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Joseph Tarrab, the Lebanese Jewish art critic who one admirer said “provided a new way of seeing the world” as he combined philosophy, history and literature in is critiques, died on January 1. He was 81.
Joseph Tarrab in 2023. He wasn’t keen to talk about his personal life.Credit: Ricardo Karam/YouTube
“He is one of Lebanon’s great losses, a man who was graced with a great number of talents: in art, criticism, philosophy, journalism and theater,” Culture Minister Mohammed Murtada wrote this month about Tarrab, who died in his home in the city of Jounieh north of Beirut.
“He was like a clear and clean mirror that reflected all the beauty of Lebanon. We’re certain that his writing will live on in coming generations.”
In his eulogy published by the Lebanese news agency, Murtada mentioned that Tarrab was one of Lebanon’s last Jews, someone famous for declaring that “I am an Arab Jew.”
“In this statement, Tarrab emphasized that the Jewish religion is part of the greater Arab region, and that Zionism is the great disease that has afflicted the people of this country,” Murtada added.
Tarrab’s special status made headlines. “The death of the culture critic – the last Jew,” wrote Mohammed Hajiri, the culture editor for Lebanese news website Al Modon. He told how Tarrab described himself as a Marxist, a social activist who took part in the May 1968 student revolt in France.
As Hajiri put it, "In late 1967, after the Six-Day War, there was a debate in Paris about the Palestinian issue; Frenchmen, Arabs and Israelis took part. Tarrab was a member of the Palestinian committee of Lebanese students in Paris, and during the debate, supporters of Israel focused on what they called ’the persecution of Jews by Arab countries.’
"When it was Tarrab’s turn to speak, he got up and said: ’I am speaking as an Arab Jew. I am speaking as an Arab Jew from Lebanon, and here I stand before you totally healthy.’
Martyrs’ Square in Beirut in 1950. ’I learned to break barriers and connect with everybody,’ Tarrab said last year.Credit: AFP
“Tarrab claimed that there was no Jewish problem in Arab countries, and that this problem, if it existed, was caused by the establishment of the State of Israel, not by Arab countries.”
As a front-page headline of the newspaper Al Nahar put it, “Write it down, I am an Arab Jew.” It was riffing on the first line of a famous Mahmoud Darwish poem: “Write it down, I am an Arab.”
Tarrab’s death is a reminder of the good relations between Arabs and Jews in Lebanon until wars got in the way. By 2023, only 20 to 40 Jews were left in the country.
“Tarrab didn’t leave Lebanon despite everything that has happened since 1948: the 1967 war and the Israeli incursions into Lebanon,” journalist and poet Joseph Issawi wrote.
Tarrab emphasized that the Jewish religion is part of the greater Arab region, and that Zionism is the great disease that has afflicted the people of this country.
Lebanese Culture Minister Mohammed Murtada
He added an anecdote that reflects Tarrab’s preference to downplay his Jewishness and private life. “We bumped into each other after the 2006 war in the Al Nahar newspaper building, and I suggested that he take part in my program on the Alhurra TV channel. He smiled shyly and responded in the tone of a question: ’Let’s put off that idea a little?’ He was a Jew who didn’t talk much about his personal history.”
Tarrab was born in Beirut in 1943. “As a child I went to school with my friends; we played in the streets, I felt safe in the city,” he said last year in the podcast of talk show host Ricardo Karam. “I learned to break barriers and connect with everybody. I’m fortunate that I grew up in the golden age of growth in Beirut.”
From an early age, Tarrab loved films and would visit Beirut’s cinema club. A two-hour critical discussion followed every film there, he said in the podcast.
“That was a formative period for me,” he said. “I learned how to look closely at every cinematic and artistic work. That’s where my critical thinking was formulated.”
Buildings bombed by Israel in Beirut last October. ’You don’t feel talk of hatred,’ Tarrab said about the city he lived in, Jounieh.Credit: Hussein Malla/AP
Later, Tarrab majored in art at the American University of Beirut. “As students we yearned to take part in the founding of Lebanese culture,” he said. “I remember when we were partners in launching the modern theater that staged plays at the university.”
Tarrab came to art criticism “by chance,” as he put it. When he was in France in 1968, he helped young Lebanese artists mount exhibitions in Paris. Regarding one artist, he said: "He was an enthusiastic diver and all his works were inspired by what he saw in the depths of the sea. But there was a strike during the exhibition and people didn’t come.
Tarrab claimed that there was no Jewish problem in Arab countries, and that this problem, if it existed, was caused by the establishment of the State of Israel.
Journalist Mohammed Hajiri
“I was upset that such works weren’t receiving proper attention, so I decided to write some criticism about the exhibition. I sent it by mail to the editors of L’Orient Le Jour,” a French-language daily. “The criticism was published as it was, and later they suggested that I write in the newspaper’s culture section, and I agreed.”
In an article in L’Orient Le Jour, Fifi Abou Dib wrote that Tarrab “had an unparalleled talent. He was able to capture the essence of the artist’s work – his journey, achievement and place in art history. He had a unique critical ability combining philosophy, history, literature and other parameters familiar only to him.”
She added: “His criticisms not only offered insights about art, they provided a new way of seeing the world. Reaching the heights of this perspective required a life of near isolation, moving between reading and observation, an existence far beyond the understanding of most people.”
History has taught us that sometimes there are revolutions that change reality, but at the moment I don’t see any hope or change in the region.
Joseph Tarrab
Tarrab avoided the spotlight, something he considered a form of self-discipline, Abou Dib wrote, adding: “And yet, readers eagerly awaited his criticism before every exhibition.”
Nadine Begdache, the director of a gallery in Beirut, told L’Orient: “We were familiar with our artists, but we learned something new from Tarrab’s writing. We still needed him, we, the gallery owners. Since he retired something has been missing – his great knowledge, his interest in new artists. He ’read’ the works and explained them to us.”
In the late ’80s, Tarrab moved to Jounieh, where he spent the rest of his life. Starting in 2004, when he announced his retirement, he helped open galleries and publish art books. In Karam’s podcast he said that orthopedic problems kept him away from Beirut.
When asked whether as a Jew he felt a difference in Jounieh, he replied: “In the Jounieh area there are Syrians, Iraqis, Saudis; there are people from all ethnic groups, and they live together naturally. You don’t feel talk of hatred.”
Tarrab could have stayed in France, but he said his love for the sun and his links to his homeland overcame everything.
Regarding Israel’s war with Hamas, Tarrab said in the podcast: “Innocent people are the ones paying the price. At the moment I don’t see a solution to this war. History has taught us that sometimes there are revolutions that change reality, but at the moment I don’t see any hope or change in the region.”
Abou Dib mentioned that in the final months of his life, Tarrab was cared for by his close friend, Aouni Abdel Rahim, a Sunni Muslim. Tarrab, meanwhile, bequeathed his 6,000 books to the Lebanese National Library.
Sheren Falah Saab
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