Culture and its balance

Death in Gaza (2004)
dir: James Miller

The movie opens with the numbing fact that director James Miller died in 2003 while shooting this movie. He had planned for a pair of films, but only got to shoot enough to fill one. Death in Gaza is the first half of the now-non-existant pair of movies featuring children in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, focusing on Palestinian children in Rafah. The other half was to focus on the Israeli children. One can never know what the pair would be like, given that Miller is dead, and any other attempt would be flawed by a different set of idea(l)s.

One of the first images one sees is also of a car bombing which the Israelis conducted on one of the terrorist organizers. This isn't the truely disturbing part, but the footage that follows is. One sees the adults and children picking up brains, body parts,and blood from the victim, and trying to save as much of it as possible.

This is the disturbing foundation for what is to be an extremely surreal and disturbing movie analyzing the conflict from a determinedly neutral point. It shows the paramilitaries (the film hates to use terrorist, probably because of the biased implication) and their active recruitment of children. It focuses on Ahmed, a 12 year old, who is caught up in the war not by choice, but by fate. He was merely born into this. The paramilitaries actively recruit Ahmed to become a martyr, one of the highest honors to these people, ultimately to be used in a more political sense. But, the filmmakers don't hesitate to point out the contradictions of the paramilitaries. There is a scene, almost touching, when Ahmed is hanging with the group, and is shown as a brother. They pose him with a rocket launcher. It reminded me of the touching scenes you see in ghetto movies like Juice or New Jack City where an older male gives a young boy a gun to hold, half the time the boy's mother comes in bitching up a storm. BUT, by the end of the scene, the one holding Ahmed says, while Ahmed is in the room, that the interviewer shouldn't worry about the responsibility of Ahmed's age, as there are thousands more children like him.

I'll pause to give you value for that sentence.

The film also shows a very small girl who states that she once saw the sea before the Israelis put a wall up, and now she can't see it anymore. I would say the girl is about 7. She then states that she hates the Israelis, and that they are sons of dogs (probably a literal translation of an Arabic curseword). She comments how they come in with tanks and fire on everything.

The teachers also teach that the Israelis stole the land they procured in the 1967 war (and they probably also teach that the land was stolen in 1948 as well). There is so much anti-Semetic bias running through the teachings, one almost says that anti-semitism is ingrained in the culture.

But, then the film shows a different side. Tanks fire at kids because they throw rocks at bulldozers. At most, the rocks could be dynamite in a soda can, which would never do damage to the bulldozers, nor their drivers. In one of the most surreal moments, we see the bulldozers and tanks as almost inhuman self-contained objects coming in to Rajah. As we watch this, we wonder what this does to the Palestinian mind especially as they grow up in the state. Are the children more susceptible to the brainwashing by the elders because the Israelis bulldoze houses and shoot at unarmed children, who are just throwing rocks at whom they believe to be their oppressors? What does the constant state of Israeli bulldozers, and the destruction they conduct, do to the children and the residents? Does it inspire peace?

The film also shows a 14 year old going to the hospital after being shot by a tank while throwing rocks (I hate to use the word attack) at bulldozers.

The final segment of the film shows the death of James Miller. James Miller, his translator, and Shira Shah, his co-creator, walk out of a house after the bulldozing stops. They are holding a white flag, and have the words TV taped in white to their helmets and bodies. James even shines a flashlight on the white flag. We hear Shira call out in English, "We are British Journalists," just as James is shot in the neck, presumably by an Israeli.

James is turned into a martyr by the extremists (the film doesn't hesitate to pass judgement on them at this point), and is ultimately lost to his family and friends. Ahmed is inspired to drop the paramilitaries and to become a cameraman.

The best part about this film is that you realize that with new generations the starting and ending of the war are no longer legitimate points to start from. They have only been taught what they learn from the bias. They only experience the current state of terror brought on by both sides: the palestinian and the israeli. The new generations are now more inspired by their oppression than by history, and that is where we willbe in a very short amount of time. But, where do you go from there? When there is no start point, how does one get to the end? Especially when one of the sides is not completely government-sponsored, but conducted by militants and renegades rather than a single organized force.

These are the points that Death in Gaza brings up, but it offers no answers. I doubt it would have offered any answers if the Israeli film had been finished. It was intended merely an insight into the foundations of the anger and hatred pervading both cultures, but we only get insight into one side: the Palestinian side. Its cause is shown, as well as its irrationality. And that's what makes this an important movie.

A+

(currently being shown on the HBOs)