The Law in These Parts: difficult truths about Israeli justice
Fuente: Drive-by Times.
8 del 2 de 2012
The Israeli film The Law in These Parts, was awarded Best Documentary at the 2011 Jerusalem Film Festival and the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. Director Ra'anan Alexandrowicz, said it was the hardest film he has ever made.
It's a brilliant piece of work. The film gets behind the rigged court system in the West Bank and cleverly exposes its inner workings via the mouths of those who were in on it from the early going. What becomes evident is that "justice" was routinely manipulated in the interests of national and IDF priorities.
In speaking of his film Alexandrowicz said that "... upholding the law doesn't always lead to justice. It can even be used as a tool against certain segments of society."
The film is divided into five chapters and comes across as almost academic in its approach. It features interviews with Israelis who helped set up the system in the West Bank and administer it. As you watch these men explain themselves and justify their actions, it is disturbingly reminiscent of war criminals conducting self-serving reviews of past actions. There are moments of ambivalence when facial expressions and body language seem to contradict the words being spoken.
The truths that come out in the wash aren't pleasant. Activities that were probably very routine are troubling to those looking in from the outside. One judge candidly says that he was aware of the torture that was going on. The admission seemed as routine as the land confiscations and other aggressions committed in the name of the state.
Black and white footage from the early years of the Israeli occupation evokes memories of incursions by the Germans into lands of the conquered in WW2. It is a comparison that resonates even as it disturbs. The film certainly isn't alone in going there. During operation Cast Lead in Gaza, a former Zionist, British MP Sir Gerald Kaufman, made a direct reference to IDF tactics as Nazi-like.
To say there are issues with the administration of justice in the occupied territories is a large understatement. The problems are systemic and deeply rooted.
Lisa Hajjar, a professor at the University of California, did extensive research into the system in the West Bank for her book Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank And Gaza. A very good review by Menachem Hofnung - here - highlights important areas of Ms Hajjar's work.
In describing the impact of the system in the West Bank, Hofnung says: "The military court system has served as the important foundation within the broader range of governing institutions and practices in which Palestinians are controlled by the state of Israel, subjected to restrictive codes of conduct, and physically immobilized through the use of mass arrests, closures, curfews, checkpoints and prisons."
Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy likened the "law enforcement mechanism of the IDF" to a "ridiculous simulacrum of a justice system." In his article IDF's law enforcement is a joke of a justice system Levy talks about individual cases involving the killings of Palestinians and the ways in which the wheels of justice turned slowly or not at all - slightly more perhaps when pushed by human rights organizations such as B'Tselem.
In its 2011 Annual Report, Amnesty International detailed the many abuses that have become woven into the fabric of life for Palestinian residents in the occupied territories.
Amnesty International:
Consistent allegations of torture and other ill-treatment, including of children, were frequently reported. Among the most commonly cited methods were beatings, threats to the detainee or their family, sleep deprivation, and being subjected to painful stress positions for long periods. Confessions allegedly obtained under duress were accepted as evidence in Israeli military and civilian courts.
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz deals in more hard truth about Israel than you are likely to find in N. American mainstream media. The columnist Gideon Levy told American Jews: "If you love Israel, criticize it." Advice a few N. American editors should take under notice.
Trailer of The Law in These Parts beneath:
