Short before Emwas: Restoring Memories
Night
Ahmad Saleh | Germany, Qatar, Palestine, Jordan | 2021 | 16’ | Arabic spoken | English subs
The dust of war keeps the eyes sleepless. Night brings peace and sleep to all the people in this broken town. Only the eyes of the mother of the missing child stay resilient. Night has to trick her into sleeping to save her soul.
Emwas: Restoring Memories
The Palestinian inhabitants of Emwas were forced to leave their hometown on the second day of the 1967 war, when Dima was only two years old. She has heard stories of her birthplace for years, but only knew of it as a ruined village that was razed by the Israeli army. No construction remained except for the Nicopolis Church, the Latrun Monastery, and some ravaged areas. The Israeli government built a public park called “Canada Park” over the demolished town as an acknowledgement of the Canadian Jewish National Fund that donated money to plant trees there. In 2009, with the help of family and friends, Dima decided to build a scale model of her hometown Emwas, as it appeared before its destruction.
This film succeeded to bring the demolished village to life through the memories of its people, and raises questions about the future of Emwas and its original inhabitants, who still long to return to it.
