10 FEATURES guardianfeats@src.gla.ac.

uk 16th OCTOBE

The human factor

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The Israeli-Palestine conflict has been making headlines for sixty years. But how are the displaced a

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affected? Filmmaker Ke Cai travelled to the Middle East to investigate. (Interview by Chris Watt) a
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hen Ke Cai visited the Middle East’s biggest the people he meets. spoke to a lot of older people, who would tell me ‘Just give me t
refugee camp last year, he was shocked by He explains: “I don’t want to record any Hamas or Fatah offi- any nationality, any country, and I’ll go and live there rather than o
the crushing poverty, the hopeless suffering, cials because they talk rubbish. I want to focus on how individuals here.’ But a lot of young people were different. One typical girl
and the suffocating density of life that he get on with life – like if you see a man and know that he drinks told me ‘The Lebanese make our lives so difficult in the camp. I i
encountered. milk, and that he smokes cigarettes, and that he likes the colour don’t care about international aid, or whether the UN is helping us –
But rather than returning to his comfortable west end home to red, that humanises him and brings him closer to you. That’s the or not, just send us home.” b
forget about it as quickly as he could, the Glasgow Art School reason I’ve done the short film A Conversation and a Speech.” Ke is quick to draw a distinction between the older Palestinian i
graduate knew that he had to return as soon as possible – armed Ke’s latest film, an entry to Channel 4’s ‘Three Minute exiles, who he believes have largely resigned themselves to their c
with a camera and a mission to show Britain the plight of the Wonder’ series, jumps from scenes of a conversation between unfortunate situation, and the younger, more idealistic and hopeful
hundreds of thousands displaced by the conflict.
“I was first in Lebanon in summer 2006 covering the
an elderly Palestinian man and his eighty-year-old mother about
their lost homeland, and footage of a fiery speech delivered by a
generations. This, he suggests, is one of the factors that has led
to the widespread use of one of the worlds most tragic weapons
“
Hezbollah-Israeli conflict,” says Ke. “I saw the bombs. There
are militants in the street, and everyone has guns. I realised that
militaristic politician.
Though official representatives of Palestinian groups are
– the child soldier.
“The parents of children with guns think they know what
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there could be a good film there next time, so I went back there in
December, focussing on Palestinian camps in Lebanon.
frequently overtly militant, Ke doesn’t believe that this accurately
represents the views of the thousands of Palestinians torn from
they’re doing, they think this is the future for their children, and
they want to teach them to fight now so they can kill just like
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“Someone asked my if I’d like to go to the Ain Helwe refugee their homes during six decades of struggle against the Israeli their parents. A lot of people think it’s very necessary t
camp near Sidon, because they dropped a few bombs there. It’s occupiers. For a start, he points out, there are 19 distinct political to do so. d
a totally different world – they have 100,000 people living there, factions within the largest camp he visited – the most powerful “I wanted to do a montage sequence of this
and I think it’s only two kilometres wide and three kilometres of which, Fatah PLO, controls little more than the main street Lebanese man I met telling his son about the P
deep. In one place 42 people were killed in one night.” – and he believes that people’s desires are much simpler. Attah festival, one month after Ramadan. It a
Though appalled by the scenes he witnessed, Ke was deter- “I think Hamas and Fatah make empty celebrates the story of how Allah told Ibrahim f
mined to return. “I realised how much worse life was in here than promises,” states Ke. “They talk about to take his son to the desert to sacrifice his son, t
everywhere outside, so I got permission to go back, with my own fighting their way back to Jerusalem, and he was going to do it, but when he had the p
translator, and realised that almost everybody here is without state. but all people want is to go back to knife to his throat the god appeared and told s
They have no civil rights, they can’t build houses, they can’t find their country – the village they grew up him just to kill a sheep instead. And now d
employment outside – there’s 72% unemployment in the camp in and pat the tree they grew up with, every year at Attah families will kill a
– and a lot of Lebanese criminals hide in the camp, because the smell the air, feel the earth. sheep in the street, and give the h
Lebanese army has no authority there. I looked at Google Maps “But I don’t think it’s possible meat to their families and friends u
after I got back, and it’s looks so dense – so dense you can’t even at all to find a state, and resettle all and the poor, and will tell their t
see the streets. And outside you can see the normal Lebanese.” these people. The number is too children about Ibrahim. h
Whilst the stories that make it from the Middle East to the huge, and they have suffered so “To me this is a very strong
West usually focus on military details and political dealings, Ke many years. The only thing they metaphor and symbol for what is
strives to ensure that his films and photography show the human want is to go back to Palestine, happening to the children. Parents T
side of the conflict, and capture the local mood and the feelings of but it’s not going to happen. I give their children guns, and they p