The Sundance Film Festival begins later this week in Utah. How exciting to get the announcement that the film fest has picked up Praxis Films' The Law in These Parts.
THE LAW IN THESE PARTS explores the four-decade-old Israeli military legal system in the Occupied Territories. Since Israel conquered the territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the 1967 War, the military has imposed thousand of orders and laws, established military courts, sentenced hundreds of thousand of Palestinians, enabled half a million Israeli "settlers" to move to the Occupied Territories and developed a system of long-term jurisdiction by an occupying army that is unique in the world.
THE LAW IN THESE PARTS explores this unprededented and little-known story through testimonies of the military legal professionals who were the archtects of the system and helped run it in its formative years.
Directed by Ra'anan Alexandrovicz. Laura Poitras producer. Sundance's synopsis:
“This film is not about the people who broke the law, but about those entrusted with the law,” says director Ra’anan Alexandrowicz about his latest project. Ambitiously perceived, sparely designed, and meticulously executed, The Law in These Parts is commanding and compassionate as it goes to the heart of Israel’s moral quandary. In this country founded on democratic principles, Alexandrowicz asks—in both simple and profound terms—can justice truly be served in the occupied territories given the current system of law administered by Israel for Palestinians?
(Hat tip Matthew Graber @WPEB881RAA )
Actually, if you ask the Tibetans, the occupation of their homeland and the exile of many of their people began earlier than the Israeli occupation, which began in 1967. Also, parts of the Israeli occupation have in the meanwhile been ended; not so for the Tibetans.
Some Kashmiris would make a similar claim. The West Saharans and some of the Cypriots will tell you their occupation hasn’t been much shorter.
We’re really splitting hairs on this one, aren’t we?
Not really. It raises the obvious question, If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.
“It raises the obvious question, If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.”
Here’s the obvious answer–the blog is mainly about the Israeli occupation, not occupations in general.
Sheesh, maybe someone better dredge up the JSF list of the four basic arguments. We’re gonna be hit by a number of variations, it seems.
Not really. It raises the obvious question, If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.
Now how did I know that was coming? Welcome to Mondoweiss, Winnica, if only as a bemused anthropological observer. You might want to have a look at this: link to jeremiahhaber.com
Nevermind, I looked it up myself–
How to make the case for Israel and win
>> It raises the obvious question, If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.
As a quick glance at this site’s “About” page reveals, this site is not dedicated to “long-term occupations”:
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It has four principal aims:
1.To publish important developments touching on Israel/Palestine, the American Jewish community and the shifting debate over US foreign policy in a timely fashion.
2.To publish a diversity of voices to promote dialogue on these important issues.
3.To foster the movement for greater fairness and justice for Palestinians in American foreign policy.
4.To offer alternatives to pro-Zionist ideology as a basis for American Jewish identity.
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If one were to join a site dedicated to discussing the China-Tibet issue, and to excuse China’s actions because “Israel does it, too!”, that person would look just as stupid as every Zio-supremacist who comes to this site excusing Israel’s actions because “China does it, too!”
It began in 1948, Winnica. That was the year the Ziobots dispossessed the Palestinians. How come there are so many people crammed into the Gaza Strip? How did this happen?
Everything Israel does is a follow on from 1948.
winnica, i am going to write phil and adam about deleting threadjacking first comments in general. i put a certain amount of effort into drafting these posts and i don’t do it so you or anyone else can come along and change the topic on the first comment. i think it’s rude and impolite. you could have asked me that later.
this is my personal opinion and does not reflect blog policy but if this is something you continue to do i’ll make a big stink about it, big stink.
Shmuel: Hasbara Central really needs a better training course. Winnica has followed their long-familiar pattern: a new commenter shows up on Mondoweiss, full of wide-eyed, feigned innocence, followed within 48 to 72 hours by outrage at most of what they see here. Mondoweiss demands more sophisticated sparring partners!!
A particular action is wrong if a true universal principle logically implies that it is. So what happens if we say that some action is wrong and another action, genuinely very like the first, is then mentioned?
The likeness of the two actions supports, does not weaken, the view taken of the first one. If the second action is brought into the debate as something already known to be wrong and as a clear parallel to the first, it merely proves that the argument against the first action was all along right, not that it was all along questionable.
No one at any stage of a debate is obliged to mention everything relevant before saying anything at all.
More sophisticated sparring partners? Good luck with that… we’re talking about Zionists here. They are masters at fooling themselves, and bullying the weak-minded. But that’s all they got. It’s why they’re losing despite boatloads of money in a world of freely shared information.
