All That Is Chic: Pondering Fashion and Militarization (edited version)
by Sherene Seikaly

A heavy beat, a black backdrop, elegantly scrolled names. Curiosity and temptation will overwhelm you from the initial moment. Fashion for Israeli checkpoints? A checkpoint narrative that can fulfill the individuals' bottomless well of longing? That haunting desire for beauty and immortality in the always changing the idea of hip? That aesthetic that is always beyond reach, for as soon as it is acquired, it is immediately anachronistic?

One beautiful man after another strolls with stern determination down a catwalk. Let the music and haute fashion provoke sensations of sight and sound. A black pin-striped suit, soft cloth, a white crisp shirt adorned with tie. Short jacket, with silver buttons down the front that comes to midriff exposing a well-sculpted stomach and lower back. Accessorized with a dark blue plastic transparent grocery bag. Perfect outfit, exposing just the right amount of flesh, for that up and coming young professional to make the crossings between home and work. A traditional long men's galabiya, soft cotton, easy wear for lazing around the house, sitting in a coffee shop, welcoming guests, or making that long adventurous journey from Gaza to Jaffa.

Tradition has a twist this time around. A collar designed mid torso, perfectly ironed and clasped, exposing hair and flesh. Ever so sexy a cut, accentuated by the model placing his hand momentarily in the custom-made man's collar. For young and old alike. Finely cut jacket with Mao collar and low riders. Modest but elegant, light but practical. Great for a professional meeting or a dinner out.

Top adorned with discrete string that once pulled transforms the finely edged jacket into an accordion top, exposing mid-torso to lower stomach. Suitable for any man who wants to look good and impress a colleague or lover, without the discomfort of taking off his whole jacket.

Light blue button-down, simple and easy, unique and fresh for the man-on-the-go. Hangs loosely, with only the first button clasped,
exposing chest and stomach. Matching design on back, appropriate for the man-on-the-go who won't have to take time out of his busy schedule to undress at the checkpoint.

Funny and fashionable, a white tee with an I Love New York logo in black. University men will love this design, with a heart cut out exposing the left breast. Light and breezy for those crossings to Birzeit University. Another blue collar long sleeve special. Light blue shirt with special clothes hanger engraved on the back. Useful for hanging a towel to wipe those sweaty brows when the wait at the checkpoint is particularly long.

The music fades. Your brief tryst with fashion at checkpoints ends and you are taken to a different, more perverse platform. A series of stills set to a background of stirring silence show Palestinian men lifting shirt after shirt exposing stomachs, backs, and shoulders to a coterie of attentive Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). Men, young and old of all shapes and sizes, are subjected to compulsory flashing under gunpoint. Traces of a scream line one man's lips. Others express emotions ranging from boredom and anger to discomfort and indifference.

Enjoy the relentless challenge to viewing and perception. Peal one layer after the next. You will not miss the display of beauty. Only the tip of Waked‘s iceberg. For it is the gaze and the desire for all that comes with it that Waked has so skillfully unraveled. Move from enjoying the sights and sounds of high fashion. Turn to viewing the exposed stomachs, backs, shoulders, legs, and genitals exposed to an avaricious and voyeuristic IDF. With skill and subtlety, Waked has joined two contradictory worlds, one of fashion and comfort and one of militarization.

Chic Point flirts with aesthetics and beauty, pondering their very possibility under escalating oppression. It injects humor into the myriad of daily tribulations Palestinian men (and women) face as they make the various crossings that have now become necessary for daily life. The fashionable clothes and heavy beat in the first half of the video will speak to that desire articulated by Palestinian poet laureate Mahmoud Darwish, all we want is to be ordinary.

Israeli authorities and discourses have long interpolated the Palestinian body as a security threat, a walking bomb, something to be feared, interrogated, and exposed. Skin, flesh, and hair become hiding grounds for bombs and the destruction of the victimized, ever threatened Jewish state. The gap between Israeli discourse and Palestinian experience quickly unfolds with each still. Moments of humiliation are recorded and the viewer is unsure whether to become a voyeur like the soldier or to look away. By documenting these moments and juxtaposing them with the impossibility of aesthetics, Waked has made art that punctures the global, exposes the local, and ponders the beautiful.