infoshop
Infoshops are places in which people can access anarchist or autonomist ideas. They are often stand-alone projects, or can form part of a larger radical bookshop, archive, self-managed social centre or community centre. Typically, infoshops offer ...
in
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...
,
Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
.Alt URL /ref> Its purpose was to spread information and raise awareness of issues related to social change, including
human rights
Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
,
animal rights
Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all Animal consciousness, sentient animals have Moral patienthood, moral worth independent of their Utilitarianism, utility to humans, and that their most basic interests—such as ...
globalization
Globalization is the process of increasing interdependence and integration among the economies, markets, societies, and cultures of different countries worldwide. This is made possible by the reduction of barriers to international trade, th ...
, social and economic oppression, consumerism,
feminism
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...
and gender issues. It ran by an open, non-hierarchical collective of volunteers at 32 Yitzhak Sadeh Street, Tel Aviv.
Activities
Salon Mazal had a lending
library
A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...
, a shop and a space for meetings, lectures, workshops and film screenings.''
Maximum RocknRoll
''Maximumrocknroll'', often written as ''Maximum Rocknroll'' and usually abbreviated as ''MRR'', is a not-for-profit monthly online zine of punk subculture and radio show of punk music. Based in San Francisco, ''MRR'' focuses on punk rock and ...
'', Issue 235 (December 2002). Retrieved on July 11, 2008. "The place is 100% vegan straight edge. called Salon Mazal and has a library, along with books, zines, and music for sale." Occasionally there are other projects on various topics of interest, such as youth group meetings,
Arabic
Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
lessons, DIY workshops, a reading group of anarchist texts.
The lending and
reference library
A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...
stocks several thousand books on subjects related to social change, of which roughly half are in English. The idea behind it is to enable people to read books without encouraging them to buy, thus creating an alternative to the existing
consumer culture
Consumer culture describes a lifestyle hyper-focused on spending money to buy material or goods.
Consumer culture became prominent in the United States during the rapid economic growth of the Roaring Twenties following the end of World War I ...
. Salon Mazal prints and publishes materials on a variety of subjects, including a DIY guide, a guide on wise consumerism, a translated booklet on
permaculture
Permaculture is an approach to land management and settlement design that adopts arrangements observed in flourishing natural ecosystems. It includes a set of design principles derived using Systems theory, whole-systems thinking. It applies t ...
, translated anarchist texts, booklets on feminism for men and women.
Workshops, lectures, film screenings, group discussions and meetings on different subjects are held several times a week, open to the public and are free of charge. Salon Mazal also provides a space for study, organization, meeting, planning and working on initiatives and projects for social change, free of charge. Groups who have used the space over the years for their meetings include Anarchists Against the Wall,
Indymedia
The Independent Media Center, better known as Indymedia, is an open publishing network of activist journalist collectives that report on political and social issues. Following beginnings during the 1999 Carnival Against Capital and 1999 Seat ...
, One struggle, Woman for Woman, Kelaf (The Lesbian Feminist Community), A garden for Peace, The Coexistence Forum in the Negev, The Community Advocate, Shatil - Mixed Cities Project, The Center for Alternative Knowledge and The Committee against House Demolition, the Alternative youth summer camp, New Profile.
Store
Salon Mazal was one of the distribution points for fair trade products in Israel (coffee, cocoa and olive oil), which was sold at the shop. The market for these products is still very small in Israel, mainly due to lack of awareness. They also offer
olive oil
Olive oil is a vegetable oil obtained by pressing whole olives (the fruit of ''Olea europaea'', a traditional Tree fruit, tree crop of the Mediterranean Basin) and extracting the oil.
It is commonly used in cooking for frying foods, as a cond ...
from
Palestinian
Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine.
*: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...
farmers in
Tulkarm
Tulkarm or Tulkarem (, ''Ṭūlkarm'') is a Palestinians, Palestinian city in the West Bank, the capital of the Tulkarm Governorate of the State of Palestine. The Israeli city of Netanya is to the west, and the Palestinian territories, Palestinia ...
and olive oil soaps from Palestinian farmers in
Budrus
Budrus () is a Palestinian village in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate, located 31 kilometers northwest of Ramallah in the northern West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), the village had a population of ...
environmental degradation
Environment most often refers to:
__NOTOC__
* Natural environment, referring respectively to all living and non-living things occurring naturally and the physical and biological factors along with their chemical interactions that affect an organism ...
. In addition, they distribute flyers and booklets on fair trade and hold lectures on the subject.
The infoshop is one of the only places in Israel where self-made products and self-published books can be distributed. People are encouraged to sell their products, including artwork, books, poetry books, homemade jams, deodorants, self made political T-shirts and other products made by individuals. In this way the infoshop encourages local, non-industrial production and supports local independent producers.