Last year, the San Francisco Film Festival bravely programmed the film Rachel, about the life and death of Olympia-raised pro-Palestine peace activist, Rachel Corrie. As a result of the screening, the director of the Koret Foundation slammed both the film and the festival for supporting “anti-Israel propaganda.” To its credit, the Festival didn’t cancel the film and didn’t back down in any substantive way.
The upcoming Seattle Jewish Film Festival has no such courage of its convictions. The director took one look at the first image on screen and said: “No way:”
Beyond her hopes that Seattle’s festival will bring local Jews together rather than divide, Lavitt said she rejected Rachel first and foremost on quality, which she said was too incendiary and unwilling to see more than one side of the story. Unlike the stage play My Name is Rachel Corrie, in which Corrie’s character opens with her head under a sheet and shining a flashlight on her journal, “this film…begins with the body of Rachel Corrie in a morgue,” Lavitt said. “No dialogue could get your head past that.”
Notice the director says she rejected the film because of its poor quality and then quickly adds it was “too incendiary.” Of the two, I think we know what the real reason for rejection was. And apparently you can’t exhibit any film at the Seattle festival that includes images of a dead American girl killed by the IDF.
To view an interview with filmmaker Simone Bitton, watch this YouTube video.
Another film you won’t see this year in Seattle is American Radical: the Trials of Norman Finkelstein. If you thought Rachel Corrie was too “incendiary,” Norman Finkelstein is downright inflammatory. And Seattle doesn’t do controversy apparently. The motto seems to be: don’t rock the boat. Now here I always thought the purpose of great film and art was to provoke, to question, to trouble, to make you think about the big questions of Jewish identity. In Seattle, there’s a six foot fence around these issues.
There is one excellent Israeli film the festival is featuring, Ajami, which is an unusual film in that it portrays the seamier side of Israeli life and the poor Tel Aviv-Jaffo neighborhood of Ajami. Of course, it hasn’t hurt the film that it swept all major Israeli film awards and has been nominated for an Oscar. Clearly, liberal Zionists in Seattle feel comfortable with a film that Israel and the outside world has embraced even if it does deal with troubling notions of what it is to be an Israeli Palestinian in one of Israel’s poorest neigborhoods. But when it comes to discussions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, you can forget about it. As far as the Seattle festival is concerned, the 2007 Gaza war never happened. BDS doesn’t exist and the Goldstone Report never happened. Let’s see if Ms. Lavitt is willing to program documentaries about these difficult issues in future festivals.
Related articles by Zemanta
- Czech Activist Kicked Out Of West Bank By Israelis (ceeuropeaninfo.blogspot.com)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](https://i0.wp.com/img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?w=640)
Rachel Corrie was no more a peace activist than was Atilla the Hun. She was anti-Israel rather than pro-Palestinian she had no wish for peace other than if it resulted in the destruction of the State of israel. Please be accurate the ISM is anything but a peace organisation and you know it! BTW there is and never has been a State called Palestine so get overr it and furthermore there no such thing as an Israeli-Palestinian if an Arab holds Israeli citizenship he is an Israeli Muslim or Christian.
You don’t know jack about Rachel Corrie & what she believed. Have you read her diaries? Seen the play? Where did you conceive yr ideas about her & what she believed? I don’t know anything of the sort about yr claims about the ISM. You don’t know any more about the ISM than you do about Rachel Corrie. I presume you’re either a settler or settler supporter. Why don’t you reveal where your prejudices derive?
You’ve violated my comment rules. Read them if you submit a future comment. Your next violation will result in being permanently banned. Until then, future comments will be moderated.
Typo alert–you said 2007 Gaza War.
Self-censorship is the worst thing, when fear of controversy and its possible consequences becomes the element that stops a free society’s need to explore and discuss sometimes volatile subjects. I would be interested to know more about who made the decision to exclude this film, and why. I don’t buy the claptrap about the film being “one-sided”; there is no rule saying that films must be “balanced” in order to be considered legitimate. (As for Ajami, of course it is included in the festival; it is nominated for Oscars and therefore is guaranteed to be a crowd pleaser.)
