“Journey to Gaza”, a lesson in Palestinian humanity captured by Piero Usberti’s camera

Presented at the 46th International Documentary Film Festival, Piero Usberti’s film accurately shows the life of Palestinians in Gaza stuck in an open-air prison.

“It is a lesson in humanity that the Palestinians give us because they are not into violence.“, says a spectator after the screening of the documentary Trip to Gaza at the Palestine Cinema Festival in the Jean Vigo cinema in Gennevilliers. Endowed with the Cnap special mention for French film 2024 at the last international documentary film festival, it captures images of Palestinian youth in 2018, during the death of Palestinian journalist Yasser Mortaja killed by an Israeli army bullet. He covered the “March of Return”, a civil protest movement launched on March 30, 2018 in the Gaza Strip to denounce the Israeli blockade and demand the “right of return” of Palestinian refugees. In theaters October 30, 2024.

In Trip to Gaza, we discover what motivated these demonstrations. Above all, we discover another face of Gaza, in terms of men and women. The point of view of director Piero Usberti is the strength of the film. His perspective is that of a young 25-year-old Italian director who discovered Gaza for three months, while shooting his film. His distance becomes an asset. Even if he denounces Israel’s violence against Palestinian civilians and the deprivations of rights they must endure, the reality shines through. The state of siege, poverty, lack of water and electricity, dehumanization, the exploitation of terrorism but also the weight of traditions mark the Gazans speaking in the film.

“The Palestinians forget nothing. The most precious thing is their memory.”, says Piero Uberti in Italian at the start of his documentary. His voice-over guides us for more than an hour into the daily life of Sara, 25, a humanitarian in an association, Mohanad, a Marx book buff, and Jumana, an aspiring lawyer. Piero Usberti highlights the paradoxically beautiful landscape of Gaza: the sandy lands, the sea, the sublime sunsets and above all the human warmth that emanates from it. It shows rarely filmed locations like the organic strawberry fields of Beit Lahiya along the Gaza-Israel border, near which Israelis drop missiles and poison crops with gas.

“Gaza means pride“, specifies Piero Uberti. The pride among Gazans is to laugh, to put into perspective the horrors that go through their daily lives. Laughing at the power cut which occurs in the middle of a conversation between Piero and Sara. L Gazans only have four hours of electricity per day. Beyond the embargo and poverty, the inhabitants of Gaza are attached to their land. However, fleeing is their only prospect for the future.

Mohamed tried to flee Gaza 13 times, without success. Impossible to leave the city. The Erez border crossing is the only crossing point allowing transit between Israel and the Gaza Strip. The army does not let any civilians pass. The other crossing point at Rafah, on the Egyptian border, rarely lets Gazans pass. You often have to wait at least six months and pay a high price. “3000 dollars“, according to Mohamed.

Friday is a day of rest. It was at this time that Gazans chose to demonstrate for the right of return of refugees and for the end of border control by the Israeli army. Israeli snipers shoot at demonstrators, journalists, ambulances. “How can you shoot at an unarmed crowd?, asks Piero Uberti. “Suffice it to say they are terrorists.”, the director himself replies. Piero Uberti went to meet those whom the Israeli government describes as terrorists with Sara, who accompanies him throughout his trip. She asks them if they are terrorists. “I don’t go to demonstrations with a weapon. I go there bare-handed. My motivation is internal, I was not paid by Hamas”says Ahmed, injured by a bullet from an Israeli soldier.

In his documentary, Piero Usberti compares Israeli colonization to that of the United States and Australia. Sbeih Sbeih, sociologist at the Institute for Research and Studies on the Arab and Muslim World present during the screening of the film, explains that the Israeli relationship of domination is a phenomenon imported from European colonization. “The Israeli army makes the Palestinian people wait, whether at checkpoints, in prison or by hovering drones. Confiscating time is an important element in a colonial order“, he explains. “There is a process of trivializing crimes. The Palestinian problem is a colonial problem. If we don’t define the problem this way, it’s impossible to find a solution.”adds the sociologist.

Piero Usberti completed editing his documentary on September 29, 2023, almost a week before the Hamas attack on October 7. He refused to change the editing of his documentary, feeling that he would never be able to complete it if he took that direction. “It would have made another film. I found it important to keep the resonances of what I had shot to understand the present. It was important to remember what happened with the return marches.”reveals the director present at the Palestine Cine Festival.

“It was a symbolic and peaceful attempt to escape from this prison that is Gaza. It was monstrously suppressed, there was no need to shoot people. In any case they would not have passed the barrier“. Since the events of October 7, 2023, the attacks in the Gaza Strip have been the deadliest since 2006, according to UNICEF.

The tenth edition of Palestine Cinema Festival 2024 in Ile-de-France and Paris runs until June 16.