Their blurb for "5 Broken Cameras" says, "An extraordinary work of both cinematic and political activism, 5 Broken Cameras is a deeply personal, first-hand account of non-violent resistance in Bil'in, a West Bank village threatened by encroaching Israeli settlements. Shot almost entirely by Palestinian farmer Emad Burnat, who bought his first camera in 2005 to record the birth of his youngest son, the footage was later given to Israeli co-director Guy Davidi to edit. Structured around the violent destruction of each one of Burnat'scameras, the filmmakers' collaboration follows one family's evolution over five years of village turmoil. Burnat watches from behind the lens as olive trees are bulldozed, protests intensify, and lives are lost. "I feel like the camera protects me," he says, "but it's an illusion.""
Emad Burnat is the first Palestinian documentary filmmaker ever nominated for an Academy Award.
Guess what? When he arrived at LAX to visit "The land of the free", he was immediately treated to some of our all-American official harassment.
Michael Moore, a governor of the Academy's documentary branch and a champion of Burnat's film, said, “"Emad, his wife & 8-yr old son were placed in a holding area and told they didn't have the proper invitation on them to attend the Oscars," he wrote. "Although he produced the Oscar invite nominees receive, that wasn't good enough & he was threatened with being sent back to Palestine... Apparently the Immigration & Customs officers couldn't understand how a Palestinian could be an Oscar nominee.”
I haven't seen the other Best Documentary contenders, so I don't know what the competition is like, but if this moving film wins (and the Documentary Section is about the only progressive faction in the Academy), it will send a powerful message about Israel's behavior in the Occupied Territories, and the effect on Palestinian villagers of the continued expansion of the Israeli settlements.
A couple of years ago, I read Jeremy Bowen's excellent "Six Days", on the 6-Day War in 1967. Bowen is the BBC's Middle East Editor, and a true expert on the Middle East. (I also recommend writings by Robert Fisk, of the London "Independent".)
One thing Bowen's book makes vividly clear, is that the "settlements" are and have been since 1948, the vital element in Zionist expansionism. Of course, to Americans, the word "settler" has a friendly, even inspiring connotation - of brave pioneers opening up "empty" lands to civilization, against fearsome odds.
However, in the Israeli case, the settlements are government backed, and are used as wedges to drive into Palestinian communities, steal their farmland, and divide their communities. The settlers are recruited from the most fanatical religious groups, those loonies who actually believe that "God" would choose one tiny group of humanity and "give" them a particular piece of land, along with carte blanche to use any vile tactic to seize and hold that land. (Nobody seems to notice that in any normal society, this would be regarded as raving madness.)
The settlers themselves are heavily armed, but further, they receive the full protection of the Israeli "Defence" Force. Thus, far from being peaceful farmers looking to grow food, they are actually the spearhead of a military takeover.
Ain't life grand?
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