For the launch of Al Jazeera America, USC Annenberg Professor Sandy Tolan wrote a piece on a group of Palestinian musicians who risked their freedom by sneaking into Jerusalem to perform a concert. When the Israeli government denied five members of the 37-person Ramallah Orchestra travel permits, the group was forced to climb the Separation Wall in order to enter the city. "A little after 8 p.m., strings whispered the haunting first notes of Beethoven's Fourth, in a minor key, as 200 visitors filled the seats in the old church, unaware of the journey the performers had taken to play for them that night," wrote Tolan. "But perhaps they sensed something. Moments after the visiting French conductor made his last thrust, and the final notes of the Fourth echoed off the walls, the audience rose in a sustained, joyful ovation."
Read the full piece here.