More likely that there is a fear of losing patronage and the donations that come along with it.
Looking on the bright side, at least you’ve not got the state’s thought police wishing to control what you can see, like we have in the UK. How about this for a bit of Orwell:
Last year, a film was made which didn’t even have an opinion, it was simply a sequence of clips of a group carrying out horrific actions and them defending and justifying those actions.
The film was not banned or illegal, nor was it found to be factually inaccurate. It was just a series of factual statements, uncomfortable though some may have been.
The film-maker was a Dutch European Member of Parliament. The then home secretary, Jacqui Smith illegally banned him from entering the UK. A court swiftly overturned the ban and found her to have acted illegally, and she was sacked. The film-maker came, the film was seen, the world didn’t end. Horror of horror, we’re all grown ups. (UK’s New Labour hate this idea).
Oh, the film was called Fitna.
As you say, I always thought the purpose of great film and art was to provoke, to question, to trouble, to make you think about the big questions.
Indeed, they both certainly do that, and while you may not care for one film and I may not care for the other, we may watch them both. The troubling thing here is that one choice was that of a private film festival. For us Brits was made for us by our Dear Leader, illegally.
If that troubles anyone here as much as it should, fear not. We have an election soon 🙂
The difference about Fitna is that it is hate propaganda, and Geert Wilders is a hatemongering bigot whose goal is to have the Holy Quran banned and all Muslims expelled from the Netherlands. To compare his trash to a film about Rachel Corrie and her brief life (and tragic death) is just plain grotesque.
I’m sure the BNP crowd in the UK was sorely disappointed that the disgusting “Fitna” couldn’t be shown there. Too bad.
Jonathan: I’m sorry but your views of Fitna and this issue are wrong. You do not know anything first hand about Islam & yet are willing to rely on the word of a two-bit, half wit Islamophobic racist who knows even less about Islam than you do.
I wrote a blog post about this calling appropriately, Fitna, Dutch for “Garbage.” I’m rather disappointed to hear such naivete on yr part toward the film, which was a piece of anti-Muslim propaganda. Did you ever stop to think of the effect this film’s screening might have on impressionable young Muslims who hear about the hate it spews? Did you ever stop to think that Islamization is a process that is fomented by hate like this?
Fitna is not great, it is not art though it is a film of sorts. And no, no one will be watching Garbage here.
Moshe Feiglin has also been banned fr. entering Britain. Perhaps you want to overturn the ban on this pro settler fascist as well?
Mary: Your views on the film are your views. It’s not your perceptions of the content on the film that I’m talking about here, it’s about the right of film-makers to make films, providing they don’t break the law, however challenging you might find their content.*
I don’t know much about the BNP, but where you got the idea that the film was every banned I have no idea. It was not.
Richard: My views on the film are my views and I don’t recall airing them here.
I’m not entirely sure how a film of Islamofascist activities, in which most of the worst of the xenophobic, homophobic and anti-Semitic hate-speech was actually filmed by Islamic fascists themselves, can be seen as propaganda.
You also ask: Did you ever stop to think of the effect this film’s screening might have on impressionable young Muslims who hear about the hate it spews? Did you ever stop to think that Islamization is a process that is fomented by hate like this?
Personally, I think it’s more likely to be fomented by the hate-preachers in British mosques calling for “Jews to be thrown from the highest places” and for “the kuffar to perish and roast”, as we saw in both the “Undercover Mosque” programmes on UK TV.
But then, West Midlands Police, having been infiltrated by radicalised Muslims, also tried to have that programme banned. They lost and were fined over £300,000. Yes, this was the police force asking that a programme exposing fascism not be shown, lest it upset fascists. Strange days indeed.
So, just to clarify, because I’m sure I must have mis-read this: you are saying it’s more offensive to expose Islamic fascists, than allow them to carry on radicalising in the way that ends up with shoe bombers, underground bombers, exploding pants bombers, etc?
