Algerian-American Sculptor of Alex Odeh Memorial Honors Cesar Chavez

By Pat and Samir Twair

Khalil Bendib gained recognition in Southern California's Arab-American community in April 1994 when his first bronze sculpture—a larger-than-life-size statue of slain Palestinian-American activist Alex Odeh—was unveiled in front of the Santa Ana Central Library (see photo on page 55). Before that, he had gained both fans and detractors for his political cartoons that appeared daily, starting in 1987, in the San Bernardino County Sun.

Now this Algerian American is gaining national prominence as the first Arab American to create monumental bronze sculptures. Bendib's entire life contradicts the ordinary. He's fiercely proud of his Algerian heritage, but owing to the revolution then taking place in his homeland, his mother gave birth to him in Paris. While many youngsters were memorizing the Qur'an in Algeria, Bendib, whose father was a physician, was drawing, molding clay, and sketching. He sold his first cartoon to an Algerian newspaper when he was 15. Physically, he stands out in a crowd because of his towering six-foot-four-inch height.

Bendib came to California in 1973 to study for a bachelor's degree in geology from the University of Southern California. In order to comply with U.S. residence requirements he remained on the USC campus, earning two master's degrees—one in geology, the other in Eastern Asian languages and cultures—and had entered a Ph.D. program in comparative literature when he landed a job with Gannett Co. as an editorial cartoonist in 1987. He became a U.S. citizen in 1992.

Bendib met Alex Odeh at USC. After Odeh was killed by a bomb in 1985, Bendib vowed that someday he would create a lasting memorial to the regional director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC). The concept of a statue incubated for years. No sooner did Bendib take his sketches of the statue to Odeh's widow, Norma, and to radio personality and Arab-American activist Casey Kasem, than the project was underway. With Kasem spearheading a national fund-raising campaign, within one year the statue of Alex Odeh was erected in Santa Ana, the county seat of Orange County, and the city where he was assassinated.

Long before Bendib met Odeh, he was reading about the late Mexican-American C³sar Chavez's struggles in California to gain rights for farm laborers. "We [Algerians] were all aware of what Chavez was doing in America," Bendib said. "He was a rebel, but in an elegant, poignant, touching, non-violent way. That really stuck with me." Again, at USC Odeh had told Bendib how he was cooperating with Chavez to organize hundreds of Yemeni farm workers living in substandard conditions in the Bakersfield area.

Once the Odeh statue was completed, Bendib began to work on a sculpture project he hoped would represent the hopes and struggle of Chavez and the disenfranchised people whose rights he fought for. Bendib took his proposal to the Chavez family and to the C³sar Chavez Foundation, founded after the labor leader's death in 1993.

Many artists had submitted proposals for a monument, but Bendib's concept was determined by the foundation to best capture the spirit of Chavez. Actually, it is three sculptures. The first, entitled, "When the Eagle Flies," depicts a barefoot Chavez releasing an Aztec eagle symbolizing his movement, La Causa. The second sculpture, "Innocence Lost," portrays a migrant child pushing a wheelbarrow, a silent testimony to Chavez' efforts to instill laws against child labor. The third piece, "Backbreaking Labor," is of a stooped old man working with a short-handled hoe, a tool Chavez was able to have outlawed in California in 1975.

Magdaleno Rose-Avila, executive director of the Chavez Foundation, commented that it was Bendib's concept of incorporating the people Chavez represented that won him the commission.

Fund-raisers with Hollywood Latino celebrities already have begun for the Chavez monument. Bendib hopes it will be unveiled in March 1997, to coincide with the farm leader's 70th birthday. The foundation's goal is to erect the Chavez statues in El Pueblo de Los Angeles Park, the site where the city was founded in 1783. Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alatorre, in whose district El Pueblo is located, County Supervisor Gloria Molina, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony and Lydia Lopez, president of El Pueblo's governing board, have endorsed the historic square as the appropriate site for the tripartite sculpture. But therein lies a controversy.

Conservative defenders of Los Angeles history argue Chavez was a contemporary personality and has no place in the city's birthplace. Many Mexican-American leaders have joined in the fray, contending the three statues already standing in El Pueblo are European, not Mexican. They represent King Carlos III of Spain, who ruled at the time Los Angeles was established; Felipe de Neve, the Spanish governor of California; and Father Junipero Serra, the founder of Catholic missions in California.

Bendib wouldn't have been able to volunteer his time and talents to the Chavez memorial if he hadn't received a commission last September for another sculpture project, a trilogy entitled "Ode to Diamond Bar."

Soon after he gained his first job in the U.S. working for Gannett Co., Bendib chanced upon the Southern California hamlet of Diamond Bar and decided to make his home there. He rhapsodizes about the quasi-alpine character of the sleepy community, and its "breath-taking vistas and chalet-like homes that could pass for a lost fragment of the Swiss Alps," all combined with a Mediterranean climate.

Bendib's sculptural trilogy—approved by the Diamond Bar City Council—consists of a cow, a mountain lion and a cricket, each situated in parks near the confluence of the Pomona and Orange freeways. And, if everything falls into place for this imaginative artist, the three will be unveiled in April 1977, one month after the Chavez work is presented.