Winnica, why should every single blog make categorical statements about every single issue on the planet and throughout history.
Why wouldn’t MW condemn other colonial projects and other injustices?
Do you see Phil Weiss saying otherwise? Do you see Adam Horowitz saying otherwise? Do either of them support the dictators in the Arab world or the Islamic fundamentalists?
Phil is very transparent and sincere. He talks about his past mistakes.
So I see NO basis for your insinuations.
Moreover, you just don’t want us to talk about THIS occupation. It has nothing to do w/ other issues; other crimes; other whatevers.
It has to do with us talking about something YOU specifically care about.
And your reaction (as well as many other Zionists) is instead to divert attention away from Israel by filibustering (Darfur/China/blah blah). As if we are pro-Darfur genocide or something.
This is an I-P blog.
Why don’t you go to a blog critical of other issues and then say to them, why don’t you talk about Israel?
If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.”
Because it is about ‘one’.
For discussions about any and everything else there are plenty of blogs and some I am sure specifically about Tibet if that’s your interest.
I think they also have respectability, which we still lack. Preposterous arguments from respectable people get taken seriously. Still, better be right than respectable.
Do The Chinese extend full citizenship to the Tibetans under the land that it claims as part of China?
y’all forgot another one – Witty’s longterm occupation of this site’s comments section
As is everything that Palestine has become, seafoid.
“Sundance” will generate new commenters because zionists are fanatically obsessed with anything the least bit zeitgeisty, particularly with regard to film and tv and Sundance owner Redford has very strong credentials on the environment, Native Americans, animals. Not good.
Annie,
“i put a certain amount of effort into drafting these posts and i don’t do it so you or anyone else can come along and change the topic on the first comment.”
I support that.
Hasbara Central really needs a better training course.
Mondoweiss should submit a proposal. I’m thinking a fat sub-contract from the Ministry of Information. We do it anyway; might as well support our favourite blog in the process :-)
Right on Annie. Winnica , conveniently leaves out the fact of complete, total, US support for Israel, militarily, economically, diplomatically which has enabled the continued occupation of Palestine and the obscene violence and humiliation its inhabitants have been made to suffer. Our tax dollars and Zionist occupied congress allow this . I don’t believe we can say that about Tibet and Kashnir.
>> Actually, if you ask the Tibetans, the occupation of their homeland and the exile of many of their people began earlier than the Israeli occupation, which began in 1967.
“Israel: We may not be as good as the best but, hey, at least we’re not as bad as the worst!” (c)
Well at least you acknowledge the heinous nature of the Israeli occupation, and being in the same category as China’s occupation of Tibet, and its attempt to wipe out its indigenous culture and history. As a matter of fact, the parallel has been mentioned on more than one occasion here, so I think you can take it that people here generally detest the occupations of both indigenous people. The Israeli occupation is of course the focus of this blog, and you can find others dedicated to Tibet. Somehow, though, you don’t come across as caring a damn about the occupation and dispossession of native people. I wonder why. Meanwhile, back on planet earth, there is an interesting and releveant film being shown at Sundance, perhaps you should see it, then you might have something to contribute here, rather than pathetic trolling.
I would quarrel with this statement:
No, Israel was NOT founded on “democratic principles,” not for a minute, not in its planning, not in its foundational writings, not in its earliest acts, not in its history of denial of the obligation to respect the rule of law. Jabotinsky enshrined the principle that “might makes right” in his militarist plans that Benjamin Netanyahu’s father, Jabotinsky’s assistant, followed, and that Bibi carries out today.
From its inception in the 1880s Israel was to grant self-determination ONLY to Jews; intended to disempower the indigenous peoples of Palestine; acted in disregard of rule of law; and acts today not only in disregard of rule of law but also under the philosophy and praxis that Israel’s process of eroding protections of law in the international arena should itself BECOME the prevailing way of being among all nations.
Chas Freeman pointed out how Israel disdains law:
The whole democratic principles thing is a Hasbra talking point. I don’t think people would argue that the Israeli definition of democracy is a bitmofma stretch.
Hi Annie, isn’t it a bit early on the West Coast?
Your details look interesting. But I have to figure out why some videos don’t work on my Firefox. Anything special about this one?
Vimeo again. Do they use a different format, does anyone know?
But yes, I remember this documentary. Good one.
