Arna's Children

"Arna's Children" is indeed a very powerful movie. The message transcends ethnicity, religion, and class. Arna proved the futility in stereotyping. She showed love and compassion to Palestinian children, not as a Jew, but as a caring and compassionate human being.

Arna and Juliano showed the Palestinian children that if no one else cared, they did. They created the theatre as a positive outlet for creativity and expression. They let the children know that they mattered. Above all, they proved that someone loved them enough to want them to experience the joy and laughter of childhood in the midst of such utter chaos.

To see this movie as glorifying Palestinian militants is to be naive and miss the whole point. What the movie does do is show the ugly and chaotic side of living in an oppressive police state through the eyes of children.

The film brings home the detrimental aspects of how one often reaps what they sow when using violence and oppressive force to solve problems. It reminds us of how today's feeble and fearful child too often goes on to become tomorrow's angry and militant young man.

The movie was made by Juliano Mer, Arna Mer's son. Arna Mer, a Jewish woman who fought in the 1948 war dedicated her life to helping Palestinian refugees after the 1967 war. Among her feats was establishing a children's theater in the West Bank city of Jenin during the 80s. Using old footage, Juliano Mer returns to the refugee camp after his mother's death and after a devastating Israel Defense Forces operation, to check up on the kids who attended the drama group - Arna's Children, who have grown up under Israeli occupation. Some joined militant groups, went on suicide missions or were killed while defending their home. Though highly political, the film does not take sides and is not dogmatic, just humane and real.

I saw this movie over 2 years ago, and it still sticks in my memory as one of the best, most shocking, most eye-opening movies I've ever experienced. A movie that makes you smile, and even laugh for a moment, and makes you choke with tears the next,a mesmerizing movie that shows how, even some Israelis, who choose to see the reality as it should be seen, turn against their government for its brutal and discriminating acts against the Palestinians.

But, the more important point I could see is that how the atrocities of the occupation turn the Palestinian people from ordinary citizens into militants. Normal people who, after facing the unimaginable from the occupation forces, decided that the best thing they could do was joining the armed conflict against the occupation. I know many people would argue about how Palestinians are terrorists and some such crap, but the point is: Who started it all? Before you judge someone for carrying out a bombing, you have to first put yourself in his shoes, and picture yourself carrying a 10 year-old bleeding, lifeless girl.

One of the things that stuck in my head is something Arna said at the beginning: There's no peace without freedom. No peace without freedom.

"Youssef died in Israel", states the Narrator. What the Narrator doesn't say is that poor Youssef was a suicide bomber, who didn't simply die - his death was incidental to his mission - to kill as many innocents as possible. Not innocents, you say? Occupiers...and therefore deserving of death? This seems to be what the Narrator, the director Juliano Mer Khamis, says. But once he starts down this evil road - that the Oppressed are allowed to kill their Oppressors, as well as their innocent family members - he loses legitimacy. And he does make this statement when he portrays these poor Palestinian Arabs as the Noble Oppressed and the Israeli army as the Faceless Evil. But it's not so simple as this; there's evil and good on both sides and the Palestinians have no monopoly on sadness, injustice, or fear. He of course has no responsibility to make a balanced portraiture. But let's call this film what it is - a propagandist recruiting film for Palestinian militants.

That this film has won some minor awards is testament only to political correctness - and the kind of political correctness that is merely a fashion. The film is poorly shot, with terrible sound and a haphazard story. Lucky for the director that Arna and the three children died or he'd have no film at all. (Was he really sad when he stood over Arna's lifeless body? To me he seemed to be acting; perhaps he was thinking about his acceptance speech for the Czech One World Film Festival - whatever that is).

I'm sure that the director gets a lot of pats on the back about his "brave" film. Too bad.

I was fortunate enough to catch this powerful documentary at the 2004 Hotdocs festival in TO. The film was shot over a period of ten years from 1992 to 2002, and follows a group of Palestinian children as they grow up and turn to violence to guard their refugee camp.

Go see this movie if given the chance. It provides a rare and refreshingly caring glimpse into the personal lives of people usually portrayed as terrorists and monsters. The movie works especially well because the director has a personal relationship with the kids-turned-fighters in the film.

This is not self-indulgent "stick it to the man" left wing propaganda; it's one of the most human films you'll ever see regardless of your political views.

Peace.