Israeli-Arab porn duo raise passions, land in hospital

Amal Kashua, a 38-year-old mother of eight, was set upon by a mob last week at Tira, in central Israel. ‘‘Yussuf’’, a Palestinian, was beaten too. They went to hospital under police guard. Ashamed by their association, Kashua’s relatives disowned her.

Tira residents were divided over whether Kashua and Amir were married or merely lovers, and rumours put the money they had made in November for their hour-long on-camera coupling at anything from 700 shekels to 30 times as much.

But none disputed that the stars of Yussuf and Fatima had brought the near-lynching in Tira square upon themselves. ‘‘The whole town is satisfied and dissatisfied at once,’’ said Fathi Sultan. ‘‘Satisfied at what happened, because we tried to protect our honour, but on the other hand dissatisfied because she (Kashua) didn’t die, nor her husband.’’

Kashua pleaded hunger as the cause of her ‘‘heresy’’. ‘‘I didn’t want to insult Islam. I just wanted to make some money,’’ she said, her face cut and arm set in a fresh cast. ‘‘I was addicted to drugs and needed cash to feed my kids.

‘‘Plenty of others are worse than me,’’ she said. ‘‘The fact is that a lot of people in Tira saw that movie.’’ The litany of complaints began with the video’s cover, which showed Kashua and Amir in a pre-coital pose against a minaret.

‘‘This is a blow to the sensitivity of Muslims everywhere,’’ said Tira attorney Ihab Galgoly, who was representing two men arrested on suspicion of leading the assault on the couple. ‘‘We are considering suing the producers for breach of the law.’’

The studio which made Yussuf and Fatima remained unfazed. ‘‘We are not liable since we did everything by the book,’’ SexStyle director-general Amos Lahat said.

‘‘The couple approached us to make the film, and we warned them that there could be repercussions in their personal lives,’’ he said, adding they were paid ‘‘around $1,000’’ each.

With Israeli Arabs more conservative than their Jewish counterparts, Yussuf and Fatima set a precedent.

‘‘There is a considerable demand from the Arab sector for pornography which ‘speaks to them’, as it were. So we wanted to emphasise that this was a precedent-setting ethnic film,’’ Lahat said. (Reuters)