Settler Singer’s Gaza Lamentation Goes Viral
Orit Arfa made a bold music video that pushes the envelope from both directions.
Novelist, author, songwriter and media sensation Orit Arfa has just released an original song and music video, “Home (Lives in My Song),” about the loss of settler homes in Gush Katif 10 years ago when the Jewish towns in Gaza were destroyed as part of then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s Disengagement Plan.
“One of my goals is to introduce a new language for talking about the settlements and Israeli politics in general,” says Arfa. “In my work covering and speaking out against the Disengagement from Gaza, I noticed that much of the narrative was dominated by the religious-Zionist camp, when there are many reason-based, secular, human-rights related reasons for Israel’s presence in Gaza and Judea and Samaria. The music video is designed to give a universal perspective to the loss of Gush Katif, focusing on what is most important: our homes.”
“Home (Lives in My Song)” is the first single off the upcoming album that will serve as a companion to Arfa’s novel The Settler. Music is a subtheme in the novel which has the heroine, Sarah “Shachar” Dakar, develop her voice as an artist as she undergoes an identity crisis following the Gaza withdrawal.
The song was produced in Berlin and co-written by Orit Arfa, German artist and producer Mati Gavriel, and American singer-songwriter Jenny Karr (who worked with Celine Dion and Britney Spears).
Orit Arfa moved to Israel in 1999 from her hometown of Los Angeles. As a reporter for a variety of publications, most notably the Jerusalem Post and the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, she covered Israeli politics and Tel Aviv nightlife, two worlds that merge in her novel, The Settler.
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