My films tend to get complicated and even when my intention is to make a very simple film, often things get tricky. THE FIRST 54 YEARS – AN ABBREVIATED MANUAL FOR MILITARY OCCUPATION (2021) was supposed to be a very simple film: a collection of soldiers’ testimonies spanning 54 years of Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The testimonies are taken from the archive of Breaking the Silence, an organization of Israeli veteran soldiers who have taken it upon themselves to expose the inner workings of the occupation machine to the Israeli public. The film was originally titled THE FIRST 54 YEARS and the subtitle was added later. At first I was convinced that indexing the testimonies within a logic of internal connections would be enough to tell the story of what is probably the longest occupation in modern history. I thought that the compilation of one testimony after another would autonomously bring forth the meaning of occupation: what it means to be an occupier, what is involved to sustain an occupation, and what kind of system the Palestinians of the Occupied Territories find themselves living under. It was clear to me from the outset that I would concentrate on actions, deeds, commands and mechanisms as the soldiers describe them, rather than on their reflections about these deeds. But as editing progressed, I realized that I had to develop a framework that would contain the deeper meaning of this huge enterprise, the largest the State of Israel has undertaken in its 73 years of existence. After all, I do not assume that Israel’s purpose is solely to cause suffering to the Palestinians.
It was clear to me that no one who had been part of the system that created and set the rules of the occupation would agree to collaborate with this project and honestly reveal the logic behind the huge machine of the occupation.
It was clear to me that in order for my project to be complete, I had to connect the very strong body of testimonies with some logic that would allow a deeper understanding of the reasons for the longevity of the occupation, and the unlikelihood of its ending in the foreseeable future. The vast majority of the testimonies deal with local events which in themselves do not reveal the general impetus that led to their formation. An isolated incident of an imposed curfew, an erected checkpoint, a detention or other restriction on movement does not usually indicate the broader end to which it serves. Thus was born the „Abbreviated Manual for Occupation” – a kind of instruction manual for operating a military occupation that deals not only with the „how” but also with the „why” of these provisions: what general purpose does this or that mechanism serve, and what is the occupier’s motivation when imposing a particular system of laws and rules on the inhabitants of the occupied territory?
It was clear to me that no one who had been part of the system that created and set the rules of the occupation would agree to collaborate with this project and honestly reveal the logic behind the huge machine of the occupation. I therefore had no choice but to take upon myself the role of representing the enormous system known as the Israeli occupation.
