Ahead of the memorial in Tel Aviv marking thirty years since the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, followed by the world premiere of Golem in Pompeii at the Tokyo Film Festival, legendary Israeli filmmaker Amos Gitai joins François Picard on the second anniversary of the deadliest attack in Israel’s history. As war rages, Mr. Gitai offers a message of urgency: “Peace is obligatory,” he tells us. “The alternative is destruction, death… we have to find a way to live together.” For nearly half a century, Mr. Gitai has been tracing the marvels, complexities, and fragilities of Israeli society, not just as an artist, but also as an activist and first-hand witness. Israel is wrestling with immense suffering and the paradoxical role of both victim and aggressor. For the Israeli filmmaker, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is unlike any other in the region. Iran and Lebanon do not involve territorial conflict the way it does with the Palestinians, he explains. “It’s also their country. And we have to find a peaceful way to shape a new future for the Middle East.” Rather than collapsing inward into tribal pain, Mr. Gitai invites both Israelis and Palestinians to "think about the suffering of the other". In 1982, Amos Gitai interviewed the Palestinian Mayor of Nablus, Bassam Shakaa, who lost both of his legs in a 1980 assassination attempt by Israeli extremists. He asked the mayor if he remained optimistic or pessimistic. "And I loved his answer", remembers Mr. Gitai. "He said to me, ‘Amos, we can’t afford to be pessimistic, it’s a luxury’.” And so Mr. Gitai reminds us: History is shaped not only by weapons and wealth, but by ideas. That’s where culture comes in and plays an essential role.
#October7th #Israelis #Palestinians
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