Claus Mueller

One of the most important documentaries shown at the November 2017 edition of The Other Israel Film Festival held by the Manhattan JCC [Jewish Community Center] was Born in Deir Yassin by Neta Shoshani.  She introduces her production with text stating the essentials:

 April 1948: The Jewish state and army are soon to be established in Palestine. The underground paramilitary organizations – the liberal “Haganah” and the radical “Irgun” and “Lahi” are still in conflict over the identity of the new nation. “Irgun” and “Lahi” attack and conquer the Arab village of Deir Yassin near Jerusalem. Rumors of a massacre spread, causing a mass exodus of Arabs from all over the country. What happened in Deir Yassin is controversial to this day. Since 1951, on the streets of Deir Yassin, stands the “Kfar Shaul” government Mental Health Hospital.

Neta Shoshani’s documentary elucidates the 1948 massacre at Deir Yassin with archival material and numerous interviews with surviving senior members of the paramilitary organizations who participated or witnessed the killing.  Jewish authorities, including Haganah, the Chief Rabbinate, and David Ben-Gurion, had condemned the attack. The careful reconstruction of the event is accompanied by a parallel narration, the story of a Hanna Nissan who spent her life in the Yassin mental hospital built in 1951 on the ruins of Yassin. Her adult son Dror, who was born and raised in the hospital, and an East Jerusalem orphanage, visits Yassin and the hospital. He is filmed quoting from a copy of his mother’s file given to him by the hospital. It contained her medical records, letters and correspondence. None of the Jewish participants of the massacre disputed that it took place though accounts differed in detail such as the number of civilians from the village who were killed, the survivors, the motivation for the attack, and presence of armed Arab men among the villagers.  Lehi member Moshe Edelstein was horrified by the images of blown up women and children. According to Ami Isseroff, members of a Jerusalem youth group were ordered to bury remaining corpses because Irgun and Lahi members refused to complete the cleanup.  They were 17 years old and not prepared for the massacre. Yehoshua Zettler, Lehi Commander of Jerusalem, acknowledged that he ordered the destruction of Deir Yassin.   Uri Yankovski from the Haganah who took photos admitted that “they did a dirty job” but emphasized that “from a practical point of view Deir Yassin helped to reach our objectives”. The commander of the Irgun group, Ben Zion Cohen expressed pride in his role at Yassin “If there would have been more Deir Yassins not one Arab would be left in the land of Israel”.  The paramilitary combatants carrying out the attack apparently had no military training or information about Deir Yassin. Ben Zion Cohen reports initiating the attack after he was shot in the leg by a sniper. Combatants were ordered by Cohen to destroy everything, to blow up the houses one by one with the 28 bombs they had and throw grenades into the houses knowing that there were children and women inside. 

Dror’s mother pleads in a voice over with texts taken from her clinical files, that her son should not visit Yassin since it is an evil place and states that she named him Dror meaning freedom. She was diagnosed with signs of psychosis but no awareness of the illness. When the hospital staff advised her to have an abortion she refused, believing that having a child would balance her life. After her young son was taken from her, she escaped from the hospital and was found wandering the street medicated. Placed in a closed ward she was diagnosed as suffering from psychosis and amnesia.  A 1967 report about Dror notes the rich fantasy life of the six year old child, his requests to see his mother, and suggests that he be given up for adoption.  After some time in an East Jerusalem orphanage he became a member of a kibbutz and began exchanging letters with his mother. Grown up he succeeded in visiting her at the Kfar Shaud mental hospital. By that time his mother’s latest diagnosis stated that...” patient has paranoid hallucinations hearing voices warning her of murder…she is kept in isolation [and] attempts to heal her failed”. 

As ordered by Cohen, the Irgun went from house to house leaving no survivor behind though a girl about 6 years old was found alive by Uri Yankowski. Political leaders ordered that the massacre be covered up but also requested photos be taken. Meir Pa’il from the Haganah information service standing next to the photographer observed men, women and children lined up against a wall and shot. There was pressure to act because UN representatives were expected to show up. Meir did not see photos or ask questions assuming Zionists did not want them to be seen “If Jews commit a massacre it is an atrocity” Uri Yankovski never saw the pictures he took either but recalled clearly what he observed. Yehoshua Zettler reported that some survivors were trucked to Jerusalem. Those refusing to be moved were told that they would be shot.  It took two days to clean the site and get rid of the bodies.  30 half burnt corpses were stored in one room, a pile of burnt corpses was found at the entrance of the village. The cleanup crew included 17-year-old boys from the Haganah youth battalion. Sara Ben-Or from the youth group identified her post traumatic stress disorder as the consequence of being exposed as a young woman to the killed villagers and her discovery of a beheaded woman sitting on a chair. Most of the more than 100 victims were women, children and old men. When queried by Shoshani about the impact of their action which turned Arabs into refugees and the Israelis into occupiers, her respondents indicated that they were not aware of it but stressed that they failed to explain what happened.  

Her attempt to view the photos from the massacre failed because IDF argued that “[it] cannot release photos because it may be detrimental to foreign relations”. There is no remedy apart from a Supreme Court appeal.  When she again gets in touch with some former members of the para-military organizations involved in the Deir Yassin massacre who she had interviewed for the documentary they refuse to confirm their statements. All had received calls ordering them to be silent. This order was bizarre because their on the record statements were an important part of the documentary and there were apparently no attempts to prevent their use in the documentary. As her last remedy Shoshani filed a request with the Supreme Court to open the files. Her demand to release classified documents and photos of the 1948 massacre at Deir Yassin was denied in 2016 by three judges from Israel’s Supreme Court invoking the following reason:

The problems entailed is Israel’s foreign relations related to the events of 1948 have not been solved and the conflict has not ended yet. Therefore, we are convinced that publishing the documentation and photographs is liable to harm Israel’s foreign relations. We are particularly worried about the harsh visual effect. This effect is present in certain photos in the archive. Therefore, we find no grounds to intervene at this time.

Claus Mueller  filmexchange@gmail.com