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30 Second Bottom Line: This very timely documentary takes us into the homes and the war torn streets of Jerusalem and the West Bank with B.Z. Goldberg, one of the film's three collaborators, as he talks with Israeli and Palestinian children about their lives and legacies. Filmed between 1997 and 2000, we meet the youngsters when they are nine to thirteen years old. At the film's end they are each older, wiser and wearier teenagers.
Story Line: The crowded streets of a Palestinian community reveal a youngster wearing a Chicago Bulls tee shirt and another whose shirt proclaims "We have a Dream." We will meet seven Israeli and Palestinian children who navigate these by-ways, criss crossing some of the most sacred ground on earth as well as, often these days, the most treacherous.
One boy recounts that when he boards a bus, he looks for suspicious people and watches them. "I keep waiting for the explosion," he says. It occurs to me as I write this, it's not important whether this child is an Arab or a Jew¾it just shouldn't happen.
Yarko and Daniel are secular Israeli twins, who admit later in the film, as they approach the Western Wall, that they are wary of "religious Jews."
Mahmoud is a blond, blue eyed Muslim. He is charming, yet he holds fast to his views of Palestinian liberation and is a supporter of Hamas.
Shlomo, an ultra-orthodox Jewish boy, whose father is a well-known American Rabbi, studies the Torah 12 hours a day and prays at the Western Wall.
Sanabel is a Palestinian refugee, whose father, a journalist, has been in an Israeli prison for two years; held without a trial. She and her family are "modern" secular Arabs. She is a dancer and often a voice of reason in the film.
Faraj, a Palestinian, lives in the Daheishe refugee camp. When he was five, he saw his friend killed by an Israeli soldier.
Moishe, whose family are Jewish settlers, lives in a "gated community" of nice homes. It is cut off by wire fencing from the Arab sector that surrounds it. Israeli firing ranges dot the landscape, with sharpshooters at the ready¾as reassurance for the Jews and as a warning to the Arabs. Moishe, too, lost a young friend in this ongoing war.
Checkpoints and armed soldiers are in constant evidence as we move in and through these neighborhoods with B.Z. Goldberg, the film's director and narrator. At a volleyball game a young soldier tries to blend in, with a rifle slung over his shoulder.
Heightened emotions crackle as each youngster lays claim to his or her notion of freedom, or in this case, one's piece of land. Humor and irony coexist with tragedy in this setting; as when Shlomo and a Palestinian boy engage in a burping contest when they confront each other as Shlomo passes between the Jewish and Muslim Quarters of the Old City. Or when Moishe admits that though he's never met an Arab, he'll "clear them all out of Jerusalem," when he becomes Prime Minister.
Sanabel's sanguine answer to Faraj, who initially wants nothing to do with Israeli children, can apply to Moishe as well. "I don't know of one Palestinian child who tried to explain our situation to an Israeli," she says.
Yarko and Daniel agree to meet with Faraj and Sanabel in the Palestinian sector. The twins and Faraj have a love of sports in common, and Sanabel has an earnest wish for understanding between people. They play soccer, share a meal and talk to one another. As evening closes in, Faraj acknowledges that "…we've become friends with Yarko and Daniel. But all will be in vain when B.Z. leaves."
Two years later, when we see these students again, at best they have simply become involved in their own pursuits of sports and social life, and have not been in touch. At worst, those who were defiant in their attitudes of separation are now even more entrenched in their beliefs.
Tell Me More About It: At first you wonder if these kids are simply mouthing what they've heard discussed around the dinner table; telling the filmmakers what they want to hear. Gradually, you realize these are children at war, in their hearts and minds as well as on their way to school or the market. Friends have been killed on both sides.
Israeli children in the West Bank settlements live surrounded by wire fences, barricades, and soldiers on firing ranges. Arab children in refugee camps cannot move freely either. Their families need passes to go from one Muslim village to another. They are detained at checkpoints where they are searched and often denied passage by Israeli soldiers.
Promises has won many awards, worldwide, and is an obvious labor of love and determination by its three collaborators. Justine Shapiro grew up in Berkeley, California. Her fun and informative travel series, Lonely Planet gets a name change to Globetrekker and moves to PBS in Spring 2002. Justine provides an "outsider" view of the situation. B.Z. Goldberg grew up in Israel, so the Israeli perspective is a natural for him. Carlos Bolado, from Mexico, has a "citizen of the Third World" take and felt a certain empathy with the Palestinian perspective. The filmmakers agreed, "We engaged in our own versions of the Middle East conflict."
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