9/11 didn’t come before Fitna. Neither did the London or Madrid bombings.
So, explain a bit more about how that works, would you?
As for Moshe Feiglin, he appears to have a criminal record and is on record with such unsavoury quotes as:
“Hitler was an unparalleled military genius. Nazism promoted Germany from a low to a fantastic physical and ideological status. The ragged, trashy youth body turned into a neat and orderly part of society and Germany received an exemplary regime, a proper justice system and public order. Hitler savored good music.”
They both seem as disturbing as each other, the difference is that Wilders doesn’t have a criminal record and is a European MP.
But none of this has anything to do with the point of the blog post which is about the right to show or view a challenging film.
*Incidentally, while not wishing to drag this comment thread off into another realm too much, small anecdote for Mary. Having taken nearly an hour to get an anti-Fitnatic to agree that actually all the clips shown weren’t some sort of mock-up or fake, in exasperation I said “so, what, now we don’t mention the wife-beating daughter-murdering misogynistic homophobic anti-Semitic plane-exploding elephant in the room, in case we offend any wife-beating daughter-murdering misogynistic plane-exploding homophobic anti-Semitic elephants”??
To which the answer, from a liberal (as in, UK liberal, small l) was “well, if it stirs up ill-feeling, then yes”.
Fascism is fascism, there isn’t a good kind, however much cultural relativism you try and throw at it.
Jonathan, you horrendous jackass, I am going to let loose on you whether Richard bans me or not.
“Richard: My views on the film are my views and I don’t recall airing them here.
I’m not entirely sure how a film of Islamofascist activities, in which most of the worst of the xenophobic, homophobic and anti-Semitic hate-speech was actually filmed by Islamic fascists themselves, can be seen as propaganda. ”
If you use the word “Islamofascist” one more time, I am going to pray to Allah himself to have you banned from this website along with every other idiot who thinks they have any right to associate Islam with fascism. If I were not a lady I would have some extremely choice words to say to you, any one of which would be enough for Richard to kick me off here permanently.
There is not such thing as an Islamic fascist. If you persist in this tone, I will lose my temper and everyone here is forewarned.
You disgust me with your ignorance and bigotry, that you rely on film clips to give you any sort of education on Islam and the Muslim world. You are seriously trying my patience. I fact, I am sorely tempted to call you a moron, but I will leave that for my next comment unless you can explain yourself a little better.
There is no such thing as Islamofascism & the use of the term violates my comment rules. Pls. read my comment rules before commenting again. In order to maintain respect & civility for both sides of this conflict, there are phrases & claims that are simply not accpetable for use here including that one.
And I repeeat myself, you know no more about Islam than you know about my own religion, Judaism, so you’d best not embarrass yrself further by declaiming on such subjects. I’m very sorry to hear that yr views are those of Geert Wilders, one of the slimier characters to have emanated fr. the Dutch far right.
What is offensive is ignorance of Islam masquerading as Christian or western virtue. Neither you nor Geert Wilders have that market cornered though you may believe you do.
And Hitler was Germany’s elected prime minister before he became a tyrant. What does that prove?
Introducting Fitna here was WAY OFF TOPIC, another comment violation. Pls. remain on topic in future comments.
Come on, you guys, leave Jonathan alone. He is a man of principle. I am sure that in the name of artistic freedom he would just as vigorously defend the showing of a film that was as anti-Semitic as Fitna is anti-Islamic.
You would, would you not, Jonathan?
@shirin – well, sure. Fitna isn’t “anti Islamic”. If anyone thinks it is, then that is to suggest that those people filmed carrying out the grotesque actions of genocide and hate in the film were representative of mainstream Muslims. Of course, clearly that is not the case.
If a film exposed many extreme Jewish people calling for the death of Muslims and posing a threat to the way of life of those people, of course I would suggest it should be shown, in the same way as any lesson of history is shown. Otherwise, what next – holocaust denial?
You are right, I am a man of principle, not a weathervane that blows whichever way the foul wind of political expedience is wafting.
