Limited Arab and Syriac turnout in Harkul book fair in Qamishli
Qamishli – North-Press Agency
Ibrahim Ibrahimi
The third edition of annual “Harkul” book fair this year in the city of Qamishli in northeastern Syria, has more than 8.000 titles for over 100.000 copies of books in Kurdish, Arabic, Syriac, and English languages, while the Arab and Syriac turnout in the exhibition was limited.
In its third year, publishing houses from within Syria and others Kurdish ones from Turkey and Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) take part in the book-fair in Qamishli, as well as cultural Arab, Kurdish and Syriac associations, but participants and exhibitors complain about the weakness of the turnout of the Arab and Syriac components compared with their Kurdish counterparts.
The book fair was attended by intellectual associations from various cities in northern and eastern Syria, Ahmad Al-Yousef, a participant in the book fair under the name of intellectual associations, told North-Press: “The number of participants has increased compared to last year,” adding “we noticed a weakness in Arab cultural parties, due to political calculations in the region, as I think”.
The annual book fair includes several Arabic publishing houses such as (Dar Mu’asaset al-Safahat, Dar Kan’an and Dar al-Takwin in Damascus), Khaled Omar, who is in charge of Dar al-Takwin in Damascus and participated in “Harkul” book fair for the second time, said: “It was supposed that Arab component turnout to be larger, but there’s some shortcoming”.
Omar stated that the turnout this year is larger than last year, “but most of the visitors are of Kurdish nationalism,” according to Omar’s belief, the reason is that the book fair is not sufficiently publicized among Arab places of presence, in addition to the possibility of political reasons”.
Limited Syriac turnout
In its turn, the Syriac Cultural Society participated in 100 new titles, in addition to other 500 titles presented in previous years, most of these books cover Syriac history, politics, and literature, these books also demonstrate Seyfo massacre (massacres conducted against the Syriac and Armenian peoples in 1915), and the status of the current Syriac people.
However, the Syriac presence at the book fair is not much different from its Arab counterpart, according to Hanna Soumi, who is responsible for the Syriac Cultural Association at the book fair, the reason is: “The weakness of publicizing for the book fair in the Syriac neighborhoods in Qamishli such as al-Westa, al-Gharbiya, al-Arbawiya, and As-Seryan”.
“If there was enough propaganda in the visible and audible media and social media, then the turnout would be great,” according to Hanna Sowmi, Something else likely made the Syriac presence weak; that is the organization of the book fair by Autonomous Administration, which made some decide not to attend and mix political matters with cultural ones, considering these reasons “show fear and underdevelopment”.
Politics is an obstacle!
The Cultural Board of Autonomous Administration formed a preparatory committee to hold the annual book fair, the preparatory committee showed propaganda posters in the main streets of the city of Qamishli, distributed propaganda leaflets and sent invitations to interested personalities and cultural entities of all components.
But all this could not bring Syriac and Arabic intellectuals to the book fair, Aboud Makhso, member of the preparatory committee of the book fair justified that to North-Press by saying: “We notice the lack of presence of the Syriac and Arabic components, and the reason is not the preparatory committee, but the publishing houses and the cultural institutions that we’ve invited to the book fair, it was supposed for them to help us.”
Makhso also justifies the reasons to political problems the region is witnessing, saying: “It’s supposed for political problems not to be an obstacle to cultural activities,” expressing his regrets: “We were hoping for the participation of Arabic and Syriac intellectuals at the book fair, as the Kurdish one”.
It’s noteworthy that “Harkul” book fair is in its third annual edition, and is named “Harkul” in memory of the late Kurdish writer Hussein Shawish (Harkul), who died in a traffic accident on July 20, 2016.