sunday film screening : "THE KILLING ZONE"
- - 28.10.2005 10:49
Documentary film screening : "THE KILLING ZONE" @ Het Wilde Westen, Bilderdijkstraat 82hs, Amsterdam. Sunday 30 October, 21:00, free entrance.
"The Killing Zone"
[ source:  http://www.orscp.org ]
On the eve of the attack on Iraq (2003) Reporter Sandra Jordan and Director/Cameraman Rodrigo Vazquez went to the Israeli Occupied Gaza Strip to investigate the killings of internationals Rachel Corrie, Tom Hurndall, and UK Reporter James Miller. They collect video footage and eyewitness accounts, all evidence which shows clearly that the Israeli military targetted them knowing they were civilians, a war crime under international law. This is a stunning, graphic, and overwhelmingly important documentary which shows the impunity with which the Israeli Defense Forces are acting in the Occupied Territories, towards internationals and Palestinians.
Film Review: Dispatches - The Killing Zone
by Sonia Nettnin, Ramallah Online Columnist & film critic
[ http://www.ramallahonline.com ]
Dispatches documentary, “The Killing Zone,” investigates numerous deaths and injuries of internationals and Palestinians by Israeli Defense Forces in Rafah, Gaza.
Through eyewitness accounts from civilians and international activists Director Rodrigo Vazquez and Dispatches reporter Sandra Jordan examine several crime scenes over five weeks. They ask IDF representatives for explanations behind the fatalities. Jordan is narrator also.
“I want to die, I want to give up this pain,” cries Huda, who awakes from a coma. While family members line both sides of her hospital bed, Huda stares up. As her aunt waves her hand in front of Huda’s eyes, Huda does not blink.
Three weeks prior, Huda sat at her classroom desk. Then an IDF bullet broke her classroom window and shot Huda in the head. Now, she is blind. Huda’s dream is to become a schoolteacher. “Why this happen to me?” Huda asks.
Jordan goes to the girl’s school and inquires about the day the IDF shot her. On the classroom’s back wall remains dried blood. While Jordan asks questions, an Israeli shell explodes nearby. In the school, children scream and seek cover under their desks. A man carries a girl who passed out from trauma and shock.
“You can die anywhere at anytime in Gaza,” Jordan says.
The documentary investigates several violent attacks upon Palestinians and internationals through live footage also. For instance, an Israeli helicopter dropped a precision missile on a Palestinian militant who was in a car in a residential area. After the assassination, helicopters returned and dropped two more shells on an open crowd surrounding the body. As a result, more bodies and blood pervaded the streets.
At the time of the attack, ten-year-old Mahmoud was riding his bicycle when shrapnel struck his right eye, abdomen, arms, and legs. Another boy, Muhammad, thirteen years-old, suffered from shrapnel wounds. He did not survive the blast. In the end, four people died and 47 people suffered injuries.
Jordan recounts that she asked the IDF why they fired into the crowd. The IDF’s response was they do not comment on security matters.
In Nusseirat Refugee Camp, an Israeli attack of anti-personnel shells, which contain thousands of flying darts (also called flechettes), killed seven people and wounded 67 people. One boy named Omar, 16, died. He had a future as a builder’s apprentice and now his blood remains on a building wall. Family members watch a video of him dancing at a relative’s wedding.
In the streets, funeral processions scream emotions.
In Gaza, over one million Palestinians live under occupation. Through daily experiences with violence they learned that even if the U.S. supports Israel financially and politically, the world turns a blind eye to Palestinian pain and suffering.
When Palestinians attack the IDF and Israelis in the vicious cycle of revenge or they defend themselves, the U.S. Government and American mainstream media chime the words “Palestinian” and “terrorist” as the same chord. The result is it alters American perceptions of Palestinians. In the Arab World resentment toward Americans continues because the vestiges of the West’s colonialism and imperialism are the present-day forces behind U.S. policy in the Middle East.
While Palestinian mothers care for their children, Israeli bullets ricochet off buildings and shoot through the walls of their homes. Israeli bulldozers raze thousands of Palestinian homes, sometimes with minutes notice. In the end, the families receive no compensation, they lose their lifetime savings and they are homeless.
When ISM activist Rachel Corrie tried to save the home of the Nasrallah Family she lost her life. The IDF reports the driver of the bulldozer did not see her. The film shows armored personnel carriers fire tear gas at people and shoot bullets over their heads when they tried to have a memorial service for Corrie.
While Jordan and the film crew were in their rented flat, she describes the daily night fire as relentless, overwhelming and dangerous to civilians, who point to pockmarks in the walls of their homes.
During her visit with the IDF Jordan reviews night-vision footage. Colonel Pinky Zoaret points to Palestinian militants firing into an area. Jordan’s assessment is that the IDF has a sophisticated surveillance system.
“Did you kill them?” she asks.
“I hope so, I think so,” Zoaret answers.
“Do you ever get it wrong?” she asks.
“Yes,” he says. “People get into the range of bullets, this is a combat zone.”
The scene shows a barren lot that looks like a demolition area because of the razed, brown dirt. In the background are rows of houses. It is unclear if Palestinians or Israelis live there. Regardless the IDF designated the residential area a combat zone, which raises more questions.
On a phone in a hospital, a Palestinian doctor asks for a written guarantee from the IDF for the safe transport of a British photographer and activist, Tom Hurndall, shot by an Israeli sniper. The IDF has a history of shooting Palestinian ambulances and medical personnel because they say the ambulances carry weapons.
Before the IDF granted permission for his transfer Hurndall waited 2.5 hours. Since he is a foreigner, special arrangements were made for a helicopter to pick him up at an Israeli outpost near the Rafah-Egypt border, and then transfer him to an Israeli hospital. Since Hurndall is not Palestinian, the IDF makes this exception. Otherwise he would have been left to die.
The documentary shows investigations into the deaths of the late Rachel Corrie, the late Tom Hurndall and the late, award-winning cameraman James Miller because of political pressure. The IDF kills and injures thousands of Palestinian civilians, but the international community conveys a bare response.
If people want to learn what life is like in Rafah, “The Killing Zone” contains accurate and thorough testimonies to life in Gaza for Palestinians.
Along with their blood and their tears.
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