The Diamond Bar project reveals Bendib's sense of humor and concern for the environment. A life size bronze cow with contented smile and long eyelashes and her calf are entitled "Country Living." They will graze on a steep slope of Ronald Reagan Park and are intended to represent bovines that wandered the same pastures just a few years ago. At nearby Summit Ridge Park, Bendib will erect the "Last Refuge," a mountain lion in full run that stretches approximately seven feet. He nostalgically refers to the puma as a threatened species that can still be seen in remote areas of the county. The third work, entitled "Oasis," will be in Peterson Park and is a giant, six-foot-long cricket whose song can still be heard on warm summer nights; whereas its chirping in Los Angeles has been stifled by traffic noise and pollution.

Bendib won over city fathers as he explained the three would become a visual symbol of Diamond Bar's ecological niche: the whimsical cow representing the serene alpine ambience; the puma depicting a proud American species; and the cricket celebrating the Mediterranean flavor of the region.

What projects will follow?

Bendib is already contemplating larger-than-life representations of his other heroes: poet Khalil Gibran, John Lennon and Martin Luther King, Jr.

PAF Stages 27th Convention

A speech by the PLO's Non-Governmental Organization representative, a tribute to the late Dr. Hatem Husseini, and seminars on the reconstruction of Palestine highlighted the 27th annual convention of the Palestine Arab Fund in the Los Angeles suburb of Buena Park Oct. 20 to 22. A total of $9,400 was pledged at a moving tribute to Dr. Husseini who was president of al- Quds university until his untimely death from cancer last year. All the money will go toward a scholarship in Dr. Husseini's name at the Jerusalem university. A director of the Palestine Information Bureau from 1978 to 1982, Dr. Husseini taught at three American universities and also was director of the Arab League information bureau.

Sakhir Habash, the PLO's NGO representative, told his audience of 400-plus people that when he came to the U.S. as a student years ago, he listed his place of birth as Jaffa, Palestine. "I was told no such place existed, but," he went on, lifting a document in the air, "I can only say they were wrong because here is my Palestinian passport."

During an interview with the Washington Report before his speech, Habash said the Clinton administration must improve its role in implementing measures stipulated in the peace agreement. "We don't just want a signature, we need the U.S. to push the other side to work in the spirit and text of the agreement," he said.

Asked about the irreconcilable problem of militant settlers in the heart of Hebron, Habash said the PLO did not want to destroy the peace process by demanding the extremists' removal at this time. "In February 1994 when Baruch Goldstein murdered 60 Palestinian worshippers at the Ibrahimi mosque, the U.S. was talking about making Hebron the first issue in the peace talks and that it would clear Hebron of the troublemakers," Habash said. "Now Hebron seems to be the last issue, excluding Jerusalem."

In answer to our query about rumors Palestinian police are abusing human rights of people under their jurisdiction, Habash commented: "Our police come largely from the Palestinian army, although some have been recruited from inside. To my knowledge, all are dedicated to democratic policies, but that is not to say there aren't some bad apples."

During a seminar on rebuilding Palestine, Mahmud Abu Hamdi, a past president of PAF, discussed the Palestine Economic Development Co. (PEDCO). He said it has pinpointed 24 industries the Palestinians are in need of, including factories for food, clothing and shoes.

"More than $400 billion has been invested in the creation of the state of Israel. We will never be an industrial giant nor able to compete with it, but over there, an investment of $20,000 can make a big difference," Abu Hamdi said.

Loafers Honor UCLA Coach

The Loafers was organized in Los Angeles in 1948 by a group of sports-loving Arab Americans, who, explained charter member Leon Saliba, "love God, love their country, love their heritage and one another." After a considerable hiatus, the Loafers reactivated expressly to honor UCLA's coach Jim Harrick after he led the Bruins basketball team to the 1995 NCAA championship. Harrick, who also is the Pacific 10 "oach of the year," is of Lebanese descent.

Dr. Ray Irani, CEO of Occidental Petroleum, and contractor Naseeb Saliba, whose firm is building the Los Angeles subway, underwrote the Nov. 11 dinner program staged in the exclusive Wilshire Country Club. Casey Kasem was master of ceremonies and proudly announced that more than $40,000 was raised for a scholarship fund for Arab-American students. Emmy award-winning composer Norman Henry Mamey performed at the piano. Dr. Edward Deeb was dinner committee chairman.

Lebanese Mark 52nd National Day

Thanksgiving coincided this year with Lebanon's 52nd National Day of Independence and more than 850 friends, guests and consular dignitaries were on hand for a special Lebanese thanksgiving for peace in the Beverly Hilton hotel. Receiving wellwishers for the first time in Los Angeles was Consul General Gebran Soufan. It was the largest-ever turnout for the Lebanese community and, as the protocol officer from Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordon's office remarked onstage, "It looks as if half of Lebanon is here tonight." The children's choir from the American Druze Cultural Center sang the Lebanese national anthem, while emcee Peter Michael sang the American anthem.

Calling on all Lebanese of all political persuasions at home and abroad, Consul General Soufan noted the accomplishments of his government in the postwar period and urged everyone to unite in rebuilding the tiny nation which had been subjected to conflicts waged by foreigners on its soil.

Pat and Samir Twair are free-lance writers from Southern California.