Of Land and Bread

B’Tselem – The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories—promoted in 2007 a project which consisted in giving video cameras to Palestinians in the West Bank so that they could document the human rights violations they were forced to suffer under the Israeli occupation. This raw video footage captures in the most simple and effective way the daily and unrelenting repeated abuses that both the illegal settlers and the army perpetrate against the Palestinians. Over the years, all these films have become a living and sadly ever-expanding archive of the constant abuses and violence the Palestinian population has to live with and bear. Of Land and Bread collects some of these short films in a feature length documentary that is definitely not easy to watch. The brutality of the settlers and the army spares no one. And yet we need to see in order to fully grasp and understand the magnitude of the never-ending cycle of human rights violations the Palestinians must face while the world obstinately looks to the other side.

Giona A. Nazzaro