“No Other Land” commentary

There’s an Oscar-nominated documentary, No Other Land, that’s having a hard time finding an American distributor. It’s getting screenings in a small number of theaters, and I saw it today at the Film Forum.

            It’s made by a Palestinian on the West Bank and an Israeli journalist. They appear to be friends, though the film doesn’t say how they know each other. Basel, the Palestinian, went to law school, and it’s hinted that he either can’t practice or maybe what he’d be able to do as a lawyer is too limited. When Yuval, the Israeli (he’s Jewish, but does that go without saying?), is introduced to some Palestinians in Basel’s village, one asks, “You’re a human rights Israeli?” The subtitles have quotes around “human rights,” perhaps to indicate an ironic tone?

            It’s very hard to watch No Other Land. Basel’s village, actually a series of small villages called Masafer Yatta, has been designated an army training zone, so people are supposed to be evicted. But they refuse to go, even after their homes are demolished. (Israel’s been demolishing Palestinian homes for decades for various reasons, including homes of families if any member has committed a violent attack against Israelis. Has that policy stopped attacks on Israelis?) Instead, they rebuild, and rebuild again when homes are destroyed again and again.

            The film alternates between scenes of the army arriving—bulldozing a house or multiple homes or buildings (one is a chicken house, and chickens scatter everywhere) or attacking people protesting the demolitions or simply marching in protest—and Basel and Yuval talking to each other, trying to understand what’s happening, what either of them can do about it, and what their positions are vis-à-vis each other. For instance, Basel and Yuval’s conversations mostly take place in Basel’s West Bank village, and Yuval can “go home,” which feels like code for a normal life that Basel and his people are not allowed to have. Well into the film there are TV clips of Yuval on Israeli TV being accused of being a Jew hater—because he’s critical of what the Israeli army is doing.

            When Basel was young, the village built an elementary school, and the army threatened to demolish it. This got some international attention—clips from MSNBC and British TV—and after Tony Blair, then the U.K. prime minister, visited Masafer Yatta, the army backed down. But in the period covered by this film, 2019–2023, the army comes in and knocks down the school. Watching bulldozers take bites out of these structures is like watching a monster eating its prey. Why is the Israeli government so opposed to education and shelter for Palestinians?

            No Other Land wrapped in October 2023, maybe shortly after October 7.  In a montage of statements at the end, we learn that a secret document reveals  the army designated the area of the villages as a training zone specifically to prevent expansion of Palestinian settlements; meanwhile, Israeli settlements on the West Bank, illegal by international law, expand relentlessly, and settlers also attack the Palestinian villages.

            In the exchanges between Basel and Yuval, the Israeli is disappointed that his stories get only a few thousand views. The Palestinian teases him for expecting to solve the problem in 10 days; he knows that maybe his people will never win, but they have to keep fighting, and they do.

One Day at a Time, Countdown 1,429

 One Day at a Time, Countdown 1,429 to the Next Administration

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

The chaos president is now

the Pinocchio president.

Is he lying?

Or has he simply forgotten

current history?

The Pinocchio president says

the Ukraine president got the U.S.

to give Ukraine $350 billion.

(It was actually $119 billion.)

The Pinocchio president says

the Ukraine president went into

a war that couldn’t be won.

(Ukraine was invaded by Russia.

Ukraine did not begin the war.)

The Pinocchio president calls

Zelenskyy a dictator without elections.

(63% of Ukrainians oppose any elections

until the war is over.)

The Pinocchio president’s envoy to Kyiv

canceled a meeting because

the Ukrainian president said bad things about

the envoy’s boss.

This all matters. Can other countries

trust a country’s leader who lies

constantly?

One day at a time.

 

One Day at a Time, Countdown 1,430 Days

Countdown 1,430 Days to the Next Administration

 

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

The U.S. veep travels to Germany.

He tells European countries to be

more open to their racist,

right-wing political parties.

He prefers to meet with the

head of the neo-Nazi AfD,

instead of meeting with Olaf Scholz,

the current German chancellor.

The head of the neo-Nazi AfD recites

the slogan “Everything for Germany,”

a slogan Nazis engraved on their daggers.

The head of the neo-Nazi AfD wants

Germany to stop apologizing

for the Holocaust.

