The Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies, The Middle East Studies Program, and The Middle East Etc. Film Club present a screening of Arna`s Children in memory of Juliano Mer Khamis, this Sunday, April 10th, 1:00 pm, at George Mason University`s Johnson Center`s Cinema.
Juliano, 52, who was the Artistic Director of The Jenin Freedom Theater and the co-director of the award-winning documentary Arna’s Children, was shot by unknown assailants in Jenin [on April 4th, 2011] as he was leaving the theater. We offer our deepest condolences to his family, his friends, and all who worked with him and loved him. Juliano was born in Nazareth in 1958. He was the son of Saliba Khamis, a Palestinian citizen of Israel who was at one time the secretary of the Israeli Communist Party, and Arna Mer Khamis, a Jewish Israeli who spent her youth in the Palmach but became an anti-Zionist activist and a fearless fighter for peace, justice, and human rights. In interviews, Juliano would tell a story that marked the “racial lunacy” into which he was born: his mother went into labor while taking part in a protest against the imposition of martial law on Palestinian villages in Israel. She was rushed to the hospital, "but the doctors refused to stitch her and she nearly bled to death," he said. "They knew she was married to an Arab." For more on Juliano, see this Jadaliyya post. For an interview conducted with Juliano in 2005, see this Jadaliyya post.