The San Francisco Jewish Film Festival did not become the pre-eminent forum for Jewish film by playing it safe. Throughout its 29-year history, the festival has courted controversy by including provocative films, especially when it comes to the subject of the Middle East.
So when festival programmers added “Rachel” to this year’s lineup, no one should have been surprised.
The documentary explores incidents surrounding the death of Rachel Corrie, a young American activist aligned with the International Solidarity Movement, a viciously anti-Israel organization that calls for the destruction of the Jewish state. Corrie was killed in Gaza in 2003 during an aggressive protest in which ISM members stood in front of Israeli bulldozers involved in home demolitions.
While director Simone Bitton, who was born in Morocco to a Jewish family and is both a French and Israeli citizen, claims to present a balanced view in “Rachel,” the film gives a sympathetic portrait of the late activist and her anti-Israel cause.
That, however, should not preclude the festival from showing “Rachel.”
What we disagree with is the festival organizers’ decision to invite Corrie’s mother, Cindy Corrie, to attend the July 25 screening and participate in a post-screening Q&A. It would have been better to have Bitton on hand to respond to viewers’ questions and ire, but she turned down an invitation, citing a schedule conflict, organizers said.
So were are left with Corrie’s participation, which, as our letters section last week and this week suggests, has sparked outrage among some of our readers. There is good reason.
Cindy Corrie is the founder of the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice, a pro-Palestinian organization that promotes the anti-Israel views of her daughter. Can there be any doubt that Corrie will use her festival appearance as a soapbox to present those same views?
It is one thing to present controversial films from across the political spectrum. And it is one thing for directors to attend and defend their work. But it is quite another to invite someone such as Cindy Corrie.
As a grieving mother, Cindy Corrie has our sympathies. No parent should ever have to bury a child. But as an echo chamber of her daughter’s repulsive opinions, this woman has no business attending and speaking at a Jewish event like the film festival.
We are all for free speech. We are all for scheduling controversial films. But Cindy Corrie’s appearance crosses a line. The Jewish Film Festival is under no obligation to offer a microphone to Israel-bashers.
The SFJFF has a history of promoting anti-Israel films. I stopped attending them years ago.
Euphemism is how polite middle class people like the J. Staff lie to you to your face.
The J. Staff says the SFJFF “courts controversy”. That is their euphemism for “insults and outrages Jews to our faces, using own own philanthropic money to do it”.
The J. Staff calls the SFJFF films “provocative”. If they were not polite middle class people lying to us to our faces, they would have said, “anti-semitic, anti-israel propaganda” films. Does anyone doubt that if Rachel Corrie’s ISM were to put on a Nazi film festival that the J. Staff would describe that as “provocative” as well?
The J. Staff even comes out from behind its cloud of concealing euphemism-ink to tell us just how morally and intellectually bankrupt they are, just for a moment, they drop the fig leaf of polite euphemism and deniability. “the film gives a sympathetic portrait of the late activist and her anti-Israel cause.
That, however, should not preclude the festival from showing “Rachel.”
Really? The SFJFF should spend Jewish philanthropic Jewish money and institutional effort to put on what even the giant intellects at the J. Staff recognize as anti-israel propaganda? I suppose that is because the comfortable, safe, polite middle class folks at the J. have pooled their giant intellects and concluded that there is not quite enough anti-Israel propaganda in the world. The J. Staff giant intellects apparently concluded that the deficit should be made up using JCRC-raised dollars (SFJFF’s funder) to spread yet more anti-Israel propaganda.
Please explain that to us, J. Staff. We heathen outside your enlightened giant intellect circles somehow cannot figure out why a film that even you recognize as anti-Israel propaganda, should not be precluded from a Jewish film festival. Please explain and we will do our best to unpack your euphemisms and squid-ink polite middle class prose.
It may be that the current generation of giant intellects at the J. have forgotten or never knew about the fates of former directors of the SFJFF Janis Plotkin and Deborah Kaufmann. Fifteen years ago donors to the JCRC grew tired of being insulted with their own money and pressured the JCRC to do something about it.
In J. Staff-speak, Plotkin and Kaufmann were given the opportunity to seek other fields of endeavor. In English, they were canned. Neither has had a regular job since.
Maybe it is time for the JCRC to recall its past actions and give the current SFJFF directors the