By Yara Yaish

JERUSALEM, February 7, 2011 (WAFA) – A solidarity group with Palestinian actor in Israel, Mohammed Bakri, called Monday on the Israeli High Court to dismiss the “frivolous” suit against Bakri filed because of his movie/documentary Jenin, Jenin.

Bakri produced a film on the April 2002 Israeli army invasion of Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank which left dozens of Palestinians dead and hundreds of homes demolished.

The solidarity committee accused Israeli courts of being determined to attack and intimidate director and actor Mohammed Bakri for using his art to document the “crimes” of the Israel army.

His supporters declared that “whatever still remains in Israel of the right to freedom of thought, expression and artistic creativity must be saved.”

They considered the suit against Bakri “an attempt to silence all those who dare to reveal the truth about the Israeli occupation.”

In 2007, five Israeli soldiers, who were involved in the attack on Jenin refugee camp in 2002, sued Cinématique in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for screening the film while it was banned.

Cinématique then reached an agreement with the soldiers and paid 40,000 Israeli shekels (more than US$11,000) for compensation.

Bakri is currently being sued by the soldiers for 2.5 million shekels (US$700,000) for producing the film, on charges of slander and defamation of character. However, these soldiers were neither shown nor mentioned in the film, says the solidarity group.

Bakri commented on this prosecution as follows: “Nobody sued me when, in addition to movies about the victims of the Jewish Holocaust, I acted in movies on the Armenian genocide and the crimes against the Kurds. Why, then, am I being pursued because I made the film Jenin, Jenin about the attack of the Israeli army on the refugee camp in that city in spring 2002? I am a committed artist to the human rights issue regardless of color or national and ethnic affiliation.”

The northern West Bank city of Jenin remained sealed for days after the Israeli military invasion. The army raided the camp and sealed it off for 10 days using brutal force against the local population after more than a dozen Israeli soldiers were killed in an ambush in the camp.

United Nations reports and hospital figures said 52 Palestinians were killed while local people say the number was over 70 after many people were buried under the rubble of almost 700 homes totally demolished in the camp.

The army refused to allow journalists and human rights organizations into the camp for “safety reasons.”

Iyad Samoudi, Jenin, Jenin's executive producer, was killed at Yamoun, near Jenin, at the end of the filming by Israeli soldiers on 23 June 2002.

After only three showings, the Israeli Film Board and Israeli censorship banned the film for two years arguing that it was “a unilateral film that confuses and deludes the viewer that the Israeli army committed war crimes against the Palestinians.”

Bakri petitioned the Israeli High Court against the censorship for prohibiting the screening of the film saying it wants to hide the truth. After a long fight, the court rejected the censors’ decision and said that “no one monopolizes the truth.”

This political persecution comes after the escalation of racism against the Arabs and Palestinians as the Israeli government’s extremist right-wing coalition tries to intimidate Arab citizens.

Y.Y./F.J.