An unprecedented, groundbreaking and voyeuristic look into military reserve life in Israel, this film was shot over a 5 year period in director and reserve soldier Yaniv Berman’s life. A soldier in the Israeli army reserves, Alpha Company, Berman had unparalleled access and filmed the soldiers as they went about their military service day and night. Crossing over to the Palestinian border the camera captured remarkably every movement of the soldiers from the frenetic night-time house arrests to the quiet moments of self reflection and despair. Capturing the humiliation of both the Palestinians who are subject to the house arrests as well as the Israeli soldiers who had to carry them out, this documentary is the unique story of those who every 30 days in the year drop their normal lives and under the guise of the olive green uniform, perform the toughest, most unsettling tasks, in the heart of an urban Palestinian town. The camera penetrates the steely barriers of the military barracks and gains fresh insight into the views of the soldiers who speak frankly and uncompromisingly on a range of issues including the occupation, the conflict and the Army. A sensitive exploration of the conflict done first hand from an individual caught in the midst of the action, Berman’s film leaves us with no doubt that war leaves scars and victims on both sides of the camp.
7.52
Rating: 7.52/10 based on 21 votes cast.
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@tripster – Well said!
I see it as a Jewish test.
the palestinians and the jews should be nuked. That would solve the problem of this controversial geographic area. Its not like we need the natural resources that exist in Israel…Its useless to the world…Nuke it!
Please move to Israel then, it’s pointless nuking them if you’re not there.
humans are victims of their own psychological tendencies.
without religion there is only evil in the world…Religion prevailed and continues today because people know that the morals dictated by religion make the world a better place to live in. If the police had the power to reward kindness and purity with a divine afterlife, then we would be praying to them. But instead we fear their ability to bring harm to us, just in a different way then the devil causes harm to us.
@Simon
It’s ignorant people like you who are the real problem. Yes, of course watching this documentary should piss you off- I would hope everyone would sympathize with the Palestinian people who have their homes searched with impunity, who’ve been forced off their land, who have their houses bulldozed, who are often, but not always, jailed unjustly, among other crimes. I would also take up arms if someone occupied my land and invaded my home. You also have to weigh this with what’s not shown in this video, namely (1) Israelis are now established there and (2) palestinian violence is a tangible threat to Israelis. If they didn’t search houses and maintain a military presence, then Israeli citizens would also die. I’m not saying one way or another that one side is right, just that the situation is far, far more complex, ill defined and intricate than what this video shows and what little most loud mouth demagogues like you appreciate.
But that’s not what I really find repugnant about comments from people like you, halfway around the world who know nothing about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. You don’t think Palestinians are bad people at all? How do you know this, because you watched an hour and a half documentary? Jesus H christ. When will people stop making generalizations? The vast majority of Palestinians are good, decent people trying to make the best of an awful situation, people who want peace and their basic rights. And the same is true of most Israelis. And some- of both- are evil, violent opportunists who exploit the situation, or are just completely brain washed beyond all reason.
How the hell did a ridiculous comment like this get upvoted? I mean, do people just leave all their rationality at the door?? “I hate jews”, really? First off, being Jewish is not the same as being Israeli. Second, being Israeli is not the same as being the Israeli government. Third, being Jewish is more than a set of religious beliefs, it’s an ethnicity (or arguably a collection of related ethnicities) that has NOTHING to do with the decisions of the Israeli government. True, many Jewish people support Israel, as you’d, expect, but again this is itself a pretty sweeping generalization. Whatever your politics are, the ability to differentiate these things and to see the finer details, not to mention shades of gray, is a litmus test for your level of education.
Simon- I really hope you educate yourself before you make comments about hating entire heterogeneous groups of people and lionizing others because some hour film made you emotional. After all, it’s antisemitism like yours that fostered the establishment of Israel in the first place, and hence all that followed. YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY PART OF THE PROBLEM.
