Director’s statement

When I first shared my idea of making a documentary about the wall in Palestine, my friend
Tilmann told me that the way to start would be to write a Director’s Statement enunciating the
reasons that motivate me. I protest. I am not a director nor it is my intention to become one by
making this documentary. I am, nevertheless, a storyteller and I believe I have a good story to tell.
So here it goes. Palestine has been under Israeli occupation for over 50 years, since the Six Days
War in 1967, but something with a far greater impact in the daily lives of Palestinians has happened
since then.
In 2002, Israel took the unilateral decision of building a separation wall, a wall that would
eventually extend to 708 kilometers and reach 10 meters high. This unequivocally strong
psychological sign sent by Israel, isolated populations all over the West Bank and had a negative
impact on water resources, agricultural land use and waste management. There is even a city
surrounded by the wall.
Despite never having been consulted about it, there are many dealing with the negative
effects of this ode to segregation. Lack of schools, isolation, restriction of movements, widespread
confiscation and destruction of Palestinian property are only a few examples of the consequences of
the construction of the wall. But there are consequences far greater than the physical aspects I just
mentioned: the wall also affects the personal and mental development of those living by it, the
mindset of a child growing up with the rituals of checkpoints and the erection of a wall that stole his
or her playground will surely be a different one.
The United Nations and several international non-governmental organizations have
repeatedly warned of the humanitarian toll of these policies on Palestinian populations but the
public opinion in western societies still resists to take a clear stance against this humanitarian crime.
And this is what startled me.
After living close to one year in Ramallah, Palestine, I realized that, regardless of how well
informed one may be about these facts, it is impossible to fully grasp the harmful repercussions that
came with the building of the separation wall. This realization started from the moment I first
crossed the check-point in Qalandia, where visitors are presented with a sign stating that the road
leads to an area under the Palestinian authority and that the entrance for Israeli citizens is forbidden,
dangerous for one’s life and against the Israeli law. Not the best omen, I would say.
However, after this first presentation and the arrival to Palestine’s West Bank things appear
to be quite different from what the sign announced. Although military presence is still very present,
a short walk around the city makes apparent that people in Ramallah are not that different from the
rest of the world: they are concerned with living the best way they can, pursuing their happiness,
constantly striving to provide a better life for their loved ones. All this with the constraints I have
mentioned above.
So why is that western public opinion struggles so much to see the obvious? The answer is
simple: because it is not that obvious. To this regard, it is important to highlight that the influence
and propaganda machine that Israel possesses in the Western world makes it very difficult for
anyone to see past the smoke screen. This is what has motivated me to make this documentary: to
show that those living behind the wall are not that different from us, to show how we are all
Palestinians in some way and how this wall affects the day-to-day life of Palestinians.
Several studies in the field of linguistics suggest that a message will be much better
understood if it activates the so-called mirror neurons, which will enable the receiver to relate to the
message, to have empathy for it. Most documentaries about the wall show all the negative impacts
that I briefly described above and many more, but fail to show the essence of those living them.
Therefore, the spectator gets the message that things are bad, but is incapable of feeling
empathy for those in the screen, as they seem distant and different from what the spectator is used
to and relates with. In other words, the message is not framed in a way that makes the receiver
understand its essence. In the words of George Lakoff, a renown Linguist: ”The biology of empathy
allows us to comprehend our connection to each other, to other living things, and to the physical
world that supports life”. In fact, although empathy is in the genesis of most western societies,
being one of its fundamental foundations, the information we receive about issues like the one of
the separation wall in Palestine are being framed in ways that do not allow us to feel empathy for
people suffering.
The construction of the segregation wall and the Israeli occupation of Palestine are indeed
moral issues. However, moral, as reason, is not universal. Just like there are several moral systems,
the way how humans exercise reason is not universal and its dependent of the moral system that is
activated in our brain. This is why is paramount to correctly frame a message according to our
objective. And this is also why I want to make this documentary.
To frame the message that the separation wall in Palestine represents, according to a moral
system that will allow the spectator to feel empathy for the Palestinian people, to reason in
consonance with a frame that will permit a better understanding of the atrocities cause by the
building of the wall.
Images of war, fear, confrontation will activate the emotional pathway for negative
emotions, the nor-epinephrine circuit. Conversely, the activation of the pathway for positive
emotions, the dopamine circuit, will let the spectator live out the narrative in a positive way,
creating a positive emotional experience and allowing for the spectator to feel empathy for the
characters. Watching someone trying to look for shelter, running away from bombings, activates the
war frame, and the spectator will feel sorry for the character. The problem resides in the fact that
wars can also be framed, and within some frames (a noble and necessary war, for instance), we may
feel sorry for a character, but we will not feel empathy for him/her.
On the other hand, a narrative depicting the day-to-day life of an artist, a student or a
shepherd will activate well established frames and scripts in our brains, and when these frames or
scripts are broken the spectator will be able to feel empathy for the characters.
This is what motivates me to do this documentary: to provide a narrative framed in a way
that allows the spectator to feel empathy for the characters. And hopefully this empathy will be
strong enough to empower common people to take a harder stance against blatant human rights
violations, like the ones taking place in Palestine’s West Bank. May these lines be my grain of sand
in the struggle for a better world.