Thank you, Shirin, for bringing a bit of rationality and reason brought to the discussion.
Hey Jonathan, what is a “mainstream Muslim”? One that conforms to your ideology? Or what?
And please do regale us on what kinds of principles you are a man of. You obviously don’t recognize snark when you see it.
And yeah, Hitler wasn’t an anti-Semite & Bull Connor wasn’t racist. The BNP? Good British patriots all.
Jonathan: we’ve really gone over this territory in this blog endlessly & I don’t want to go over it again ad nauseam. Look up all my posts on Fitna, Obsession & 3rd Jihad. And only after reading all of them & all the comment threads if you have something NEW to contribute, do so. Otherwise, pls. don’t go over ground that endless commenters before you have tried to pass off as common sense or reasonable when they are anything but.
What you don’t understand is that all these films were made by people who detest Islam. I can take virtually any film footage and twist it via editing & other tricks into saying whatever I want it to say. Yr support of these films is a serious disappointment to me. I thought better of you till now & I’d hoped you wouldn’t introduce our political disagreements into the comment threads.
9 yrs ago there was no such thing as Islamofascism so indeed Muslim hatred is a trendy political obsession blowing whichever way the foul wind of right wing political expedience wafts.
“Fitna isn’t “anti Islamic”.”
Yeah. And Protocols of the Elders of Zion isn’t anti-Semitic.
How ’bout Triumph of the Will for starters.
Yes, that one will do for starters.
Ugh. Comparing any film on Rachel Corrie to “Fitna” is just repugnant. Honestly, I did not agree, and do not agree, with what Rachel Corrie did. Subhanallah, we could use her and her dedication now. With a good education and her sincere desire to help the Palestinian people she could have moved mountains if she had lived. It was a waste, that she died. But I think she hopefully changed the focus of many activists from stopping one house demolition to changing the policies that make house demolitions a sickening reality in Israel. We work tirelessly to that end. May Rachel rest in peace. To the Muslims, she is Shaheed.
It is amazing how you all let your emotions run away, when reason is what is needed. The most reasonable response to ignorant nuts like Jonathan is to ignore him. Replying to his posts only incites him to more idiocies.
Mary, I’ll say it for you, at the risk of being banned by Richard: Jonathan is an asshole! Like many others we’ve had to confront on this blog.
Thanks, Gene, but I wouldn’t go that far. I would, however, suggest to Jonathan that he might want to google Geert Wilders and read up on just who he is, and why he made “Fitna.” He would learn that “Fitna” was not a film made for creative intents, but that it is part of Wilders’ political agenda which includes ethnically cleansing the Netherlands (and eventually all of Europe) of Muslims.
Films like “Fitna” and “Obsession” are forms of hate speech, whereas, “Rachel” is not.
Without Jonathan, I’d be tearing my hair out for all the techincal challenges I’ve faced in maintaining this blog. Needless to say, I don’t agree w. his politics. But he’s been immensely helpful in the technical side of this blog.
I think he is a young man who would do well to investigate further into what he claims he is agreeing with. He needs to seriously understand who and what Geert Wilders is, and other people who try to peddle hate speech as legitimate dialogue. Unfortunately, the internet is overrun with the likes of Wilders, Robert Spencer, Daniel Pipes and others whose agendas are carved from Islamophobia. Unfortunately also, these people are able to get their slimy discourses widely published and promoted. I am not surprised that a young person like Jonathan is so easily led to believe that something like “Fitna” is not the hate-filled propaganda which is actually is. The bill of goods is so well packaged that the rotting flesh inside is almost undetectable.
I ask Jonathan, and others who may not see that the refusal to show “Rachel” is a triumph for those who would wish to silence voices that must be heard, to think again, and think hard. Censorship is a bad thing, it is one of the worst crimes we can inflict on ourselves because it destroys our freedom of expression. On the other hand, let’s thank Jonathan for exposing the other side of the question, that of whether hate speech should also be considered “freedom of expression.” I say it should not be.