-A white atheist, because that apparently matters
please pay attention to what religion beliefs are doing to humans and we as human race without any religious beliefs would be living in peace and harmony.we should renounce all religious institutions and come togeather.world would be a better place and there will be no wars and that’s the future if we want to survive in this world.
kike kike
weasel like
scheming since
a hooknose tyke
counts his pennies
day and nigh
squeals if one gets
out of sight.
promotes a thousand
social ills
for which you’ll have
to foot the bills
eventually in love he falls
and weds a shrew
who swipes his balls
soon this pair of
whining scum
will beat their breasts
just like a drum and
lie about the ones they lost
in a myth called the
holocaust.
coarse and pushy
greedy and trite
beware the jewish parasite
WHat a travesty what these palestinians have been subject to. No wonder they have lost hope. Now they do booms. Bomb themselves and others. Nothing else to fight for.
Maybe all the jews should go back where it is they come from and leave the Palestiniens to themselves. And of course the argument will come up that the jews are persecuted where they come from. If a kid keeps getting kicked out of different schools are the schools at fault. I have no political or religious leanings. Seems to be common sense who is at fault here. But I am sure I am to be labelled anti Semitic now.
Kike Kike jewish Kike counts his pennies days and nigh, squeals if one gets out of sight beware the kike the jewish parasite!
raph, you have to watch it till the end. Maybe you will be surprised.
I couldn’t watch til the end. This is making me sick to my stomach.
Because, Georgy boy, this documentary is not about Syria.
You are welcome to talk about it in other places.
This thread is about Palestine and Israel.
I think Palestinians as jews used to live together until different forces empowered israelis to fight them and take the land that they were living in for thousands of years and do so brutally. I take most of the desperate violent acts for palestinians are a react to being so hopeless because they know Israel has gotten all kinds of support and they don’t, they are at their mercy.
Why doesn’t anyone say a word about the genocide in Syria?
A regime that kills tens of thousands of people = not a word is said.
Paleestinians have wagged war on Israel in the same way Black South Africans waged war on Aparteid. I believe it’s more accurate to say that Israel has waged war on the Palestinians from the day of it’s inception by first displacing them off their land then forcing them into ghettos. What the Palestinians are doing is more accurately described as an uprising, or as a resistance.
to a white guy in Canada with no religious affiliations from a white gal in Britain with none either, our days are numbered in the same way by the same miscreants in London, Paris, Rome, etc.
this film is embedded journalism and could not possibly have been made without high level permission. as such it tries to appear ‘sensitive’ to both sides ignoring the fact that it is only one side who are at fault on all counts yet continue to be the aggressors.
it was always the aim that the UN take over the terror-story and this ‘insightful’ expose’ may be a part of that process. what, even the israeli’s are fed up with the brutality?
You will NEVER see a documentary about palestinians on a terror strike or a Hamas mortar or rocket team setting up in Gaza to shoot at Israel. No, only the Jews will have the freedom to show what it is like to serve in the West Bank. This leaves Israel looking like the bully but it doesn’t show why it is necessary to conduct searches for people and weapons – because the people they are searching have waged war against the Jewish state from the day of it inception. No Israeli soldier wakes up thinking “today, I’d like to go humiliate some palestinians or blow open some steel doors.” Patrols of the West Bank are unfortunately necessary for the security of Israel so while a Jewish soldier has the freedom to film and air his military patrols the rest of the world condemns him without understanding that the people who live in those houses are responsible for blowing up a school bus full of children.
After watching this I hate Jews and Israel even more than before. How unjust for the Palestinian people. How is it fair that Israelis can walk around and search thru peoples houses with impunity. If someone kept doing that to me over and over I’d most likely start to take up arms and be like get the fuck out of my house and start shooting. I don’t think the Palestinians are bad people at all. I think they are just fed up with these jews fucking with them all the time. best of luck to Palestine.
from: A white boy in Canada with no religious affiliations!