The Death of Klinghoffer and What Actually Happened on the Achille Lauro

By Lily Rothman

Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro left Port Said harbor on Oct. 10, 1985 after Egyptian authorities stopped it from sailing to the Israeli port of Ashdod.

A Controversial Opera is Based on the Events of the 1985 Terrorist Attack.

Protestors Held a Vigil, and a Rally Condemning "Klinghoffer" Opera Outside Lincoln Center.

Hundreds Protested Met's New Opera for 'Romanticizing Terrorism'

For New York City’s Metropolitan Opera, this week has been one in which the relationship between art and history got a little bit more complicated, as Monday’s opening night of the John Adams opera The Death of Klinghoffer provoked protests.

Those opposed to the production, who included former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani, believe that the opera glorifies terrorism in the way it presents the story of those who caused the titular death; those who support it say that the opera, though about the 1985 murder of Leon Klinghoffer, does not celebrate the people who killed him.

At its heart, the controversy is about the difficult distinctions between expression and endorsement–and perhaps even the very purpose of art.

But it’s also bound to raise a much more easily answered question, at least among younger observers of the debate: who was Leon Klinghoffer and what happened to him?

Some hecklers reportedly yelled during the performance that his murder should never be forgotten, and there’s no sign that the opera’s supporters would disagree with that statement.

TIME covered the murder in the Oct. 21, 1985, issue, as a key element in a cover story about terrorism.

As the magazine reported, the Achille Lauro was an Italian cruise liner taking about 750 passengers around the Mediterranean; those on board included 11 friends from New York and New Jersey, brought together by Marilyn Klinghoffer, who celebrated her 59th birthday during the trip.

Leon Klinghoffer, Marilyn’s husband, was confined to a wheelchair after having had two strokes.

The ship also carried four other passengers, terrorists from the Palestine Liberation Front who supposedly planned to attack when the ship reached the city of Ashdod in Israel.

But according to an Italian report at the time, after a waiter saw them with their guns they decided to launch their attack early, hijacking the ship and ordering the captain to steer the ship toward Syria.

If their demands—for the release of 50 prisoners being held in Israel—were not met, they would begin to kill their hostages.

Leon Klinghoffer, tragically, was first.

Here's how TIME reported what happened:

    At exactly what point these sadistic threats became reality is not known.

    But in a now familiar ritual of terrorism, the hijackers had decided to underscore their seriousness by taking a sacrifice.

    First they separated Leon Klinghoffer from his wife.

    “No,” said one gunman to the wheelchair-bound passenger.

    “You stay.

    She goes.”

    Marilyn Klinghoffer never saw her husband again.

    For the next 24 hours she and her friends were consumed by anxiety.

    When the hijacking was finally over, they looked all through the ship for him, though they expected the worst.

    Some passengers had noted that the trousers and shoes of one of the hijackers had been covered with blood.

    And besides, as one recalled, “We had heard gunshots and a splash.”

    Giovanni Migliuolo, the Italian Ambassador to Egypt, later chillingly reconstructed the event: “The hijackers pushed [Klinghoffer] in his chair and dragged him to the side of the ship, where, in cold blood, they fired a shot to the forehead.

    Then they dumped the body into the sea, together with the wheelchair.”

After it became clear that no nation would allow the hijacked ship to dock and the PLF negotiated for the hijackers to leave the ship, the Klinghoffers’ children were told that all of the passengers were safe.

Hours passed before the State Department informed them that their father had not been found.

About two days passed before the U.S. Ambassador to Egypt announced that Leon Klinghoffer had been murdered.

Marilyn Klinghoffer—who reportedly told President Reagan that she spat in the terrorists’ faces when asked to identify them in a line-up, to which he responded “You did?

God bless you.”—died of cancer the following year.

The opera The Death of Klinghoffer premiered a few years later, in 1991, in Belgium.

Though it was controversial then as well, TIME’s critic Michael Walsh wrote that fears over the subject matter should not keep it from the ranks of operatic greatness.

“Just as the lyrical and deeply humanistic [Nixon in China, an opera by the same creative team] confounded many who had expected a leftist demonization of the old unindicted co-conspirator,” he wrote, “so has this sweet, sorrowful Klinghoffer upended everyone’s expectations.”

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DO NOT

  LET PRESIDENT OBAMA

FAST TRACK TPP!

IT IS NOT IN THE BEST INTEREST

OF OUR COUNTRY!

CALL YOUR

 CONGRESSMAN & SENATORS

ASAP!

 These may be the most important calls

you've ever made for the survival of this union!

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The Ides of March (Latin: Idus Martii or Idus Martiae) is a day on the Roman calendar that corresponds to March 15th.

It was marked by several religious observations and became notorious as the date of the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC.

