At the Movies

Paradise Now is a Palestinian film about two men who decide to become suicide bombers. They vacillate about their decision, and the film expounds didactically about the reasons for and against martyrdom. We are offered competing arguments by people of conviction. It is difficult for me, an American Jew, to give fair consideration to the reasons in favor of martyrdom, however a few eventually got through.

In the West Bank, you can buy films of the martyrs made prior to their acts. You also can buy films of collaborators just before they are executed. The collaborator films are in greater demand and would fetch more money, but out of respect for the martyrs, the price is the same.

The martyr's mentality essentially is that Palestine is occupied by Israel. The occupation is hell, and it is better to die heroically than to live in hell. This philosophy is not rooted in Islamic fundamentalism.

We are taught as Jews that Jews can never be oppressors. The film forces one to consider the Palestinian plight through their eyes. Their world is impoverished and bleak. It is pervaded by rootlessness and a sense of futility. They are confined within the West Bank and Gaza, not free to move about, under the nominal protection of the Palestinian Authority. However, Israel has demonstrated its willingness to violate this authority when it rolled its tanks into Ramallah and cut off Yassir Arafat from the outside world. The Palestinians have no military and are unable to defend themselves.

When the bombers cross the West Bank border into Tel Aviv, the landscape is filled with the vision of shiny, new buildings. The cars are new and brilliant, the opposite of the burnt-out shells littering the Palestinian landscape. It is no less striking than Dorothy leaving monochromal Kansas for technicolor Oz.

Although there is no name given in the film to the political movement staging the bombing, it is difficult not to think about Hamas and its recent electoral victory. Israel has cut off the flow of revenues to which the Palestinian Authority is entitled, stating that it will not support the Authority unless Hamas foreswears terrorism and rescinds its platform for the destruction of Israel. This is understandable from an Israeli point of view. However, the Palestinians would say that this is another act of thuggery by an oppressor nation, punishing the Palestinians for exercising their right to vote. Palestine threw out the discredited Fatah Party, which also advocated terrorism and the destruction of Israel, in favor of Hamas, a party that had galvanized the voters with promises to end corruption and improve life for the people. It is too early to tell if Hamas will move to the center, as some predict. In this case, one must watch the hands and listen to the words.