Venice hears Gaza

Israel’s war on Palestinians has migrated from television news to feature films appearing at festivals in Venice and Toronto. Gaza war film the “The Voice of Hind Rajab” by French-Tunisian director Kaouther Ben Hania was accorded a 23-minute standing ovation, the longest ever, and awarded the Sliver Lion, the second grand jury prize at Venice. It had been widely expected this film would secure the coveted Golden Lion which was won by US director Jim Jarmusch for “Father Mother Sister Brother” which depicts uneasy ties between parents and adult children. Commenting on the Gaza war, Jarmusch wore a badge proclaiming “Enough” at the awards ceremony. Tunisia is likely to choose this film as its official entry for the Academy Award in the Best International Feature category.

Based on an actual tragedy, Ben Hanina portrays the final three hours in the life of 5-year-old Hind Rajab killed while trapped in a bullet-ridden car with six family members who were trying to flee Gaza om Jan. 29, 2024. Her mobile phone pleas for rescue and calls tor help to the Palestinian Red Crescent have been incorporated into the film, drawing audiences into the drama. Both the child and two rescuers who had coordinated with the Israeli military were killed by Israeli strikes. Rajab’s dying cousin cried, “They are shooting at us. The tank is right next to me. We’re in the car; the tank is right next to us.”

Ben Hania stated, “This film is not just about one girl, it’s about all the children whose voices are silenced in war...Cinema cannot bring Hind back, nor can it erase the atrocity committed against her. Nothing can ever restore what has taken, but cinema can preserve her voice, make it resonate across borders.” According to Save the Children more than 20,000 children have been slain in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023, when 1,200, two-thirds of whom were civilians, were killed during a Hamas attack on southern Israel.

There have been multiple international and Israeli investigations into this incident with Forensic Architecture concluding in June 2024 that an Israel tank had fired 335 rounds at the car. As the tank was close, the crew would have seen the car contained children as well as adults. Furthermore, the tank attacked the Red Crescent ambulance. The UN Human Rights Council ruled Rajab’s killing could be a war crime while the Palestinian Foreign Ministry urged the International Criminal Court to hold those accountable for the two attacks. Following her death, a foundation was established in her name with the aim of addressing Israeli impunity over war crimes in Gaza and the Palestinian territories.

Meanwhile, the Toronto Film Festival featured Bethlehem-born Annemarie Jacir’s “Palestine 36.” It tells the nearly forgotten story of Palestinian resistance to post-Ottoman British rule and sponsorship of Zionist settlers and armed gangs which attacked Palestinian villagers. The cast includes Jeremy Irons, Hiam Abbas, and Irish actor Liam Cunningham who is on board the latest international flotilla seeking to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza.

Wherever they went, the British relied on “divide and rule” to maintain occupation: North America, Ireland, India, Palestine, and Cyprus. The result everywhere has been conflict and instability.

“You can’t understand where we are today without understanding 1936, Jacir told Agence France Presse the day after the world premier. The film, in Arabic and English, seeks to show how British colonial policy led to the emergence of Israel by war and produced the ongoing regional conflict. “I wanted to really point the finger at the British.” Jacir said. As Jewish immigration from Europe surged and settlers took over Palestinian land, Palestinians responded with a three-year boycott and armed revolt against the British who cracked down hard. Villagers were arrested and their homes torched while British officers trained Jewish irregulars in units known as the “Night Squads” which later served in the Zionist underground army, the Haganah, that conquered 78 per cent of Palestine in 1948 and morphed into the Israeli army which finished the job and imposed the 1967 occupation.

These films are not entertainment. Featuring them at the latest festivals keeps the unresolved Palestine conflict alive among cinema goers and helps Palestinian and pro-Palestine activists to tell the story of what is happening in Palestine today and how it depends on the history of British colonialism and Zionist colonisation and militarization. Hind Rajab was one of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian children who have died or been killed as a result of post-World War I British policy. No thought was ever given of the deadly and destructive consequences.

In the 1917 Balfiur Declaration the British government pledged to facilitate the establishment of a “Jewish home land in Palestine” without prejudicing “the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine.” In 1919, there were an estimated 94,000 Jewish residents of Palestine who amounted to 8 per cent of the population. When the UN voted to partition Palestine in 1947, the population was two-thirds Palestinian and one-third Jewish. The current population of Palestine-Israel approaches 15 million, 7.2 million Israeli Jews, and 7.8 million Palestinian Muslims and Christians, including Palestinian citizens of Israel as well aa occupied Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. This amounts to an increase in numbers among Muslims and Christians in recent years. They are now a significant majority. Due to Israeli and US opposition, the proclamation of the state of Palestine at this month’s United Nations General Assembly is unlikely to lead to implementation of the two-state solution which could give Palestinians 22 per cent of their homeland and end their statelessness.

Photo: TNS