Meet The Arab Singer Performing For Israeli Memorial Day
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
By Naomi Zeveloff April 30, 2017
On Sundown on Sunday, Israel will pause to mourn the nation’s fallen soldiers on Yom HaZikaron, or Memorial Day. This year, an Arab pop singer is helping to usher in the somber mood.
Most Arabs don’t serve in Israel’s military, and oppose Israel’s military policy in the West Bank and Gaza.
That’s what makes Qadri’s participation in the Sunday night memorial day ceremony at Sultan’s Pool in Jerusalem, one of several across Israel, so unusual.
When a reporter with Israeli news site Ynet suggested that it would be difficult to perform on Israel’s most nationalist holiday, Qadri brushed away the question.
“Don’t take me into these corners,” she said. “We were born into a difficult, abnormal and crazy reality. I come from a place of making it simpler, more positive. Music can bring people together, and that’s what I’m doing.”
Qadri believes her planned performance at the national torch lighting ceremony on Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl for Israel’s 69th Independence Day will make the event more inclusive could help make the event feel inclusive for Arabs.
“They will say: ‘Look, our Nasreen in singing.’”
Contact Naomi Zeveloff at [email protected] or on Twitter @naomizeveloff
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
