The film “Yalla Gaza” sheds light on the lives of the residents of the Gaza Strip, which has been suffering under an ongoing Israeli siege for 17 years, during which it has been exposed to devastating wars that have destroyed everything.
The documentary reviews the opinions of Palestinian and foreign activists, specialists, and experts about the densely populated coastal Gaza Strip – most of whom are refugees – and the reality of the human tragedy experienced by the Palestinians there (to watch the full film, please click on this link).
Palestine Rasras, head of the French language department at Al-Aqsa University in Gaza, says, “Rights are obtained through struggle, so education is essential and a life requirement for the residents of Gaza.”
The film touched on the beginning of the story when Britain did everything in its power to create a national homeland for the Jews based on the Balfour Declaration on November 2, 1917, and encouraged the establishment of the Zionist movement and its militias.
Historians reported that various small militias from among the settlements merged to form the main militia of the Jewish Agency, “Haganah.”
Ken Loach, a British film director, says, “The destruction of Palestine is the greatest collective crime of the last century and is still continuing.”
The film refers to the Nakba, the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes, and the establishment of refugee camps in the Gaza Strip, in addition to the plan to divide Palestine into two Arab and Jewish states in 1947.
The speakers in the film agreed that the Gaza Strip witnessed the emergence of a Palestinian nationalism “unparalleled anywhere else in Palestine,” and explained that Gaza “has become a homeland for the guerrillas, where armed struggle is the only way to restore Palestine.”
Sieges and wars
Israel imposed a stifling siege and launched wars on the Gaza Strip after the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) won the legislative elections in 2006 and formed a Palestinian government, but it did not receive Western recognition.
Roni Barkan, an Israeli dissident and opponent of Zionism, says that the siege imposed on Gaza is a “barbaric, inhumane siege and a flagrant violation of international law,” noting that “the ethnic Zionist state needs to impose force to maintain racial supremacy.”
He added, “Zionism is a project whose goal is to dismantle Palestine and empty it of its indigenous population,” describing it as “settler colonialism.”
The film touched on the Palestinians’ attempt to overcome the effects of the siege and wars, such as creating a youth platform aimed at introducing the world to the Palestinian issue and human rights.
The film devoted a large amount of space to talking about the suffering of farmers, fishermen and other groups in the Gaza Strip due to the siege and wars, in addition to a number of entertainment and popular events demanding an end to the Israeli occupation.
The film “Yalla Gaza” dealt with the ongoing attempt by Palestinian and foreign lawyers to prosecute Israel in the International Criminal Court after the wars it launched against the besieged Gaza Strip and the fall of thousands of martyrs and wounded.
