Jumana Manna and Forensic Architecture zoom into the lush, green hills of Golan Heights, rich meadows of Galilee, and blooming fields of Khan Younes in southern Gaza, offering a combination of raw, forensic focus and a delicate and poetic look at the flora of the region.
Foragers
Jumana Manna, 2022, 64’
Foragers depicts the dramas around the practice of foraging for wild edible plants in Palestine/Israel with wry humour and a meditative pace. Shot in the Golan Heights, the Galilee and Jerusalem, it employs fiction, documentary and archival footage to portray the impact of Israeli nature protection laws on these customs. The restrictions prohibit the collection of the artichoke-like ’akkoub and za’atar (thyme), and have resulted in fines and trials for hundreds caught collecting these native plants.
For Palestinians, these laws constitute an ecological veil for legislation that further alienates them from their land while Israeli state representatives insist on their scientific expertise and duty to protect. Following the plants from the wild to the kitchen, from the chases between the foragers and the nature patrol, to courtroom defences, Foragers captures the joy and knowledge embodied in these traditions alongside their resilience to the prohibitive law. By reframing the terms and constraints of preservation, the film raises questions around the politics of extinction, namely who determines what is made extinct and what gets to live on.
Herbicidal Warfare in Gaza
Forensic Architecture, 2019, 9′
Working closely with the Gaza-based Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, the Tel Aviv-based Gisha Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, and the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Haifa, Forensic Architecture examined the environmental and legal implications of the Israeli practice of aerial spraying of herbicides along the Gaza border.
This event is part of In Songs and Scenes from Palestine,
In Songs and Scenes from Palestine, we get to view the history and cultural identity of the Palestinian people through their own lens. In this programme, Palestinian artists and filmmakers allow us to share in their culture and their stories. They watch and listen attentively to the personal stories of resilient Palestinians seeking contact with the place where their families lived, cried, sang, dreamed and loved for generations. The selection is made up of recent, powerful documentaries and artist films that shine a new light on archival footage, and in which the relationship between landscape, culture and identity plays a major role.
More infos: https://www.eyefilm.nl/en/programme/songs-and-scenes-from-palestine/1249657