The AfD claims that all Muslims

are a danger to Germany.

Why is the U.S. veep so eager to talk to

a neo-Nazi politician?

Elsewhere, Brazil indicts its former

president for attempting a coup.

Brazil is what democracy looks like.

The U.S. is what falling into autocracy looks like.

One day at a time.

One Day at a Time, Countdown 1,431 Days

Countdown 1,431 Days to the Next Administration

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

The DOGE-bags are

slashing immigration judges,

slashing air traffic staff,

slashing National Park rangers,

slashing nuclear security agents.

slashing health workers at CDC,

slashing nurses at NIH,

slashing cybersecurity workers,

slashing the VA and its crisis line.

Who is in charge of all this slash and burn?

For purposes of a legal brief,

it’s not Elon.

Elon is not the DOGE administrator.

What is DOGE?

The Department of Gutting Employees.

One day at a time.

One Day at a Time, 1,439 days to go

Countdown 1,439

 

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

The chaos president has unleashed his funder

to break the government.

A German pastor who initially

supported Hitler confessed after WWII

to his responsibility in not protesting Nazi acts.

Are we protesting the chaos president’s

executive orders sufficiently?

Or are we waiting until those EOs come for us?

I carry his thoughts into our current situation

as a warning.

First, they came for theimmigrants,

but I was not an immigrant

so I did not speak up.

Then they came for the trans men and women,

but I was not trans

so I did not speak up.

Then they came for the FBI and CIA,

but I did not trust the FBI and CIA

so I did not speak up.

Then they came for other government workers,

but I was not a government worker

so I did not speak up.

Then they came for me,

and there was no one left to speak for me.

One day at a time.

Still time to speak up.

One Day at a Time, 1,441 days to go

Countdown 1,441

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

Cleansing the federal government

of the dreaded DEI,

diversity, equity, inclusion,

a Doge worker removes from

a supervisor’s desk in an intelligence agency,

a plaque that reads

“Be kind to everyone.”

Does this sentiment violate

the chaos president’s agenda?

At a news conference

an Afghan journalist, a woman,

asks what plans the chaos president has

for Afghanistan.

He pretends not to know what she says.

He claims he cannot understand

a word that she says.

This may be true.

She is asking for compassion and empathy.

He does not understand compassion and empathy.

A president ignorant of compassion and empathy

is a dangerous thing.

Can we survive him?

One day at a time.

One Day at a Time, 1,443 days until next inauguration

 Countdown 1,443

One day at a time.

One hour at a time.

One second at a time.

One thousand, four hundred and forty-three more days of continuing chaos.

Watch what he does, not what he says.

But his saying is a doing.

How can his words be ignored?

He says the U.S. will take Gaza,

Rebuild it, turn it into a Middle East Riviera.

How? How? Howl! Howl!

Palestinians howl, never, never, never.

Some Israelis rejoice.

The U.S. will do the ethnic cleansing for them.

That would required 3,333 of the largest passenger planes.

With planes taking off every five minutes,

it would take two years to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

Has the great wheeler-dealer, the deal maker, the real estate mogul

Considered the logistics?

Of course not.

He’s only doing a shtick.

He’s playing at being president

while the billionaire and Project 2025 gang

continue to demolish our democratic government.

I wait for him to say Gaza will be the 52nd state

(after Canada becomes the 51st).

Watch what the billionaire and Project 2025 gang do

While he entertains the MAGA,

And the world cries.

A poem for this moment

One Day at a Time

One day at a time.

One day at a time.

One day at a time.

I live in these five words.

One thousand, four hundred and forty-five days left of this creator of chaos.

I suppose I’m relatively safe from his malign focus.

A white person. Jewish, but not the kind of Jew he likes.

The ones who give him money, the ones who love him for whatever reason, because they think he loves Israel.

He loves the Jews who wear yarmulkes every day to count his money for him. (He did say that once.)

He also harbors antisemites who wore Camp Auschwitz sweatshirts on January 6.

One day at a time.

I have to live in my country as he deforms it.

How do I do that?

I cannot ignore the news because the news will not ignore me or people I care about.

One day at a time I breathe and breathe and breathe. By breathing, I exist and resist.

One day at a time.