this week, by Sonja Sharp, and entitled "Your Intifada: Now Made in China!" For the most part, Sharp goes over material that hawgblawg has covered obsessively over the last year or so. (My first post on the demise of Palestinian-manufactured kufiyas is here.) But here is the key argument:

...why is the the last keffiyeh factory in Palestine about to go out of business?

That's because the one you're wearing (and, increasingly, the ones Palestinians are wearing) are now made in China.

Here's how it happened: Back in '87, during the first intifada, intifadniks couldn't get enough of Palestinian-made $25 scarves. Looser export restrictions meant that Israelis could rep them too, and slowly but surely the scarf and its emblematic pattern began appearing in the West. By the time the second intifada happened in 2000, hardcore activists and the super cool already had them. Then the keffiyeh trend reached its tipping point, and hipsters' insatiable lust for the scarf lured Chinese manufactures into the gig. Fast forward a decade, and Chinese keffiyehs are the norm.

Ironically, global support for Palestinian-statehood-as-fashion-accessory has put yet another nail in the coffin of the Occupied Territories' beleaguered economy. What's next?

So, hipsters are to blame for the decline of Palestinian industry? Ah, they are so easy to blame, aren't they?

But as more responsible reporting suggests, it probably makes more sense to blame the "peace process," which caused the West Bank to open up to "free trade" but created no viable national authority that could impose imports. But maybe criticizing the "peace process" would be too radical a step for Sharp.

One thing that Sharp could have done is to promote the purchase of Palestinian kufiyas by providing a link to the The Kufiyeh Project. (Note to The Kufiyeh Project: get the Hirbawi factory to make green kufiyas, so that we can show our solidarity with both Palestine and Iran. If you need a green kufiya, try the Arab American National Museum.)

And a footnote to earlier kufiyaspotting posts. Here's another photo I found of Colin Farrell (man, he has been photographed a lot in kufiya!--see here and here.)


And here's a photo of a kufiya from designer Isabel Marant, from her Fall/Winter 2008 Runway Show (courtesy Mick Margo, writing in the Fashion Journal):

Celebrities among the tens of thousands of Europeans demonstrating against Israeli assault on Gaza

Annie Lennox (C), Bianca Jagger (2nd R) and British politician George Galloway (L) march through London with thousands of protestors in London, Britain, 03 January 2009. A series of demonstrations took place across Britain against the Israeli air strikes on Gaza. The protests are being held at 18 locations including Portsmouth, Manchester, Hull, London and Glasgow. EPA/ANDY RAIN

In London, today, among the 10-12,000 demonstrators were Bianca Jagger, Annie Lennox (ex-Eurythmics) and comedian Alexei Sayle, according to the New York Times.

For the record, Bianca Jagger's daughter Jade donated money at charity event for Palestinian children sponsored by the Hoping Foundation back in May 2007. So apparently critical thinking on Palestine-Israel runs in the family, or at least the female side of it.

You gotta love it, demonstrators threw shoes at 10 Downing St. (Britain's government is part of Israel's cover too, along with the US). And there were lots of kufiyas. Please note the kufiya on the woman standing next to Annie, below, and the Palestinian flag.

EPA/ANDY RAIN

Postscript: about 1/2 hour after I first posted this.

'In Paris, more than 20,000 demonstrators, many wearing Arab keffiyeh headscarves, chanted slogans like "Israel murderer!"' (Reuters, via NYT). And Israeli ground troops are now headed in...

Hollywood stars dissociate themselves from diamond store connected to Israeli settlements

One reason I make an effort to kufiyaspot celebrities is that I don't think that stars are inevitably and necessarily idiots. We simply can't assume that when a celebrity like Cameron Diaz puts on a kufiya, it is "just" a matter of fashion, and could not be in any way political. (And in fact I have argued that on at least one occasion when Cameron was kufiyaspotted, there might well have been a kind of political gesture.)

This report would seem to bear out my claim. It also provides a bit of New Years cheer, a bit of relief from the Gaza onslaught which I can't seem to pull myself away from. I found this out courtesy of the invaluable Kabobfest, who got it from al-Arabiya. I reproduce the al-Arabiya article in full below. More comments follow.

Actresses refuse to be linked to 'unethical' business
Hollywood stars shun pro-Israeli diamond store

Tuesday, 30 December 2008
DUBAI (AlArabiya.net)

Hollywood stars have called for their pictures to be removed from the website of a diamond company that is associated with settlement expansion in Israel and human rights violations in Africa.

The diamond stores owned by Jewish-American billionaire Lev Leviev had to remove pictures of several actresses after they complained of being linked to a company that funds settlements in the Palestinian occupied territories, a statement issued by the pro-Palestinian human rights group Adalah- New York said.

The actresses include Salma Hayek, Sharon Stone, Whitney Houston, Halle Berry, Drew Barrymore, Brooke Shields, Andie Macdowell, and Lucy Liu. The celebrities were contacted by the rights group Adalah and the New York based 'Jews Against the Occupation' and asked them to distance themselves from a corporation that supports the Zionist project.

The organizations sent letters to the actresses and held negotiations with their representatives to inform them of the human rights violations Leviev is involved in in Palestine and South Africa. As a result the actresses demanded that pictures of them wearing his diamonds were removed from the company's website.

In October, the ambassador of Oxfam International aid agency Kristin Davis demanded that the Leviev's company remove her pictures from its website.

In June, UNICEF announced its refusal to receive any future donations from Leviev for his involvement in building settlements in the West Bank.

UNICEF justified its decision by stating that it does not receive donations from any parties in conflicts.

"We are gratified that these stars have joined UNICEF, Oxfam and a growing list of others who have distanced themselves from Leviev over his companies’ settlement construction in violation of international law in Palestine, and rights abuses in Angola and Namibia," Ethan Heitner from Adalah-NY said.

"Some immediately expressed concern when we explained that Leviev was using their photos to whitewash his unethical business practices," he said, adding "their actions show that Leviev’s wealth and diamonds can’t buy impunity."

(Translated from Arabic by Sonia Farid.)

Go here for Adalah-NY's press release on its successful campaign. Arabiyah does not quite get the story right. According to Adalah, it contacted the artists listed above, and representatives of four of them (the identity of the four is not given) contacted Leviev asking to have their photos removed from the celebrity section of the Leviev website (www.leviev.com). Following the complaints, Leviev's staff removed the entire celebrity section. (Adalah had not yet contacted the following stars whose photos were also up on the site: HRH Princess Michael of Kent, Ginnifer Goodwin, Katharine McPhee, Teri Hatcher, Lauren Graham, Estelle Lefebure, Zara and Dita Von Teese.)
I wish I knew which four! I'm guessing "yes" on Salma Hayek (whose father is of Lebanese descent, and who was simply terrific in the Mexican film version of Midaq Alley, based on Naguib Mahfouz's celebrated novel) and "no" on Sharon Stone, who not so long ago visited Israel and was fawning all over Shimon Peres.

But who knows? The point is, pro-Palestinian groups contacted celebrities and persuaded them to make a positive political gesture.

(And if the motivation had more to do with Leviev's nefarious Africa activities than with his involvement in settlements, so what?)

Bravo, Adalah-NY and Jews Against the Occupation.

Go here for Adalah-NY's very thorough report on Leviev and his extensive involvement in illegal settlement activity.