Menassat:

On Sunday night January 11 as bombs rained down on Gaza, Israeli’s watched one of the their own, director Ari Folman give his acceptance speech for best foreign film at the Golden Globe’s for his animated film “Waltz with Bashir." At the end of that same night at least 60 Palestinians were killed in what was the 16th day of Israel's "Operation Cast Lead."...

At its core, "Waltz with Bashir" is a tale of a middle-aged man flashing back to his war experience as a 19-year-old Israeli soldier in Lebanon in 1982. It specifically deals with Ari Forman’s attempt at reconciling his own complicity and the Israeli army’s complicity in the massacres in the Palestinian refugee camps Sabra and Shatila in September 1982....

Over the last year, as “Waltz with Bashir” has made its rounds at festivals throughout the world, it has been welcomed with open arms in Israeli society, including in right-wing circles, which initially surprised the director....

But why the warm public welcome for this anti-war film – a sensitive topic in Israeli history - when Israelis are at the same time hailing the war waging in Gaza - a potential black stain on Israeli history in the years to come?....

Folman even gave part of the reasons himself in an interview with Jewish and Israel News (JTA). According to Folman, "It made Israel look like a tolerant country, allowing soldiers to talk openly about their experiences in the war, and when it was screened in Europe it made many people there realize for the first time that it wasn’t the Israeli troops that committed the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacres,” he said....

In his portrayal of the events of Israel’s involvement in the Lebanese civil war, particularly the Sabra and Shatila massacres, the director presents the Israeli soldiers as naïve young men who were only participating in a massacre because of the time and the place they happened to be in. "It is a completely apolitical film. It's a personal film. If it were a political film, we would have dealt with the other sides, meaning that we would have interviewed the Palestinians and Christian sides. And it does not. It's a very personal film," Folman told France 24....

The film’s narrative begins as Folman, who plays the main character, travels to Europe and around Israel speaking with fellow soldiers who fought in Lebanon. He eventually begins to piece together what happened during his term in Beirut, which he had erased from his memory....

Waltz with Bashir shows scenes of inhumane Israeli acts – Israeli tanks trampling cars in the narrow streets of Beirut, a soldier being chased by the 26 dogs he killed in preparation for the bombardment of a Lebanese village, and a random sniper who kills a man on a donkey. Nevertheless, as he pieces the story together for the audience, he fails to provide a complete picture of Israel’s role in the Lebanese civil war....

Maybe it was too much to ask of Folman to reinterpret the entire historical accounting of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in one film, but the Israeli public can swallow the sensitive nature of Waltz with Bashir because it stays away from treating the Israeli state as a long-time political actor in the systematic, ongoing violence of Palestinian and Lebanese people. Thus, there is no overt questioning of why Israel was in Lebanon in the first place. Israeli military actions are validated under the guise of “fighting terrorism”....

As well, Waltz with Bashir fails to present Israeli soldiers as direct participants in the massacres of Sabra and Shatila. Israeli soldiers were only following orders and were therefore tacit participants - responsibility then lies solely with the chain of command. As a result, and perhaps without Folman’s intent, individual responsibility is deferred. In a sense, the film then buffers the actions of soldiers in Gaza today.

As for popular support of the Israeli occupation of Beirut in 1982 and for actions of the Israeli army at the time, Israeli public opinion was very much against the massacres committed at Sabra and Shatila. 400,000 Israelis marched in the streets on Tel-Aviv pressuring the Israeli Knesset to begin an inquiry after reports of the massacre were leaked. The ensuing investigation – the Kahan Report - concluded that then Israeli defense minister Sharon was personally responsible for the massacres - which led to his resignation, although he remained in government as a minister.

Now, Israeli streets are empty compared to 1982. The biggest demonstration reported in Tel-Aviv numbered 10,000, and the most recent polls have shown that nearly 90 percent of Israelis support the war in Gaza - that does not include the 20 percent of Palestinians living inside Israel. Some 100,000 Israeli-Palestinians demonstrated in the village of Sakhnin. Israeli public support for the current war is actually soaring while their TV screens show a rapidly increasing Palestinian death toll in Gaza, and oddly enough, Folman’s “anti-war” film is being venerated.

In his blog Angry Arab, Professor of political science at California State University, As`ad AbuKhalil, questions what the international response would be like if Palestinians were to make such a film.

“If a Hamas writer were to shoot a film about his experience in Gaza would the Hollywood community welcome him with open arms, and would the liberal media shower him with praise? With or without the "anguish" of the Israel soldiers.”....

The image of the consciense-stricken killer, struggling with his past, gives a reassuring face to the young men, or kids, who are at this moment committing acts of terroristic mass-murder. It doesn't matter what they do now, as long as we can be assured that 20 years from now, they will articulate their regrets poignantly -- would "terrorists" do that?

Ari Folman may be a nice and thoughtful guy. But his film is performing a particular function right now, and this needs to be pointed out.