‘Vile’ Hamas film hits the theaters, portrays Israelis as child killers

The movie about Israel’s Operation Guardian of the Walls is full of inaccuracies and omissions of inconvenient truths about Palestinian terrorism.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

A Hamas propaganda film is currently playing in a dozen British theaters under the guise of being a documentary of Israel’s Operation Guardian of the Walls, say bloggers who have seen the movie.

“Eleven Days in May” consists of interviews with the families of 28 children out of 66 who were killed in the Gaza Strip when Hamas began launching rockets at Jerusalem on May 10 and the IDF retaliated with airstrikes.

The directors decided that to bring home the cruelty of war, they would show pictures of many of the children’s bodies after their deaths. This decision gave the movie a “18” rating so that no one younger could legally see it in the theater.

No historical context of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is provided for the viewers. Israel is blamed for starting the mini-war. Nothing is said about Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad firing over 4,000 rockets indiscriminately at Israel over the 11 days of fighting, killing more than a dozen civilians, including two children, and injuring some 200.

Israel is deceitfully portrayed as aiming for the children. Actress Kate Winslett, who narrated the movie, says at one point, “A plane fired a missile at” two youngsters, killing them.

The movie does not mention that many of the children were killed while Israel was focusing on legitimate military targets, such as terror tunnels or senior Hamas operatives. Hamas’ military positions were located within the civilian population, used as “human shields.”

Some useful context to provide would have been that the IDF has an extremely low ratio of inadvertent civilian deaths to combatants killed. In fact, the IDF uses a variety of means to warn civilians in the vicinity of a planned strike to flee ahead of time.

The supposed documentary also lies outright.

Four children in a single family were killed by terrorist rockets that were aimed at Israel but fell short. At least two teens were not innocent bystanders, as according to documentation by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, they were members of terrorist organizations in the Strip.

British reviewers in The Guardian gave it three stars, with Catherine Shoard calling it “spare, respectful and overwhelming.” Like the movie, her interview with the directors did not put the events described in any context other than the ugliness and tragedy of war, a sentiment that all Israelis would agree with and that its leaders constantly articulate.

“Thanks to invaluable Open Source research by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, there is substantial material to fill in the gaps left by the film,” notes Jonathan Hoffman, former vice chair of the Zionist Federation and a former elected member of the Defence Division of the Board of Deputies of British Jews.

“It is a terrorist propaganda film which incites hatred against Israel and its supporters. It is mendacious, completely devoid of context and emotionally manipulative and exploitative,” Hoffman stated.

“No doubt of course that the film will be made available to University Palestine Societies free or at nominal cost and that many under-18s will see it. And that Vice Chancellors will turn a blind eye to objections that it incites hatred.”

Hoffman also pointed out that the UNICEF logo is in the closing credits.  “Did UNICEF fund the film? If so there are serious questions to be asked in Parliament,” he said.

Israellycool blogger David Lange noted that another way to know that the film is a “vile, anti-Israel hate-fest” is that famous pro-BDS performer Roger Waters tweeted to all his followers, “It breaks your heart. See it.”