Censored Voices

Oral histories of soldiers recorded by Israeli writer Amos Oz and other young kibbutzniks in the weeks immediately following the the Six Day War are brought to life in this revealing documentary. The Israeli army censored the 1967 audiotapes, allowing only a fragment of the conversations to be published until now. The tapes reveal the moment that Israel’s soldiers, in their own words, went from identifying with David to Goliath. As the soldiers divulge their feelings of newfound military might, filmmaker Mor Loushy deftly layers their testimony over archival footage of a young country at war. The camera focuses closely on the veterans, forcing an unwavering attention on their voices as they describe the fear of battle, the rush of victory, their identification with the refugees and the pain of losing comrades. The veterans’ wrinkled visages speak volumes, as does the footage of Moshe Dayan’s march into the Old City and the Palestinians carrying their worldly possessions on their backs. The veterans’ listening to what they said 50 years earlier affords a unique opportunity to relive the glory and the pain and to contemplate, with them, the cycle of war in Israel. It is the act of trying to remember¬ that gives this documentary its profound resonance. —Nancy K. Fishman Director Mor Loushy in person in San Francisco and Berkeley