HEART OF JENIN
In view of the tragic developments taking place in Israel/Palestine at the moment, we have decided to release a Palestine/Israel trilogy with the three films "Heart of Jenin", Cinema Jenin – The story of a dream" and "After the silence". These are all three award-winning films that show people - Jews and Palestinians alike - who have tried to break the cycle of hatred and violence.
Films included:
Heart of Jenin | Cinema Jenin - A story of a dream | After the Silence
These three stories are united by the fact that they are all set in Jenin/West Bank, a city that has gained sad notoriety for the fact that 30% of all suicide bombers came from Jenin. In particular, the film CINEMA JENIN tells how difficult it is to bring peace to the conflict. After the opening of the cinema, many people in Jenin were afraid to visit the cinema because it was seen as a “normalization project” by the Al-Aksa Brigades, the dominant militia in Jenin, and in a small town like Jenin, few people had the courage to be seen as someone who belittles and “normalizes” the occupation. We think that given the current situation, it is important to tell the background to the conflict that has been simmering for decades, and especially now to bring to the audience three different stories of people who have tried to break the vicious cycle of violence and counter-violence, to give the world and its leaders the courage to do the same.
Help us get these stories seen around the world. Donate to the non-profit organization Cinema Jenin e.V. and support the production.
HEART OF JENIN
THE HEART OF JENIN tells the true story of Ishmael Khatib, whose 12-year-old son Ah-med was killed in 2005 in the Yenin refugee camp by bullets fired by Israeli soldiers. After the doctors at the hospital have only been able to diagnose Ahmed’s brain death, the Palestinian Ishmael decides to donate his son’s organs to Israeli children and thus save their lives.
Cinema Jenin – A story of a Dream (English)
In order to offer children and young people in Jenin hope and a perspective, hundreds of volunteers from all over the world, together with Ismael Khatib from 'The Heart of Jenin', are renovating an old cinema in Jenin that was closed during the first Intifada. CINEMA JENIN was opened in the summer of 2011 and operated as a movie theater for 5 years before it was demolished in December 2016 and replaced by a shopping mall.
After the Silence (English)
The Israeli woman Yael Armanet loses her husband in a suicide bombing by a Palestinian from Jenin and inspired by Ismael Khatib's gesture, sets out to visit the suicide bomber's family in Jenin to get answers about what happened. The film was made possible and co-produced by the Palestinian Cinema Jenin.
“The biggest war crime of all is the war itself”
„War and Justice“ is a true-life documentary about Luis Moreno Ocampo, the first chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court and Benjamin Ferencz the youngest prosecuting attorney of the Nuremberg Trials. They both are of the firm opinion that war itself is the biggest war crime of all.
But with tragic events in Israel Palestine that could easily lead to a mayor confrontation in the middle east, and the three largest world powers — China, Russia and the United States — still unwilling to accept the International Criminal Court in The Hague, will genocide, war crimes, and wars of aggression ever be brought to justice?
Sadly, just as the film is about to debut, Ferencz dies at the age of 103. But Ocampo fights on in his honor, more determined than ever to put an end all to wars of aggression, along with the inevitable human atrocities they cause.