Hi Annie, isn’t it a bit early on the West Coast?
good morning LeaNder. i actually drafted this sat night, finishing blockquotes yesterday. it probably would have gone up had the breaking news not blown everything into a topsy turvy but you’d have to ask phil or adam about that. they make the editorial decisions about when things get published. as a matter of habit tho i am usually up and running by 5:30/6:00 am. (3 hrs before the MW timestamp)
as for the film, i actually saw and extended version of a trailer (as i recall it was 10-15 minutes) back in july at 972 joseph dana’s here: link to 972mag.com
i was one of the only people who saw it (notice first comment on the thread), just a coincidence i happened to be there at the time. the ‘trailor’ was pulled very shortly after it was posted and dana replaced it with another video and added other text.
this trailer is good and gives one a very good sense of the movie, but what i saw before was absolutely exceptional. there’s nothing on film like it. nothing.
you may have to download flash or something like that to watch vimeo.
either way, try to watch the whole movie when you get a chance. i can’t wait to see it.
i actually drafted this sat night, finishing blockquotes yesterday.
thanks Annie, I realized this after I was wondering how early it must be on the West Cost. I have flash, but for whatever reasons Vimeo videos only work on IE for me. I have to look into this.
05.30, that’s middle of the night for me.
i know but i think of it as a blessing. generally i sleep around 6 hours, it just works for me. i’ve always been a morning person.
Alexandrowicz is an interesting case of an Israeli director — his earlier doc “The Inner Tour” is a stand-out work, one that goes to the heart of the right of return. However when I asked him once if he considered the film anti-Zionist he was very conflicted with the label. When the film screened at MOMA he similarly distanced himself from the label during the Q&A. I saw him as a kind of leftist Israeli artist I occasionally run into — able to express a critique of Zionism almost unconsciously through his creative work, but very uneasy with socially and publicly embracing the critique he had just enacted or articulating it through available political frameworks of “anti-Zionism” or otherwise. His next film, James’ Journey to Jerusalem, is a nice liberal film against racism directed towards African migrants in Israel — nothing to complain of, but plainly and safely in the realm of acceptable critique, a film that is cozy with Zionism. As I recall, it doesn’t even reference Palestine/Palestinians. I was disappointed seeing it, I felt he was moving away from edge into the soft center of Israeli public discourse. But I’ve held out hope and this film seems more promising… I look forward to seeing it.
when I asked him once if he considered the film anti-Zionist he was very conflicted with the label
this doesn’t surprise me. thanks for your comment.
Thanks for that recommendation Annie.
I assume you recommend the film.
your welcome richard, yes i recommend the film.
“I asked him once if he considered the film anti-Zionist, he was very conflicted with the label. ”
Why do people always try to put a label on anybody??
Why do they try to squeeze other people in some kind of drawers, so then they can take them out of those drawers, and use whenever needed??
Anti-zionist, liberal anti-zionist , conservative anti zionist, progressive anti-zionist, leftist anti-zionist, secular anti-zionist, ultra anti-zionist, hyper-anti-zionist, hypo-anti-zionist, almost anti zionist ,”wanna be” anti- zionist,” gonna be ” anti-zionist, anti-zionist with affinity to zionism, anti-zionist in making, anti-zionist in breaking, anti-zionist in zionist’s clothes, …………..
Maybe he just tries to be objective, honest, ABOVE all the labels??
Maybe he just wants to present the movie , for the audience to see, to learn, to discuss, to judge.
As long as he has done the docummentary honestly, trying to be as objective, fair and square as possible, then let’s appreciate the effort , without trying to put a label on his back.
Who were the lawyers who helped Hitler write his many and varied of laws against Germany’s Jews? Good Germans, I imagine.
The most ingenious and important, Hans Globke, remained in high honour after the war in the Adenauer regime. One of my early memories is of sitting in a library reading a journalist in a (moderately) conservative magazine attempting to rubbish Betrand Russell, to whom we should have listened more, for pointing this out.
Here’s 18 minutes worth (no English).
link to youtube.com
Yeah,he cares about Tibet.There are many temples around the cincinnati area.for few years now one has two big signes on it’s lawn saying:A call to your concious,darfur.One day I might go crazy and buy the house across the street and have some fun with the hypocrites.
Winneca:
“Not really. It raises the obvious question, If Mondoweiss is against long-term occupations, why does it focus only on one.”
Tibet, Cypress, Kashmir, Palestine – American tax payers are only financing Israel’s occupation army in Palestine – that’s one important reason why.
Looks interesting. The last quote in the trailer is telling
“But when it goes on for 40 years…”
The judge is in complete denial of the Nakba.
It does look interesting.
The quote…
“Order and justice don’t always go hand in hand. ”
is another telling quote.
Cool that Sundance shows it. I hope many are watching!