Oct. 7, 2023, is not the day the Israeli-Palestinian conflict began — it was rather the spark that further ignited long-existing tensions. That conflict has led not only to violence in the region, but spikes in both anti-Muslim and antisemetic action on a global scale. And in a world of algorithms, where complex topics are packaged in overly simplistic TikToks and bites of media, many people are misinterpreting and oversimplifying the issue as Judaism versus Islam. The reality is far more complex. The new film The Voice of Hind Rajab isn’t attempting to present and explain the conflict as a whole. It focuses instead on a singular and brutal true story — the Red Crescent’s efforts to save civilian lives during Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
Jan. 29, 2024, at the Palestine Red Crescent Society in Ramallah in the West Bank: Volunteers are working nonstop, taking emergency calls from throughout Gaza. They receive a call about a car taking gunfire, and the only survivor is 5-year-old Hind Rajab. Trapped in an active combat zone and under fire from the Israel Defense Forces, the Red Crescent fights bureaucracy and races the clock to arrange for an ambulance to the girl’s location. The phone call featured in the film is the unedited recording from the real-world event.
Director Kaouther Ben Hania has a unique talent for blending the cinematic and the real. The pacing of the film’s editing and her cast’s performances make for a hypnotic thriller, while the use of Red Crescent call logs and social media posts cuts through the veil of cinematic immersion and grounds the film in real emotion. Unlike Jonathan Glazer’s 2023 film The Zone of Interest, in which Glazer (an executive producer on Hind Rajab) opted to shoot his film like an observational documentary, Hania styles her film like a cinematic drama — but uses actual recordings from the incident to bring the audience into these real-world moments. The result is 89 straight minutes of stress and frustration — you will feel as though you are in the room with the Red Crescent as helplessness bleeds off the screen into the audience.
The Oscar-nominated documentary opens this week at the Belcourt
The ongoing conflict in Gaza is a subject that many are scared to touch, and films of this nature are therefore often overlooked by major film distributors for the U.S. Last year, the documentary No Other Land was overlooked by distribution companies, and its filmmakers were forced to self-distribute in a very limited run despite the film being highly awarded on the festival circuit — it even won Best Documentary at last year’s Oscars. Similarly, Hind Rajab was passed over by most major distributors, eventually being acquired by independent company Willa, which is distributing the film — a nominee for International Feature Film at next month’s Oscars — throughout the U.S. When the studios refuse to touch certain subject matter, that effectively silences a voice. This voice is simple and direct — it speaks of an ongoing humanitarian crisis. The Voice of Hind Rajab doesn’t attempt to dig into the decades of conflict and extremist violence. It stays at the human level — the difficulty of saving this little girl’s life.
The Voice of Hind Rajab will stick with you. And so will the voice of Hind Rajab itself, which will continue to ring in your ears. Hania’s powerful docu-fiction cuts through the political noise and focuses on the crucial real-world challenges that first responders face every day as they attempt to bring aid to civilians — and especially children.
