The historic battle between Israel and Palestine will be the topic of the next screening of the White Rock Social Justice Film Society on Friday (Jan. 26).
The need for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza will be the theme of the question-and-answer session by Sid Shniad, a founding member of Independent Jewish Voices, special guest at the screening of the documentary Five Broken Cameras, to be shown at 6:30 p.m. at South Surrey Recreation and Arts Centre, 14601 20 Ave.
An Israel-Palestine-France-international co-production, the film bears witness to recent history in the region in a specific period between 2005 and 2011.
Co-directed by Palestinian Emad Burnat and Israeli Guy Davidi, it’s a deeply personal, first-hand account of non-violent protests in the village of Bil’in, a West Bank community affected by the Israeli West Bank Barrier.
Burnat, a Bil’in farmer, bought his first camera in 2005 to record the birth and growth of his youngest son.
But as protests grew over the destruction of olive groves to build a barrier between the village and a Jewish settlement, Burnat increasingly filmed clashes between villagers, the army and police and settlers.
The location of the barrier effectively cut off access to some 60 per cent of the village farmland, and residents felt compelled to resist the seizure of their land by settlers.
Some of the protesters were beaten, some were shot and some, like Bernat, were arrested – and successive cameras he used to film the events were smashed.
Structured around the destruction of five of Burnat’s cameras, the collaborative, English-subtitled production follows one family’s evolution over five years of turmoil.
Screened to international acclaim in 2012-13, including the Sundance Film Festival award, an international Emmy award and an Academy Award nomination in 2013, it has been praised as a “moving” visual autobiography and a “proudly defiant work”, with even Timeout Israel proclaiming it a “masterpiece”.
It has also had its share of detractors, inciting anger on both sides of the conflict.
Other reviews have noted that, as advocacy journalism, it is scarcely neutral, while a National Public Radio review of the film stated that it is “unabashedly pro-Palestinian, an indictment of Israel’s settlement policy that never examines either the settlers’ claims or the security forces’ point of view”.
IJV, co-founded by Shniad in 2008, describes itself as an organization representing Canadian Jews who have “a strong commitment to social justice and universal human rights.”
Its avowed goals are to give Jewish Canadians an alternative that ‘works for peace and justice’, to challenge the Jewish establishment’s views on the Middle East, to open up discussion about Israeli government and military actions, and to support the right of Canadians to discuss Israeli policies without fear of being accused of anti-Semitism.
Other stated goals of the organization are to promote contacts with Muslims and Arabs in Canada and “to demonstrate that we can work together for peace,” to oppose ‘wars of aggression‘, and to work in solidarity with the peace movements and war resisters within Israel. IJV has been strongly critical of the Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC), now the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), as simply wanting to shut down any debate on Israeli policies, while the CJC has long taken the position that IJV is a ‘fringe group’ that has promulgated ‘vile, anti-Zionist rhetoric’.
Parking at the centre is free. Admission is by donation.
For more information, visit whiterocksocialjustice.ca
