Palestinian Mental Image Basel Palestine A Year Post Al-Aqsa Flood
The emergence of the Zionist movement was a turning point in the history of Palestine, because it sought to create a "Jewish national state" on the land of Palestine. This goal could only be achieved by expelling Muslims and Arabs and stripping them of their lands in order to empty Palestine of its people.
This was accompanied by the development of the Zionist project in the late nineteenth century, which adopted a set of methods and means to achieve the goals of expulsion and establishing a population replacement project. This relied on several axes, all of which created a mental image of the land, the indigenous people, and the immigrant occupiers who came for the purpose of occupation.
The development of the Zionist project, which took an executive turn in 1897 AD with the convening of the Basel Conference in Switzerland, coincided with the beginnings of the emergence of cinema. This was noticed by the founding fathers of Zionism, who used cinema as a mobilizing propaganda tool that could promote the idea of replacing the Jewish element with the Arabs and Muslims in Palestine.
The Beginnings
The beginnings were in the hands and funding of the Zionists when Theodor Herzl tried to make the first propaganda film entitled "The Promised Land", in the years between 1899 and 1903 AD. This was an attempt to establish the idea of the divine right of the Zionists to the land of Palestine, but Herzl's project failed for many reasons, perhaps the most important of which was the lack of technical capabilities at that early time.
In 1903 AD, things changed when the Edison Company sent a photographer to Palestine to produce short films that established the concept launched by Lord Chaventry in 1840 AD "a homeland without a people for a people without a homeland". The idea established the expulsion of the Arabs of Palestine as a mere group of Bedouins who came from the Arabian Peninsula and had to return to it. Denying the existence of a Palestinian people was the basis of the idea implemented by the Edison Company with funding from the Jewish Agency, which also documented within the project the arrival of the first immigrants to the "Promised Land".
This period that preceded the establishment of the Zionist entity focused on creating an imaginary reality and creating the “utopia” of the Holy Land, devoid of inhabitants, waiting for someone to populate it. It contributed to creating symbols and icons of Jews in world cinema, which has been active since 1908, whether in Hollywood, which has become the capital of film production, or in Europe, so that world cinema has become the spearhead in directing world public opinion about the Arab-Zionist conflict taking place on Palestinian land.
The Zionist Narrative During the British Mandate and Its Impact
The professionalism of many Jews in the film industry and their spread in Hollywood and world cinema had a great impact on the cinema's treatment of the Palestinian issue. This greatly supported the Zionist narrative of the conflict that ended with the establishment of a state on the usurped land. These filmmakers were able to translate British and American political support for the Jews into films that tend to portray the Jew as a persecuted person, exiled from his homeland and lived for two thousand years as a diaspora, and the time has come to gather this diaspora and return it to its homeland. It does not matter to ignore all the other ethnicities that lived on this land.
During the British Mandate period (1920-1948 AD), world cinema was influenced by Britain's policy that supported the immigration of Jews under the "Balfour Declaration". The films of that period portrayed the Palestinian as a brutal rebel who lacked any human values and was prone to killing (a terrorist) - the term had not yet been invented - while the Jew was portrayed as a civilized human being capable of developing the land and transforming it from swamps and forests into a paradise suitable for humans and their livelihood, and that he defends his right to establish his homeland. Examples of these films include:
- "Land of Promise" in 1935 AD; this documentary film is one of the most prominent examples of Zionist propaganda that portrayed Jewish settlers as pioneers building an abandoned land, completely ignoring the Palestinian presence. The film was produced by the Palestinian Jewish Council to promote the idea that settlement was the development of Palestine.
- In 1940 AD, during World War II, Charlie Chaplin presented his film "The Great Dictator", which is one of the most famous films in the history of world cinema. The film made the issue of the persecution of Jews and the suffering of the Jewish community as a marginalized community a central issue that influenced the global narrative related to the right of Jews to life and live in their homeland.
- "The Wandering Jew" in 1933; A British film that dealt with the subject of Jewish immigration to Palestine in a literary manner based on the ancient legend of the "Wandering Jew". The film addresses the idea of Jewish persecution throughout history, and presents Palestine as a safe haven for them; which enhances sympathy for the Zionist project.
- "Der Wille zur Macht" or "Will to Power" in 1935; A German Zionist propaganda film that deals with the settlement of Jews in Palestine, but it is presented in a clear propaganda manner as the film highlights how the Jews succeeded in reviving the land and transforming it from a desert land into a thriving agricultural land; which ignores the local Palestinian narrative and enhances the narrative of Jewish settlement as a developmental and humanitarian process.
The Zionist Narrative from the Nakba to the First Intifada
After the defeat of the Arab armies and the declaration of the usurpation of Palestine, the Zionist narrative gained great popular and political support in the West and the United States, and this was reflected in the cinematic production that began to build a positive image that presented the Jews as pioneers and heroes who established a democratic state in a hostile environment and faced difficult challenges.
In contrast, a negative image of Arabs, Muslims and Palestinians in particular was reinforced, and they were presented in a negative stereotype that reinforced alienation from them and considered them as usurpers of Jewish rights, in addition to being enemies of life, barbaric and terrorists, in addition to showing them as enemies of humanity in general, and with the emergence of the feminist movement, their societies were colored with a hateful masculinity that is hostile to women and violates their rights.
The films of that period largely ignored the Palestinian narrative of the conflict, whether it was about refugees, suffering under occupation, human rights, or the suffering of prisoners in prisons, while completely ignoring all the essential issues surrounding Palestine. Examples of this include:
- The 1960 film “Exodus” played a role in creating sympathy for the Jews and reinforcing a mental image of them as heroes who struggled to escape the “Holocaust” in Europe to establish their state and build their homeland, while portraying the Arabs as a hostile group standing in the way of this legitimate dream.
- “The Promise” an American television film produced in 1968 that reinforced the narrative of the Jewish right to Palestine among Americans and demonized the Arab resistance that confronts the usurpation of Palestinian land, considering the Arabs to be an obstacle to the security and peace of the Jews?
- "Victory at Entebbe" is a 1976 film that supports the narrative of "Israel" as a state that resists terrorism and narrates the rescue of the hostages at Entebbe Airport by Zionist commandos, reinforcing the idea of a hostile environment that seeks to eradicate the Jews.
The first decades from the Basel Conference until the first Intifada were characterized by a one-sided view dominated by the Zionist narrative in world cinema, but with the first Intifada, slight changes began, and with "The Flood of Al-Aqsa" we observe more daring changes, although they are not sufficient, and we will devote another article to them, God willing.
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