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A People Without a Land
Streaming Oct 4-13, 2020
Online Discussion Sunday Oct 11 @ 7:00 pm EDT
If you are searching for the historical context for what is often presented as an intractable “conflict,” this film will serve that purpose. The title of this carefully-researched documentary conjures up the Zionist myth that the post-World War II arrival of European Jews in historic Palestine represented a “people without a land” coming to “a land without a people.” The film, which features the work of the Israeli-Palestinian collaboration Zochrot, documents the ongoing ethnic cleansing of millions of Palestinians from their historic homeland beginning with the UN partition of 1947. It exposes the current realities of occupation and settler expansion into East Jerusalem and the West Bank and the challenges posed by these realities to a two-state solution. Program Details & Registration
It’s What We Do
Streaming Oct 11-20, 2020
Online Discussion Sunday Oct 18 @ 7:00 pm EDT
Courageous veterans of the Israeli military have come forward to testify to the violence that they were ordered to carry out against Palestinians living under occupation. House demolitions, night raids of Palestinian homes, arrest and detention of children, and other human rights abuses are routine. In 2004, Israeli Defense Forces veterans, who have seen and participated in these atrocities, formed Breaking the Silence, whose purpose is to bring these stories to the Israeli public. The film, based on a play, presents verbatim testimonies of former Israeli soldiers. Program Details & Registration
Seeing Through the Wall
Streaming Oct 18-27, 2020
Online Discussion Sunday Oct 25 @ 7:00 pm EDT
This sensitive film explores the evolving relationship of a group of Jewish Americans to the state of Israel during a 12-day visit to the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The 2016 delegation was led by Rabbi Dov Taylor whose purpose was to afford this small group of American Jews “the opportunity to meet and get to know some Palestinians as human beings, just like themselves, with the same hopes and fears and dreams.” The “wall” in the film’s title refers to the separation barrier constructed by Israel throughout the West Bank, which in many instances has resulted in the loss of Palestinian land, the separation of farmers from their fields, and which greatly restricts the free movement of Palestinians.
Seeing Through the Wall is an appropriate metaphor for the personal stories told by ordinary people daring to have their assumptions and identities challenged and redefined. Program Details & Registration
Brooklyn Inshallah
Streaming Oct 25 – Nov 1, 2020
Online Discussion Sunday Nov 1 @ 7:00 pm EST
Khader El-Yateem was born in Bethlehem. He was a 19-year-old theology student when Israeli police raided his home, woke him from sleep, arrested him without charge and subjected him to 57 days in solitary confinement. His brother-in-law, an international attorney, was able to secure Khader’s release. Khader went on to complete his studies and was ordained a priest in the Lutheran Church. In 1992, he was sent by the Lutheran Bishop of Jerusalem to Brooklyn, New York, to minister to the large Arab immigrant population there. The film tells the story of his remarkable 2017 campaign for New York City Council. Along the way, we learn or are reminded of the harsh discrimination, illegal surveillance, and deportations of Arab Americans following the passage of the Patriot Act. Program Details & Registration
Did we schedule Brooklyn Inshallah for this week with the U.S. election in mind? Yes, we did!