British Arabs made a huge contribution to London’s coronavirus response, the film-makers behind a documentary on the community’s experience during the pandemic have said.
BBC Arabic producer Emir Nader and director Namak Khoshnaw discussed their film, London Lockdown, at an online event hosted by the Council for Arab British Understanding, and explained their desire to capture the events unfolding around them.
“The city was empty and, of course, as journalists we wanted to go out and capture the story around us,” Mr Nader said.
“The news around the pandemic was to do with the massive contributions of migrant communities, minority ethnic communities and Arabs especially,” he added.
Mr Khoshnow described how he wanted to bring his experience filming crises in the Middle East to capturing the onset of the pandemic in the UK.
“We wanted to have something outside the hospital,” he said. “It is our job to capture those moments, whether ISIS is attacking Mosul or Covid is attacking Trafalgar Square,” the director explained.
The film follows a series of characters through their day-to-day lives during the coronavirus crisis and is book-ended by piano music played in London’s empty spaces by Jordanian-Palestinian classical pianist Iyad Sughayer.
One of the central subjects of the film is Osman El Tayar, a British-Sudanese consultant doctor and son of Dr Adil El Tayar, a renowned organ transplant specialist who became the first National Health Service surgeon to die with Covid-19.
Dr El Tayar, 63, had worked in his native Sudan and Saudi Arabia and had volunteered to work to support the battle against the coronavirus.
The film captures deeply intimate family moments as Dr El Tayar’s body was returned to Sudan in the midst of lockdown and Osman and his 14-year-old brother were forced to remain at home.
London Lockdown shows how the pair had participated in the funeral rites from their living room over the phone.
In the film, the younger Dr El Tayar can be heard expressing his sorrow that he could not go to the funeral where it would have been his duty to pray over the grave. “He was one of the victims of the war against corona,” the doctor said of his father.
The film-makers said they had been moved to be involved in such a personal time for the El Tayar family.
“[We had] a huge feeling of being humbled of a family letting you into a moment like that,” Mr Nader explained.
“He recognised that there was something important to be told. And I guess his family's sacrifice,” he added.
The documentary ends on a note of optimism, showing members of Britain’s Arab community meeting, albeit with social distancing, for Eid.
The film, which originally aired on BBC Arabic has reached a wider audience on the BBC’s English language outlets.
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Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
The Bio
Favourite vegetable: “I really like the taste of the beetroot, the potatoes and the eggplant we are producing.”
Holiday destination: “I like Paris very much, it’s a city very close to my heart.”
Book: “Das Kapital, by Karl Marx. I am not a communist, but there are a lot of lessons for the capitalist system, if you let it get out of control, and humanity.”
Musician: “I like very much Fairuz, the Lebanese singer, and the other is Umm Kulthum. Fairuz is for listening to in the morning, Umm Kulthum for the night.”
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
Major honours
ARSENAL
BARCELONA
- La Liga - 2013
- Copa del Rey - 2012
- Fifa Club World Cup - 2011
CHELSEA
- Premier League - 2015, 2017
- FA Cup - 2018
- League Cup - 2015
SPAIN
- World Cup - 2010
- European Championship - 2008, 2012
The specs: 2018 Nissan Patrol Nismo
Price: base / as tested: Dh382,000
Engine: 5.6-litre V8
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 428hp @ 5,800rpm
Torque: 560Nm @ 3,600rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 12.7L / 100km
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Engine: naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12
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Total eligible population
About 57.5 million people
51.1 million received a jab
6.4 million have not
Where are the unvaccinated?
England 11%
Scotland 9%
Wales 10%
Northern Ireland 14%
Sting & Shaggy
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The biog
Family: He is the youngest of five brothers, of whom two are dentists.
Celebrities he worked on: Fabio Canavaro, Lojain Omran, RedOne, Saber Al Rabai.
Where he works: Liberty Dental Clinic
Kathryn Hawkes of House of Hawkes on being a good guest (because we’ve all had bad ones)
- Arrive with a thank you gift, or make sure you have one for your host by the time you leave.
- Offer to buy groceries, cook them a meal or take your hosts out for dinner.
- Help out around the house.
- Entertain yourself so that your hosts don’t feel that they constantly need to.
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Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Profile
Co-founders of the company: Vilhelm Hedberg and Ravi Bhusari
Launch year: In 2016 ekar launched and signed an agreement with Etihad Airways in Abu Dhabi. In January 2017 ekar launched in Dubai in a partnership with the RTA.
Number of employees: Over 50
Financing stage: Series B currently being finalised
Investors: Series A - Audacia Capital
Sector of operation: Transport
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ELIO
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Three stars
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