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Understanding Israel Palestine
This show is inspired by Citizens for Justice in the Middle East, a local group that has advocated for 20 years for a fair and even-handed U.S. foreign policy that recognizes the rights of both Palestinians and Israelis. Our program offers interviews with journalists, scholars, policy experts and activists to offer multiple perspectives, and to clarify the underlying issues that are often obscured by headline news.
1948: Creation & Catastrophe is the story of the establishment of Israel as seen through the eyes of the people who lived it. Rather than being a history lesson, this documentary is a primer for the present. It is simply not possible to make sense of what is happening in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict today without an understanding of 1948.
Ahlam Muhtaseb, co-producer of the documentary, discusses the ten-year process interviewing Palestinians and Zionist militia who experienced the war in 1948. Zionists experienced the events as a brutal but necessary task to achieve the state of Israel. Survivors of the Nakba experienced the events as a catastrophe.
An addendum is included here to hear Dr. Muhtaseb reflect on the emotional challenge of producing the film. She recalls her heartbreak as Palestinians told her their stories of the Nakba as well as the trauma she felt on hearing the recorded interviews of Zionists collected by her co-producer Andy Timlett in which the Israelis typically celebrated the victory in 1948 even as they recounted personal stories of brutality.
