Further Reading Yasmina Khadra, The Attack (2005) Mia Bloom, Dying to Kill: The Allure of Suicide Terror (Columbia University Press, 2007) Jeffrey William Lewis, The Business of Martyrdom: A History of Suicide Bombing (Naval Institute Press, 2012) Asthma Afsaruddin, Striving in the Path of God: Jihad and Martyrdom in Islamic Thought (Oxford University Press, 2013) *** See the last sections of the article below for female suicide bombers and the role played by a highly sexualized paradise in recruiting boys and young men. Young women are sometimes recruited after being raped as it is the only way to remove this "dishonour" from their family. Note the image of paradise and, again, the role of the Iranian revolution (1979) in building this modern culture of martyrdom. Does Islam Have a Role In Suicide Bombings?
5 Comments
Penny
1/25/2016 02:03:41 am
I have to wonder if director Ziad Douueiri could possibly have been unaware of the truth about Jenin, but if he was—if he believed the lie that it was a massacre, I still question his representing it as a legitimate trigger for Siham’s radicalization (as well as his setting his audience up to accept this by having someone claim early in the film that everyone can snap and become a suicide bomber). And if Ziad was aware that the premise on which he is predicating his film is a lie, his misrepresentation is very problematic. I think the other historical inaccuracies (for example, the presence of the separation barrier that would not have been built yet) and the changes he made to the novel (for example, making Siham a Christian, not a Jew, which does not remove religion from the equation but rather obscures the fact that suicide bombing is an inherently Islamic phenomenon) do matter, whether this is a fictional account or not. These cannot be explained as taking artistic license; rather, they seem to serve propagandistic purposes.
Reply
deborah schnitzer
1/26/2016 12:27:19 am
The issues you raise are critical ones and lead to a variety of questions: why does Ziad misrepresent facts and why, when, in interviews, for example, he is clear that he wants to convey complexity and move beyond established hatreds; are some misrepresentations more grievous than others if they lead to biases that are toxic insofar as the film's reach is profound (though it suffers censorship in parts of the world Ziad hoped it would also be shown; what is the relationship between the art and the historical reality it intends to realize; to what extent does the departure from facts in a work of art render its artistic merit untenable; is art obliged to be truth-telling if it chooses to be related to historical events; did Ziad's research bring him beyond the novel's version of events which depend on that misrepresentation or did he choose to depend more exclusively on that version in his adaptation of the novel, even though he altered other elements so that he would reach a different/broader audience; by relying on this version of "massacre" as trigger did he fail - given his point of view (experience, culture, etc.) - to understand the consequences of such choice-making, even as he attempted to reveal that there were no easy answers. In other words, could he have been as unaware of his own biases as his use of this realization of Jenin suggests; could that lack of understanding of his own subject position, his own identifications make him this vulnerable - as vulnerable as his own leading character - in the ways that you suggest - highlighting the perhaps insurmountable difficulties of conflicting loyalties, affiliations, etc.; are there elements in the film that suggest his capacities to render both sides even as there are elements that suggest his cannot do justice to both sides - the underlying affinity with a Palestinian position you note. The list goes on . . . The contexts, observations, and questions you ask demand that it should.
Reply
Penny
1/29/2016 07:41:47 am
So many thought-provoking questions. To one, I would answer that yes, “art is obliged to be truth-telling if it chooses to be related to historical events.” Otherwise, it is a falsification, not fictionalization, of historical fact, which thereby distorts rather than clarifies the truth, as happens here, and so perpetuates the lies that feed and justify hatred rather than represent reality accurately so the hatred might stop. And the purpose of art should be to lead us out of, not into, the darkness of falsehood.
Reply
Penny
1/29/2016 07:41:57 am
So many thought-provoking questions. To one, I would answer that yes, “art is obliged to be truth-telling if it chooses to be related to historical events.” Otherwise, it is a falsification, not fictionalization, of historical fact, which thereby distorts rather than clarifies the truth, as happens here, and so perpetuates the lies that feed and justify hatred rather than represent reality accurately so the hatred might stop. And the purpose of art should be to lead us out of, not into, the darkness of falsehood.
Reply
deborah schnitzer
1/30/2016 04:58:07 am
Once more, interesting observations and ones we will encounter in Ida. I come back with more observations/ questions: In Attack, the concept of what constitutes "life" varies among those whose causes/experiences/dreams define/apprehend it. Siham sees herself advancing the physical, spiritual, emotional, psychological, and national life of her people - working toward their "redemption" by whatever means she can. This is her larger picture - a degraded people desperate reclaiming their rights. For Amin, life references that struggle whose significance he is coming to understand, even as he has taken an oath as a physician to do no harm and even as he is a "member" of Israeli society and benefits from that membership (though his vulnerability as an Arab repeatedly exposes the fragility of that benefit in the film). These are the shifting frames for and grounds within which life is defined/apprehended in the film and could they not make for valid complexities in terms of the choices that are made? Of course, the validity of complexity re choice making does not render the further claim that the killing of innocents to advance a cause is abhorrent and a crime against . . .
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
|