Hassan El Shafei... From Melodies of Love to Anthems of War

Arab Sea Newspaper - Follow-ups

Arabian Sea - Yemen - Follow-ups: Egyptian composer Hassan El Shafei has sparked widespread controversy and outrage in Yemeni and Arab circles after re-producing an old Houthi "Zamel" known as one of the group's most prominent propaganda anthems, including inflammatory slogans for war such as: "Make it a major global war." The move, described by activists and media professionals as a "artistic downfall," was considered a free promotion of the discourse of a group designated as internationally terrorist. Some sarcastically said that El Shafei was not content with searching for a "trend," but rather jumped to producing free music for the voices of war, while others saw that what he did was not a "remix" but an "artistic setback." The anger was not limited to Yemenis, but extended to Egypt, where media professionals recalled that the Houthis had caused heavy losses to the Egyptian economy through their attacks on navigation in the Red Sea, which harmed the Suez Canal's revenues by billions of dollars, in addition to a missile of theirs falling inside Egyptian territory months ago. They commented sarcastically: "What rhythm is worth all this risk?" In his first response to the new song, according to the Egyptian website "Sada El Balad," El Shafei said in an interview with the program "Tafa'olcom" that he was surprised by the amount of controversy caused by his musical piece, which he played during a concert on the North Coast, stressing that what he presented was "completely far from promoting any group." He explained that the project was electronic music integrated with Arab culture, in an attempt to convey Arab heritage to the world, pointing out that he used a traditional Yemeni melody "out of admiration for popular culture," before later discovering that the Houthi group had adopted this Zamel as its own mobilization slogan. El Shafei added that he decided to delete the musical piece that caused the controversy, stressing that he was not aware of the political background of the melody, and that its use was not intended for promotion or propaganda. He concluded by saying: "I take responsibility and apologize to my audience, I did not intend to make this mistake, and I will not allow my work to be used in contexts that I do not believe in."