The death of Caesar made the Ides of March a turning point in Roman history, as one of the events that marked the transition from the historical period known as the Roman Republic to the Roman Empire.

Although March (Martius) was the third month of the Julian calendar, in the oldest Roman calendar it was the first month of the year.

The holidays observed by the Romans from the first through the Ides often reflect their origin as new year celebrations.

Congress, Public Waking Up To Trans-Pacific Partnership Threat

By Dave Johnson

August 2013--Members of Congress are starting to pay attention to the upcoming, secretly-negotiated Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) “trade” agreement that isn’t really about trade.

And the public is also becoming aware that this runaway job-loss express train is coming straight at us.

Not Really A “Trade’ Treaty”

The TPP agreement is being negotiated—in secret, even from Congress—between representatives of governments and giant, multinational corporations.

Government negotiators are not prevented from seeking lucrative corporate jobs if negotiations are completed in favor of those corporations.

Groups representing the interests of labor, environmental, consumer, human rights or other stakeholders in democracy are not at the negotiating table.

And, not surprisingly, it appears that the agreement will promote the interests of giant, multinational corporations over the interests of labor, environmental, consumer, human rights or other stakeholders in democracy.

Negotiated in secret, what we know about the treaty comes from leaks.

Only a few of the “chapters” of the agreement are actually about “trade” at all.

The rest are about the “rights” of corporations and investors.

Negotiated just as the worldwide democracy uprising threatens to reign in corporate interests, the agreement will limit governments’ ability to write banking regulations, energy policy, food safety standards and even government purchasing decisions.

It will allow corporations and investors to sue governments for lost profits if the governments try to make and enforce environmental, labor and other laws.

Congress Waking Up!

The corporations are asking Congress to pass “Fast Track” Trade Promotion Authority.

This would mean Congress yields its authority and duties under the Constitution, and just has a rushed up-or-down vote on whatever is presented to them.

So this will be about which legislators the giant corporations own, and which they do not.

Of course this vote will occur during a major corporate-funded PR campaign that will rival the propaganda “run-up” to the Iraq war vote.

Some members of Congress are circulating letters opposing “Fast Track” Trade Promotion Authority and are getting plenty of signatures from the “left” and the “right.”

Last week conservative House Republicans Michele Bachmann and Walter Jones joined Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro began gathering signatures of both Democratic and Republican members of Congress on letters opposing granting “Fast Track” Trade Promotion Authority.

They complain that Congress has not played their Constitutionally-mandated part in shaping this deal, and Fast Track removes their Constitutional authority to review and amend any such agreement.

In June 2/3 of newly-elected Democratic members of Congress warned against passing “Fast Track.”

Also in June 230 members of Congress signed a letter asking that TPP address currency manipulation.

Last year many members of Congress signed letters objecting to the secrecy of the negotiations.

Representative Alan Grayson has been all over this. he has penned posts, held meetings, sent emails, done radio show, and all kinds of other things to warn the public and rally opposition to TPP.

Public Rallying

This public is slowly becoming aware of TPP and the threat it poses.

Corporate media is, of course, not covering this.

Last Saturday, for example, hundreds of people gathered at a rally in Madison Wisconsin to show their disapproval of TPP.

At the rally people chanted, “Secrets, secrets are no fun! TPP hurts everyone!”

Interestingly, those parts of the Tea Party that are not fronts for corporate interests are also trying to spread the news about this treaty.

Gotta give them credit, their radar is really catching this one.

Tea-Party concerns include the fact that the treaty would elevate a corporate-council above American sovereignty, and Fast-Track Trade Promotion Authority would strip Congress of its Constitutional role in shaping and approving the treaty.

Here are some examples from Tea-Party outlets,

Daily Paul:

Trans-Pacific Partnership--Sign The Petition to OPPOSE

Sen. Rand Paul fights Obama’s Fast-Tracking Attempt w/TPP, the Trans Pacific Partnership!
Another Corporatist ‘Free Trade’ BS!

Others:

Trans-Pacific Partnership: Secret Surrender of Sovereignty

Is Obama Negotiating A Treaty That Would Essentially Ban All Buy American Laws?

Trans Pacific Partnership Could Nuke New Balance

The Trans-Pacific Partnership: Obama’s Globalization Agreement (Part 1) (Part 2)

Trans-Pacific Partnership--The Next (Secret) Step Toward A New World Order?

The third evil,

    The third evil is flying under the radar. Few people know about it. That is by design.

    It is called the Trans Pacific Partnership. It might as well be called the American Suicide Agreement.

Do Your Part

Let your Representative and Senators know that you oppose Congress voting for “Fast Track” Trade Promotion Authority because this means that Congress cannot carefully consider the TPP and amend it as needed.