Stopping Spielberg at Munich

The Angry Arab News Service has a remarkable write-up on Spielberg's latest offering, Munich. I haven't seen the film myself but I've been reading the "reviews" with some scepticism as I know Spielberg to be a zionist and I doubt if he would do anything to undermine the cause. The film first came to my attention when various zionists began condemning it for, well, I'm not sure what for but the Anti-Defamation League's Abe Foxman defended the film on the grounds that there was no "humanising of the perpetrators" whereas "the Israelis are portrayed in human terms. Now this is precisely what the AANS's beef with the film is. Written in a very angry style, as befits the Angry Arab, the piece condemns the film as not simply dehumanising the "perpetrators" but the whole of the Palestinian people whilst bending over backwards, not simply to portray the Israelis in human terms but to show them as thoughtful humanitarians themselves. The bad news for me is that I'm going to have to see what I know, without seeing it, is going to be a zionist propaganda piece to stand with Exodus or some such tosh. Anyway, have a few chunks of the Angry Arab post. First up, the motive behind the film:

This movie could easily have been a paid Israeli advertisement for its killing machine. In fact, it could be a recruitment movie for Israeli killing squads. I mean that. In fact, it is a celebretary movie of Israeli murder of Palestinians. Israel killing is always moral, and always careful, and always on target.....

the movie was based on a book that took the Israeli account as it was delivered. But the book was honest and more accurate at least on one count: in the book by George Jonas titled Vengeance (only Israelis are entitled to vengeance as you know, the more violent the better as far as some US movie audiences are concerned), the killers did not express regret or second-thoughts. None. In the book but not in the movie, the killers, according to Jonas, had "absolutely no qualms about anything they did." How could Spielberg miss that.........

On victims and perpetrators:

The first victim of the movie was Wa’il Zu`aytir, and I knew his niece; I went to school with Abu Hasan Salamah’s son--he was younger; and I knew the street and building where the three PLO leaders were massacred in Beirut. And let me tell you that NONE of the five people mentioned here had anything to do with Munich--but more on that later. NONE. But why should this movie, a Spielberg’s movie for potato’s sake, bother with facts, especially if they come in the way of a smooth pro-Israeli narrative?

The small picture and the big picture:

It can be argued that the Palestinian attackers risked the lives of the hostages by taking them hostages, even if they did not intend to kill them. That is true. This is like hijacking: the hijackers, any hijackers, are responsible, and should be held responsible for whatever endangerment to the lives and health of victims. That is true. But it is also true that the State of Israel has taken a nation as a hostage, and has been endangering the lives of Palestinians since the inception of the state of Israel. This is why it is all a question of who is retaliating against whom?

Israelis human, Palestinians sub-human:

we had to see the head Israeli killer with his child: you need to see him as a human being. Do you know that not a single Palestinian in the movie appeared unarmed?

As I said I'll have to see the film. But please read the whole post at The Angry Arab News Service. It's none to easy on the eye as there are no paragraphs in a long piece but it's worth persevering with. Also, so far the post has generated 459 comments.