MU Doctor Hosts Film Justifying Suicide Bombers

Recently, I attended a film hosted by a doctor that justified Palestinian suicide bombers. Dr. Dima Dandachi is a medical doctor who works at the University of Missouri Hospital, as well as an assistant professor. Last week, Dr. Dandachi helped to host a documentary film called, “Where Olive Trees Weep.” The main character in the movie is a Palestinian journalist named Ashira Darwish. In the film, Ashira sits in front of a camera telling her whole life story from beginning to end. This interview is spliced with pictures of the conflict. Ashira explains her process of becoming a journalist, as well as her goal of trying to understand the minds of the Israelis. Her conclusion is that the Israelis have the same psychology as Hitler.

The film was shown at a little movie theater located down the street from campus and was co-hosted by “Students for Justice in Palestine.” The film begins with Ashira staring into a camera. Ashira has light brown penetrating eyes and speaks with the calm voice of a therapist. Unlike many Palestinian women, she has tattoos showing on her forearms. Although she looks fairly healthy, and it is difficult to see any scars on her body, it is impossible to keep up with how many times she alleges that she was beaten, shot, tortured, and lynched by the Israeli army. Towards the end, she sings and dances methodically in circles.

In the film, Ashira recalls how she grew up and decided to become a journalist. At a certain point, Ashira reports that she was actually able to make news stories about the Israelis. The documentary shows clips of her as a young journalist interviewing Israelis walking on the streets. Ashira goes on to recount how once she started to meet Israeli people she wanted to understand their perspective. She inquires, “I wanted to experience things through their eyes.” More specifically, she wanted to try to understand how the Israelis are capable of being so insensitive. The advertisement for the film displays Ashira’s investigation: “This emotional journey bares the humanity of the oppressed while grappling with the question: what makes the oppressor so ruthlessly blind to its own cruelty?”

Ashira wrestles with the question: “how you can ease the pain of this one and ease the pain of that one and stop the instrument, the big destructive machine, which is causing all this pain to both.” She studies all of the worst crimes committed in human history to try to find the key to understanding what makes the Israelis capable of being so evil. She outlines her journey: “For me, from my childhood, I was very much influenced and I was obsessed with the Holocaust, with Apartheid South Africa, the African-American and the Native struggle, and for me it was the curiosity of, how could someone get to that point?” Finally, after extensively researching the history of human evil, Ashira finds the answer: The Holocaust.

Ashira discovers that since the Jewish people were the victims of the Holocaust they have become scared of everyone. The Jewish people are traumatized and so they are carrying out another Holocaust against the Palestinians. She proclaims, “and now it’s happening again” to the Palestinians. Ashira grieves with the sensitivity of a mother, “And when you understand the Holocaust it gets so much even worse. It gets so aggravating in your cells, to understand that somebody could go through what they’ve gone through, and come back and perpetrate it again. You know, it’s infuriating, because I do understand trauma. I understand that it’s a cycle, and that it starts there.”

Even worse, the Jewish people experienced so much evil that it got inside their guts. Her conclusion is that the Israelis have internalized the same psychology as Hilter. The Jewish people “perpetrate the same cycle of hate and violence over and over. Whether it be incarnated in this body as Israelis, or incarnated as Hitler at his time and the Nazis.” Since the Israelis have the same hatred lingering inside of their hearts as Hitler, they are perpetrating a second Holocaust against the Palestinians. Ashira remorsefully continues by explaining that any group of people experiencing a Holocaust will naturally have to resist. Although the Palestinians have never had a single thought to commit a single act of violence, they are unwillingly forced to become resistance fighters against the Israeli attempt to murder all of them like rats. Ashira exclaims, “We’re so dehumanized by this instrument and machine, to the point where they can come and they can exterminate you, because to them, you’re nothing but a rat. You’re nothing but something that can be killed, you’re not a human. And that’s what creates a Holocaust.”

Ashria clarifies an important misunderstanding for us, “So the use of the words ‘resistance fighter’ versus the use of ‘terrorist,’ makes a very big difference on our nervous system, and how we accept it.” She wants us to know that the Israelis have forced the Palestinians to use violence against their gentle nature, “People see the Palestinian violence, they don’t see the Israeli violence. They don’t see that: the Israeli violence is the root cause.” Likewise, she explains that the Palestinians are not to blame when they are driven to become suicide bombers.

Finally, Ashira makes an obvious reference to Palestinian suicide bombers and laments that Israel is responsible for creating them. Ashira asks: “If you get a person to want to kill themselves, there’s a reason why this person wants to kill themselves, in the most atrocious, painful way. There’s a reason behind it. You must have killed, maimed, pained them, their families, to get them to get to that point. So don’t ask me why they want to get to that point, where they would use so much hate and anger and release it in that way. Ask me where the pain came from, and I’ll tell you why people act. Don’t ask the person who’s in the cage, why they’re hitting the cage and breaking their arms, trying to be free.”

It should be understood, the presentation of the justification for suicide bombers is a not a theoretical question. The film shows multiple interviews with a young Palestinian woman named Ahed Tamimi. As a teenager, she became famous when she slapped an Israeli soldier. That being said, a member of Ahed’s family is also famous for helping a suicide bomber. Ahed’s father is a cousin of Ahlam Tamimi, who helped carry out one of the largest suicide bombings in Israel. Ahlam Tamimi helped plan an attack at a Sbarro Pizza restaurant in Jerusalem. She disguised herself as a tourist in order to escort the suicide bomber to the location. The blast killed sixteen people, including seven children and a pregnant woman. All of this means that even the people featured in the film are family members with people who have planned suicide bombings.

After the film ended, I waited in the hallway. I politely asked Dr. Dandachi, “What do you think about the part in the film where Ashira justifies Palestinian suicide bombers?”

Dr. Dandachi responded, “I have no comment. I don’t want to spoil the mood.” Afterwards, she walked away and went out the door.