Tantura: Birth of a Nation | The Jimmy Dore Show w/ Jackson Hinkle

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8-minutte Jimmy Dore lesson here:  https://rumble.com/v3zuqrj-tantura-birth-of-a-nation-the-jimmy-dore-show-w-jackson-hinkle.html

MASSACRE: We raped Palestinian girls and killed and burned them with flamethrowers. The VIDEO documentary presented at the Sundance Film Festival transcribed by an ActiveNews reader
https://ioncoja.ro/eroi-israeliti-in-actiune/

TRANSCRIPT below:

"On the night of May 22-23, 1948, one week after the declaration of the State of Israel, the coastal Palestinian village of Tantura (population 1,500) was attacked and occupied by units of the  Alexandroni Brigade  of the Israeli army. The village, located south of Haifa, was in the area assigned to the Jewish state by the partition resolution of the UN General Assembly.

In 1948, following the controversial approval of the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, war broke out between Arab and Jewish factions, both claiming the same territory. Of course the Arab villages were there before the Jewish people were told it was their land. We are informed that while the Israelis consider this period of fighting to be the War of Independence, the Palestinians call it the "Nakba" (the 1948 catastrophe). As Schwarz bluntly puts it in black-and-white text: "Hundreds of Palestinian towns and villages were destroyed in 1948. At least 750,000 Palestinians became refugees."

Through occupation, depopulation, subsequent destruction and confiscation of all its land by Israel, the fate of the village of Tantura was similar to that of over 400 other Palestinian villages during the 1948 war. But it also shared with about two hundred of the these villages, the additional agony of a large-scale massacre of its inhabitants.

Perhaps the most chilling thing about Tantura, an impressive documentary made by Alon Schwarz, is the nervous laughter that comes from the mouths of old men who are supposed to have been complicit in a massacre decades earlier. They chuckle and grin at the suggestion of their wickedness, either convinced that they have been justified or blinded by their own lies. It's a brutally human reaction that's deeply disturbing to absorb. War enables the rationalization of evil. And the banality that follows often seems to be an act of denial. As Schwarz and his collaborators present the evidence of the eradication of the Palestinian village of Tantura by the soldiers of the  Alexandroni Brigade , all this becomes abundantly clear.

One of these villages was Tantura, and what happened after the war is the focus of the narrative. Several former soldiers of the Brigade are interviewed (including those who were present at Tantura), as well as the last living inhabitants of the village. A central interlocutor throughout the film is the historian Teddy Katz, who wrote a thesis in 1998 while teaching at the University of Haifa, in which he argued that the  Alexandroni Brigade killed hundreds of Palestinian villagers after they taught. Katz was immediately sued for libel by  Alexandroni veterans  and eventually retracted his work. Shortly after, he tried to withdraw his statement, but Judge Drora Pilpel rejected the request.

Tantura reviews and resumes Katz's evidence: numerous taped interviews with both soldiers and survivors of the event in question. Often the "blurry" memories from the present contradict what we hear from the recordings. What is remembered as casualties of war is spoken on audio tape, in many cases, as a more than planned execution. There is talk of digging a mass grave and taking no prisoners. Interviewees can often be heard telling Katz to "ignore that last part," apparently aware of what he has to hide. Judge Pilpel listens to the tapes in camera for Schwarz, concluding that if he had listened to these audio tapes all the way through twenty years earlier, Katz could very well have won in court.

A larger context is given by the cover-up of the deportation of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes. MGM film crews were brought in by Israeli leaders to film the exodus, with the footage then edited to suggest a peaceful and voluntary departure. Also highlighted are the directives of David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, who supported this.

Aesthetically and dramatically, Tantura is a fairly simple work, and this is to be appreciated. We are presented with the facts as the filmmakers see them. Schwarz and his collaborators acknowledge Katz and the complications of his word, while letting us hear the confessions from the soldiers themselves. The saying goes:  Those who do not know history are condemned to repeat it.

Tantura premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival in the US.

Here are two related TiU posts:

"Other Israel" film festival opens with massacre documentary  https://theinfounderground.com/smf/index.php?topic=30161.msg97576#msg97576

jews have beach parties on mass grave of 1948 Tantura massacre  https://theinfounderground.com/smf/index.php?topic=29036.msg95477#msg95477