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DOCUMENTARY | PALESTINE
Reflecting on “Where Olive Trees Weep”
Because there must always be hope.
Don’t ask the person in the cage — why they’re hitting the cage, breaking their arms, trying to be free. Ask the person who put them there, why they’re there.
~ Ashira Darwish, Journalist, Activist, Reiki Healer
Last night, while watching the premiere of Where Olive Trees Weep, I once again caught myself shaking my head and gasping in horror, as I’ve done dozens of times over the past eight months. Tears again caressed my cheeks as my shoulders shook — my upper body physically jolting as I turned my face away from my MacBook’s screen in order to avoid seeing the extremely traumatic images unfolding in front of me.
Set against the backdrop of the continually struggling and viciously oppressed Palestinian people, the documentary takes us to the West Bank of May and June 2022, where we see horrifying images of explosions and civilians with bloodied faces and limbs. We listen to the pain in the voice of a teenage boy confined to a wheelchair after becoming the victim to the Occupier’s terror reign. Our hearts again are wrenched as we witness what has become an unending cycle of violence against our unarmed Palestinian sisters and brothers.
